458

THE COLLIERY GUARDIAN.

March 10, 1916.

LETTERS TO THE EDITORS.

The Editors are not responsible either for the statements
made, or the opinions expressed by correspondents.

All communications must be authenticated by the name and
address of the sender, whether for publication or not.
No notice can be taken of anonymous communications.

As replies to questions are only given by way of published
answers to correspondents, and not by letter, stamped
addressed envelopes are not required to be sent.

BAR v. DISC COAL CUTTERS.

Sirs,—In the discussion of the relative merits of the
disc, bair and chain types of coal cutters, the makeis of
the first two types sometimes try to justify die principles
of these machines—especially the first two types—by
analogies to other cutting machines—such .as milling
machines >and saws.

Such analogies are obviously beside the point. Coal
cutlers have a very different cutting problem than the
machines mentioned, and what may apply > to cutting
metal in a machine shop or wood in a saw mill does
not have any appreciable bearing on coal cutters.

A statement recently made by a disc machine manu-
facturer in an endeavour to justify this type was,
however, so much in error that it seems proper to
correct it. The statement was :—

“No timber worker would ever think of cutting
heavy logs up with a band saw! He would naturally
use a circular saw! ”

May I point out that the band saws are used almost
exclusively in all modem saw mills in Western Canada
and the west and north-western part of the United
States? Some very large logs are sawn up in these
districts by band saws. For instance, redwood trees
21 ft. in diameter are sawn in this way. A circular saw
7 ft. in diameter is considered about the practicable
limit.

I will not attempt io justify the chain machine by
these facts—their success of late under conditions from
anthracite and hard pavement holing to holing under
tender laminated coal and bad top disturbed by the
mining out of adjacent seams would seem to be more
pertinent. It may be suggested that when it comes to
holing 10 ft. under (as a Sullivan chain header is doing
in South Whales), that the constructor of a disc machine
would encounter somewhat the same troubles as the
builder of a circular saw for splitting a 21 ft. redwood
tree.	Austin Y. Hoy.

London, March 4, 1916.

BOOK NOTICES.

Directory of British Manufacturers for Russian Trade.

Edited by B. A. Lenski. Nearly 400 pp. 9f in. x 6 in.

The Busso-British Trade Exchange Limited, 16, Begent-
street, London; 1915.

This is one of the first practical steps taken to stimu-
late British trade'with Bussia, and to divert to British
concerns the enormous trade heretofore enjoyed with
Bussia by Germany. The work is printed in the Russian
language for circulation in Russia. In the directory
referred to, the trade headings are given in Russian and
English, with a brief supplement in English, “ Side-
lights on Russia,” and copious advertising pages. It
bears evidence of very careful compilation, and has
evidently received the support of the representative
British manufacturing houses. It is published at 5s. by
the Russo-British Trade Exchange Limited, 16, Regent-
street, London, which company also undertakes the
furnishing of reports on the standing of Russian firms,
the placing of advertising in Russian publications for the
British manufacturers and shippers, and is in a posi-
tion to give expert advice in this connection, and gener-
ally with regard to Russo-British trade.

The Mining Manual and Mining Year Book, 1916. By

Walter B. Skinner. 957 pp. 8|in. x 5^ in. W. B.
Skinner and The Financial Tinies, London; 1916.

This volume is the 30th consecutive yearly issue, the
first having been issued in 1887. The work covers every
section of the mining market, and many mines whose
shares are not dealt in at present on the London Stock
Exchange are included. The alphabetical arrangement
adopted last year as regards the body of the work is
continued, and the index has not been abandoned, being
very helpful—especially to those not over-familiar with
Stock Exchange nomenclature—for cross references. To
carry out this policy, but at the same time avoid the
work becoming too unwieldy, the supplementary index
(which has been transferred to the end of the book) con-
tains the names of those companies which have either
ceased to be of public interest, or are in too dormant a
state to justify their inclusion in the body of the work,
no less than 2,657 companies being mentioned. By a
search through the two indices an executor or a solicitor
engaged in winding-up an estate is able, with the least
possible labour, to ascertain whether old mining scrip
represents a property still in being, or whether the mine
may be assumed to have gone into liquidation cr
disappeared.

