The necessity for sending
the ores from Adelaide to some foreign port to undergo the process of
smelting, will probably exist for a considerable length of time; until
such time, indeed, as the electric process shall be found to answer on a
sufficiently large scale to be profitable, or, until smelting works are
established; but, the great difficulty to be apprehended in carrying on
such operations would be the want of fuel, which scarce even at the
present moment, would soon be more so--for there is not sufficient wood
in the vicinity of any of the mines to keep up the supply for such a
consumption as that which would be required; besides which, the cartage
of the wood, and the expenses attending its preparation for the furnace,
would materially diminish any profits arising from the smelting of the
ores. In such a view of the case I cannot but think that the
establishment of works at the mines will be found to be as unprofitable
to their proprietors as to the smelter, and that such works will only be
remunerative when carried on under more favourable circumstances--for it
would appear that coal is the only mineral South Australia does not
possess, and I am apprehensive that no bed of it will ever be found in
the colony. I have ever thought the geological formation of the country
unfavourable to the presence of coal, but, still, it is said to exist as
a submarine formation close to Aldingi Bay.
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