July 30, 1915.

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN

223

of at least 30 per cent, of the total votes, the Central
Authority shall decide whether the reduction shall take
place or not.

Section 6.—State mines may hand over their products
direct to administrations and works departments of the
Realm and Federal States, without being subjected to
limitations of quantity or price. In other respects, the
State-owned mines shall not enjoy any advantages over
those not owned by the State.

Section 7.—The company shall be under the super-
vision of the State Central Authority, which shall be
empowered, under the articles of association, to
delegate an advisory representative to attend the
meetings of the company. This representative may
oppose resolutions contravening the law, the articles
of association or the public interest, and the validity of
his objections shall be decided by the Central Authority.
The resolutions objected to shall not be adopted until
the Central Authority has given its decision against the
objection. In the case of resolutions objected to as
being against the public interest, the Central Authority,
before coming to a decision, shall have the point dis-
cussed by a committee to be summoned by it and con-
sisting of representatives of the mining, coal trade
industrial and agricultural interests, the municipalities
and the railway authorities.

Section 8.—Any person omitting, in contravention of
this Ordinance, to place mining products at the disposal
of the company shall be subject to a fine of up to
100,000 mk., irrespective of any penalty fixed by the
articles of association. A repetition of the offence will
render the offender liable to a term of imprisonment for
not more than six months. Punishment will also be
dealt out to any person making an unauthorised sale of
mining products in contravention of the undertaking
specified in relation to contracts under section 4.

Article 3.—The powers conferred by Article 1 shall
not be put into operation provided mine owners whose
production, as determined by official statistics, exceeds
97 per cent, of the total output of the district in question,
form a voluntary association for the purposes set forth
in Article 1, within a period to be fixed by the State
Central Authority, and provided the terms of associa-
tion are considered by the said Central Authority to
secure the interests of the public.

Article 4.—A company formed in accordance with
Article 1 shall be dissolved by the Central Authority
* provided the mine owners of the district in question,
whose production corresponds to the requirement of
Article 3, agree to form an association for the purpose
of Article 1, and the said Central Authority considers
that the interests of the public are secured by the terms
of the agreement.

Article 5.—This Ordinance shall come into force on
the day of publication. The date of its expiration shall
be settled by the Federal Council, and the companies
established in accordance with Article 1 shall come to
an end on. the said date of expiration of this Ordinance.

Herr Kirdorf, who is in charge of the negotiations
for the renewal of the Westphalian Coal Syndicate, has
informed the Vossiche Zeitung that both he and his
industrial colleagues were completely surprised by the
announcement of the Government policy. The Prussian
Minister of Commerce had taken part in the renewal
negotiations, and had made frequent threats of com-
pulsory legislation, but the leading men in the coal industry
had never imagined that such a drastic measure, the
effects of which would extend beyond the duration of the
war, would be adopted by the Government without con-
sultation with representatives of the industry. In view
of the unfavourable effects of the Potash Law, he was
inclined to view the policy of State syndicates with
mistrust, and to fear it would have an unhealthy influence
on the coal industry. Whether it would be possible
to form a voluntary association representing 97 per
cent, of the coal output in Rhenish Westphalia, in
order to avoid compulsion, was a question that could
not be answered offhand. Possibly that percentage had
been fixed in the Ordinance because of the fact that the
projected new syndicate agreement contained a clause
that notice of termination could be given as soon as the
production outside the syndicate amounted to more than
3 per cent, of the total output. The dissolution of the
syndicate at present would undoubtedly cause a
sharp rise in prices, probably exceeding anything the
syndicate might have to charge extra in future. Of
course, measures would have to be taken against a
heavy increase in prices during the war, but the
Government could have employed other means than the
present one. Although maximum prices might be open
to objection, they were certainly to be preferred to
compulsory syndicates with an influence extending
beyond the war period.

Notification has already appeared in the Reichsanzeiger
that companies in accordance with the provisions of
Article 1 of the Ordinance must be formed in the Dort-
mund district (the Ibbenburen-State and Preussische
Klus-Minden collieries being exempted) and in the
Krefeld (Bonn) district, by September 15 next. The
former district is that in which the activities of the
Rhenish - Westphalian Coal Syndicate are centred;
whilst the second one comprises, inter alia, the important
Rheinpreussen Colliery. The renewal of the present
syndicate must, in the ordinary course, be renewed by
September 30 ; but the negotiations will now have to be
accelerated or compulsion will be enforced after the 15th
of that month.

