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To the Editor of the Scientific American : Dr. Holmes's article upon the conservation of the coal resources was highly interesting, and from the viewpoint of the scientist leaves nothing to be desired. It was, to my mind, the distinctive feature of your issue of August 12th, 1911. With your permission I would like to state a mere layman's side of coal conservation. To clearly convey my meaning I will use two mines about 900 miles apart. The Blossburg, Pa., coal region has five veins of coal; that of the Sullivan County, Inciana, region has seven veins of coal. Now note the difference between mining systems. The lower drift at Arnot, Pa., has been worked since 1866. There was seldom less than 800 miners employed in it. The workings extend over 23,000 acres and 96 per cent of the coal is taken from the workings. In the forty-five years the mine has been worked but six men have lost their lives while digging coal, and an accident is a very rare occurrence. That I term the correct method of working a coal mine. In Sullivan, Indiana, a coal mine has been worked seventeen years. About 150 miners are employed. The workings extend over 600 acres. An average of seven men have been killed in it each year, while accidelts are of almost daily occurrence. That I call the incorrect method, for less than 60 per cent of the coal is taken out. The method of working at Arnot, Fa., is this: All coal is both undercut and sheared by pick or machine; then a few ounces of powder brings down the coal without shattering the strata above, so that when the out-crop is reached the pillars can be drawn, thus leaving but three or four per cent of the coal behind. The freedom from death and accident is due to this: When the miner reaches his room he immediately takes his lamp from his head and cautiously raises it once in a while to see if the flame will denote the presence of fire-damp. If so, he does not blow it out, but slowly puts it down on the ground and extinguishes the lamp by placing his coat over it. Wlhen the miner reaches the “face” he takes a pick and sounds the roof to find out if there is any loose rock overhead. If so, he either wedges it down or sets a prop under it. Though the mine is full of coal dust no dust explosion ever took place in it. At Sullivan, Indiana, the coal is “shot from the solid.” Little or no under·mining is ddne. Each miner uses at from five to ten pounds of dynamite o'r an equa!Iy strong explosive each day. This not only loosens the coal, but shatters the roof also, so that if a vein of coal is above the one worked it is extra ha'aT\". It \oe” mOTe. It ca\"<, the a\mo"t \a\\y accident and the loss of about 40 per cent of the coal in the mine. It is rarely possible there to draw. the pillars. So the net result is the loss of 40 per cent of the mine worked, the almost entire loss of the vein above and a continuous maiming and killing of the miners. Consider this matter in another way: Supposing a half ton or more of dynamite were exploded in five and ten-pound charges in the streets of a city within one hour. What would be its effects in the open? Apply this, then, to what must be the effect of the explosion of a similar amount in a mine where the effect of the explosion has but a single direction to expand. All this is to take place within the area of fifty acres. The method used in Indiana is in vogue all over the West. It is wasting, criminally wasting, a large percentage of the most valuable of nature's gifts and causing a wholesale slaughter of men. I edited the national official organ of the coal miners for seven years, and my observtions, extending practically all over the coal fields, taught me that there was but one way to prevent the slaughter of miners and the criminal waste of coal, to wit: To make it a penal offense to shoot coal from the solid or to attempt to get it without undercutting and shearing the “shot” with either pick or machine. What would be the result? But one·tenth cf the powder would do the work; there would be no dust explosions, for little dust would be made; the strata aboye would be practically unharmed, thus preventing the killing and maiming cf miners and securing oyer 90 per cent of the coal. That this is so is again illustrated by coal regions separated only by county lines, Allegany County, Maryland, where the method used is similar to that used in Arnot, Pa., with similar results, and AllegheIY County, Pa., where the Indiana method is used and the same results ensuing. When I stated these things in the miners' organ the operator would sneer at them because he wanted to get the greatest amount in the shortest time regardless of the wrong he \vas doing to the country' and the injury to future generations.' Many miners indulged in somewhat heated criticisms of myself, for they, too, wanted to get the most for the least. Some day, some time, we will secure a legislator and a Congress with patriotism and courage enough to enact laws that will stop this devastation and the destruction of an asset inca.lcuable in value. Blossburg, Tioga County, Pa. S. M. Sexton. Eugenics and the Conservation of Humanity To the Editor of the Scieitific American: Conservation of American forests is important. So is conservation of American coal, and oil, and na:ural gas, and water supply, and fisheries. But the conservation and improvement of the American race is far more important than all other conservation. The real wealth of a nation is the quality of its people. Of what value are endless acres of forests, millions of tons of coal, and billions of gallons of water, if the race is not virile, and sane and sound? You haye shown a fine discrimination in including an excellent editorial on eugenics in your Conservation Number, and as one of your many readers I wish to thank you heartily for it. Germany is ahead of us in her forest policy. She is also ahead of us in her efforts to improve and conserve her people. England is ahead of us, too, in the practical interest which is now taken there in the splendid work of the National Eugenics Laboratory of the University of London, and of the Eugenics Education Society. In the United States we are just beginning to take notice of the work of foreign investigators along eugenic lines, and slowly but surely the painstaking researches of Dr. Charles B. Davenport, and of his colleagues of the Committee on Eugenics of the American Breeders' Association, are attracting attention and will }ead to action. Fearfully misguided has been most of our so·called philanthropy. We have
