1883.] History of Anthracite Coal in Nature and Art. 7 
having been a pioneer of railway enterprise. Edward Pease was 
the father of British railway enterprise; and was, like Josiah 
White, “a man who could see a hundred miles ahead.” He was 
a man of excellent business abilities, energetic, and of most per- 
sistent stuff. Having been placed upon a committee to devise 
improved modes of conveyance from Stockton to Darlington, 
thenceforth his heart was in the project of a railway, till the act 
was passed in 1823, and the first railway was opened for traffic 
Sept. 27th, 1825, thirteen months prior to the opening of that be- 
tween Liverpool and Manchester. The road built through the 
influence of Edward Pease was intended to aid in developing the 
vast mineral resources of his district, and but for his exertions 
and that of his sons, another generation might have passed away 
before the people of the region benefited could have enjoyed the 
marvelous prosperity with which they have been favored. The 
enterprise, courage and pertinacious genius of one man has 
tamed the uncouth savagery of nature, changed the dashing tor- 
rent into a placid canal, turned the wilderness into a busy abode 
of happy industries, opened to day the treasures hidden for ages, 
and poured them out to bless his fellows and advance more rapidly 
the ever progressing course of human development. When 
from the summit of Mount Pisgah the admiring tourist gazes 
upon the wonderful scene spread before him, and regards the 
railroads with their immense trains of coal, the canal bearing its 
burdened boats, the activity everywhere visible in this hive of 
industry, let him turn to the memory of Josiah White, and apply 
to him the words as aptly written of another, Si ejus monumentum 
requiris circumspice. 
Arrived at White Haven, we leave the Lehigh Valley road and 
take the Nescopeck branch. This carries us for nine miles up an 
incline which, at some places, rises upwards of 147 feet to the 
mile, while it follows seemingly every curve that could be readily 
devised in its winding track. Mountains are around us and above 
us, and red rocks and gray rocks and white sandstone—pebble 
rocks succeed in order piled in endless variety of attitudes—until 
we at length are deposited at the simple station at Upper Lehigh, 
and we have reached a height of 1850 feet above the sea. We 
are in the midst of a coal basin, small, it is true, but of immense 
value. The Green Mountain basin is but about two and a quar- 
ter miles in extent, and is worked at five slopes which supply 
