Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1880-05-19
la,lraster f1ltrIligenrer.
WEDNESDAY EVENING, MAY 10, 1880.
Now and Then.

upou Ho" ouiau d LudIUCI d SICdt AOA tuhS
may be gained and lost, and how
the progress of mechanical develop
ment may alter the effect Of a
contract. Nearly a hundred years
ago Peter Grubb, jr., the owner of a sixth
interest in the great Cornwall ore bank
in the neighboring county of Lebanon,
sold it to Robert Coleman, the owner OF
alarge part of the mine, reserying, how
ever, sufficient ore for the use of one fur
pace forever thereafter. Then the cold
blast charcoal furnace, with an output
of but thirty tons week was the only
smelling furnace. known. The Coleman
heirs insist that this is the proper meas
ure of the ore right reserved: and
when the owners of it, some thirty years
ago, tore down. n.the old furnace and erect
ed new one capable of turning out ten
times the amount of metal, they object
ed, and twenty-four years ago the disa-
greement eliminated in the suits which
have just been decided. The supreme
court holds that the right to take ore for
any one furnace is unlimited. The deci-
sion follows the language of the stipula
tion: but the opinion goes farther and
finds that this construction also carries
out the intent of the parties. This is
not so clear and Judge Paxson's argu-
ment that under it each party in interest
is equally at liberty to draw upon the ore
with the improved modern appliances,
and that therefore it is equally fair
to each, is hardly sustained by the facts.
1t is true that when Coleman and Grubb
made the bargain, each desired the use
of the ore for the same kind of furnace g:
and that the parties to-day all want it
for the improved furnace. 1t seems
plausible that each should have their de-
sire gratified now rs then, and that each
should have the same measure of privi-
lege in using the ore that they had a
hundred years ago. That is plausible
and would be right but the present adj
justment of the supreme court does not
accomplish this result, since the Robe
sonia owners get the first 6 hack " as
the sixth part of the ore bank and
when they are done there may he moth
ing left for the owners of that sixth in
terest to take.
That is just the situation. The an.
nual product of the Cornwall ore bank is
about 100000 tons of ore. A furnace
with all the modern improvements may
he erected by the Robesonia owners Ca
pable of smelling a thousand tons of iron
a week. The furnace of the Edgar
Thomson steel company, just completed
if u feet bOsh, and, using coke and fifty
four per cent. ores, turns out this pro-
duct. The Cornwall ores are not so readily
smelted as the cres used at the Edgar
Thomson, but still larger furnace is
possible, and it is not possible to fix the
limit of capacity of a single furnace
when owners have the incentive now
offered to the Robesonia owners to
build the biggest one possible. If they
but equal what has already been done
they will draw on the Cornwall
ore bank for hundred thousand tons
of ore year, which is considerably
more than sixth of the present
product. That product can nc
doubt he greatly increased but it looks
very much as though Mr.. Fer
gusOn and his associates of Robesonia
have secured all the meat, leaving to the
Coleman heirs but the bare bones of the
fowl the supreme court has carved fol
them. 1t will be matter of seriou:
consideration for the Colemans as tt
whether it will not pay them to surren
der the whole of the sixth interest in the
mine to the owners of the right to 6 thu
ore for one furnace forever" So that it i:
not clear, as Judge PaXson says, thai
Peter Grubb'S candle burns no faster
than the Colemans' it smelts all the orr
and don't leave the mine owners ever
the cinder. Judge Paxson's comparison
is that of a number of candles all lighted
together and burning down equally fast
1t is a bright comparison but don't seen
to cover the case. The Grubb candle
with its improved mode of consuming
oxygen, don't leave any for the Coleman
candles to feed on. The Colemans cam
use the improved methods for their can
dies, for the simple reason that there il
only enough oxygen for the Grubb can
die, which has the call on the supply.
Probably the division is right, but il
will hardly do to base it on the inten
tiOns of the parties. They did not con
template the use of anything but thu
cold-blast furnace and so did not pro
vide for anything else. The supply O.
such furnace would hardly have beer
felt by the owner of the sixth of thu
mine. BY neither parties could it have
been supposed that it would be ;
serious tax on the mine, else thu
amount to be supplied would have beer
more definitely fixed. All of which
teaches the necessity of carefully describ
ing and limiting right that is sold to bt
exercised "forever." If Robert Cole
man had been prudent enough to put q
limit to the tonnage to be used by the
furnace, or to have described it as char
coal furnace of its existing dimensions
he would have saved his heirs the several
millions of dollars which his little omis
S ion now promises to cost them.
A BAPTIST church in jamestown, n
Y, has been disgraced by the moral
downfall of it pastor, Rev. Geo. Peltz