exaggerate, that no real reliance can be placed on such statements, but the whole place and its surroundings were kept in good order. There were fourteen roasting furnaces, two smelting furnaces, and one open one for the oxidation of lead and the reduction of silver. A handsome fountain poured its waters into the wasting pond, which was further surrounded with trees. These mines had a large jurisdiction, that included seven Kaziliks or communes, from which both men and fuel were obtained, and the produce of the taxes was also said to be devoted to the mines.

There are also mines of argentiferous galena near the Kulak Boghaz-the celebrated Gates of Cilicia. When the Egyptians held possession of the latter province, Ibrahim Pasha appointed an Italian as overseer to these mines; but when we visited them, he had a large collection of refuse, which he hoped we would agree with him in representing to the pasha as useless. It was, in fact, one mass of blende and bad ore, perfectly worthless.

The Chalybes, like their ancestors of old, are still engaged in scraping the soil of Pontus in search of iron, the ore being found everywhere about the hills near the surface. This is also the case, not only at Divriki, where are boulders of half-a-ton in weight, but to a still more remarkable extent on the southern side of the KhanTagh-a spur of the great Bin-Gul-Tagh, or mountain of a thousand lakes, in Armenia.

The Silver mines of Gumush-Khan, or Silver Khan, between Erzrum and Trebizond, were once celebrated, both for their produce and as a kind of practical school for mines. There is only one mine worked at present, although the whole face of the hill is covered with the remains of old workings and galleries. The gallery at present worked is not, as at Gumush-Maden, propped up at all, nor, notwithstanding the reputation of the place as a school for mining, is there either method, order, or common prudence observed in the manner in which the mines are worked. According to Mr. Hamilton ("Researches in Asia Minor," vol. i., p. 236) these mines produces annually from 250 to 300 drachms of gold, and and about 30 okas of silver, and 120 okas of lead for each oka of silver, in all 3000 okas of lead. As in most other cases, although the mines belong to Government, they are not worked on the public account, but are farmed out on certain conditions highly favourable to Government. The director has, however, the power of purchasing charcoal (one load-100 okas-being necessary to smelt 3 okas of lead) at the low price of two piastres or 5d. per load, being onefourth of the usual market price; the villages in the neighbourhood are obliged to furnish him with whatever quantity he requires at this price, in return for which they are exempted from taxes.

There are also copper mines in blue shale at Chalvar, near Bai

burt, in the same region.

These mines produce annually from

three to four thousand maunds of Copper; each maund weighs six okas, and is worth 80 piastres, the oka being equal to 21 lbs. Twenty maunds of charcoal, which cost 8 piastres, are necessary for the different processes of roasting and smelting, to produce one maund of copper. The ore, which appears particularly rich, is roasted four times in order to drive off the sulphur, before it is smelted. These mines give employment to 500 persons, i.e., 350 mens and 150 boys: the former receives four, the latter two, piastres per diem.

The copper obtained from the still more productive mines at Arganah Maden is conveyed, by a kind of semi-compulsory process, in its rough state from the mines, to Tokat, between 12 and 14 days journey. The charcoal for roasting and smelting has to be provided by the villagers at little or no remuneration, and even labour is compulsory. True, the peasants are relieved from taxation and military service, but that does not save them from extraordinary contributions, or the capricious extortions of a pasha. It is not to be wondered at, then, that where the most common principles of finance are disregarded, where misrule reigns supreme, and where the people are oppressed, while Government itself is imposed upon, that nothing but failure and disappointment must be the ultimate result.

The metalliferous resources of the great mountain chains of Kurdistan are virtually unknown. We found a vein of galena wrought by the Chaldeans at Taraspino, but merely for bullets, and heard of other mines, but had not an opportunity of examining them. This region would probably present a better field for mining exploration than even Asia Minor. If we consider what the Turks have done, or are still doing, simply as such, the prospects for the introduction of capital and science would be great; but it must also be taken into consideration that many of the mines have been wrought from the most ancient times, and that, with intervals of activity and of neglect, many have passed through the hands of Greeks and Romans, of Byzantines and native races, before they fell under the compulsory and miserly, yet greedy and rapacious, system of the Osmanlis.

The Turkish Government has no school of mines, and even miners, or people having some pretensions to practical experience in mining, roasting, and smelting (Madenji), are rarely to be met with, and they are invariably Greeks or Armenians, whilst the directors and extortioners are ignorant and rapacious Turks. All there is, is an office at Constantinople called the Maden Mukataasi Kalemi, or more briefly, Maaden Kalemi, which is a branch of the Treasury (Terfterdary), and is a place of reception for monies or minerals

G G

coming in. Owing to the first shafts and galleries being carried on, for the most part, without any protection whatever, it is not only difficult, and in most cases impossible, to form an idea of the existing wealth of the mines, but in many cases the most productive veins, beds, or masses of ore, are concealed and buried beneath the detritus of years. Not only is the roasting process imperfectly done, but the mineral, instead of being previously triturated, is cast into the furnaces in great lumps, involving loss of fuel and repeated operations. Yet at almost all the mines water-mills could be easily turned to account to pound the mineral. The furnaces are also so imperfect, that added to the non-trituration of the mineral, only a portion is extracted, and much is left among the slags and scoria. In most furnaces the walls are insufficient, the chimneys are not lofty enough for a powerful current, and the vault is too high and too open, at times, indeed, more like a fire-place or blacksmith's forge, than a furnace or enlarged retort. When engaged at Ishik Tagh in exploring the resources of its mines, we had a furnace set up upon a better principle, and soon convinced the Greek miners of its greater efficiency by the results obtained.

