361 
Tin?. 
antlers of an animal of the stag kind, a human scull, and a 
copper battle-axe ; to this succeeds a layer of rounded 
stones, beneath which is the bed of tin ore, in grains and 
lumps of various sizes. The thickness of this bed varies 
from one to five feet, but the thickest part is comparative- 
ly the poorest. The whole of the superincumbent strata 
is cut away, as the workmen proceed, so that the general 
appearance of the cavity is that of a vast gravel or sand 
pit, near half a mile long, and about two hundred feet 
broad, which is kept clear of water by the powerful action 
of two water-mill pumps. The tin ore, as it lies quite 
loose, is merely shovelled into barrows, and wheeled to 
the head of the works, where it is thrown under a thin 
sheet of water which washes away the earth, leaving the 
pure ore behind. After this simple purification the ore is 
sent to St. Austle, a distance of about twenty miles, to be 
smelted. Here all the preparation for the furnace, that it 
receives is being bruised and passed through wire sieves, 
containing sixteen meshes in the square inch. The fur- 
nace employed is called in Cornwall, England, a blowing 
furnace, and is in fact only a blast furnace of the simplest 
construction, about seven feet high, and supplied with air 
from two cylinders, worked by an overshot water- wheel 
The only fuel made use of is charcoal, and after the fur- 
nace is fully heated, it is fed at short intervals with the fol- 
lowing charge, viz. three or four shovels-full of ore, and 
two or three half-bushels of charcoal, no flux of any kind 
being employed. At the bottom of the furnace is a small 
channel, through which tjie reduced tin is constantly flow- 
ing into a pit below, accompanied by a small quantity of 
dag, which is removed from time to time, and thrown 
again into the furnace. When the pit is full of tin, it is 
ladled out into an iron boiler, about three feet in diameter, 
with a small fire under it, to keep the metal sufficiently 
fluid : two or three large pieces of charcoal are then laid 
