206 [Assembly 



supply so great a demand. The quantity used daily during the busi- 

 ness season is about 1000 cords. Blossburs: coal can be delivered 

 here for about four dollars per ton, which for manufacturing pur- 

 poses, I think, is cheaper than wood at $3.50 per cord. 



"The quantity of salt manufactured last year at the Kenhawa (Va.) 

 Salines, was three millions of bushels, o{ Jifly pounds each. It was, 

 however, more than their market required. The manufacturers in- 

 formed me that this year they should make but two and a half 

 millions of bushels, which they thought would supply the demand. 

 The price at the works when I was there (first of August,) was 20 

 cents per bushel, 50 lbs,, including the barrel in which it is packed. 

 They use bituminous coal for fuel, which is abundant and contiguous 

 to the works. It costs delivered at the works, about two and a-half 

 cents per bushel, and a bushel of coal consumed produces a bushel of 

 salt. Their brine is not quite halt as strong as ours, and it contains 

 a much larger share of impurities; but they manage to cleanse it in 

 the process of manufacture, so as to make an excelledt quality of 

 salt. Their works are located on the banks of the Great Kenhawa 

 River, 50 or 60 miles from the Ohio. The river is navigable for 

 steamboats up to the salt works, and there i^ a brisk trade carried on 

 with Cincinnati, which is their general salt market. Large quanti- 

 ties are, however, sent to other markets on the Ohio, Wabash, Cum- 

 berland and Tennessee rivers. 



"There are 41 furnaces in operation, each of which has its own 

 salt well. 



" I noticed two furnaces where no fuel but gas is used, where the 

 flues or chambers beneath the boilers were 100 feet long, 8 feet 

 ■wide, and 5 feet deep, which were filled with an intense flame, and 

 to one of them, a column of flame poured out of the chimney, 30 

 feet high. 



Thomas Preston, Esq., writes me from the salt mines in the 

 mountains of southwestern Virginia, under date of August 31, 1847, 

 among other things, thus: 



" I presume Mr. S. has given you an account of the improvements 

 we have made in the construction of furnaces for evaporating brine. 

 I think I am entitled to the credit of some of that merit — even a 

 patent. By springing arches under the kettles, and suspending them 

 entirely in the flue, two very great objects are effected: First, the 



