Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne

“ Whilst Geology is making such rapid strides, and is met by so laudable a readiness to communicate facts, whereby to elucidate theory and to enable human reason to dive into the hidden mysteries of past ages, it has occurred to me to submit to the examination of the Society, a short description of a peculiar formation of Sand and Gravel, which spreads over a part of the collieries of Saint Lawrence and Gateshead Park, in this neighbourhood. ”

“ At the same time I must agree with you, that modern Botanists are carrying their ideas of division and subdivision to a most unwarrantable length, and that they are thereby doing an injury rather than a benefit to science, and are deterring many from undertaking the study altogether. I must not be supposed to condemn the subdivision of genera on every occasion. If there is a distinction in the habit of the plant, and a different mode of fructification at the same time, then I will allow the genus may be a good one. ”

“ Nothing can be more interesting, or more instructive and ennobling, to the mind of man, than the contemplation of the works of his Maker, which are daily before us, but when scenes of such immensity and grandeur present themselves, that even imagination has not pictured them, the soul must indeed be unsubdued which does not bow with admiration and awe. ”

“ Although the construction and size of the roasting furnaces, at most of the smelting mills in this district, are nearly alike, yet considerable difference is found in the rate and mode of working them. At some places, two men manage a furnace, into which one bing of ore is put at a charge, and the furnace is charged and drawn five times in eight hours. Each pair of men work 8 eight-hours-shifts per week, and are relieved at the end of each shift by another couple, who work with them alternately eight hours on and eight off; in this manner roasting eighty bings of ore per week in one furnace. ”

“ I have lately been engaged in some experiments on the colouring matter of the decayed wood on which Peziza æruginosa (well represented in Greville's Cryptogamic Flora, t. 241) generally occurs. It is often to a considerable depth of the same beautiful green colour as that remarkable Fungus, and frequently when none of that plant appears upon it, so that I should think that this colour is derived from a peculiar matter unconnected with the Peziza.
I find that it is most readily soluble in nitric acid, which soon acquires a deep emerald-green colour from a small portion of the wood. ”

“ It is not difficult to understand why these effects take place, when it is considered, that in smelting by means of the ore hearth, it is the oxygen of the blast and the atmosphere which principally accomplishes the reduction; and the point to be chiefly attended to, consists in exposing the ore to its action, at the proper temperature, and under the most favourable circumstances. The importance of having the ore free from impurities, is also evident; for all the stony or earthy matter it contains impedes the smelting process, and increases the quantity of slags. ”

“ From what is here said, it must not be supposed that the advantages of this perspective are such as to supersede the use of other plans; on the contrary, it must be kept in mind that the common ground plan and vertical section are among the very clearest and most perfect aids which drawing can afford to science: the application of one common scale in every direction of them renders them so easily understood, and so much within the reach of even the most ordinary understanding, that no other kind of projection can excel them as a popular and useful mode of delineating subterranean features. ”

“ The figure in English Botany is a good representation of the plant, but I suspect the Bramble of the south of England, by several Botanists considered the same as the Highland plant, will prove to be distinct from it, at least I am led to think so, by dried specimens collected in the former part of the kingdom.
Notwithstanding that the Willows are much more numerous than the Roses, their different species may, with attention, be settled with greater certainty and upon surer grounds, for they are less liable to run into varieties. ”

“ When the ore is of a description to smelt readily, and the hearth is well managed in every particular, it works with but a small quantity of brouse, which feels dry when stirred, and is easily kept open and permeable to the blast. The reduction proceeds rapidly with a moderate degree of heat, and the slags produced are inconsiderable; but, if in this state, the stirring of the brouse and exposure upon the workstone are discontinued, or practised at longer intervals, the hearth quickly gets too hot, and immediately begins to agglutinate together ”

“ A very slight difference of composition of perfectly dressed ore may readily be understood to affect its reducibility; and hence it is, that ore from different veins, or the same vein in different strata, as before observed, is frequently found to work very differently when smelted singly in the hearth. It happens, therefore, that with the best workmen, some varieties of ore require more coal and lime, and a greater degree of heat, than others ”

“ The proper charge of ore is spread evenly over the bed of the furnace to the depth of two or three inches, and the fire is at first pushed moderately, during which the ore is frequently turned and stirred, in order that the whole may be uniformly heated, but care is to be taken that no part is prematurely fused. If the fire is judiciously managed, the charge gradually attains a dull red heat — a greater heat is then given and the ore vigorously stirred, when, in a little time, it begins to feel soft and adhere slightly to the tool, in which state it is withdrawn from the furnace. ”

“ By far the most important stratum of this district is the Great Lime- stone, the bassett of which, in this and several adjacent dales, forms the limit of cultivated land and of human habitations. It preserves a nearly uniform thickness of 9 or 10 fathoms, and has produced as much ore as all the other strata put together ; the Rampgill Vein having, in this Limestone alone, produced 400 tons of Lead ore in each fathom of length for a consider- able distance. It is from the Great Limestone also that the mineral riches of Hudgill-burn have been chiefly obtained. ”

