184 



On Indian Iron and Steel. 



[Jan. 



fibre, and susceptibility of being drawn out into a thread, without the 

 fibre being entangled, are abo indispensable, and may be greatly 

 marred by the process of beating with sticks, so as to occasion that en- 

 tanglement. Managed as the present consignment has been, so much 

 superior to the preceding fifteen bales, any quantity would here meet 

 a ready sale, and we should suppose would amply recompence the 

 trouble and care which it demands. 



*' We think this is a matter of so much importance, that we have taken 

 a sample from these bags, which we intend to accompany this letter, 

 that, by reference to it, you may keep in view the qualities that would 

 always command this market."— JbMr?ia^ of the Royal Asiatic Society^ 

 vol. 0, p. o72-8. 



Art. X. — On Indian Iron and Sleel ; hi a Letter addressed to the 

 Secretary to the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland* 

 —By J. M. Heath, Esq. 



In the month of Jnne, 1837, the Managing Directors of the Indian 

 Iron and Steel Company received a letter from Robert Clerk, Esq., Se- 

 cretary to the Madras Governor, forwarding a copy of your letter of the 

 17th of February, 1837, addressed to the Governor of Madras, request- 

 ing information on the subject of wootz*, or Indian steel: the purport 

 of Mr. Clerk's letter was to ask us to furnish the information and spe- 

 cimens required by you, provided we could do so without inconvenience 

 or detriment to our own interests. 



At the time Mr. Clerk's letter was received, 1 was the only one 

 of the Managing Directors who was in possession of sufficiently de- 

 tailed information on the subject of the manufacture of Indian steel, 

 to be able to reply to the queries contained in your letter, but as the 

 duties I had to discharge at that time in the superintendence of our 

 iron works at Porto Novo, were exceedingly laborious, it was alto- 

 gether out of my power to turn my attention to the subject previ- 

 ously to my departure from India, in November, 1837 : the leisure 

 afforded by the voyage home has enabled me to resume the subject of 



* Wootz, or Oots, is probably the name of steel in the Guzerattee language in use at 

 Bombay, from which place the first specimens of Indian steel were sent to England under 

 that name. 



