WATERWORKS.

THE Philadelphia Waterworks were begun in the spring of 1799. It had but little encouragement, and to induce monied men to adventure their capital, they were offered water free of rent for a term of years. As late as 1803, only 960 dollars was the rental of the water, although nearly 300,000 dollars had then been expended in the enterprise; at the same time 126 houses were receiving the water free of cost. In 1814, there were 2850 dwellings receiving the water and paying a rent of eighteen thousand dollars. In that year, the cost of raising the water was 24,000 dollars. In 1818, the steam engine at Fair Mount was set in operation, and raised the water at a saving of 8000 dollars, still leaving an expense of 16,000 dollars per annum; but in 1827, such was the improvements introduced, that the expense of raising the water was but 1478 dollars! while the water rents from the city and districts had risen to 33,560 dollars, and this is still rapidly increasing. In the eventual success of these measures we owe much to the skill and perseverance of J. S. Lewis and Frederick Graff— names which will always be identified with its origin and renown. The unpromising and unassisted beginnings of this establishment, and its rapid progress to profit, will be the history in its turn of our canal and rail road enterprises. Our great benefactor, Franklin, early foresaw the need of a fresh supply of water for Philadelphia, and recommended the Wissahiccon creek for that object; but that, now in the city's great enlargement, would be drained dry in a week!

There was little or no desire expressed by the citizens of Philadelphia for any other than their good pump water, till after the fever year 1793. Then, when the mind was alive to every suggested danger of ill health, the idea of pump water being no longer good, found its increasing advocates. But after river water was introduced many were still very slow and reluctant to give up their icy-cold well water for the tepid waters of the Schuykill; but numerous pits for other purposes, in time, destroyed the former pure taste of the pump waters, and led finally to their total abandonment, and the consequent increased patronage to the waterworks.

ANTHRACITE COAL.

I sat beside the glowing grate fresh heap'd
With Lehigh coal, and as the flame grew bright-
The many coloured flame-and played and leap'd,
I thought of rainbows and the Northern light,
And other brilliant matters of the sort."

WHEN the anthracite coal up the Schuylkill, at Mount Carbon, &c. was first effectively discovered, since the year 1800, it was deemed of little value, because they could devise no way to ignite it a character which its name sufficiently denotes. the year 1810-11, however, a practical chymist, I believe, an Englishman, his name unknown to fame or me, combining science with practice, made such an analysis of the coal as convinced him there was inherent in the mass all the properties suited for combustion. He therefore erected a furnace in a small vacant house on the causeway road (Beech street) leading over to Kensington. To this he applied three strong bellowses; these succeeded to give out such an immense white heat from the coal as to melt platina itself! From this experiment, at which two of my friends were present as invited witnesses, was derived such proofs as led to its future general use in our city.

It was in the year 1808, that Judge Fell, at Wyoming, made the first experiment to use that coal in a grate of his own construction; a measure in which he succeeded far beyond his expectations. Before that time they had used it only for smith-work. It was first so used in 1768-9, by Obadiah Gore, (an early settler of Wyoming) and afterwards by all the smiths there.

The Mount Carbon coal was known to exist in the neighbourhood more than forty years ago; and some search was made, but the coal found being so very different from any which was previously known, it was not thought to be of any value, and the search was abandoned. It is supposed to be forty years since a blacksmith by the name of Whetstone, found coal and used them in his smith-shop. At a very early period, Judge Cooper declared his belief of the existence of coal in the district, and the Messrs. Potts explored various places along the old Sunbury road, but success did not attend their operations. A Mr. William Morris afterwards became the proprietor of most of the coal lands at the head of our canal; he found coal,

and took some quantity to Philadelphia, about the year 1800; but all his efforts to bring them into use failed, and he abandoned the project, and sold his lands to their late proprietor, Mr. Potts.

It does not appear that much notice was taken of the coal from the time of Whetstone, and the search made by the Messrs. Potts, until about twenty years ago, when a person by the name of Peter Bastrus, a blue-dyer, in building the valley forge, found coal in the tailrace.-About the same time, a Mr. David Berlin, a blacksmith in this neighbourhood, permanently commenced and introduced the use of stone coal in the smith's forge, and continued to use and instruct others in its use many years afterwards. But few persons, however, could be induced to use them; prejudice and old habits again became victorious, and appear to have held undisputed sway until about the year 1812, when Mr. George Shoemaker, a present innkeeper at Pottsville, and Nicho Allen, discovered coal on a piece of land they had purchased, now called Centreville. Allen soon became disheartened, and gave up the concern to Shoemaker, who, receiving encouragement from some gentlemen in Philadelphia, got out a quantity of coal, and took nine wagonloads to Philadelphia. Here again, our coal met with a host of opposition. On two wagonloads Mr. S. got the carriage paid; the others he gave away to persons who would attempt to use them. The result was against the coal: those who tried them, pronounced them stone and not coal, good for nothing, and Shoemaker an impostor! At length, after a multitude of disappointments, and when Shoemaker was about to abandon the coal and return home, Messrs. Mellon and Bishop, of Delaware county, made an experiment with some of the coal in their rolling mill, and found them to succeed beyond expectation, and to be a highly valuable and useful fuel. The result of their experiments was published at the time in the Philadelphia papers. Some experiments with the coal were made in the works at the falls of Schuylkill, but without success. Mr. Wernwag, the manager at the Phoenix works at French creek also made trial of the coal, and found them eminently useful. From that time forward, the use of the coal spread rapidly, and now bids fair to become a most important and valuable branch of trade, and to produce results highly beneficial to the interests of Pennsylvania generally.

