in the middle of the eighteenth century, it was revived at
Colebrook Dale by the Darbys. In the intermediate period, we were dependent
on Russia, Spain, and Sweden for the chief part of the iron used in
manufactures.

But one of the most curious passages in Dudley's Metallum Martis, is the
following picture of the Dudley coal-field:--"Now let me show some reasons
that induced me to undertake these inventions. Well knowing that within ten
miles of Dudley Castle, there be near 20,000 smiths of all sorts, and many
ironworks within that circle decayed for want of wood (yet formerly a mighty
woodland country); secondly, Lord Dudley's woods and works decayed, but pit-
coal and iron stone or mines abounding upon his lands, but of little use;
thirdly, because most of the coal mines in these parts are coals ten, eleven,
and twelve yards thick; fourthly, under this great thickness of coal are very
many sorts of ironstone mines; fifthly, that one-third part of the coals
gotten under the ground are small, when the colliers are forced to sink pits
for getting of ten yards thick, and are of little use in an inland country,
unless it might be made use of by making iron therewith; sixthly, these
colliers must cast these coals and slack out of their ways, which, becoming
moist, heat naturally, and kindle in the middle of these great heaps, often
sets the coal works on fire and flaming out of the pits, and continue burning
like AEtna in Sicily or Hecla in the Indies." (sic.)

At present, for more than ten miles round Dudley Castle, iron works of one
kind or another are constantly at work; no remains of mighty woodland are to
be found. The value of the ten yard coal is fully appreciated, but the
available quantity is far from having been worked out. The untouched mineral
wealth of Lord Ward in this district was valued, ten years ago, at a million
sterling. The small coal is no longer wasted, but carefully raised from the
pits and conveyed by the numerous canals, tram-roads, and railroads, to iron
works, glass works, and chemical works. But still heaps of waste, moistened
by rain, do smoke by day, and flaming by night in conjunction with hundreds
of fiery furnaces and natural gases blazing, do produce, on a night's journey
from Dudley to Wolverhampton, not the effect of one AEtna or Hecla, but of a
broad "inferno," from which even Dante might have gathered some burning
notions.

The political croakers who are constantly predicting th