IRON ORES OF KUNJAMULLAY. ' 161 



down the mountain sides, especially to the southward, where, not only does 

 the extensive talus consist mainly of it, but the fields, for 1 or 2 

 miles from the hill, are thickly strewed with it, in the shape of rolled 

 fragments of all sizes. Thousands and thousands of tons are thus 

 scattered about, and require merely to be gathered up without any 

 mining operation. 



In richness the beds are not constant throughout, but vary gra- 

 dually from a rock, which to the eye would appear to consist of ore 

 to the extent of seven parts in eight (the eighth part being quartz, 

 the only mineral associated with the magnetic iron,) to one containing 

 about half its bulk of ore ; the great mass of the beds consisting of an 

 intermediate quality, in which the cubical and octahedral forms of the 

 crystals of magnetic iron can occasionally be traced. The ore generally 

 occurs in grains of various sizes lying in the planes of foliation, and 

 sometimes uniting into strings or into small laminar patches. The 

 grains have, when freshly broken, a considerable metallic lustre ; weather- 

 ing, however, gives them a black, or very dull purplish-grey colour. 



The yield in the furnace, according to information kindly furnished 

 by Mr. Maylor, the Manager of the Porto Novo Company ^s establishment 

 at Beypoor, is about 55 per cent, of iron pig,* requiring 13i tons of 

 charcoal for every ton of iron obtained. 



The iron beds of KunjamuUay are resorted to by the natives of 

 the surrounding villages, both in the Salem and Kazepoor taluqs, and 

 their workings (of two kinds) may be seen in various places surroundr 

 ing the foot of the mountain. 



The kind almost universally adopted consists of small irregular 

 shallow trenches or holes (rarely more than 3 or 4 feet deep) generally 

 in the talus of the beds, but sometimes also on the weathered-out crop, 

 from which the smallest and most friable pieces are collected and reduced 



* Or about 62 per cent, of metallic iron of the finest quality. 

 w (383) 



