Page:History of Manchester (1771), Volume 1, by John Whitaker.djvu/327

 * 9 6 THE HISTORY Book L teaching them in all probability a greater neatnefs in the figure of their beads and a greater elegance in the ftuipe of their veflels. The firft formation of brafs, as we are afiured by hiftorica! infallibility, was a&ually prior to the fl^od, and was difcovered even in the feventh generation from Adam ". The ufe of it however was not, as feems generally believed and the Arandeliaiv marbles affert, previous to the knowledge of iron* They Were both firft known in the fame generation, and were both firft wrought by the fame difcoverer * Anil the knowledge of both muft have been afterwards diffufed over tire world with the dif- fufed colonies of the Noachicfee. An acquaintance with the one or the other muft have been absolutely ncceflary to the exiftence of the coionifts, to the clearing away of the woods about their fettlements, and to the ere&ion of houfes for their habitation. And as the nations in the eaft appear to have worked their mines, of iron and copper in the remoteft periods tif their hiftory ", fo the tribes of the primaeval Britons in the weft appear to haw been particularly acquainted wkh both * 9. Of all the metals the moft beneficial to man is iron. And the veins of it are therefore the moft univerfally diffufed. Providence has ftored almoft every region of the world, and lias particu- larly replenilhed the hills of Britain, with that ufefiil ore. But the primaeval Britons were long unapprised of their native wealth. It was late before any mines of iron were opened in the iiland. They appear to have bwn begun only. a few yean before the defcent of Cjsefar^ and even then were carried on, npt by the original Britons* but by the commercial Belgae -°. To that period both the Britons and the Belgae muft have received from the continent all the iron that they had among them. And at the period of Caefar's iavafion the quantity, which was col- lected in the ifland wa$ very infignifkaut so, BMt iron miocs being once difcovered, others would be imrciediately opened. And a confiderable manufactory of iron was accordingly efta- bliihed in the kingdom hdare the reign of Tiberius ". In this muft