\Tune 13, 1913.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

1285

execution of certain of the works and provide
for the use of private owners’ wagons in the
traffic. The alternative Bill promoted by colliery
companies in the Lothians was rejected.

In the Glasgow pig iron warrant market, on
Wednesday, it was announced that Messrs.
James Watson and Co. had been obliged to
suspend payment. The firm is one of the most
prominent on the pig iron warrant market. It
is understood that the firm’s difficulties have
arisen in connection with heavy speculative
movements and the heavy fall that has occurred
recently in the Cleveland iron market.

By a large majority the Yorkshire miners
have decided to strike in support of the claim
for a minimum wage for surface workers in
‘"West Yorkshire. In the hope that negotiations
would lead to a settlement of this as well as the
non-unionist question, however, notices were
not issued on Monday, and on Wednesday a
^conference was held at Leeds between the West
Yorkshire Coalowners’ Association and the Joint
Board of the Yorkshire Miners’ Association.
Tn view of the many points raised during
the afternoon it was found to be impossible to
arrive at a definite conclusion, and after an
amicable discussion the conference was adjourned
to some future date. After the South Yorkshire
owners have been met, the miners’ council will
meet to consider further action.

Meetings of the North of England Institute
and the Mining Institute of Scotland will be
held to-morrow (Saturday) at Newcastle and
Edinburgh respectively. On Monday, a meeting
of the South Staffordshire and Warwickshire
Institute will be held at Walsall.

The proposals for preventing colliery explo-
sions, made by Dr. Harger, were the subject of
prolonged discussion at a meeting of the
Manchester Geological and Mining Society held
at Manchester on Tuesday. A report appears
next week.

The application for an increase in the wages
of Scottish miners, to the extent of 25 per cent,
on basis rates, made by the workmen, and the
counterclaim for a decrease of 12J per cent,
made by the coalowners, came before a meeting
of the Scottish Coal Trade Conciliation Board,
held on Tuesday in Glasgow. The Board again
failed to agree, and it was decided to invite
Lord Balfour of Burleigh to act as independent
chairman, and in the event of his being unable
to act, Sheriff A. O. M. Mackenzie. The board
will meet again on Friday, June 20, or on
Monday, June 23.

The enquiry on the proposed General Regula-
tions will be opened on Tuesday next at the
Caxton Hall, Westminster, when Lord Mersey
will sit to hear objectors.

At a meeting of the North Staffordshire
Institute, on Monday, Dr. Cadman read a sugges-
tive paper on high temperatures in British
mines.

On Wednesday, the Court of Appeal opened
the important case from Durham in which Mr.
Justice Pickford awarded a hewer at Thornley
Colliery damages for wrongful imprisonment, on
the ground that facilities should have been
provided for enabling him to leave the pit on
ceasing work owing to a dispute.

The Scottish Justiciary Appeal Court have
dismissed the appeal of the Procurator-Fiscal in
the prosecution against Mr. C. C. Reid, manager
for the Fife Coal Company at Dalbeath, in
which the defence was successfully raised that
a self-acting incline is not a haulage road on
which mechanical haulage is employed, and that
therefore there is no statutory obligation to use
backstays.

We regret to announce the sudden death of
Mr. Matthew Habershon, general manager and
director of Messrs. Newton Chambers’ Thorn-
cliffe Collieries. Mr. Habershon, who was
57 years of age, was associated throughout his
life with these collieries, and was a pioneer in
the provision of rescue stations.

Yet another rescue official has lost his life.
On Friday last Captain Henry Ramsay, chief
officer of the Northumberland and Durham
Collieries’ Rescue Brigade, lost his life while
experimenting with breathing appliances in
stythe in the drift at the Benwell Colliery. The
inquest was opened on Saturday, and adjourned
until the 28th inst.

Until a few years ago it was
Pyrites and generally believed that the spon-
Cob Fires, taneous combustion of coal was
most frequently due to the heat
caused by the decomposition of iron pyrites, but
the fact that coals which contained only minute
quantities of pyrites were frequently liable to
ignite spontaneously has raised considerable
discussion.

An investigation into the matter of the
spontaneous combustion of coal was undertaken
at the Engineering Experimental Station of the
University of Illinois, with special reference to
bituminous coals of the Illinois type, by Messrs.
S. W. Parr and F. W. Kressmann, and the
results were embodied in a Bulletin (No. 46)
issued in December 1910.*

The authors say that “ the total heat evolved
from the pyritic oxidation does not seem
important when compared with the heat liberated
by the absorption of oxygen, but it is to be
remembered that the absorption of oxygen by
coal is immensely accelerated at an increased
temperature, and it seems very probable that the
pyritic oxidation may be the means by which
this temperature, favourable to active oxygen
absorption, is attained.”

A valuable paper on the “ Spontaneous
Combustion of Coal ” was contributed to the
Canadian Mining Institute, in March 1910, by
Mr. Edgar Stansfield, who arrived at practi-
cally the same conclusion—that the part played
by pyrites is of a subsidiary nature.

