mark the rate of increase in the production of pig iron, it is sufficient to mention that in 1852 it was 50,000 tons, while in 1879 it was 2,741,853 tons; and although the trade has great fluctuations, as with us, the increase within the last quarter of a century has been very extraordinary. In the manufactured iron we find the same strides. Of rolled iron, were produced in 1854,-736,280 tons, whereas in 1879 it amounted to 2,047,484 tons; and the same may be said of rails, and of steel, whether made by the Bessemer process or not. The following table shows that the number of blast furnaces for the production of pig iron is 713, and that their capabilities will enable them to turn out 5 million tons per annum :—

It is very seldom, of course, that all this number is

in blast at the same time; for in bad seasons not more than half the furnaces are producing. The American iron trade differs in some very important points from the English trade; one being, that the Catalan forge, which is the most primitive style of iron smelting to be found in any country, is still extant in the States, and there are upwards of thirty-nine of these forges where iron is smelted direct from the ore. This, however, can only be done when the ore is cheap and rich, and the charcoal fuel handy. It is said that 60,000 tons per annum are turned out from these, and that the produce is much in favour with the steel makers. Another essential difference between the English and American trade is, that a great majority of the production is smelted with anthracite coal. This, indeed, is the secret of the enormous superiority of Pennsylvania over the other States, for she possesses, as we have seen, inexhaustible beds of anthracite, far surpassing any other deposit of this nature in the world. The proportions of the various kinds of furnaces are as follows: charcoal, 271; anthracite coal, 226; bituminous coal, 218. The two latter are of course the most important, both in build and capacity, the charcoal furnaces being for the most part primitive and small; but, on the other hand, their number is so considerable, that a large proportion of the iron production of the States is from them. Thus, in 1876, there were :

990,000 tons of pig iron smelted with bituminous coal and coke.

The

Notwithstanding the value of the anthracite beds in Pennsylvania, competition is gradually driving the iron trade from these districts to the bituminous deposits, where the coals and the ores associated with them are cheaper. In the Lehigh Valley alone there are fifty-one anthracite furnaces, and many of the Pennsylvanian works, both for iron and steel, rank amongst the most complete in the world, such as those of the Cambria Company, at Johnstown (between Pittsburg and Harrisburg), which turn out 80,000 tons of steel and iron rails per annum. works at Bethlehem (fifty miles west of Philadelphia) are pre-eminent for their completeness, and especially in connection with the Bessemer steel process. Pittsburg itself (population 156,381) is a second Birmingham, and the centre of the iron trade of the New World. Amongst other adjuncts of the trade, it contains 33 large rolling mills, with a productive capacity of 400,000 tons, equal to one-eighth of that of the whole of the States. In New York State, Buffalo and Troy are the chief iron centres, the latter town containing the large Bessemer works of the Albany and Rensselaer Company.

Ohio has recently come to the fore as a (bituminous) iron producer. Upwards of thirteen new furnaces of the most approved height and construction, have been erected in the counties of Athens, Hocking, and Perry, where valuable beds of coal and ore exist. There are large works in Illinois, at Joliet and North Chicago, turning out some 50,000 tons a year, while in the adjoining State of Missouri there are furnaces at Carondelet, and large steel works (the

Vulcan) at St. Louis. It is, however, mostly in the Bessemer steel that the greatest advance has been made, not so much, perhaps, in the nature of the works, as in their completeness and scientific arrangement. There are now in the districts between Troy and St. Louis (that is, from New York to Missouri) eleven Bessemer mills with twenty-two converters, with a capacity of production of 550,000 ingots of steel per annum. The advantage possessed by the American steel makers is, that they have been able to profit by the experience of the English and Swedish nations, and to begin their Bessemer trade, as it were, full grown.

As regards the production of iron, it must be remembered that the wages of ironworkers in the United States are a good deal higher than those of England; but on the other hand, the cost of living and provisions is much higher also, and it is a serious question for the consideration of those who think of emigrating from the Old World to the New, whether they will benefit themselves by so doing.

The various manufactories of wrought iron are widely distributed throughout the States. Bar iron is produced in twenty-four States, to the amount of nearly three-quarters of a million tons. There are 220 bar and hoop iron mills, of which Pennsylvania again heads the list with 84. Plate and sheet iron are manufactured in fifteen States, though none is made south of Kentucky or west of Missouri. Pennsylvania turns out more plate and sheet iron than any State, producing in fact more than 60 per cent. of the entire quantity made in the Union.

MINING INDUSTRIES-PRECIOUS METALS AND

QUICKSILVER.

IT is given to very few countries in the world to be producers of gold and silver on a large scale; but in this respect nature has been so bountiful to the United States, that the mining industries arising from these valuable metals are equalled in no other localities at the present date. The enormous riches contained under the head of gold alone in the States may be imagined, from the fact that the yield of 1879 was $38,900,000 (see equivalents of money, p. 220), and of silver, $40,812,000; total, $79,712,000; and that the amount of metals deposited at the mints and assay offices up to that date had reached the gigantic sum of $1,238,387,536.

GOLD and SILVER, which we must take together, are found in the following States :-California, Nevada, Colorado, Montana, Dakota, Idaho, Oregon, Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, Washington Territory, Michigan, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee. It will be readily seen that the gold and silver-bearing districts are mainly found in the Western States, and especially those through which run the great chains of the Rocky Mountains, and thence slope towards the Pacific coast. As, however, the supply of gold, previous to 1846, came almost entirely from two or three of the Southern States, viz., Carolina, Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee, it will be well to notice these districts first. The North Carolina gold discoveries date from 1824, the gold field occupying an area of about 12,000 square miles, and the principal