Following Mr. Runciman’s statement that 200 leading coal
merchants of London are prepared to open depots where coal
will be retailed in small quantities at the prevailing price
of the day, it is stated that the movement is not solely con-
fined to the Metropolis. The suggestion has been made that
the scheme should be extended to Liverpool, Manchester,
Birmingham, Leeds, and the other principal provincial
towns.

TRADE AND THE WAR.

Earlier in the year the Board of Trade circularised gas
undertakings and other coal users regarding the quantity of
coal in stock. These undertakings were requested to keep
the Board of Trade furnished weekly with information as to
how the storage of coal was progressing. Forms were pro-
vided for the purpose of filling in the particulars required,
with columns for (1) stock at the beginning of the week, (2)
coal used, (3) coal received, and (4) stock at end of week.
It is stated that the Board of Trade are now dispensing with
the weekly statements.

The War. Trade Department has made the following state-
ment to the Association of Chambers of Commerce, with
regard to the methods of the Government Department in
dealing with the granting of licences :—All applications for
licences, of which a very large number, about 2,000, are
received each day, are registered and then sent to the Trade
Clearing House. The Trade Clearing House has collected
and collated a huge mass of information about trading firms,
especially in neutral countries. This House reports as to
whether there is anything against either the consignor or
consignee, and no application is considered without reference
to this information. Many applications go next to a Govern-
ment Department, e.g., the War Office, the Admiralty, the
Board of Trade, the Board of Agriculture, or the Ministry
of Munitions, and are then referred to a special sub-com-
mittee when such a subcommittee exists. No licence is
granted in these cases without a recommendation from the
Department or sub-committee concerned, and no licence is
ever granted against a recommendation to the contrary from
those quarters. The work of the War Trade Department is
thus carried out with exact and scrupulous care. All possible
despatch is exercised, but a careful investigation of an appli-
cation for a licence is not always compatible with great
speed. Mistakes, no doubt, do occur, but it is claimed that
they are few in number, and that every possible care is
taken to prevent them. The strictest oversight and super-
vision are exercised.

The Conseil-General of the Seine propose to lay in an emer-
gency stock of 200,000 tons of coal, and if possible to store
in each commune a reserve stock of about one-third of the
'annual consumption. The question of coal in Paris is likely
to be of vital importance this winter, as prices have already
risen phenomenally.

A deputation of Welsh coal owners waited upon Mr.
Russell Rea, M.P., chairman of the Coal Exports Committee,
on Tuesday, in reference to the restriction of licences for the
export of coal, and the Coal Price (Limitation) Bill, and to
submit the scheme by which it is hoped coal supplies for
home consumption will be increased, while, at the same-time,
there will be greater freedom for coal export. The deputa-
tion—which consisted of Mr. Joseph Shaw, Mr. Thomas
Evans, Mr. Vivian Rees, Mr. John Andrews, Mr. W. R.
Hann, and Mr. Joseph Davies—first saw' Sir Clifford Cory,
M.P., and Mr. Donald Maclean, M.P., and then interviewed
Mr. Russell Rea. The proceedings were private, but briefly
the scheme is understood to provide that the authorities
should indicate to localities with local committees in coal-
bearing areas the quantities of coal required for home con-
sumption. The coal owners, on their part, will undertake
to earmark sufficient of the output to fully meet these require-
ments. They would then know how much of the output they
would be at liberty to export. Mr. Russell Rea went fully
into the matter, and explained that his Committee had acted
in a way they thought best calculated to conserve the home
supply of coal; but, at the same time, they had recognised
that it was to the country’s interests to get as large exports
as possible, as by this means credits established abroad would
be larger. He quite accepted the principle of the scheme, and
the suggestion was made that the deputation should see Mr.
Runciman, President of the Board of Trade. On the matter
being put to him, Mr. Runciman at once consented to see the
deputation, and, on having the scheme placed before him,
said he quite thought such a scheme would be the means of
increasing house coal supplies. He asked for further details,
and these will be sent him in due course.

OBITUARY.

