The so-called diamonds in the Diamond Rock Drill are in reality carbonite, a mineral found in Brazil. When first offered for sale, the price was fourpence a carat; now it is from fifteen to twenty shillings. These pieces of carbonite being firmly set in a 'crown,' form a drill which, when driven by steam, will pierce the very hardest of rocks. According to the nature of the rock, the progress will be from one inch to two and a half inches a minute, which in ten hours would amount to a considerable number of feet. The wear of the carbonite is so small that in boring quartz, which is not a soft rock, to a depth of thirty feet, not more than one sixty-fourth of an inch would be worn off. The dangerous reef in the estuary of the Tees is in course of removal by means of the diamond drill. Holes are bored; blasting charges are inserted; the rock is blown to pieces; two thousand tons a day are lifted by a dredger; and the total cost for all this is not more than four shillings a cubic yard. Mr Handyside exhibited at the Cornish meeting above mentioned a locomotive which will ascend steep slopes of one foot in ten, or one in eight if required, and therefore may be turned to good use in a hill-country. The Brenner Railway, by which trains cross from Tyrol into Italy, has a rise of one foot in forty: on railway lines generally one foot in eighty may be taken as an available gradient: hence it will be understood that a locomotive able to run straight up hill without miles of zigzag will admit of much economy in railway construction. This new locomotive has, at its rear, a drum wound round with a chain, and is provided with self-acting grips, which descend at the proper moment, and biting the sides of the rails, after the manner of a vice, so fix the locomotive to the spot that it becomes a stationary engine. Some of the wagons are fitted with similar grips, to prevent the train from running back during the ascent. When preparing to mount a hill, the free end of the chain is made fast to the foremost wagon; the locomotive moves on the whole length of the chain and fixes itself; the drum begins to turn, and by winding up the chain, hauls the train up; and this process is repeated until the hill-top is reached. Here then is a new appliance for the engineering profession. Its capabilities have been proved, as stated in the Report, at the new Avonmouth dock, where a Handyside locomotive has hauled the excavated material from the bottom of the basin, and deposited it wherever required for filling on the top. Other advantages possessed by this locomotive are: that it can be used with rails much lighter, and consequently less costly than those in general use: that the drum and chain facilitate the passage of curves: that a train of coal-wagons may be close coupled as a passenger train; and that its break-power is complete, and being applied to the sides of the rails, does not injure the surface that bears the traffic.