TEW: EXTENSION OF MINING OPERATIONS. 97 
The Warren House or Barnsley bed of coal has been worked 
by this company for a distance of 2 miles in an easterly direction 
under the Magnesian Limestone, and is found there rising- to the 
East at about an inclination of 1 in 77. The thickness of the 
Silkstone coal at \VTieldale is 5 feet, and the coal is g-ood and 
bright in appearance. 
The shafts are each 1 5 feet diameter, which equals an area of 
176| feet square each. In each shaft there are 70 yards of stone 
tubbing to tub off the water : the ventilation is created by a fur- 
nace which produces 180,000 cubic feet of air per minute; the 
horse power of the furnace being 28 H.P. 
The number of coal seams which have been found to be work- 
able on the estates of Lord Houghton and Temple, under those 
Royalties will, before being exhausted, supply a weekly quantity 
of coal of 10,000 tons for a period of nearly 200 years. 
The Winding Engines, Plant, etc., now laid dowTi, are capable 
of drawing 1,000 tons per day when required. 
If from the Romans we received the idea of facilities of 
transport and communications throughout Ancient Britain, (for 
the Romans were the constructors of roads and highways) so from 
the Railway Companies we have received the most perfect scientific 
applications for rapidity of locomotion ; and this district is benefit- 
ed by this development of transport enterprise. 
The Swinton and Knottingley Branch of the Midland and 
North Eastern Railway was opened for traffic on July 1st, 1879 ; 
the first sod of the Hull and Barnsley Railway was dug by Lieut- 
Col. Smith, the Chairman of the Railway Co., on Saturday, the 
15th Jan. 1881 ; and the works on the line, generally, commenced 
about 1st Feb., 1881. The Hne, at present in course of construc- 
tion, is about 50 miles long, and it is to be ready for inspection by 
the Board of Trade towards the end of 1884. The contractors, 
Messrs. Lucas and Aird (to whose representative we are indebted 
for an inspection at Upton of the Railway cuttings to-day) have 
brought mechanical contrivances to work, such as Steam Hydraulic 
