G12 REPORT— 1898. 



estimate of the total coal resources of the kingdom in seams of two feet and 

 upwards in thickness, and existing at depths belosv the surface not exceed- 

 ing four thousand feet in the year 1900, would be . 81,683,000,000 tons 

 And deducting from this quantity the writer's e.~ti- 

 mate in 1900 of the resources of best coal re- 

 maining within a depth below the surface of two 

 thousand feet, about the limit probably of 

 cheaply worked coal 15,000,000,000 „ 



Leaving approximately 66,683,000,000 „ 



of best coal existing between a depth of two thousand and four thousand 

 feet below the surface, and of thin and inferior seams at all depths to the 

 limit of four thousand feet. 



Allowing for a small gradual increase of output from deep and inferior 

 seams during the next fifty to sixty years, and assuming an average out- 

 put for fifty years of best coals within a depth of two thousand feet at 

 j'20,000,000 tons per annum, exclusive of thin and inferior seams, we 

 shall have exhausted eleven-fifteenths of our best resources about the 

 year 1950, and have arrived at a stage when our whole annual output 

 will be composed of a rapidly-increasing proportion of deep, thin, or 

 inferior coals, and the proportion of our cheapest-worked coals will rapidly 

 decrease. 



It will be apparent, however, that at the end of fifty years we shall 

 still have coal resources remaining, workable, it is true, at a gradually 

 increasing cost, but sufficient for the supply of the nation at an average 

 output of 250,000,000 tons a year for upwards of a period of 250 years. 



But in working this very large residuum a greater cost in working, 

 due to natural causes, is inevitable ; and that this extra cost will gradu- 

 ally increase year by year after the best and cheapest coals are exhausted 

 is undoubted, however successfully the skill of the mining and mechanical 

 engineer may be brought to bear in mitigating this effect, and unless 

 additional measures can be adopted, outside the province of the engineer, 

 to counteract it by cheapening the carriage of the coal on the surface, and 

 reducing materially all other charges, such as labour rates and taxes.. &c., 

 the effect of this increasing cost will be of serious moment to the nation. 



The fact of the coalfields of Great Britain being situate at no great 

 distance from convenient ports and home centres of consumption has had, 

 and will continue to have, an important bearing upon the rapid develop- 

 ment of our coal resources, and adds immensely, of course, to the intrinsic 

 value of our coal resources as a whole. 



The general cost of our coal will, of course, increase in proportion to 

 the percentage of thin and deep coal worked to the whole annual output, 

 until the increased cost of the whole of our coal production due to natural 

 causes, such as depth, thinness of seams, &c. (however much this may be 

 neutralised by improved mechanical and mining appliances), will be so 

 increased as to seriously and permanently hamper our progress commer- 

 cially by increasing the cost of our home manufactures and steam shipping, 

 increasing the cost of navigating our steamers, and lessening thereby the 

 amount of our coal exports, increasing also the cost of our imports of raw 

 material and food supplies, and generally gradually taking fi'om us for 

 the benefit of other nations cur home and foreign trade. 



The progress of this item of increased cost of our coal may be gradual 

 and comparatively imperceptible for fifty years, or thereabouts, owing to 



