[ 3* 1 



teen. In thickness variable, from ten inches to upwards of three 

 feet. If less than fifteen inches they are seldom worked. Coal is 

 now working generally from seventy to eighty fathom in depth. 

 In a few places deeper ; and by a late introduction of machinery to 

 raise it by the steam engine, a much greater depth of working, will 

 be obtained. Profits of working in the aggregate, by no means 

 equal to the extent and risque of the adventure ; to a few works 

 considerable ; to the majority very moderate. 



The coal is of prime quality ; pure and durable in burning ; firm, 

 large, and of a strong grain ; which ensures its conveyance to al- 

 most any distance, without injury to its appearance, or quality ; 

 which cannot be exceeded in any part of the kingdom. Bath is the 

 principal market of consumption, to which may be added the wes- 

 tern parts of Wiltshire, and the next adjicent parts of Somerset- 

 shire. The quantity now raised is from fifteen hundred to two 

 thousand ton weekly. A much greater can be supplied mould an 

 increased demand require it. Boys and men to the number of fif- 

 teen hundred are employed in working it, with wages sufficiently 

 adequate to procure them a comfortable subsistence. 



An application is intended to be made to parliament at the en- 

 suing session, for leave to cut two branches of a canal for the ac- 

 commodation of the collieries in this northern district, to commu- 

 nicate with the rivers Avon and Kennet.. Should the bill pass, a 

 considerable extension of sale may be reasonably inferred. The 

 permanence of the works is amply secured by various contrivances, 

 in preventing the admission of the springs into the deep working. 



The number of wurks, twenty-six. The owners of the freehold> 

 from whence the coal is raised, generally receive an eighth of the 

 gross receipt of sale ; but, to encourage the proprietors to greater 

 depths of working, have occasionally complied with a proportion- 

 able reduction of this quota, on account of the increase of expences 

 in working ; whereby they have derived a profit from coal which, 

 otherwise would have been irrecoverably lost. Some through ig- 

 norance and stubbornness have withheld this concession, and thereby 

 incurred the loss.. 



Average price of coal five-pence per bushel at the pits. 

 The southern district is on a more limited scale of working. 

 The strata of coal form an inclination of the plane from eighteen 



E z te. 



