INDUSTRIES 



the stones had been broken to convenient size, 

 they were carried to a stamping-mill, whose 

 mechanism by this time had become so improved 

 that it would work for a couple of hours without 

 attention, 1 one John Tomes, when a boy thirty 

 years before, having patented an invention by 

 means of which, when there was not enough ore 

 in the coffer, the water was turned off, whereas 

 before this a bell had been used which only 

 gave warning when the coffer was empty, by 

 which time the mill was often broken. 2 One 

 wheel cou!4 now work the stamps in three or 

 four coffers. Leaving the stamp heads, the ore 

 was subjected to a series of operations, the object 

 of which was to grade and concentrate it by 

 application of running water. From the stamps 

 it was washed through a grate into a ' launder,' 

 or shallow trench, where it was divided into 

 < forehead,' ' middle,' and ' tails,' according to its 

 specific gravity. After having been ' trambled ' 

 or buddled, it was ' sezed,' ' dilleughed,' crazed 

 or ' framed,' as required. 



The buddle is described as a long square tye 

 of boards or slate about I foot deep, 6 feet long, 

 and 3 feet broad, wherein stood a man barefooted, 

 who, with a ' trambling shovel,' cast up ore 

 upon the buddle head as high as his middle. 8 

 The stuff was worked both vqith the shovel and 

 with the feet, and, as the buddle was traversed 

 by a gentle flow of water, the effect of the 

 operation was to separate the ore into several 

 qualities, the heaviest remaining at the head, and 

 the lightest being deposited at the foot.* There 

 also were ' drawing buddies ' for ' retrambling,' 

 which had no tye, but a plain, sloping board. 4 

 Sezing consisted in the use of a hair sieve, in- 

 stead of the drawing-buddle, to grade the tin. 4 

 Dilleughing was performed by putting the 

 'forehead' of the doubly-trambled tin into a 

 canvas sieve, and shaking it in a large tub of 

 water. The tails from the buddle were thrown 

 into strakes, or tyes, of which there were com- 

 monly three or four in succession, where the 

 'slimes,' or finer ores, were separated from the 

 coarser ' roughs.' 4 The latter were crazed and 

 retrambled, 6 the former were framed, 6 the frame 

 being a rack 6 feet long by 3^ feet broad, sus- 

 pended on two pivots like a cradle. 



In this account we find mention, for the first 

 time, of the process known as calcining, to burn 

 away the impurities of the ore. It was done in 

 a square kiln, heated by furze, 6 the ore being 

 spread over a flat granite slab, placed above the 

 furnace, over which the flame played. Having 

 been stirred on the slab with a rake, r the 

 ore was finally pushed into the fire, the fire- 



1 ' Mineral Observations on the Mines of Cornw. 

 and Devon,' Philosopb. Trans, vi, 2108. 

 * Ibid. 2108-2109. 



3 Ibid. 2109. 



4 Ibid. 21 10. 6 Ibid. 2111. 

 6 Ibid. 7 Ibid. 21 12. 



place, when choked up, emptied, and the 

 mixture of ore and ashes retrambled. Rude 

 as many of these operations were, they show 

 a great advance in mining skill since the time 

 of Carew. 



Dr. Merrest, a few years later, describes the 

 tin stuff as dried in a furnace on an iron plate 8 

 before being crazed, which seems an inexact 

 reference to calcining. He says, also, that stuff 

 not worth working was thrown into heaps 

 which, in six or seven years, would be fit for re- 

 working. The germ of truth in this statement, 

 undoubtedly made in all honesty, seems to be 

 that, just at that date, advances in dressing were 

 unusually rapid, and every few years operations 

 became more precise. 



Improvements had also been made in smelting. 

 The slovenly habit of burning the blowing- 

 house to catch the tin in the thatch, which 

 Fuller mentions in 1662, had been replaced by 

 the construction of chambers in the chimneys 

 for the deposit of metallic dust. 9 Although 

 smelting with pit coal was still unknown, a 

 difference had been made in the fuels used 

 for various grades of ore. Moor, or stream 

 tin was fused by charked peat ; lode tin by 

 charcoal and peat mixed ; and slag by charcoal 

 alone. 10 



Following closely upon this advance in ore- 

 dressing came the invention of improved devices 

 for mine drainage. As the tin districts of Corn- 

 wall became further developed, mining had taken 

 on more of the character of lode-mining. The 

 stream works were still largely in evidence in 

 1765," but in 1778 Pryce gives us to understand 

 that they were of minor importance. Few 

 changes had taken place in their operations since 

 the days of Carew. The adventurer sank a 

 hatch, three or five fathoms, to the shelf on 

 which the tin stones were deposited. When he 

 had found, by a rough washing on the point of 

 a shovel, that it was ' paying ' tin, he drained 

 his work by a level, and continued working 

 with the aid of a few helpers until the spot was 

 exhausted. 12 



In lode mines the accumulation of water called 

 for more advanced methods. At the beginning 

 of the eighteenth century John Coster had taught 

 the Cornish miners to use one large water-wheel, 

 40 feet in diameter, instead of the half-dozen 

 smaller ones then used for a single mine. 13 His 

 invention, however, was overshadowed by that 



8 The Relations of Tin Mines and the Working 

 of Tin in Cornwall,' by Dr. Merrest, Pbiksoph. Trans. 

 xii, 952. 



9 Worth, Historical Hotel on the Progress of Mining 

 Skill, 50. 



10 ' Mineral Observations on the Mines of Cornw. 

 and Devon,' Philosopb. Trans, vi, 2113. 

 11 Jars, Voyages Metallurgques, iii, 187. 

 11 Pryce, Mineralogia Cornubiensis, 132-133. 

 18 Ibid. 307. 



549 



