PEAT AND TURF 527 



in the usual way, under a covered shed ; in drying, they lose in their bulk, but they 

 are in a fortnight converted into a good hard fine-grained fuel, and when roasted with 

 charcoal, are about one-third their original size. The producers of the Danchelle peat- 

 fuel also convert the peat into sewage filters by incorporating the peat with a mixture 

 of clay and charring them. Experiments have been made, and are continued with 

 these filters, in Bradford, Yorkshire, and in Paris, and the results are stated to be very 

 satisfactory. Peat-fuels are prepared in Sutherland by charring the peat, which has 

 been broken up by a machine, so as to leave it in a rough granular state, and afterwards 

 worked up with crude shale-tar, and pressed into bricks by a moulding machine. The 

 quantity of shale-tar taken up by the vegetable peat is very considerable, and gives it 

 a thoroughly carbonised appearance. 



The Peat Fuel and Charcoal Company, by similar manipulation and drying, obtain a 

 remarkable degree of density, and produce samples which are close-grained, hard, and 

 look like mahogany. 



Mr. Joshua Kidd has succeeded in obtaining an excellent charcoal from peat, which 

 answers admirably as a fuel, and as a deodoriser. It is also used as a filtering me- 

 dium for foul water and sewage. 



In France, peat-charcoal under the name of Charbon roux, is much used for making 

 gunpowder. The Duke of Sutherland has made extensive experiments on the produc- 

 tion of peat-charcoal. Thirty tons of this charcoal are produced weekly on the Duke's 

 estates, costing III. 10s. 9d. 



Eichorne's process for condensing peat, produces balls of a hard, clean, and conve- 

 nient size, burning with a bright flame, and gives an excellent heat. Their calorific 

 ralue is said to be, when compared with coal, as coal, TOO, ball-peat, T37. 



Mr. Eobert Kerretitchison breaks up his peat with a machine, by means of which it 

 parts with a great deal of its water. It is then manufactured in a masticator, and 

 finely-broken asphalt is mixed with the mass. It is then shaped into briquettes, and 

 dried under sheds. Its specific weight is less than most other peats, the addition of 

 asphalt adds to its cost, but gives it greater value for furnaces and for raising steam. 



There are several other patentees of processes for preparing peat, which differ from 

 those already named only in some minor details, the final result being in all of them 

 nearly similar. 



Dutch peat is simply cut from the fens into bricks and dried in the air. They sell, 

 where cut, at 12s. lOd. a ton, and in the towns at 18s. or 19s. 



Korte turf is obtained by dredging in low lying water-covered bogs. It is dredged, 

 well-trodden, and then cut into short bricks and dried. It is sold largely to hotels 

 and the better class houses in Holland ; at the peat bogs it is 14s. Id. per ton, in the 

 towns, 18s. lid. Derril turf is found under the sand driven on the coast of Holland ; 

 it is very compact, but not much used. 



Many of the particulars above given are obtained from a Lecture on Peat given by 

 Mr. J. Plant, on the samples of that fuel exhibited in the Peel Park Exhibition, Man- 

 chester 1874, before the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society. 



Mr. O'Hara, in the ' Dublin Quarterly Journal of Science,' estimates the peat bogs 

 of Ireland at 1,576,000 acres, occupying the limestone plains, and 1,255,000 acres, on 

 the hills and mountains, making a total of 2,831,000 acres. Mr. Plant estimates the 

 extent of peat in Great Britain at 3,500,000 acres, therefore the total in the British 

 Isles will be about 6,000,000 acres ; consequently, if 12 feet is assumed as the average 

 thickness, each acre will yield 12,000 tons of peat, on the whole at least 72,000.000,000 

 tons of valuable fuel. 



The following account of the peat-industry in Germany is extracted from the ' Allge- 

 meine Deutsche Polytechnische Zeitung,' which gives a good account of what is doing 

 in the matter abroad : 



' Herr Busch, a landed proprietor in Gross-Massow, near Lauenburg, appears to be 

 carrying on the peat-industry on his own estate, and communicates to our contem- 

 porary that he was delegated by the " Lauenburg Branch " of the " Pomeranian Agri- 

 cultural Society " to examine and report upon a new peat-press constructed by Stuetzke 

 Bros., jun., Lauenburg, which commanded at the time considerable attention. After 

 having seen the machine in operation, he was so well satisfied with its capabilities that 

 he recommended to his branch society the purchase of one. He reports the machine to 

 be exceedingly simple in construction, capable of working up all manners of peat, 

 requiring little power and almost juvenile attendance. The price of the same, although 

 not definitely mentioned, seems to be somewhere between 20/. and 251. The following 

 description is given : 



' The peat-press consists of a wooden tub, about 6ft. high, and 2ft. wide, chained 

 upon a kind of sledge. The wooden vessel contains an upright shaft which may be 

 set in motion by means of a horse-gear. This shaft carries on the bottom an iron 

 disc, above it two revolutions or turns of screw-blades, and above these four similar 



