TORBITE AND ITS USES. 199 
Advantage hns, on the contrary, been taken of the natural property of 
peat, suitably prepared, of contracting as its parts with its moisture and 
becoming perfectly solid and cohesive. The means of separating the 
water suspended in the peat have, too, be carefully perfected. The 
necessity of dealing with, and getting rid of, such a large proportion of 
water has been a standing difficulty from the first and the cause of 
excessive expenditure. At Horwich the problem has been carefully 
studied, and the difficulties appear to have been successfully overcome. 
Until a mode of arrifficially drying peat rapidly and economically had 
been worked out air drying was necessarily resorted to ; and where 
limited quantities of fuel — say about 100 tons a-year — only are required, 
to be made air drying may suffice, but for large quantities it would be, 
in our fickle climate, too uncertain a process to be depended on, and for 
seven months in the year it would not be available at all. 
According to the system matured and established at Horwich, the 
peat, as it comes from the bog, is thrown into a mill expressly con- 
structed, by which it is reduced to a homogeneous pulpy consistency. 
The pulp is conveyed, by means of an endless band, to the moulding 
machine, in which, while it travels, it is formed into a slab and cut into 
blocks of any required size. The blocks are delivered by a self-acting 
process on a band, which conveys them into the drying chamber, through 
which they travel forwards and backwards on a series of endless bands 
at a fixed rate of speed, exposed all the time to the action of a current 
of heated air. The travelling bands are so arranged that the blocks of 
peat are delivered from one to the other consecutively, and are by the 
same movement turned over in order to expose fresh surfaces at regular 
intervals to the acti >n of the drying currents, so that they emerge from 
the chamber dry, hard, and dense. To the peat substance thus treated 
the name of " torbite " has been given, from the Latin torbo, by which 
name peat is constantly mentioned in ancient charters. 
The next stage in the process is the treatment of the torbite in close 
ovens, when it may either be converted into charcoal for smelting pur- 
poses, or may be only partially charred for use as fuel for generating 
steam, or in the puddling furnace. 
The whole of the Horwich system has been planned with a view to 
the utmost economy of time and labour. The raw peat is nearly 
altogether automatically treated by steam power — introduced at one end 
it issues from the other in the form of charcoal, within twenty-four 
hours after it is excavated from the bog, and the manual labour expended 
is almost entirely limited to the first operation of digging, consequently 
the actual outlay in labour and fuel in the production of the charcoal 
does not exceed from 10s. to 12s. per ton ; but, in addition to the eco- 
nomy thus effected by charring, in close ovens, a considerable quantity 
of valuable chemical products are yielded, as ammonia, acetic acid, 
pyroxylic spirit, paraffin oils, the sale of which alone nearly cover the 
expenses of the w)iole process. 