It is with regret that we have to announce that Dr. Joseph
A. Holmes, director of the United States Bureau of Mines,
died from tuberculosis, resulting from overwork, in Denver,
Colorado, on July 12. Dr. Holmes founded the Pittsburg
testing station of the Bureau of Mines in 1907, immediately
after the mine disaster in Monongah, West Virginia, and
three years before the Bureau itself was organised by Con-
gress. It was, in great measure, through his efforts that
sufficient interest was aroused to warrant the establishment
of the Bureau in 1910. He was immediately placed in
charge. Dr. Holmes introduced into the country the use
of the oxygen helmet for rescue work, and was a consistent
exponent in America of the coal dust theory. He was born
at Laurens on November 23, 1859, and was a son of Z. L.
and Catherin Holmes (nee Nickles). In 1881 he received
the degree of B.Sc. from Cornell University. He later was
made a D.Sc. at the University of Pittsburg, and an LL.D,
at the University of North Carolina. He was professor of
geology and natural history in the University of North
Carolina from 1881 to 1891, and had been a lecturer there
since that time. He was State geologist from 1891 to 1904.
At that time he was placed in charge of the United States
Geological Survey laboratories for testing fuels and struc-
tural materials at St. Louis, where he remained until 1907.
Dr. Holmes went to Pittsburg in the same work in 1908.
He also was chief of the technology branch of the United
States Geological Survey, in charge of the investigation of
mine accidents, from 1907 to 1910. He was director of the
Bureau of Mines, Department of the Interior, since its
creation, July 1, 1910. At the St. Louis Exposition Dr.
Holmes was chief of the department of mines and metallurgy.

Capt. E. G. Tidd, 6th Highland Light Infantry, who has
been killed, was a member of the firm of Messrs. Morris,
Warden and Company, engineers, Gordon-street, Glasgow,
and was chairman of the Glasgow section of the Institution
of Electrical Engineers during the session 1909-10.

Mr. John Whitfield, who died at his residence, Bondicar-
terrace, Blyth, at the age of 61 years, had considerable coal
mining interests on the north-east coast, and was senior
partner of the firm of Messrs. Whitfield and Company,
managers of the Tyne and Blyth Shipowning Company, a
prominent member of the North of England Steamship
Owners’ Association, the senior member of the Blyth Harbour
Commission, a member of the Northumberland County
Council from its inception, and a magistrate for the county
of Northumberland.

Herr Joseph Thyssen, of Thyssen and Company, Millheim,
died on July 15, at the age of 71, as the result of being
crushed between the buffers of a train on the works railway.

Maj. A. M. Downie, l/5th Highland Light Infantry, who
has died in hospital at Alexandria from wounds received in
action in the Gallipoli Peninsula, was the managing director
of D. Stewart and Company Limited, general engineers,
Glasgow, and a director of R. M. Downie and Company
Limited, shippers, of Manchester. He was a B.Sc. of
Glasgow University, and an associate member of the Insti-
tute of Civil Engineers.

The death occurred on Monday, under tragic circumstances,
of Mr. Thomas Hoyle, retired colliery manager, of Turn,
near Ramsbottom (Lancashire). The deceased, who was
70 years of age, went to the vicinity of the Scout Moor
Colliery to get some “ crop coal,” and was subsequently
found by his son, who is the manager of the colliery, pinned
under a big piece of rock. He had evidently undermined
the rock, which had fallen on him. His skull was fractured,
and it is thought that death must have been instantaneous.

Mr. Charles Watson, docks engineer of the North-Eastern
Railway Company, died at his residence at Tickton, near
Beverley, on Tuesday.

We regret to announce the death of Mr. Henry Alexander
Mavor, which occured on the 16th inst. Mr. Mavor was
born in 1858, and was intimately concerned with the early
days of electric supply in Scotland through his firm, Messrs.
Muir and Mavor. The firm afterwards devoted itself
extensively to electric manufacturing, taking the name of
Mavor and Coulson. Its first works were at Orr-street,
Bridgeton, Glasgow, but in 1898 new works were built at
King-street, Mile End. The firm have been concerned with
general electrical manufacture, but have specialised in con-
nection with the application of electricity to coal cutting.
Mr. Mavor was born at Stranraer, and was educated at the
Glasgow and West of Scotland Technical College and at
Glasgow University. He was a member of the institutions
of Civil and Electrical Engineers, and a member of the
American Institute of Electrical Engineers. He had been a
member of council and vice-president of the Institution of
Engineers and Shipbuilders in Scotland, and chairman of the
advisory committee on juvenile employment of the Board
of Trade Glasgow Labour Exchange.

The death is regretted at Hull of Mr. Herbert Winston
Martin, aged 50 years, who was known to a wide circle of
friends in the coal trade of the Humber. For 37 years he
had been employed on the staff of Messrs. Pyman, Bell and
Company, coal exporters, Hull. Wreaths were sent to the
funeral by the firm and many coal traders, and also from,
his friends on the Hull Coal Exchange.

