Page:Cornwall; Cambridge county geographies.djvu/99

 MINERALS AND MINING 83 fields are shown as using wooden spades shod with metal. German mining was carried on upon better principles than the English, and Sir Francis Godolphin sent for an experienced German engineer to instruct the miners of Godolphin and Tregonning in the superior systems em- ployed in Saxony. It was then only that the hydraulic stamps were introduced. In 1742 one steam-engine only was found in the county; but speedily after came a great advance. Savery and Newcomen brought in their steam pump ; that of Newcomen was introduced at Chasewater in 1777. Notwithstanding that the methods of descent into the mines by a series of long ladders had been superseded by the man-engine, first introduced in 1842, it was a long time before the old ladders at different successive stages were abandoned. Owing to the introduction of tin from the Straits Settlements, where it is found in the condition of stream tin and can be easily worked, the tin mining in Cornwall, necessitating real mining and the following of lodes, has proved unremunerative and has been abandoned, and now but few mines are worked for the metal. Another cause has fatally affected Cornish mining the fraudulent practice of the promoters of the mines. It was no uncommon practice for the "captains," when a rich lode was struck, to cover it up, and follow false lodes, till the investors in the venture lost heart and refused to advance more money, when the captains would carry on the work in the real lode, if they could raise the capital, but this they often failed to do, 62