122

COAL MINES OF

years, requiring no repair, and the present cost'will not exceed two guineas and a half.*

<c It has been more than once urged thatventilation properly conducted will do everything. I grant that by proper ventilation se-veral accidents might be prevented. But whereis the colliery that is properly ventilated ? In-dependently of this, explosions have generallyarisen from the following causes, in whichventilation, even in its improved state, cannotbe considered as a preventive; for, from thepresent state of the collieries, considering theirextent and the time they have been worked,the uncertain information as to the extent orlimits of old collieries, on all sides, of whichno information can be obtained, besides theincertitude which prevails for want of mapsand records, no secure plan of ventilation canbe followed up in most of the mines in thisdistrict; and consequently explosions underthe present state of affairs must increase, pro-vided my apparatus be not in use, particularlythe following case as hinted at above.

« "When the plan of a colliery is abstractedor lost, as I understand to be the case in a

* They are how made of copper for thirty shillings,and may be had of block tin for seventeen.