HERE AND THERE.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXVI, Issue 11655, 10 June 1912, Page 6

HERE AND THERE.

GOLDEN DISCOVERY OF IRON, Reports have been published that immense deposits of the highest grade i'-ori orv. conservatively estimated at mor» than 1,000,000,000 tons, have been, discovered in the heart of Pennsylvania 200 miles from Philadelphia and 240 miles from Pittsburg. The reports are based on the findings of J. NGrassland, a mining engineer and geologist of 30 years' experience, who camo on the ore while searching for coal. Mr Grassland thinks the beds are the mother lode of hematite ore which scientists for many years believe, have been hidclcu in Southern Pennsylvania. Enthusiastic engineers, who confirm Mr Crosslaud's discovery, say the find is the most important since the discovery of gold in Western America in 1849, and it is destined to mark a no>v era in th« steel and iron industry of the United States.

A SUBTERRANEAN CITY. Epernay, in France, is a vast subterranean city of champagne-' There are miles and miles of underground galleries, like streets, hewn out of the solid "chalk, and flanked with millions: of bottles of champagne of all blends and qualities. It is not an inviting place this- subterranean city of wine. All is dark, dank, and damp. __ with ths temperature about zero- Yeifc in this low temperature and under these dark and unhealthy conditions, thousands ot workers spend the hulk of their waking lives. For although the champagne :s stored for so 'long as five ot six yea.rs undersiroiind, it is not left alone there unattended. Every one of the millions of bottles must be shaken up day by dav. If this is mot done regularly and! properlv the wine ceases to ferment and is spoiled. Every now and again, too, in the earlier stages, each bottle must be opened for a fraction, of a second, and a small quanii.y of the fermenting wine- allowed to escape. GAS IN THE MINE. White, damn is the gas most feared bv the miners", for its properties render it difficult to detect, inasmuch as it s tasteless, odorless, and colorless, and when mixed in the proportion.of about one part of gas to nine parts of air is called "firedamp," and becomes explosive to a degree hard to realise unless one has seen its effects. Black damp, unlike white damp, is heavier than an-, and is a, non-explosive gas which may ha detected-by its peculiar, odor. Again., unlike the other, its effect is to suffocate and extinguish fire. This gas.is -o heavv. and. moves with such a sluggish 'flow, that occasionally when miners have been trapped, in a mine following an explosion and have detected the black damp creeping in upon them by its smell, they have been- able to stop its advance bv erecting dams or barricades along the floor, building them higher as the volume of gas increased', and keeping the air within their little enclosure comparatively clean by rude, improvised fa-ns. Following an explosion, these two gases become mingled and form a gas possessing all' the dreacl qualities of each, which is known as '•after damp," and;-it is this mixture of gases which destroys any life that may remain following a- mine disaster.