No important innovations have been made in the body
of the work, whose numerous informative features by
now almost speak for themselves. An analysis of at
least the last balance-sheet—and in many cases of the
last two—is a. prominent feature of every notice, while
the dividends from the start are given, also details of
ore reserves, borehole results, description and capacity
of treatment plant, and any other facts likely to be of
service to those who consult the work. The practice of
placing full tabular statements of the crushing results

of all the various mining fields together at the beginning
of the book has again been followed, as this system has
proved the most convenient for ready ~ reference and
comparisons. Alphabetical lists of mining directors,
secretaries, engineers, and mine managers, with their
addresses and the names of the companies with which
they are connected, are, as usual, included. These are
supplemented by an up-to-date dictionary of mining
terms, which is yearly revised in order to include the
fresh puzzles set mining operators by the extension of
enterprise to new fields where unfamiliar currency,
weights, etc., are employed. For instance, the explana-
tions of the terms used in the reports of Russian mining
companies will be particularly helpful, the more so as
they are not to be found in ordinary mining glossaries.

An appendix will be found on pp. 934 to 936, contain-
ing the latest registrations of new companies, and other
particulars completing the information in the body of the
work to within a few days of publication.

LAW INTELLIGENCE.

HOUSE OF LORDS.—March 6.

Before Viscount Haldane, and Lords Kinnear, Shaw,
Parmoor, and Wrenbury.

Workmen’s Compensation : “ Accident ” Defined.

P. Welsh v. The Glasgow Coal Company Limited. — In
this case the colliery company were the appellants, and the
respondent a miner in their employ, Welsh, who had secured
compensation from the arbitrator, w’hich was confirmed by
the Court of Session, Scotland. The facts of the case are
briefly these : On October 23, 1914, the pump in the
appellants’ Newton pit, Kenmuir Hill Colliery, broke down,
and the work had to cease. Five days later, Welsh, a
brusher, was sent down the pit. He went down, believing
that he was to carry out his ordinary occupation of brusher,
but when he reached the bottom he was ordered to bale out
the water, and this he proceeded to do. It necessitated his
standing in the water up to his chest for eight hours.
Subsequently he was laid up with sub-acute rheumatism,
which rendered him unfit for work. His incapacity lasted
for about 12 weeks; and for five further weeks he was
partially incapacitated. The arbitrator awarded him 20s.
a week for the first period, and 8s. 3d. per week for the
second period, and the Court of Session upheld this decision.

Viscount Haldane, in giving judgment, said that the
question raised in the appeal was not really a difficult one.
The Sheriff-Substitute, who was the arbitrator, had found
that the rheumatism from which the respondent suffered
“ was caused by the extreme and exceptional exposure to
cold and damp, to which he was subjected,” by complying
with the directions given to him on October 28, 1914, to
bale the water out of the pit. In order to make out his
claim under the Workmen’s Compensation Act, 1906, a
workman must prove that there was “ personal injury by
accident arising out of and in the course of his employ-.
ment.” In the present appeal it was clear that it must be
taken that the arbitrator found conclusively that there was
injury due from an event arising out of and in the course
of the employment. The one question was whether, reading
the award as a whole, that event could be in point of law
an accident within . the meaning of the Act, for if so the
arbitrator certainly had before him evidence on which he
could find that it had happened. On the question so remain-
ing, he thought that the judgment in the House of Lords in
Fenton v. Thorley and Company Limited, was conclusive.
If the definition of accident within the meaning of the
Act was “ an unlooked-for mishap or an untoward event
which is not expected or designed,” as stated by Lord
Macnaghten, it covered the present case. If a qualification
was added, as was proposed by Lord Robertson, to the
effect that such mishap must arise from miscalculation of
forces, or inadvertence to them, he thought the definition
so qualified would still cover the case. For he interpreted
the finding of facts as amounting to this : that there was
an entry into the cold water and prolonged exposure to it,
the effects of which', being miscalculated, proved unex-
pectedly injurious. There W'as no suggestion of serious and
wilful misconduct on the part of the workman, which might
under section 1 (2c) of the Act deprive him of the right to
compensation. Indeed, it was plain that he went into the
water to bale it out of the pit under directions from his
employer, and he did not appear to have entertained such
apprehensions of danger to himself as to induce him to
disobey those directions. Had he died suddenly whilst so
exposed, say of heart disease, there could be no doubt that
this would have given a title to his dependants to claim
on the footing of injury from accident. He was unable to
see why a claim in respect of a less serious mishap should
be excluded by the circumstance that the miscalculated
action of entering the water took time to produce its con-
sequences. That miscalculated action of entering the water
in the present case must be taken to have constituted a
definite event, which culminated in rheumatic affection. It
was the miscalculation which imported into that event the
character of an accident within the meaning of the Act.
For those reasons he had come to the conclusion that the
appeal ought to be dismissed with costs, and he moved
accordingly.