This paper has been reprinted in Vol. vi. of
“ An Investigation of the Coals of Canada,”
recently published, and Vol. vii. will contain
further and later information, to be supplied by
the same author.

In his report, dated March 6, 1912, on the
causes of and circumstances attending the
explosion in the Jamage Pit, on November 25,
1911, H.M. Chief Inspector of Mines, Mr. R. A. S.
Redmayne, gave a brief summary of the causes
of spontaneous combustion, in which he said :
“ It used to be supposed that spontaneous com-
bustion was the resultant of the heat due to the
oxidation of the pyrites in the coa], the sulphide
being converted into the sulphate, but this has
been shown to be false.” He went on, however,
to say “ that the pyrites, especially if very finely
disseminated throughout the coal, is a contri-
butory cause, is no doubt true, the manner of the
occurrence of the pyrites being more important
than its amount. The chief cause is, however,
the absorption of oxygen by the coal, the carbon
and hydrogen of the latter being attacked by
oxygen.”

In Vol. IV. of the new edition of “A
Dictionary of Applied Chemistry,” by Sir
Edward Thorpe, which has just been published,
the contributor of the article on “ Oxygen ” says
“ the allegation that the ignition of coal is due to

* Colliery Guardian, November 17,1911.

the oxidation of pyrites has been disproved by
the work of Richter and Lewes, who have
shown that the heat is generated by the absorp-
tion of oxygen and its action on the bituminous
constituents of coal.”

At the request of some of the coalowners in
the Doncaster district, Dr. Haldane began,
about a year ago, to direct a thorough investiga-
tion into the circumstances attending gob fires.
At the same time, Dr. Haldane was asked to
engage the very best talent to carry out sepa-
rately subsidiary investigations into special
subjects in regard to which scientific data and
information were required.

One of the first of these investigations, on
“The Slow Combustion of Coaldust and its
Thermal Value,”* was entrusted to Mr. F. E. E.
Lamplough and Miss A. Muriel Hill, and the
results were contributed as a paper read at the
meeting of the Institution of Mining Engineers
held in London last week.

One of the conclusions arrived at by the
authors of the paper was that “ with conditions
under which there is diffusion of air through
the coaldust, and when a considerable amount
of iron pyrites is present, the oxidation of this
mineral would possibly be the predominant
factor in the spontaneous heating of coaldust.”

The paper aroused an interesting and lively
discussion at the meeting, in the course of which
Prof. Henry Louis drew attention to a fact
which is frequently overlooked—that two kinds
of pyrites exist in coal, the cubical pyrites and
the coxcomb pyrites. The former has consider-
able resisting power, while the latter oxidises
with great rapidity.

Each species has the same chemical composi-
tion, FeS^, but crystallises in a different form-
Common iron pyrites, also known as “ mundic,’’
“ fool’s gold,” and “ brass,” crystallises in the
regular or cubical system. “ Cockscomb ’’ pyrites,
or marcasite, crystallises in the rhombic system.
The latter is hot found in simple crystals, but,
owing to its multiple twinning, presents a great
variety of shapes with jagged outlines and
re-entrant angles, and on this account it has
obtained the names “ spear ” and “ cellular ”
pyrites* It is also known as “ white ” pyrites.

It is not unlikely that this case of isomerism
may explain and reconcile the divergent opinions
recorded by different observers.

A Departmental Committee is now sitting
“ to enquire into the circumstances in which a
spontaneous combustion of coal occurs in mines,
its causes, and the means of preventing it or of
dealing with it when it has arisen,” and their
conclusions upon this point will be received
with interest.

Trade Summary.

The London coal trade has slightly improved during the
past week, and depots report an increasing number of orders
from the general public. The house coal market continues
very dull, as, of course, the actual consumption is exceed-
ingly small. The bulk of the buying is for stock coal.
No change in prices is reported, but a large number of
special sales are recorded from time to time. The renewal
of contracts at the Is. advance is very slowly proceeding.
Many of the London merchants strenuously oppose it.
Slacks and small nuts are not so plentiful, and maintain
full values. Manufacturing coals are firm. Gas coke is
getting scarce.

The market at Newcastle continues unsatisfactory, and
prices vary considerably. The shipping enquiry is dull.

The Durham coal trade is still weak, although tonnage is
offering rather more freely. Gas coal is more plentiful.

The Lancashire house coal trade remains under a cloud,
but in other branches a fair demand is experienced. In
slacks there is a fair balance between supply and demand.

House coal in West Yorkshire has fallen off, and the pits
are on short time. Slacks are not quite so plentiful.

In South Yorkshire, the demand for export is rather
more vigorous. Small coals are more freely offere^. House
coal is quiet. Coke is unsettled.

Derbyshire house coal is quiet, but prices remain steady

* Colliery Guardian, June 6,1913.