THE BLESSINGS OF COAL. {From the Illustrated London News, November 3.)

New Zealander, Volume 5, Issue 419, 20 April 1850, Page 2

THE BLESSINGS OF COAL. {From the Illustrated London News, November 3.)

When a Londoner visits Paris for the first time, he is not only delighted with the change of manners and the novelfy of surrounding circumstances, but his eye is chaimed with the purity of the atmosphere, the whiteness of the exterior of all public buildings, the sharpness of outline even in distant objects, and the distinct beiuty of the whole lanu&cape. He inquires the reason, and iB informed that Paris burns wood.— Wheu a Parisian visits London, very different is the spectacle that presents itself, h. dense cloud— a perpetuil canopy of gloom, hatigt over the city. He itinds upon Waterloo Bridge, and sees the distant churches looming through the murky air — rather hinting at than exposing their own rorms and semblances; he gees, or half sees, the noble dome of St. Paul'i, and probably the glittering cross that surmounts it, bnt the church itself — that foundation upon which the dome mmt, if it be not, like a balloon, supported in mid-air by a buoyant gas— is invisible to his sight. If he approach the noble churcli itself, and place himself in tangible proximity with it, in order to admire its magnificence, he beholds it blackened and encrusted with a hard mixture or cement of smoke, cobwebs and rain. The lionses in most of the streets are of the same dingy hue : remote edifices are all but invisible ; and objects of close proximity have lo»t that sharp, clear, and well defined outline to which his eye has bsen accustomed in his own more brilliant and more beautiful capital. A French poet, struck with the perpetual gloom of London, and feeling upon him a slight touch of the fabulous melancholy ot the place, ixclaimed that it wis an immense mass of dark confusion, from the midst of which, tall chininies— Clochers de l'industrie, Ouvrent toujours la gueule et de leurs ventrea chauds Exhalent d«ns lei airs la fumee a grands flots. Puis un ciel tourmente, nuage sur nuage; Le soleil cymme un mort, le drap sur le visage, Ou pttrfois dons les flots dun air empoiionnd Montrant comme un roiueur son ront tout charbonne. The Parisian, surpiised, and possibly disgusted, asks the reason of the gloom of our renowned city, and is informed that its two millions of inhabitants burn coal. Yet the Londoner, although he may sometimes joke at the atmi sphere of London, and be very glad to get out of it, at all convenient opportunities, to inhale a purer and more invigorating oir, would not like to change circumstances with the Parisian. Happy is it for us in London that we have coal to burn, and that like the Parisian*, we ate not reduced to the sad extrfmity of buruing wood. Though we are obliged to pay an exorbitant price for our coal, the price paid by the Parisnns (or their scanty fiuppl.es of wood is fearful to reflect upon by a Londonder of moderate means, to whom thn hieht of a comfortable blszs is in itself a great luxury, but to whom, in our climate, a good fire is one of the chief ntcess.rtes of existence. Nor is the domestic the only evil const quetit upon th • nbsencs oi coal, and the scarcity of le;s valuable fuel. Puris, that now only ministers by its s.ndll trade to thf luxury of the rich, might, if like London or Glasgow, it had been well supplied with coal, have become a metropolis with a thousand branches of trade and commerce, uup plying the necessities of the world. To understand the full value of coal, we have but to fancy what our con« dition would be if we were deprived of it. Good fires wou'd be the expensive luxuries of the wealthy. The beautiful gai with which our thoroughfares are 60 brilliantly illuminated, would be too expensive for com mon use ; and the miserable oil lamps of our fathers aud grandfathers, or the still more miserable cressets of our remoter ancestors, borne about the street at the end of poles, would supersede it. Manufactured arti cles would become dear ; trade and commerce would decline ; steamboats would ceaie to ply ; railway trains would cease to dart through the length and over the breadth of the land ; we should relapse into our old habits, and bjscome a slow, a poor, an unenterprising, and an ignorant people. It is indeed a happy thing for Great Britain that her coal fields are all but inexhaustible ; aud whatever the condition of humanity may be in the year 2850, there is coal enough in the bowels of England and Scotland, to last us comfortably until that time. There is one great drawback to the use of coal— its smoke. But that is not the fault of the coal ; it is attributable entirely to our ignorance and daily tells us as. plainly as any natural evil can speak to the mind of man, that we should exercise our ingenuity, and devise some means by which we may consume it, and turn the daily waste of material into a daily profit.— An over- zealous advocate of temperancei wuo objects both to the use a'lil the abuse of fermented liquors, has made a calculation that every year in England there is consumed a quantity of intoxicating liquors, sufficient to make a river 3 feet deep, 30 feet wide and 168 miles long. We wish some statist, fond of figures, would calculate for ns the weight and value of the coal, that, in the shape of smoke we annually pour out to contaminate the atmosphere. We believe the money would be startling. There can be little doubt, however, that sooner or later, science will accomplish this most valuable task, and that London will be relieved of the smoky crown, which proclaims her, by the most disagreeable of evidence, to be the Queen of Trade, Commerce and Manufactures — the most industrioui though the most dingy of cities. The opening of the new Coil Exchange was a cere* mony to which a people like the English did well to invite the Sovereign and her family, and which the Sovereign did well to honor. It was a matter of regret — the only one connected with the circumstance— that the indispos turn of her Majesty prevented her fiona taking port with the citizens of London upon the ->ccalion: but her illustrious consjrt, accompanied by the heir of England and the Piincess Royal, testified in the most interesting manner, by their presence, that the Royalty of Great Britain sympa'hises with the industriel pursuits of the people, and fully recognises those homely but great virtues of the national character, which make this small island an example to the world. The address of the Corporation of London to his Royal Highness Prince Albeit, which was read by the Recorder, did no more than justice to the import* auce of the occasion which had brought the splendid pageant from Whitehall to the close and smoky pur. lieus of ancient London. " When with the purchases of this Exchange," said the document, "are aasuciated the creation and increase of commerce and manufactures, and the naval superiority of this kingdom —when the essential article of coal ministers by ap.

