PRACTICAL PAPERS—PRODUCTION OF IRON. 343 
much more extension of tbe business is possible in that region, 
except at much higher prices than now prevail. The main 
reliance of Scotland has heretofore been upon its blackband 
iron ore, “ and the development of its iron trade has been co¬ 
extensive with the exploration of that famous mineral, fur¬ 
naces following in the wake of its discovery. The clay bands 
are in such small seams, and of such irregular character that 
the business would soon languish and be greatly reduced if 
dependent upon them alone. The thickest and best seam of 
blackband, commonly called the ‘ airdrie,’ is now substantially 
exhausted, and the reliance is on seams of no greater thickness 
than eight inches. Blackbands are notoriously irregular, and 
are not found in uniform thickness ; for example, the airdrie 
blackband occupies but a small portion of the space allotted 
to it in Lanarkshire coal-field. A more notable example of 
caprice of blackband is to be found in the slaty band, which 
occurs occasionally in patches of irregular thickness, some¬ 
times six inches and sometimes six feet in thickness; but 
there is always something to mark its position, either a coal or 
iron stone. Indeed, all the iron stones in all portions of the 
coal-field are erratic. They are persistent throughout in no 
field, yet it is a singular fact that we have in all the fields 
blackband iron stone.’’ This extract from a paper of Ealph 
Moon, government mining Inspector in Scotland, is made for 
the double purpose of showing how impossible it is that there 
should be any considerable increase in the annual product of 
Scotch iron unless foreign ores are brought to utilize the 
unlimited supplies of admirable coal which exist in that 
country ; but, with the further object of giving some informa¬ 
tion, which may be of use in the development of the black¬ 
band iron ore which have been recently discovered in Schuyl¬ 
kill county, in Pensylvania, the value of which to the coun¬ 
try can hardly be exaggerated, if it should prove to be in 
quantity and quality equal to its British prototype. An anal¬ 
ysis of the best Scotch ore is here annexed—rather out of 
place, but too valuable as a guide to be dispensed with : 
