159 



Pits of similar coal have also been dug in Cheshire, and in some 

 other parts of the kingdom. 



Dr. Plott relates* that the Cannel coal from Wednesbury Common 

 Pit is of so close a texture, that it will take a passable polish ; as 

 may be seen in the choir of the cathedral church of Litchfield, 

 which in great part is paved in lozenges, black and white, as other 

 churches with marble ; with Cannel coal for the black, and alabaster 

 for the white. He also says, that " at Beaudesart will work so very 

 fine, that the king's majesty's head is said to have been cut in it, 

 by a carver at Litchfield, resembling him very well." 



Yours, &c.: 



LETTER XVI. 



COAL DESCRIBED.. ..DIFFERENT KINDS OF COAL.... DOUBTFUL IF 

 KNOWN TO THE GREEKS, OR EARLY ROMANS. ...BROUGHT INTO 

 COMMON USE, IN THIS ISLAND* BUT IN MODERN TIMES.-,. 

 FOUND IN VARIOUS PARTS OF THE WORLD. 



A WAS much entertained by reading the acccount of your subterra- 

 nean incursion ; and have frequently since smiled at the ludicrous 

 appearance which you, and our friend Wilton, must have made, 

 dressed in a collier's garb, and descending, by a bucket, down the 

 shaft of a coal pit. The astonishment with which you were stricken 

 on your entrance into the pit, is forcibly expressed, by your saying, 



* The Natural History of Staffordshire, by Dr. Plott, p. 125, 



