Minerals and Mines. 33 



Briefly, though we have touched on the salient features in 

 the history of English coal-mining, we have no doubt already 

 attracted the attention of the reader to the characteristic 

 which separates the proprietorship of this mineral from that 

 of any other ; viz., the absence of all popular rights connected 

 therewith. Landlord may dispute his mineral rights with 

 landlord, and the State may restrict the working of mines as 

 well as curtail the profits of the proprietor ; but there are no 

 time-immemorial customs requiring the interposition of popular 

 barmote, stannary, and other technical courts. The mining 

 of coal commenced at a later period than that of lead and tin, 

 when the manorial economy was fully established, and when 

 everything belonged to the lord of the manor that could not be 

 proved by ancient custom to belong to the people. Then, too, 

 coal happened to be in the more level ground of the plain, 

 where the Celtic element had long given way to the Teutonic. 

 The Anglo-Saxon and the Norman pioneers of English and 

 Scotch mining had lost touch with the patriarchal polity, 

 when their excavations first brought to light those " black 

 stones " which have contributed so much to England's com- 

 mercial wealth. 



Before concluding our examination of early English mining, 

 let us glance briefly at the state of perfection to which it had 

 been brought at the period now reached in this history. 



An ancient writer,^ in comparing the climate of Northumber- 

 land with that of Middlesex, attributes the less searching effects 

 of wet weather in the former county to "continual warm 

 breaths which come out of its numberless colepits," which with 

 the sea vapours "help to take off the rawness of a cold dampish 

 air." AVithout stopping to question his theory, we may con- 

 clude that coal-mining was almost as widely developed then as 

 now. " The greatest riches of this County," he goes on to say, 

 "lie in the Bowels of the Earth, full of Coal Mines, which supply 

 with Coals not only this Country (where the Fewel is always 

 bought at verj^ easy rates) but a good part of England besides, 

 and London particularly, for whose use many hundred sail of 

 ships have yearly from thence their loading." 



' Thd Xew State of England, by G. M., 1691. 

 n. D 



