LITHIA 129 



in Cornwall, having about as high a temperature as that of the Bath waters, and of 

 which, strange to say, no account has yet been published. It seems that, in the year 

 1830, a level was driven from an old shaft, so as to intersect a rich copper lode at a 

 depth of 1,350 feet from the surface. This lode or metalliferous fissure occurred in 

 what was formerly called the United Mines, and which have since been named the 

 Clifford Amalgamated Mines. Through the contents of the lode a powerful spring 

 of hot water was observed to rise, which has continued to flow with undiminished 

 strength ever since. At my request Mr. Horton Davey, of Eedruth, had the kindness 

 to seilxl up to London many gallons of this water, which have been analysed by Pro- 

 fessor "William Allen Miller, F.K.S., who finds that the quantity of solid matter is so 

 great as to exceed by more than four times the proportion of that yielded by the Bath 

 waters. Its composition is also in many respects very different ; for it contains but 

 little sulphate of lime, and is almost free from the salts of magnesium. It is rich in 

 the chlorides of calcium and sodium, and it contains one of the new metals, Ctesium, 

 never before detected in any mineral spring in England ; but its peculiar charac- 

 teristic is the extraordinary abundance of lithium, of which a mero trace had been 

 found by Professor Eoscoe in the Bath waters ; whereas, in this Cornish hot spring, 

 this metal constitutes no less than a twenty-sixth part of the whole of the solid 

 contents, which, as before stated, are so voluminous. When Professor Miller exposed 

 some of these contents to the test of spectrum analysis, he gave me an opportunity of 

 seeing the beautiful bright crimson line which the lithium produces in the spectrum. 

 'Lithium was first nfeide known in 1817 by Arfveclsen, who extracted it from 

 petalite ; and it was believed to be extremely rare, until Bunsen and Kirchhoff, in 

 1860, by means of the spectrum analysis, showed that it was a most widely-diffused 

 substance, existing in minute quantities in almost all mineral waters and in the sea, 

 as well as in milk, human blood, and the ashes of some plants. It has already been 

 used in medicine, and we may therefore hope that now that it is obtainable in large 

 quantities, and at a much cheaper rate than before the Huel Clifford hot spring was 

 analysed, it may become of high value. According to a rough estimate, which has 

 been sent to me by Mr. Davey, the Huel Clifford spring yields no less thon 250 gallons 

 per minute, which is almost equal to the discharge of the King's Bath, or chief spring 

 of this city. As to the gases emitted, they are the same as those of the Bath water, 

 namely, carbonic acid, oxygen, and nitrogen.' 



Mr. Warington Smyth, who had already visited the Huel Clifford lode in 1855, 

 re-examined it shortly before this meeting, chiefly with the view of replying to several 

 queries which Sir Charles Lyell put to him ; and, in spite of the stifling heat, ascer- 

 tained the geological structure of the lode, and the exact temperature of the water. 

 This last lie found to be 122 Fahr. at the depth of 1,350 feet ; but he scarcely doubts 

 that the thermometer would stand two or three degrees higher at a distance of 200 

 feet to the eastward, where the water is known tu gush up more freely. The Huel 

 Clifford lode is a fissure varying in width from 6 to 12 feet, one wall consisting of 

 elvan or porphyritic granite, and the other of killas or clay-slate. Along the line of 

 the rent, which runs east and west, there has been a slight throw or shift of the 

 rocks. The vein-stuff is chiefly formed of cellular pyrites of copper and iron, the 

 porous nature of which allows the hot water to percolate freely through it. It seems, 

 however, that in the continuation upwards of the same fissure, little or no metal- 

 liferous ore was deposited, but, in its place, quartz and other impermeable substances, 

 which obstructed the course of the hot spring so as to prevent its flowing out on the 

 surface of the country. 



Huel Clifford Amalgamated Mine, having ceased to pay the adventurers, was 

 stopped working in 1872. It is now (1874) full of water, and in all probability it 

 will never again be opened. 



A similar hot spring has been discovered in Huel Seton Mine near Camborne, 

 Cornwall. The waters issue, at the rate of 50 gallons per minute, from the eastern 

 fore-breast of the 160-fathom level, at a temperature of 92 Fahr._ This water has 

 been analysed with the greatest care by Mr. John Arthur Phillips, and found to 

 contain a larger quantity of lithium than the Huel Clifford spring. Mr. J. A. 

 Phillips communicated the results of his examination to the Koyal Society; from 

 which communication the following analysis is extracted : 



Grains per gallon 



Calcium carbonate ,.,... 7'03 

 Ferrous carbonate . . . . . 0'33 

 Manganous carbonate . trace 



Calcium sulphate 2'11 



Cupric chloride minute trace 



Calcicun chloride 475'54 



Carried forward .... 4 85'06 

 VOL. III. K 