At

At Karatova, where 400 okas of mineral are said to give 200 okas of lead and 700 drachms of silver, as at other places, the whitelead is lost. At Egri-Polanka where crystals of iron are disseminated in a soft talcose shist, they are detached from their beds simply by allowing currents of water to flow over them. The iron is not collected at any given point, but in any hole or corner where it is most readily put away. 700 okas of mineral require 7 loads of charcoal, and 18 okas of iron are obtained every 16 hours. Keisura, close by, where are other fûrûns or furnaces, they are opened every 12 hours and then closed again. The Pasha of Sophia, engaged in a foundry of cannon-balls, was one of the first to have a refining furnace constructed, in 1837, with a high chimney. At Winitza, also, the mineral is pounded by hammers, moved by a large water-wheel, and then washed. The bellows are also worked by water-wheels. Hitherto most of the iron has been used for making baking dishes and cannon balls, but a better class of furnace is being introduced into Servia from Styria and Hungary, and the art of mining, still in its infancy in Turkey, may be said to be making a step forwards. Above all, laws ought to be enacted by which in the neighbourhood of mines, only wood of a certain age, say of 25 to 30 years' growth, should be allowed to be cut for charcoal, and thus a constant supply would be obtained. The loss upon removing the mineral from Arganah Maden to Tokat-12 to 14 days' journey -to be roasted and smelted, must, for example, take away a large portion of the profits,

IS RITUALISM CONSISTENT WITH

PROTESTANTISM?

UNDER the above title a writer in the first number of the new Cosmopolitan Critic and Controversialist discusses, from a pseudoutilitarian point of view, the advisability of retaining religious services generally, and, in particular, four rites which he specifically attacks. It is somewhat difficult to follow the writer's argument, inasmuch as, although he starts by defining his terms, he does not adhere strictly to his definitions, nor, as we shall see, does he appear to apprehend very clearly how far his definitions extend.

He first defines "ritualism" as "action of non-utility formulated;" by which he implies, if we understand him aright, that any "action of non-utility" is comprehended within the category of "ritualism." "Consistent" he explains to mean "compatible terms," to which definition, borrowed from Professor Jevons' Logic, we see no objection. "Protestantism" is used in its general meaning of the "religion reformed from the Roman Church." The question which heads this paper will then stand: "Is action of non-utility a compatible term with the religion reformed from the Roman Church ?" In other words, " Can a distinctively Protestant rite be ritualistic or of non-utility?" The question thus re-stated is answered by the Cosmopolitan writer in the affirmative, on the ground that "all attributes inherent in, or sustained by any given thing at the time of the birth of such thing is (sic) consistent with the said thing." And baptism, marriage, burial, and coronation of monarchs are specified as examples of such inherent attributes of Protestantism.

The next and largest division of the paper is occupied with a discussion of the non-utility of these four rites. Who, for instance, supposes, it is asked, that his particular name could not have been given him otherwise than by a religious ceremony? Or who supposes that marriage by a civil registrar is not fully as legal and moral as marriage by a priest? Can anyone believe that the repetition of the Burial Service is a necessary preliminary to admission to eternal bliss? Finally, are our monarchs kings by divine right and priestly consecration, or simply by the will and choice of their people?

The Cosmopolitan writer having thus shown that these four rites are not necessary to the accomplishment of the ends which have

incidentally been mentioned, concludes by calling upon Protestants to abjure these specimens of "action of non-utility formulated."

Now, although we are not, personally, inclined to uphold the necessity of our four rites for the accomplishment of certain results, it appears to us that something more is requisite before the Cosmo. politan can be considered to have proved his proposition.

"Before you can give a definition, you must know in general what you are about to define-you cannot set out to define as a certain Scotch lawyer swore, at large.'"* This error of not sufficiently considering what he was about to define seems to us exactly that into which the Cosmopolitan has fallen. Defining his four rites as "actions of non-utility" because they did not seem necessary for the production of certain results, he has neglected to inquire whether these results are those which the four rites were intended to produce, or whether there are any other results which they do produce. It is easy enough to show that any action whatever is unnecessary for the accomplishment of some one result; but before that action can be stigmatised as "useless" absolutely, it must be shown that it is unnecessary to, or incapable of, the production of any result at all.

It does not need any great acumen to perceive that the ends attributed to the four rites by the Cosmopolitan are merely accidental ends, and not by any means implied in the essence of the rites. Name-giving is a mere subordinate result of baptism. Not only could the baptismal service be performed equally well without once uttering the child's name; but the popular synonym of the service-christening-and the fact that people who reject the service of the Established Church both register their children's names civilly, and have a dedication service in their own places of worship, shows that name-giving is not considered to be any essential part of the rite.

The legality of a marriage is of course dependent upon compliance with the laws of a country; but the morality of the proceeding is dependent upon neither civil nor religious ceremonies. No one doubts the morality of those marriages in Scotland which were solemnised solely by the verbal assent of the marrying parties; or the morality of certain distinguished literary personages in our own country, who are known to have abjured all outward form of marriage. Nevertheless, that there is something more in a marriage ceremony than mere registry for civil purposes is conclusively shown by those Christians who, having no licensed place of their own, perform the civil ceremony first, and afterwards perform a religious ceremony in their own place of worship.

* Mr. Shadworth Hodgson, in Mind, April 1876, p. 67.