36 On the Manufacture of Bar Iron in India. 



" of 100,000 dollars, forty tons of rail-road iron can be made 

 " in every 24 hours." 



6. As the inventor's account of his own process is not 

 given, we are unable to judge whether it is the result of mere 

 practical trials, or arrived at by a scientific inductive routine. 

 The <c chemical compound" alluded to, is " black cast iron," 

 a very small quantity of which is sufficient to disturb the 

 equivalent combining proportion of the elements of the ore, 

 and by setting at liberty a portion of the oxygen, deprives 

 the magnetic oxide of its characteristic refractory property, 

 and leaves it subservient to the reducing action of the car- 

 bon in contact with it, and the operation of the carbonifer- 

 ous gases of the focus of the furnace. But the objection 

 to the process is the great proportion of the ore which be- 

 comes separated from the reduced metal, in the form of 

 what is practically termed " slag," and when a larger pro- 

 portion of cast iron is used to prevent this, the process then 

 becomes exactly similar to Mr. Heath's " cementatious pro- 

 cess." 



7. The process of Mr. William Neale Clay has been put 

 into practice at the Shirva works, Kirkintillock, Scotland. 

 " Ulverstone iron ore (haematite) is ground with about 4-10 

 " of its weight of small coal, so as to pass through a screen 

 " of | of an inch mesh. This mixture is placed in a hop- 

 " per fixed over a preparatory bed, or oven attached to a 

 * f puddling furnace of the ordinary form. While one charge 

 " is being worked and balled, another gradually falls from 

 " the hopper, through the crown, upon the preparatory bed, 

 " and becomes thoroughly and uniformly heated, the car- 

 " buretted hydrogen and carbon of the coal combining 

 " with the oxygen of the ore, advances the decomposition 

 " of the mineral, while by the combustion of these gases, 

 " the puddling furnace is prevented from being injuriously 

 " cooled. One charge being withdrawn, another is brought 

 V forward, and in about an hour and a half the iron is 