Lord Kinnear agreed that the appeal must be dismissed.
The question for decision was whether the injury could
properly, and, according to the ordinary use of language, be
called accidental. In some cases it had been contended that
a disease was not an accident, and was therefore excluded
from the scope of the enactment. That seemed to be sug-
gested by an ambiguity in the use of the word “ accident,”
which might either denote a cause or an effect, and the argu-
ment, assuming the latter meaning to be intended, was that
no injury could be called accidental unless it were a visible
hurt to the body apparently caused by some external force.
But there was no support for that notion to be found in the
statute. For the statutory form of words got rid of the
double meaning completely. In view of previous decisions
of their lordships, he apprehended that it must now be taken
as settled that while a disease was not in itself an accident,
it might be incurred by accident, and that that was enough
to satisfy the statute. On that point, indeed, the statute was
its own interpreter. For the section which enabled certain
industrial diseases to be treated as accidents, although, in
fact, they were not accidental, provided that this was not
to affect the right of a workman to recover compensation in
respect of a disease to which the section did not apply, “ if
the disease is a personal injury by accident w the sense of
the Act.”

Lord Shaw also, held that the appeal should fail. Injury
by accident, he said, was a composite expression. It included
a case like the present, namely, the contraction of disease
arising from an exceptional exposure. That expression,
” contraction of disease,” might also, no doubt, be analytic-
ally treated, and it might be said that the disease was the
injury, and its contraction the accident; but that carried the
matter no further; and in both cases the composite synthetic
expression brought the events together just as they happened
in life and in fact. That construction, besides being most
simple, prevented the confusion that was apt to arise by the
supposed difficulty of applying the Act, because the event
could not be fixed in date. The disease and its contraction
stood together so far as date was concerned.

Lord Wrenbury considered that the matter might be sum-
marised by saying, that although the “ personal injury ” (the
death, or disease, or whatever it was) could not be the
accident, yet the contraction of a disease, or the incurring of
the death might be by accident. The fact of disease was not
an accident, but the contraction of disease might be by
accident. Section 8 (10), in using the words, “ if the
disease is a personal injury by accident,” meant, he thought,
“ if the disease is a personal injury incurred by accident.”
He agreed that the appeal must be dismissed.

Lord Parmoor also concurred.

The appeal was accordingly dismissed, with costs.

HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE.

KING’S BENCH DIVISION.—March 6.

Before Mr. Justice Scrutton.

Bunker Coal Contract : War Clause.

