57 
ON THE ECONOMIC USE OF FUEL. 
The subject of fuel has rarely been considered in all its bearings, yet it is one of 
real consequence, — not perhaps to gentlemen of rank and fortune, but certainly 
to amateurs, who take delight in useful and ornamental horticulture, but may 
hesitate to incur that expense which fuel, or even masses of fermenting materials, 
must occasion. We shall not, however, dwell upon the subject of pits, or hot-beds, 
but confine our attention to coal and wood, they being the most certain, as well as 
available, agents for the speedy and active extrication of heat. 
Every one knows what the term coal — pit-coal — implies; but few are aware of 
the many shades of difference which exist between the varieties of that product of 
the earth. A distinction is made, generally, between pit-coal and sea-coal ; the 
former being the substance collected from the coal-mines of the inland districts, and 
the latter being that yielded by mines closely adjoining to, and in some cases actually 
under, the ocean. The Newcastle sea-coal supplies the whole of the eastern and 
southern counties of England ; and a large portion of the midland districts still 
depend chiefly upon it for fuel, though the operation of the railways, as they become 
general, will greatly tend to the universal distribution of the produce of every 
trading district. 
Sea-coal is, as yet, a source of great domestic outlay wherever it is in strict 
requisition. In quality it differs from most pit-coal, chiefly in the quantity of 
bituminous or pitchy matter which it contains. This substance causes it not only 
to emit much gaseous and highly inflammable fluid ; but to bind, or solder into 
masses ; hence, the smallest particles, dust or slack, as it it called, burn with freedom, 
unite, and form a compact cinder. But sea-coal, though a rapid burner, is very 
liable to be extinguished suddenly : it cannot be left for many hours without atten- 
tion ; and they who trust to it may, at a critical moment, find themselves without 
fire, or even heat. This coal yields a sharp, black ash, which appears to abound in 
flinty and irony matters ; but, if the fire be intense, these substances fuse together 
into the form of a hard clinker, utterly incapable of combustion. If the fires be 
gentle, as are those of a common grate and range, the clinker is not produced, and 
the ashes trickle through the bars. An economical practice prevails in some places, 
which consists in making an oblong pit under the fire, perhaps eighteen or twenty 
inches long, a foot wide, and nearly two feet deep ; a grating of cast-iron drops into 
an iron groove or rabbet at the edges of this opening, and the ashes from the fire 
fall upon, and are screened by, the bars of the grating, leaving the cinders entire 
and separate. These ashes ought to be collected for the use of the forcing houses ; 
and if slightly wetted, they will consume freely with wood; or they may be used 
alone to bank up the fires at night, and at one or more periods of the day, when it 
is wished to keep the flues in quiet action. 
Pit, or inland coal \s of various qualities ; that of Staffordshire and Warwickshire 
does not usually solder ; it is found in vast masses, and gives undeniable evidence of 
abounding with woody or vegetable matters. It burns freely, is not readily ex- 
tinguished, but is resolved into an inconvenient quantity of white ashes, not unlike 
VOL. IV. NO. XXXIX. I 
