OF FOREST-TREES. 



253 



Two or three short billets, covered with charcoal, last much longer, cHAP, 

 and with more life, than twice the quantity by itself, whether charcoal 

 alone or billet ; and the billets under the charcoal being undisturbed, will 

 melt, as it were, into charcoals of such a lasting size. 



If small-coal be spread over the charcoal, where you burn it alone, it 

 will bind it to longer continuance ; and yet more, if the small-coal be 

 made of the roots of thorns, briers, and brambles. Consult Lord Bacon, 

 Exper. 775. 



The Quercus Marina (wrack or sea-weed) which comes in our oyster- 

 barrels, laid under Newcastle-coal to kindle it, (as theuseis in some places,) 

 wiU, as I am informed, make it out-last two great fires of simple coals, 

 and maintain a glowing luculent heat without waste. This sort of fuel is 

 much made use of in Malta and the islands thereabout, especially to burn 

 in their ovens ; and the peasant who first brought it into custom, I find 

 highly commended by an author, as a great benefactor to his country. 

 The manner of gathering it, is to cut it in summer-time from the rocks, 

 whereon it grows abundantly, and bringing it in boats or otherwise to 

 land, spread and dry it in the sun like hay, turning and cocking it till it 

 be fully cured. It makes an excellent fire alone, and roasts to admiration ; 

 and when all is burnt, the ashes make one of the best manures for land in 

 the world for the time they continue in virtue. Thus fuel adds much life, 

 continuance, and aid to our sullen sea-coal; and if the main ocean should . 

 afford fuel, (as the barnacles and solan d-geese are said to do in some parts ■ 

 of Scotland with the very sticks of their nests,) we in these isles may thank 

 ourselves if we be not warm. These -few particulars I but mention to 

 animate improvements, and encourage ingenious attempts to detect more 

 cheap and useful processes for ways of charring coals, peat, and the like 

 fuliginous materials, as the accomplished Mr. Boyle has intimated to us in 

 the fifth of those his precious Essays concerning the usefulness of Natural 

 Philosophy, part ii. chap. vii. to which I refer the curious. In the mean 

 time, were not he worthy of a statue of gold, that (salvo to our Newcastle 

 trade and seminary of mariners) should in this penury of fii-e-wood about 

 so monstrous a devourer as this vast city, (poisoned with smoke and soot,) 

 find out an expedient that should, within the space of five and twenty 

 years, free it from aU this hellish and pernicious fog, by furnishing it with 

 Volume II. K k 



