REPORT on the INSPECTION of METALLIFEROUS MINES in CORNWALL, DEvonshire, and part of SOMERSETSHIRE for the year ended 31st December 1873.-By CLEMENT LE NEVE FOSTER, Esq., B.A., D.Sc., F.G.S. SIR, Truro, 11th May 1874. I HAVE the honour to lay before you my report on the inspection of mines in my district for the year 1873. As I was not appointed Inspector until the month of April, my report deals mainly with the last three quarters of the year; but, thanks to the courtesy of the Coroners in my district, I have been allowed to see the depositions taken at all inquests in the early part of 1873, and I have thus been able to render my list of fatal accidents complete. Owing to Section 10 of the Metalliferous Mines Regulation Act, which does not compel the sending in of the Annual Returns until the 1st of August, I cannot give the number of persons employed and the quantity of mineral raised last year. The part of my report relating to these statistics is based upon the returns for 1872 received in 1873. I may here remark that there would not be the slightest difficulty in applying to my district the same regulation as that which is in force for the coal mines, and under which the Annual Return has to be sent in on or before the 1st February of every year. Before the 1st February this year I had received more than a hundred of the returns for 1873, although the forms had only been sent out a fortnight beforehand. If the date fixed by Section 10 could be altered to the 1st February the statistics furnished by me would be of greater value; at present they come too late to be of much practical use, and I am unable in my report to compare the number of deaths from fatal accidents with the number of persons employed. The following is a summary of the returns received for the year ended 31st December 1872: |