208 SCIENCE IN SHORT CHAPTERS. 



elaborated industrial products at a cheaper rate than at 

 present, by obtaining them in exchange for their super- 

 abundant raw material from 'those European countries 

 where population is overflowing the raw material supplies. 



When this time arrives, and it may come with the cha- 

 racteristic suddenness of American changes, the question of 

 American versus English coal in the English markets will 

 reduce itself to one of horizontal versus vertical difficulties. 

 If at some future period the average depth of the Newcastle 

 coal-pits becomes 3000 feet greater than those of the pits 

 near the coast of the Atlantic or American lakes, and if the 

 horizontal difficulties of 3000 miles of distance are less 

 than the vertical difficulties of 3000 feet of depth, then 

 coals will be carried from America to Newcastle. They 

 will reach London and the towns on the South Coast 

 before this, that is, when the vertical difficulties at New- 

 castle plus those of horizontal traction from Newcastle to 

 the south, exceed those of eastward traction across the 

 Atlantic. 



As the cost of carriage increases in a far smaller ratio 

 than the open ocean distance, there is good reason for con- 

 cluding that the day when London houses will be warmed 

 by American coal is not very far distant. We, in England, 

 who have outgrown the pernicious folly of "protecting 

 native industry,' will heartily welcome so desirable a con- 

 summation. It will render unnecessary any further inquiry 

 into the existence of London "coal rings" or combinations 

 for restricted output among colliers or their employers. If 

 any morbid impediments to the free action of the coal trade 

 do exist, the stimulating and purgative influence of foreign 

 competition will rapidly restore the trade to a healthy 

 condition. 



The effect of such introduction of American coal will 

 not be to perpetually lock up our deep coal nor even to stop 

 our gradual progress towards it. We shall merely proceed 

 downwards at a much slower rate, for in America, as with 

 ourselves, the easily accessible coal will be first worked, 

 and as that becomes exhausted, the deeper, more remote, 

 thinner, and inferior will only remain to be worked at con- 

 tinually increasing cost. When both our own and foreign 