plianceg innumerable to the wanti and proiperity'of millions— illuminate! our houses, streets, and manufactories — wlirn every metal at the forge is obedient to the fire it feeds— whilst it command* as its agent and its instrument the mighty power of steam— it became the wisdom and accorded with the enlightened beneficense of her Majeity the Queen to regard thii edifice with the favour and consideration ever graciouily extended by her Majesty to objects of national importance." The Prince, in bis reply, touched but slightly upon the importance of tbe coal trade ; but the allusion to the Prince of Wales, the expression of the hope that he mi »ht be regarded with these feelings of popular affection which have at all times been the best security of the Throne, and the introduction of the young Prince to the trading and ciric magnates of London upon an occasion which was purely commercial, sufficiently testified the sympathies of her Majesty and Prince Albert, in the industriel energy and enterprise of the people. The whole pageant was t tribute to the arts of peace— the best and indeed only lource of the prosperity of nations ; a tribute not the less significant from the pretence of the most illustrious soldier and greatest peace maker in the world— the Duke of Wellington, Though not very intimately connected with the subject, we can scarcely avoid referring to the Peace Cougre&s Meeting, at Exeter Hall, on the same evening.— Tbe whole tendencies of the B.itiih mind at the present time are more pacific than ever they were at any previous period in our history. Whether we consider the sncouiagement given, both by word and deed, by the most illustrious persons in the realm, to the useful arts and sciences, which require peace in order to flourish, or whether we look at the temper of the people, as expressed by the doings of the men who cement peace by their trade and industry, or only hear of it as expressed by< the speeches of those who have joined the new peace crusade, which is to convert our swords into pruning- hooks, it is impossible not to see that peace with the whole world, and trade with whomsoever we can procure i r , is the occult or avowed necessity and chief desire of the British people.