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timber which can be utilized offer facilities and inducements for the production of charcoal with which to smelt the local ores, and thus enrich the manufacturing interests of the commonwealth. Much of the timber is of such an excellent quality and of such large size as to cause regret that it should be sacrificed for burning into charcoal, were it not for the consolation that the maintenance of large timbered areas is essential to the continuance in activity of blast furnaces, where this fuel is the basis upon which the smelting operations are carried on. The necessity of maintaining these large timber areas naturally encourages a system of protection which none of the other utilizations of forest products warrant, and if an active pig iron industry is established in the State it may necessitate, for its continuous life, the reforestration of areas denuded of their timber, as well as an encouragement to protect forests from ravages by cattle, damages by fire, etc.; and the operation of a blast furnace using charcoal as fuel will, to a large extent, reduce the sacrifices of standing timber by farmers, who girdle the trees to encourage their decay and to permit of their more ready removal for the purpose of clearing the ground.

Charcoal is manufactured in a number of ways, but these may all be divided into three classes:

(A) CHARRING IN PITS OR MEILERS.—This is ordinarily carried on in the woods where the timber is cut, although in rare cases wood is hauled to a convenient center and there charred, so as to reduce the cost of attention and watching. The pits or meilers differ considerably in form, but the plan most generally adopted in this country is a circular or conical heap or pile of wood covered with leaves or turf. In Europe these heaps are sometimes made rectangular, and in China the pits are wells sunk into the ground, the tops being covered so as to secure slow combustion. In some of the heaps logs can be charred, but the usual practice in this country is to cut the wood into four feet lengths and place it in the heaps.

The yield of charcoal in meilers varies considerably in accordance with the kind of wood used, the depth and character of the cover, and the skill of the attendance. Taking the standard bushel as adopted by the United States Association of Charcoal Iron Workers (namely, 2748 cubic inches), the yield obtained from meilers will range from twenty-eight to forty bushels, the average approximating thirty-three bushels, or one hundred bushels for three cords. This estimate, like all others which follow, is based upon using four foot wood, well cut and properly ranked so as to obtain a good cord measure.

(B) CHARRING IN KILNS has an advantage over charring in meilers in the fact that the enclosing walls, being generally of brick masonry, are tighter than a turf covering, and therefore the operation of producing charcoal can be more readily controlled, and the loss from radiated or condensed heat