Scheepvaart Maatschappij Sylsen v. The North African
Coaling Company.—This was a claim by plaintiffs against
the defendants, who have a coaling ’depot at Algiers, in
respect of a breach of contract made between the parties
for the supply to vessels, owned and managed by the plain-
tiffs, of bunker coal. The vessel, the “ Frinthandel,” -was
not supplied with coal by the defendants, they having, some
time before her arrival in Algiers, purported to cancel the
contract under a clause in it. The real question to be decided
by the court was whether the defendants were justified in
cancelling the contract, and refusing to supply any coal.
Plaintiffs were obliged to purchase necessary coal for the
vessel, and they claimed as damages the difference between
the price of the coal and the contract price, viz., £612.

In giving judgment, Mr. Justice Scrutton said that on
the anti-war contract form was pasted a slip “ A,” which he
suspected to be a general clause agreed to by the owners of
coal depots, and patched into their contracts without any
minute consideration whether its language suited the
particular contract in question. It ran : “ Notwithstanding
the war clause, it is understood that depots will supply
during the present hostilities so long and in such quantities
as the port authorities will permit, and should circumstances
arise, to further interfere in any manner with the supply
shipment, carriage, or delivery of the coals, this contract
is subject to cancelmen t by the suppliers.” The question,
said his lordship, was whether the events which happened
were sufficient to relieve the coaling company under the
provisions of this clause. The matters which freed the coal-
ing company were said to be interference with supplies by
the French authorities, and the requisitioning of large
numbers of steamers by the Government, with the conse-
quent reduction of steamers available for trade, and increase
of freights. He was, he said, not satisfied that the regula-
tions of the Government would have prevented the shipment
of the 500 tons asked for on the “ Frinthandel ” in
February. He was satisfied that the Government regulations
would not have allowed the coaling company to supply coal
to all the ship owners who, in January and February, would
have claimed coal if their contracts made before the middle
of December were still in force. The question, then, was :
“ Had circumstances arisen further to interfere with the
supply, shipment, or delivery of the coal?” He had come
to the conclusion that the last words were not limited to
supply at Algiers, though the word “ supply ” in many
parts of the contract had that meaning. He thought the
words might be paraphrased : “ the supply of the coal in
Wales for shipment for and carriage to Algiers and delivery
to ships there.” The rise in freights was not large, but
boats were difficult to get. On January 15, when the coaling
company cancelled, they had been deprived of their ship char-
tered to carry coal which was ready for her by the unexpected
requisition of the Government, and could not replace her
coal at Algiers within a month. That was certainly, in
his view, a fresh circumstance further interfering with ship-
ment and carriage. And he thought, although he was not
so clear about it, that the French regulations, requiring a
minimum of coal to be kept at Algiers, was also a fresh
circumstance further interfering with the delivery of coal.
In his view, the coaling company, following the principle
laid down in Crawford v. Wilson, were entitled to look at
the matter from the point of view of all their trade, and
not of the individual demand of coal for one ship to one
customer. From that point of view he thought they had
established their right to cancel, and he gave judgment for
them, with costs.

COMMERCIAL COURT.—March 6 and 8.

Before Mr. Justice Bailhache.

War Clause in Coal Contracts.

Orient Steamships Navigation Company v. The Naval
Colliery Company (1897) Limited.—In this case the colliery
company were sued for an alleged breach of contract to
supply from 45,000 tons to 50,000 tons of Naval large coal
during 1914, for the latter’s requirement at Colombo. The
contract, it was stated, was dated December 11, 1913, and it
contained the following clause : “ In the event of the United
Kingdom being at war with any European State or extra-
. European first-class Power, or any prohibit being made by
the British Government on the export of Welsh coal, the
quantity due for delivery under this contract for the period
over which such war or prohibition extends shall be extended
for a corresponding period after the withdrawal of such pro-
hibition.” Plaintiffs stated, in their claim, that the contract
was to provide the above-mentioned quantity of coal during
1914, the prices being 17s. 6d. a ton for colliery screened,
and 8s. 3d. a ton for double screened at the time of shipment.
The plaintiffs were to provide tonnage, and “ should defen-
dants decline to accept tonnage in accordance with the terms
of the contract, they were to pay as liquidated damages the
difference between the contract price and the current price,
and on the last day of the month on the quantity so detained.”