[VOL IV] COAL-MINES AT YING-TIH

COAL-MINES AT YING-TIH

Cover Image: Coal-Mines, at Ying-Tih / YingDe GuangDong China / Drawn by T. Allom Engraved by W.A.Le Petitclined Plane on the Imperial Canal The Grand Canal / China / Drawn by T. Allom Engraved by W.Floyd – ALAMY Image ID:2X55NCY

*Yingde is a historical city in the north of Guangdong Province, China. The city is on the Bei River, a tributary of the Pearl River. Administratively, it is part of the Qingyuan prefecture-level city.It is considered to be one of the top three places in the world to grow black tea, In addition, Yingde has approximately 100 million tons of coal reserves. / From a Drawing in the possession of Sir Geo. Staunton, Bart.

“There is no malice in this burning coal.”

KING JOHN IV. 1.

COAL abounds universally in China, although not raised so extensively in any district as that at the base of the Meling mountains, which bound the province of Kwang-Qung on the north.

Where the Pe-kiang river ( Bei River, a major tributary of the Pearl River system in southern China ), descending from this vast chain, forces its way between the rocks, native industry is actively displayed in the process of raising coal, and lading the barges for the lower country, where extensive potteries are established. Coal-districts are in general wild and savage in their aspect, and Ying-Tih, however relieved by the magnificent forms that appear on every side, partakes still of all the characters of desolation. Once clad with pines, the miner has disafforested the banks, and few dwellings, save the colliers’ huts and agents’ offices, contribute to humanize the prospect. Intent on gain, at least on occupation, a dense population is collected here, finding homes in miserable cottages on the summit of the cliff, or occasionally in the very bowels of the earth.

No assistance being derived from machinery, no coal is raised through upright shafts, after the depth becomes inconvenient, or water collects in the pit; so that the principal and most profitable mode of working, consists in driving horizontal levels, or adits, into the front of the rock that overhangs the river. In this way water is readily drawn off, ingress and egress easily accomplished, and the coal is charged into the barges, immediately from the mouth of the pit. A fleet of junks is always assembled beneath the beetling brow of Ying-Tih, waiting their turn; some just under the entrance of an adit, others at the foot of a long flight of steps that descend from shafts sunk in higher parts of the hills.

Carriers appear in perpetual motion on the stairs hewn with vast labour in the rock, bringing the coal from an adit to the junks below, or returning for another load. Neither barrows, nor wains, nor any mechanical advantage, is seized by the colliers in this operation; two baskets, suspended from a bamboo cane that rests across the shoulders, being the only adjuvatory means employed. Fossil, bituminous, and stone coal are found in China, but the last kind appears to be most prevalent. From the pit it is frequently taken to places where it is charred a little, before use; and coal-dust combined with earth makes a convenient mixture for rice-stoves. So early as the age of Marco Polo, the Venetian traveller, this valuable mineral was familiarly known to the Chinese, yet they do not appear to have applied it to manufacturing purposes. “There is found,” writes that eminent traveller, “a sort of black stone, which they dig out of mountains, which runs in veins. When lighted it burns like charcoal, and retains the fire much better than wood: insomuch that it may be preserved during the night, and in the morning be found still burning. These stones do not flame, excepting a little when first lighted, but during their ignition give out a considerable heat.”