al as they see occasion.

"Before the mouth of the furnace lyeth a great bed of sand, where
they make furrows of the fashion they desire to cast their iron: into
these, when the receivers are full, they let in their mettal, which
is made so very fluid by the violence of the fire that it not only
runs to a considerable distance, but stands afterwards boiling a
great while.

"After these furnaces are once at work, they keep them constantly
employed for many months together, never suffering the fire to
slacken night or day, but still supplying the waste of fuel and other
materials with fresh, poured in at the top.

"Several attempts have been made to bring in the use of the sea coal
in these works instead of charcoal; the former being to be had at an
easy rate, the latter not without a great expence; but hitherto they
have proved ineffectual, the workmen finding by experience that a
sea-coal fire, how vehement soever, will not penetrate the most fixed
parts of the ore, by which means they leave much of the mettal behind
them unmelted.

"From these furnaces they bring the sows and piggs of iron, as they
call them, to their forges; these are two sorts, though they stood
together under the same roof; one they call their finery, and the
other chafers: both of them are upon hearths, upon which they place
great heaps of sea coal, and behind them bellows like those of the
furnaces, but nothing near so large.

"In such finerys they first put their piggs of iron, placing three or
four of them together behind the fire, with a little of one end
thrust into it, where softening by degrees they stir and work them
with long barrs of iron till the mettal runs together in a round
masse or lump, which they call an half bloome: this they take out,
and giving it a few strokes with their sledges, they carry it to a
great weighty hammer, raised likewise by the motion of a water wheel,
where, applying it dexterously to the blows, they presently beat it
into a thick short square; this they put into the finery again, and
heating it red hot, they work it under the same hammer till it comes
to the shape of a bar in the middle, with two square knobs in the
ends; last of all they give it other heatings in the chaffers, and
more workings under the hammer, till they have brought their iron
into barrs of