Vol. 68.] ANNIVEESAEY ADDKESS OE THE PEESIDENT. Xci- 



expeditiously, although by this practice the poorer seams are in 

 many cases irretrievably lost. Again, there is a constant tendency 

 towards the abandonment of older and less profitable collieries, 

 or even areas, in favour of newer and richer ones. It appears to 

 liave been considered by the Commissioners that these practices 

 will be given up and that, at the same time, the actual getting of 

 •all seams, including thin ones, will be more economically conducted 

 in the future, so that much coal which is now lost as slack will 

 be brought to bank. With the exception of the deductions to be 

 presently mentioned, the estimates as to coal remaining unworked 

 are apparently based on the expectation that every seam will be got 

 and got out completely. Finally the coal was not charged with 

 the expense of the discovery of coal-areas or with that of the 

 exploration of the areas when located. 



The haste with which coal in this country was taken out in the 

 early days of coal-mining, the rush to get that which was easiest 

 and cheapest, the imperfection of the early machinery and methods 

 of coal-getting, all have combined to render many of the older areas 

 practically inaccessible, although in many cases, for the reasons 

 just stated, very considerable amounts of coal, recoverable by 

 modern methods, have been left in them. Some, at least, of this 

 coal might even yet be obtainable if accurate plans and records 

 had only been kept. In the early days, however, this was but 

 rarely done, and the Government mining records were only started 

 in 1848 — after a great proportion of the harm was irreparable. 



The rotting away of the timbering left in the mines, and the 

 leaving of insufficient pillaring or the ' robbing' of such coal pillars 

 as were left, have caused the eventual collapse of many of the older 

 workings ; and it has thus not only become practically impossible to 

 work any coal-seams remaining in such areas, but the ground has 

 in many cases become waterlogged and has proved and still proves, 

 in more ways than one, a source of danger and loss to adjoining 

 areas. J^ot only must broad underground barriers be maintained 

 as a defence against water, but the irregular subsidence and conse- 

 quent destruction of the relief of the ground surface has rendered 

 it in some cases impossible to devise any comprehensive system of 

 drainage, and in any case has made drainage schemes inordinately 

 expensive or inefficient. The Commissions have been compelled to 

 'write off' the majority of these areas, and to proceed on the 

 assumption, which is probably legitimate, that in future no such 

 wreckage will be permitted. 



Passing to the deductions actually made by the Commissioners 



?2 



