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HOW TO USE COAL ECONOMICALLY

The "Scientific American" says: There is a great want of intelligence regarding the burning of coal, and it is not to be expected that servants should know how to save it. The grate or range is stuffed so full that the oven-top is loaded with it, so the fire will not die out or need looking after; then the draft is opened, and the money, or what is the same, the heat, goes flying up the chimney. With a little forethought all this could be prevented, and a ton of coal made to last three months instead of one. A good bright fire can be steadily maintained with coal, with less trouble than with any other kind of fuel, but not by raking, poking, and piling in green fuel continually.

After breakfast the fire should be cleared of ashes, if there are any, and fresh fuel put on to fill the grate moderately. Let the oven damper be turned up so as to heat it, and leave the small top door open, more or less, according to the intensity of heat required. In this way air enters over the top of the fire, and maintains a far better combustion, and consequently greater heat than when the draft-dampers are thrown down. A washing can be done, or "ironing" accomplished, with one-third less coal than is generally thought necessary to use.

There is also great waste in throwing away half-burned coal under the supposition that it is cinders. One who has experimented with coal for twenty years, both in the house and under the boiler, writes: In cleaning the grate in the morning, you will find there is a quantity of unburned coal, which has been externally subjected to combustion. It is covered with ashes, and looks to the inexperienced eye like cinder. It is often relentlessly dumped into the ash-box. The fact, in many cases, is, that the lump is only roasted on the outside, not even coked, and is in a better condition for igniting than the fresh coal. We have stated that coal is a condensed form of carbon. The superficially burned lumps, found in our grates or among our ashes, sufficiently prove this. But take a lump of anthracite coal from the fire, red-hot and all alive, throw it into the water until the ashes are washed from it, and it is black externally and cool. Take it out, and break it open with a hammer, and you will find it red-hot and glowing inside. This shows that time, and a plentiful supply of air, are necessary to burn coal, and that large amounts of what we call ashes and cinders are really excellent fuel.

To prove this fact, let any one carefully sift his ashes, throwing out the inevitable slate, which can be readily detected, and start his coal-fire on wood or charcoal, kindling his coal-fire with the savings. He will find that he can get a good bed of incandescent coal sooner than with green coal on the kindlings.

Never, whether rich or poor, suffer cinders or unburned bits of coal to be wasted in the ash-barrel. Measure for measure, they are worth more than coal. Save them, soak them, try them. Water renovates the coke, and wet cinders upon a hot coal-fire will make it hotter, and keep it so longer than fresh coal. Saving cinders is not meanness, it is economy.