THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



291 



a minute account of the Burning Wells 

 and of the geological features of their im- 

 mediate neighborhood. Mr. Spencer has 

 brought me a number of pieces of incrus- 

 tation of the inner surface of the tubes 

 through which the gas and salt water 

 ascends from its deep subterranean foun- 

 tains. Some time since the deepest well 

 at Kanawha was supposed to have ex- 

 hausted the great subterranean gasometer, 

 as the gas and salt water ceased to rise, 

 but the probability is, the shafts have 

 been closed by the rapid crystalization of 

 the material which forms this incrustation 

 on the inner surface of the tubes, and the 

 further discharge of the water and gas 

 thus prevented. I have not analyzed this 

 substance, but its appearance leads me to j 

 conclude that it is sulphate of lime. The 

 roaring well of Lockpit, which is 401 

 feet deep, was affected in the same way ; 

 the pump placed in that well became so 

 choked with seknite^ that it was difficult 

 to work it. The crystalization there was 

 different, being that of flattened prisms 

 with eight sides — half to three-fourths of 

 an inch in length, and one-sixteenth of an 

 inch in thickness, and one-eighth of an 

 inch in breadth — perfectly transparent, but 

 on being calcined became opaque and of 

 a shining white, and discovering the for- 

 mation to be laminated, the lamince being 

 thinner than the thinnest gold leaf. 



The gas which rises in the Kanawha 

 wells is used as fuel for evaporating salt 

 water, and crystalizing the salt. — the inner 

 surface of the furnaces in which the gas 

 is burnt becomes extensively incrusted 

 with a porous substance of a dark blue or 

 black color, hard, like pumice stone, hang- 

 ing in clusters like vegetable productions; 

 a sample which Mr. Spencer brought me 

 resembles the fern plant, both in leaves and 

 stem. About two millions of bushels of 

 salt are made at these salines annually. 

 I have samples of three parcels — alum 

 salt, steam boiler salt, and the common 

 pan salt. This salt has a slight reddish 

 tinge — the alum salt has much more trans- 

 parency than the Onondasra solar salt or 

 the Turk's Island salt. The salt is sold 

 at the Salines at twenty-five cents per 

 bushel of fiftv pounds. The fuel used for 

 '10 j 



salt making is gas and bituminous coal. 

 Bituminous coal is very abundant in the 

 immediate neighborhood, and costs but a 

 little. I have a sample of this coal, and 

 also a sample of bituminous coal from the 

 Pittsburg mines. The Kanawha coal is 

 of less specific gravity than the Pittsburg. 

 A mine of cannel coal has recently been 

 discovered 16 miles from the Kanawha 

 Salines. I have also a sample of this 

 coal — it is superior to any cannel coal 

 that I have seen, and I have several spe- 

 cimens of foreign cannel coal, such as is 

 brought to the New York market. This 

 last is so close in its texture, and so hard, 

 that it could be wrought intosnuff boxes. 

 When the old wells were first made at the 

 Kanawha Salines, to the depth of three 

 or four hundred feet, a large quantity of pe- 

 trolum came up with the water — this sub- 

 stance is known by the name of "Seneca 

 Oil," " Barbadoes Tar," and the transpa- 

 rent oil is " Naptha." I have a specimen 

 of it which is very limpid. The salt water 

 at Kanawha requires much purification 

 previous to crystalization, passing through 

 ibur several vats or receivers. Much bit- 

 ter water, as it is termed, is extracted, and 

 this is of great specific gravity. I have 

 a sample of this bitter water of the specific 

 gravity of 1 964-1000 — it is very acrid 

 and pungent. Cattle that tread on the 

 ground saturated with it lose their hoofs. 

 The Kanawha Salines are upon the 

 Great Kanawha river, in the southwest- 

 ern part of Virginia, east of the Ohio river 

 and west of the Alleghany mountains. 



Fears have been expressed by many of 

 the residents of Kanawha, ( hat the gas in 

 the wells would be ignited by lightning 

 storms, and an explosion result from the 

 combustion of the gas in this great sub- 

 terranean gasometer. There is no danger 

 of this whatever. The gas is covered by 

 water, and should the lightning come in 

 contact with the gas, it would ignite the 

 gas and then mingle with and burn silent- 

 ly until extinguished. Such was the ope- 

 ration of the lightning and the gas in the 

 gas pipes in Pearl street, in New York, 

 when a store was struck by lightning and 

 the gas pipe melted and the gas set on fire. 



Should balloons ever come into exter.- 



