Science, we thus see, connects distant regions, and renders the world one great commercial market. Science is, therefore, a chief instrument in the production of commercial wealth. But we have a world beneath our feet which science has only just now begun to explore. We want fuel and metallic ore to be raised from the bowels of the earth; and, till within a very few years, we used to dig at random when we desired to dig a mine, or confided the outlay of thousands of pounds to be used in digging, to some quack whose pretensions to knowledge were even more deceptive than a reliance upon chance. The science of geology, almost within the last quarter of a century, has been able, upon certain principles, to determine where coal especially can be found, by knowing in what strata of earth coal is formed; and thus the expense of digging through earth to search for coal, when science would, at once pronounce that no coal was there, has been altogether withdrawn from the amount of capital to be expended in the raising of coal. That this saving has not been small, we may know from the fact, that eighty thousand pounds were expended fruitlessly in digging for coal at Bexhill, in Sussex, not many years ago, which expense geology would have instantly prevented; and have thus accumulated capital, and given a profitable stimulus to labour, by saving their waste. But geological science has not only prevented the expensive search for coal where it does not exist, but has shown that it does exist where, a few years ago, it was held impossible to find it. The practical men, as they are called, maintained that coal could not be found beneath the magnesian limestone. A scientific geologist, Dr. William Smith, held a contrary opinion; and the result of his abstract conviction is, that the great Hetton collieries have been called into action, which supply a vast amount of coal to the London market, found beneath this dreaded barrier of magnesian limestone. Geology--however scanty its facts at present are, compared with what they will be when miners have been accustomed to look at their operations from the scientific point of view--geology can tell pretty accurately in which strata of the earth the various metals are likely to be found; and knowing, to some extent, the strata of different countries, can judge of the probability of finding the precious metals as well as the more common. Sir Roderick Murchison, in 1844, expressed his belief, in a public address, that gold existed in the great Eastern Chain of Australia. In 1849, an iron-worker in Australia, reading this opinion, searched for gold, and found it. The discovery was neglected, till an enterprising man came from California, and completed the realization of the scientific prediction. The gold-diggings of Australia are producing, by their attraction to emigrants, changes in the amount and value of labour in the United Kingdom, which may materially affect