SALTER — A CHRISTMAS LECTURE ON COAL. 



231 



kitchen, if such a division could be made. And coal that is so bad 

 that no Englishman would like to burn it, may be exported ! 



And now we must leave the coal, with one extract from a work 

 that is rather bulky, but full of information. Ronald's and Richard- 

 son's " Chemical Technology," vol. 1, treats of fuel and its applica- 

 tions, and from this work what little I have to say of the products 

 of coal will chiefly be taken.* From it we learn that in 1855 the 

 fuel used was divided as follows : — ■ 



Household coal 19,000,000 tons 



Ironworks 13,000,000 



Steam, gas, &c 9,000,000 



Export 400,000 



45,000,000 



Add for Scotland 7,500,000 



„ Ireland 220,000 



Total 52,720,000 



Our present consumption, as above said (p. 60), is about seventy 

 million tons, and for the future it will probably be greater ; and this, 

 remember, is all from the older or true coal-measures. The conti- 

 nent of Europe is supplied, in many places, with coal of a later date. 



We must look at some of the products of coal. 



It seems hardly necessary to allude to gas, for, like the common 

 blessings of light, and air, and health, we are only sensible what a 

 boon it is when we lose it. It would take a chapter by itself. Gas 

 is now made so carefully, and purified so completely from the dele- 

 terious things that once poisoned us, that I believe I am safe in say- 

 ing that the bisulphuret of carbon is the only impurity they do not 

 remove. Even this, I learn, Mr. Bowditch has lately succeeded in 

 doing. 



We are told that a country rector in Yorkshire, Dr. Clayton, of 

 Crofton, first discovered coal-gas ; and his letter to the Hon. Robert 

 Boyle attracted attention from the Royal Society — when, do my 

 readers think ? — in 1739, fifty or sixty years after ! So much for 

 the spirit of discovery at that date. The first person who really 

 used gas for practical purposes, and whose credit ought not to be 

 forgotten, was a Mr. Murdock, an engineer employed by Bolton and 

 Watt in putting up steam-engines at Redruth. He lit up his own 

 house, and afterwards the Soho Works at Birmingham ; and even 



* I did not know that this celebrated work contained a chapter on the question 

 " What is coal ?" till lately, or I should have referred to it at first. The case which 

 gave rise to the discussion was that of " Gillespie v. Eussell." I need hardly 

 say that my own conviction is, that, in a commercial sense, whatever is a bed of 

 fossil fuel is a bed of coal. I believe fully that in Dumfriesshire and the county 

 of Down there are beds of fuel made of fossil Graptolites — sea-animals. They 

 are very thin beds, but they are true anthracite coal for all that. 



