Many of the provinces of China yield an ex cellent iron, equal to the Swedish metal, from red hmmatito; limonite, black magnetic iron-ore, and specular iron-oro occur, but the trade in Chinese iron is petty.
Europeans, in private companies, under Govern ment patronage, and also by Government depart ments, have made several unsuccessful attempts to establish iron works of the forth adopted in Great Britain. The chief of these have been the attempts at Beypur and Porto Novo in 1833 and 1859, in 1874 in the Madras Presidency, with a complete loss to the shareholders ; at Dechauri in the N.W. Provinces, and in Bengal. In 1855 the iron works at Dechauri, in the N.W. Provinces, possessed a well-constructed high furnace ; forest for the supply of charcoal was growing all round them ; they had fair, brown iron-ore at hand, and excellent rich hiematite and magnetic ores only 25 miles off, but the work was abandoned. In 1882, the Government of India took the Bengal iron works off the proprietors' hands, paying the share holders Rs. 4,30,761. Surgeon-General Balfour, in 1855, reported on the iron-ores of the south of India, and showed that in the competition, to be successful, Indian iron must: vie with the iron of Sweden and Russia, and that it is the convenient forms of hoop, and bar, and pig—forms in which wrought-iron is imported—which give British the preference.
Iron imported into India— About 120,000 tons of iron are imported into India, of annual value about 1i kror of rupees, and almost entirely from the United Kingdom.
The native furnaces throughout India are of the same pattern, small circular structures 41 to 5 feet high, built of earth, and the product brings in the villages a higher price (£23 the ton) than iron from Europe (£18 the ton). The Kutub near Dehli, 23 feet 8 inches, is a remarkable illustra tion of what the ancient blacksmiths could do ; and the great gun on the ramparts of Bijapur, cast at Ahmadnaggur about the 16th century, is another.
Iron, Red Oxide.
Tsze-jen-tung, . . ORIN. i Roth clam oxyde, . GER. Sesquioxido of iron, ENG. Ferri sesquioxidurn, LAT. Peroxide of iron, .F. poroxidum, . . „ Colcothar, LAT. 2 T. F. oxydum rubrum, „ Peroxide do for, . . FR. Crocus mortis, . . „ This occurs native in the Chinese provinces of Shen-si and Kiang-si.
Iron Rust.
Sadid ul hadid, . . ARAB. Karatan basi, . . MALAY. Than khya, . . . Bum. Irambu tapu, . . . TAIL Tai basi, . . . MALAY. Tuphu, ,) Iron, Sulphate of, Ferri Sulphas.
Bala-dokta, . . BENG. Hara tutia, . . . HIND.
Luh-fan, T'sing- . fan, Cillx. Solfato di ferro, . . Ir.. Tan-fan, Tsau-fan, „ , Ferrum vitriolatum„ LAT. Green vitriol, . . mortis, . . . . „ I Green copperas, . „ Tarusi, . . . . MALAY.
Sulfate defer, . . . FR. Zunkur madni, . PERS. Schwefelsaures eisen, „ Tutiya subz, . . „ Oxydul, Eisen vitriol, GER. Unna, Anna baydi, Hera kasis, . . . HIND.
Sulphate of iron is the sulphate of the protoxide of iron, and occurs in the form of green crystals, soluble in water. The salt is formed abundantly by natural oxidation of the sulphuret of iron, a mineral especially common in coal districts. The sulphuret, absorbing oxygen from the atmosphere, is converted into the sulphate of the protoxide of iron ; this is apt to be changed into the red coloured sulphate of the sesquioxide. It is made artificially on a large scale, for use in the arts, by exposing moistened pyrites to the air. It occurs in the Indian bazars in large masses of green crystals, and in a state of considerable purity. It was known to the ancients, is mentioned in the Amara Kosha of the Hindus, and it is used by them, as by the Romans in the time of Pliny, in making ink. A very cheap green copperas m China is largely used in the mission hospitals as a disinfectant, also in dyeing black, and as an emetic in cases of poisoning. The natives of India have long known the use of acetate of iron, which they prepare by macerating iron in sour palm-wine, or in water in which rice has been boiled.—Royle, Mat. Died.; O'Sh., Beng. Phar. p. 325 ; Royle, Hindu Medicine, p. 44 ; Smith, M. M. C. ; Local Committee, Tubbulpur ; Captain Strover, 1873; Smith; Balfour's Report on the Iron Ores, Iron and Steel of the Madras Presidency ; Prof. Max Muller's Lectures, p. 223 ; M'Culloch's Commercial Dictionary ; Powell's Handbook ; Madras Ex. Jur. Reports ; Cat. Ex., 1862; Carter's Geological Papers; Voysey ; Moral and Material Progress of India ; Cat. and Jur. Report, Exhibition of 1851.