Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century: Some Contemporary European Accounts c23.s5.t1.2

c23.s5.t1.2

The ore is never found near the surface as at *Jabalpur* but always about 30 feet below it, and in large masses, or beds, in cavities between the strata of the rock, which in some cases seems to have sustained violence; it is the brown *hydro-oxide*, both fibrous, and compact; but the former is by far the most prevailing; its general character, and appearance is opaque, and earthy, but when it has a metallic lustre, its fibres are beautifully fine, and constantly radiated; its most common form is irregular concentric lamellar, the lamellae of which are separated by a different colour, usually yellow, or yellowish brown; it is sometimes, though very rarely, crystallised, sometimes also it is mamillary and *botryoidal* but I have not met with any other imitative form; it contains manganese and silex, but sulphur is its principal vitiating constituent; its produce will be shown hereafter; but here it may be observed, that it yields most excellent malleable iron, fit for all uses, and also steel at nearly the same price as iron; there are five distinguishing names for it, which I shall give in the terms used by the native miners annexing thereto—their European synonyms: Gulkoo (No.2) includes all the waterworn pebbles which are embedded in diluvial gravel between the alluvium and the rock, under which the ore lies; it is a mixed and bad kind of ore.