“ Some of the grey slags from the smelting hearth, unbroken, as picked out of the brouse, are now thrown upon the top, or rather round the edges of the fire, which fuses them rapidly into a liquid glass, and any lead they contain is set at liberty; the blast at the same time tending to reduce any particles of ore which may have escaped the action of the ore hearth. The lead and the melted glass both sink down through the porous mass of cinders placed in the lower part of the hearth ”

“ The furnace b, always heats the air in the shaft a, sufficiently to draw the current through the drift c. A furnace may be placed at d to be used occasionally, as it frequently happens in practice that the furnaces have to be worked alternately. The furnace d will draw the current of air as well through the b furnace drift, as the furnace b, will draw the current through the d furnace drift. Which ever furnace happens not to be at work is called the dumb furnace, and the drift leading from it into the shaft is called the dumb furnace drift. ”

“ On the Links south of Bamborough Castle, and on Holy Island, N.— July the 19th and 20th, 1804.
On the Links at Holy Island I have noticed thousands of the Dwarf Centaury, without finding one plant approximating in the shape of its leaves to the Common Centaury, even whose variety β, the Broad leaved Centaury of Smith, still retains its elliptical leaves on our sea beach; those of Erythraea littoralis, on the other hand, are with us invariably linear, but obtuse. Still cultivation alone can determine whether it should rank as a species. ”

“ The thick fluid glass, called black slag, after reaching the cast-iron bottom of the furnace, having cooled and thickened a little, does not sink further, but is made to issue through a small taphole, and flow over the cinders placed in the pan, running into the pit filled with water in a continued stream. By falling while hot into cold water, the black slag is granulated, and, as small particles of lead may be carried over with it, through inattention on the part of the workman, or otherwise, the granulated slags are carefully washed at most smelting mills before being thrown away. ”

“ A little slaked lime, in powder is then spread upon the brouse, which has been drawn forward upon the workstone, if it exhibit a pasty appearance; and a portion of coal is added to the hearth, if necessary, which the workman knows by experience. In the mean time, his fellow workman, or shoulder-fellow, clears the opening, through which the blast passes into the hearth, with a shovel, and places a peat immediately above it, which he holds in its proper situation, until it is fixed, by the return of all the brouse, from the workstone into the hearth. ”

“ Every one whose relatives had not yet been found, rushed to the pit in the fond hope of their yet being alive. The most exaggerated reports were spread, and the crowd of anxious inquirers thronged about the top of the pit so, as materially to impede the operations for the recovery of their relatives, which they were but too anxious to hasten. ”

“ In descending a smooth, perpendicular face of rock, of twenty or thirty feet in height, they have a method of assisting each other which struck me as remarkably ingenious : in it both ropes are employed, each climber having one end of his own rope firmly attached to his waist, while the other remains at liberty. Suppose it is their object to place A on a ledge 20 feet below where they both stand ; B chooses as deep a niche of the rock as he can find, and leaning far back into it, fixes himself firmly in his situation ”

“ All their thoughts are bent on the one subject of fowling, and all energies of mind and body centered in it. To say it is of as exclusive importance to them, as the capture of whales is to a Greenland crew, would convey but a slight idea of the value of fowl to the Kildean; for to the one his profession is matter of choice, and his mode of life may be changed at will for any other which appears more agreeable ”

“ Almost at every smelting mill a different mode of working, in point of time and quantity, is pursued; in some cases the quantity of ore smelted in one hearth, in a week, by four men, is 40 bings; but a fair rate of working is from 30 to 35 bings per week.
The quantity of coal required to smelt a fodder of lead, as has been already stated, varies with the quality of the ore. ”

“ Ventilation is the only means with which we are yet acquainted for clearing our coal mines from the constant influx of inflammable air to which they are subject. Sir HUMPHRY DAVY, and other chemists, have ascertained that it requires fourteen or fifteen volumes of atmospheric air to dilute one volume of the carburetted hydrogen of our collieries below the point of explosion. It, therefore, follows, that to place any colliery in a safe working state, requires fourteen or fifteen times as much atmospheric air to be passed through the workings, as they produce of gas. ”

“ The length of a shift is 14 or 16 hours, during which, the quantity of lead made varies from 10 to 21 cwt., according to the nature of the slags. Twenty to twenty four bushels of coke are required to produce one fodder of lead. The quantity of slag lead made in smelting, as may be conceived, is considerably greater in poor and refractory than in rich and free-running ores, but, it may be stated generally at one-thirteenth of the lead yielded at the smelting hearth, so that it is usual to reckon, in large transactions, 13 twelve-stone pigs of common lead, and 1 of slag lead, to the fodder. ”

“ If we mount our horse, take a journey in a gig or coach, or set out on a voyage in a steamer, we consider ourselves, in the common acceptation of the word — safe. Yet, in all those cases, fatal accidents frequently happen. ”

“ Kilda it is most abundant and of excellent quality, each spring being celebrated for some particular virtue it is imagined to possess, and named accordingly.
We were much struck with the good looks of the inhabitants as they turned out, men, women, and children, to receive us. They are of rather short stature, but present neat compact specimens of the human form, set off by lively intelligent countenances, adorned almost always with beautifully white teeth. ”