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148 speculative and inventive genius of the celebrated Marquis of Worcester, who was a kind of seer of science in his day. He wrote a book on the subject of coal and iron and other metals, with the title of "Metallum Martis," a work full of quaint and clever thoughts. Up to his day charcoal alone had been used in smelting iron ore, and in the working of iron in all the forges and smithies in the kingdom. The wood of the country was fast disappearing under this great drain, and he assigns a patriotic motive as the strongest that operated upon his mind in developing another species of fuel to save the ship timber, so essential to the nation's defence. He says that when he set his hand to this new enterprise there were nearly 20,000 smiths of all sorts, and many ironworks decayed for want of wood within ten miles of Dudley Castle. As the history of making iron with pit-coal is of such deep interest to all countries, and as the narrative of Dud Dudley, who was an energetic pioneer in the work, is so succinct and graphic, we copy out the following from his "Metallum Martis," a work reproduced with great care and effort by John N. Bagnall, Esq., of West Bromwich, in 1854:

"King James, His Sacred Majesty's Grandfather, and Prince Henry, for the preservation of Wood and Timber in this Island, did in the 9nth year of His Reign, Grant His Letters Pattents of Priviledge unto Simon Sturtevant, Esq., for 3 years for the making