1873.] Peat. 479 



transversely, which is done by hand with tools specially 

 adapted for the purpose. A few days afterwards it is in a 

 fit condition to be cut longitudinally ; the size of the slabs, 

 or bricks, being 18 inches long by 6 inches wide. A fortnight 

 later — if the weather be favourable — the bricks are hard 

 enough for stacking, and after several days more they are 

 turned and re-stacked; ultimately they are loaded upon barges 

 on the canal, and floated down to store. The machine, 

 which we have thus briefly described, in ten hours' working 

 excavates and pulps sufficient peat to give 50 tons of air- 

 dried fuel, and in doing so it makes a navigable canal 

 150 feet long, 19 feet wide, and 5 feet 6 inches deep. One 

 ton of this peat fuel measures 70 cubic feet. Experiments 

 as to its efficiency have been made upon the Grand Trunk 

 Railway of Canada with the following results as compared 

 with coal and wood, with an express passenger train on a 

 run of 177 miles : — 



Average mileage run with 1 ton of coal .... 59*9* 

 ,, ,, ,, 1 cord of wood (4000 lbs.) 40*69 



,, ,, ,, 1 ton of peat fuel . . 50*50 



Taking the then relative prices of the above three classes of 

 fuel it was found that the cost for the distance of 177 miles 

 would be as follows : — viz., coal 29*50, wood 30*87, and peat 

 fuel 16 dols. 



It will, of course, be understood that this method of 

 manufacturing fuel can only be carried out where a sufficient 

 supply of water exists in the peat to fill up the channel as 

 it is formed, and to float the manufacturing vessel forward. 

 In the absence of a sufficiency of water for the above 

 purpose, recourse must be had to the use of stationary and 

 fixed machinery. Of this class there exist two principal 

 methods of treatment : the one patented by Messrs. Clayton, 

 Son, and Howlett, and the other the invention of Mr. John 

 Box. These two, however, differ very materially from one 

 another, as will be seen from the following descriptions of 

 them : — 



According to Messrs. Clayton's process, the raw peat, as 

 dug, is filled into a special arrangement of " squeezing " 

 trucks, having perforated sides for the escape of water from 

 the peat. A piston forced against the peat in the truck by 

 the aid of a screw and lever effects a pressure upon the body 

 of the peat, and during the passage from the bog to the 

 machine the peat is thus freed of a considerable portion of 

 the water. The rough peat is fed from the squeezing trucks 

 into a hopper, through which it falls down a vertical chamber 

 in which revolves a shaft, having screw blades fixed on it, 