THE IRISH COAL TRADE,

Thursday, July 29.

Dublin.

Business in the house coal trade continues to be active, the
orders coming in being chiefly for stocking for autumn and
winter use. The steam coal trade is rather quiet at present,
as consumers are adopting a waiting policy in view of possible
reductions. Prices of all qualities are unchanged during the
week, viz. :—Best Orrell, 34s. per ton; Hulton Arley, 33s.;
best Wigan, 32s.; best Whitehaven, 32s.; Pemberton Wigan,
31s.; kitchen nuts, 30s.; best slack, 26s.; all less Is. per
ton discount. Scotch steam coal, 28s. to 29s. per ton; large
Welsh steam, about £'2 2s. per ton; smaller ditto, for stock-
ing, 36s.; coke, 34s. per ton delivered. Pit prices for
Kilkenny (Castlecomer) coal outside of contract prices are as
follow:—Best small coal, 23s. 4d. per ton; best large,
21s. 8d.; second quality, 20s.; bottom coal, 16s. 8d.;
breakage, 11s. 8d.; culm, 5s. to 8s. 6d. In his report on
the Castlecomer coal, the master of Nenagh Workhouse says
it has given the utmost satisfaction, and has reduced the
coal consumption by 75 per cent. Irish coal at Wolf hill
Collieries, Queen’s County, is 25s. per ton for round coal at
the pit; culm, all prices from 3s. 4d. to 10s. per ton. A
report is in circulation that the Development Commissioners
have recently recommended the Treasury to make a sub-
stantial grant from the Development Fund for the construc-
tion of a railway, for which statutory powers were secured
two or three sessions ago, for connecting the above collieries
with the Great Southern and Western Railway at Athy.
During the past week 55 coal vessels arrived in this port,
chiefly from Ayr, Garston, Partington, Maryport, Liverpool,
Preston, Whitehaven, Ardrossan, Girvan, Ellesmere Port,
Glasgow, Manchester, Saundersfoot, Irvine, and Point of
Aire. The total quantity of coal discharged upon the quays
was 22,383 tons, as compared with 19,000 tons the week
previously.

Belfast.

The fulfilment of orders from the inland districts is being
proceeded with more expeditiously, but business locally con-
tinues to be rather quiet upon the whole, a condition which
is ascribed to the introduction of the Bill relating to prices
in the House of Commons. Prices of house coal are
unchanged, as follow:—Best Arley, 36s. per ton; Orrell
nuts, 35s.; Scotch house coal, 32s.; Orrell slack, 32s. per ton
delivered. From July 4 to 17 the total number of colliers
entering the harbour was 116. Coal-laden vessels arriving
during the past week w’ere chiefly from Garston, Ayr, Irvine,
Workington, Manchester, Partington, Cardiff, Ardrossan,
Silloth, Troon, Garston, and Maryport.

THE TIN-PLATE TRADE.

Liverpool.

The tone of the market is not quite so good. Enquiries
have fallen off a good deal, and buyers are only covering their
actual requirements. Second-hand sellers are also discount-
ing works prices to some extent; 18s. 6d. has been freely
quoted by merchants for spot lots of I C 14 x 20, and it is
reported that a line for forward shipment has been placed
with a maker at 18s. 9d. We should, however, call makers’
current quotations as follow, for shipment over rest of the
year :—Coke tins : I C 14 x 20 (112 sh. 1081b.), 18s. 104d.
to 19s. l|d. per box: I C 28 x 20 (56 sh. 1081b.), 19s. 4|d.
to 19s. 6d.; IC 28 x 20 (112 sh. 2161b.), 38s. to 38s. 3d.;
IC 14 x 18| (124 sh. 1101b.), 19s. to 19s. 3d.; I C 20 x 10
(225 sh. 1561b.), 27s. 3d. to 27s. 6d.: IC squares and odd
sizes, 19s. 3d. to 19s. 6d. basis. Charcoals are quoted 21s.
basis and upwards, according to tinning. Ternes are easy,
at 34s. 3d. to 34s. 6d. for I C 28 x 20. Coke wasters are
selling rather slowly. Quotations :—C W 14 x 20, 18s. l|d.
per box; CW 28 x 20 , 36s. 9d. to 37s.; C W 14 x 18|,
18s. 9d.; C W 20 x 10, 26s. to 26s. 6d.; all f.o.b. Wales,
less 4 per cent.