The foregoing statement may appear minute, but it is due to the individuals who laboured to force upon us the great benefits which coal is and will be to our State. We are aware that the credit of pointing out the use, and perhaps of discovering the anthracite, has been claimed by and awarded to individuals in another part of our State; but it is within the knowledge of many, that those individuals joined in pronouncing the coal good for nothing. We have abundant testimony also for the facts and dates we have given; from which it appears, that to Mr. David Berlin, George Shoemaker, Messrs. Mellon and Bishop, we are indebted for the

discovery of the use and introduction of our anthracite or stone. coal.

"Dark Anthracite ! that reddenest on my hearth,
Thou in those inland mines didst slumber long,
But now thou art come forth to move the earth
And put to shame the men that mean the wrong;
Thou shalt be coals of fire to those that hate thee
And warm the shins of all that underrate thee.

Yea, they did wrong thee foully-they, who mock's
Thy honest face, and said thou wouldst not burn,
Of hewing thee to chimney-pieces talked,
And grew profane-and swore in bitter scorn,
That men might to thy inner caves retire,
And there, unsinged, abide the day of fire.

Yet is thy greatness nigh. Thou too shalt be
Great in thy turn-and wide shall spread thy fame.
And swiftly-farthest Maine shall hear of thee,
And cold New Brunswick gladden at thy name,
And, faintly through its sleets, the weeping isle,
That sends the Boston folks their cod, shall smile.

For thou shalt forge vast rail-ways, and shalt heat
The hissing rivers into steam, and drive
Huge masses from thy mines, on iron feet
Walking their steady way, as if alive,
Northward, till everlasting ice besets thee,
And south as far as the grim Spaniard lets thee.

Thou shalt make mighty engines swim the sea,
Like its own monsters-boats that for a guinea
Will take a man to Havre-and shall be
The moving soul of many a spinning jenny,
And ply thy shuttles, till a bard can wear
As good a suit of broadcloth as the May'r.

Then we will laugh at winter, when we hear
The grim old churl about our dwellings rave:
Thou from that " ruler of th' inverted year,"
Shall pluck the knotty sceptre Cowper gave,
And pull him from his sledge, and drag him in,
And melt the icicles from off his chin.

Heat will be cheap-a small consideration
Will put one in a way to raise his punch,
Set lemon trees, and have a cane plantation-
"Twill be a pretty saving to the Lunch.
Then the West India negroes may go play
The banjo, and keep endless holiday."

LOTTERIES.

It must be told;

These from thy Lottery Wheels are sold;
Sold, and thy children dearly tax'd,
That few may win.-

IT must be told, that fearful as is the waste of treasure and morals by the present infatuation of many for lotteries, they were, at an early period of our city, the frequently adopted measures of "raising ways and means." It is true they were then fairly conducted-had public benefit in design-and tickets were generally vended by disinterested citizens without reward, for the sake of advancing the public weal. It was their way when the mass of the people was comparatively poor, and direct taxes were onerous and unpopular, to thus bring out the aid of the abler part to pay willingly for expensive public improvements, &c. The facts in the case are to the following effect, to wit:

The earliest mention of a lottery in Philadelphia, occurs in 1720, when Charles Reed advertises to sell his brick house in Third street by lottery." That house, if now known, should be the headquarters of lotteries now, as the proper "head and front of their offending."

In 1728, the city council, averse to all private projects in lotteries, interfere and frustrate the design of Samuel Keimer, printer, and once a partner of Franklin's. He had advertised his purpose to make a lottery at the approaching fair, and the council having sent for him and heard his case, gave orders that no such lottery should be attempted, and thus the affair dropped.

In 1748, began the first occasion of a sanctioned public lotteryIt was altogether patriotic. It was in time of war, when great ap prehension existed that the plunder of the city might be attempted by armed vessels. Individual subscriptions and a lottery were resorted to as means for raising "the Association Battery," then constructed near the present navy yard. On this occasion, the Friends put forth their strength to discourage lotteries, and read a rule against them in their Meeting. Some controversy ensued.

Christ church steeple was the next subject of public interest, awakening general regard as an intended ornament and clock-tower. A lottery for this object was first instituted in November,