1 72 Visit the Colliery. 



This, with the charge and expense of her infant, 

 which is exclusively borne by herself, must be 

 viewed as a heavy punishment for her departure 

 from virtue. 



Mr. Read was so obliging as to accompany us 

 to his colliery. The field of coal is nearly two 

 miles in length, and Terming the segment of a 

 circle; the broadest part is about seven hundred 

 yards. The seam, or vein, is five feet thick, 

 divided by many dikes or walls of basalt, which 

 interrupt its spread, but make no change in its 

 inclination or dip. The largest field of coal is 

 about one hundred and fifty yards broad, and 

 forms a trough, by dipping from north to south, 

 and rising again from south to north. The 

 most northern part of the coal, which is under 

 Fair Cliff, has a red free-stone roof. This col- 

 liery is not subject to inflammable air, but is 

 frequently inconvenienced by the choke-damp. 

 Under the beach, the coal is not more than six 

 feet below the level of the sea at high water. It 

 is worked by slope drifts, as it has been found 

 impracticable to sink shafts from the surface 

 through the basalt rock, which here is its uni- 

 form roof, until it meets a dike about half a 

 mile from the port, which changes the roof to 

 a white free-stone. The basalt rock cuts off the 

 coal, and precludes any extension of the field on 



