In April, 1825, Furnival disposed of his salt property at Anderton, and three years later, to a month, he bought property at Marston for £1,550. On this ground he erected works covering an area of about twelve acres, and installed some three miles of pannage at a cost of upwards of £135,000, capable of producing some 130,000 tons of salt per annum. He subsequently bought and started to erect works intended, when finished, to occupy nearly six acres of ground at Marston. He asserted that these Wharton and Marston properties were the only two in the kingdom possessing the peculiar advantages of inexhaustible supplies of fully saturated brine and dry rock-salt on the same premises, and he claimed that he could not only deliver rock-salt at fully 25 to 30 per cent. less than any other mine in the country, but, further, that the salt made on his principle was admitted to be superior in quality, owing to the regular distribution of heat, by which more uniform and superior crystals were produced. In the autumn of 1829, he opened negotiations in two separate quarters to lease on royalty certain portions of his salt-works at Wharton, and two committees, each consisting of three men, were appointed by the prospective tenants to investigate the system. On 22nd August, 1829, the two committees drew up a joint report, from which I extract the following-- “The first committee entered upon the investigation on the 15th August, 1829; remained on duty eight hours; was then relieved by the second for the like period, and so continued the investigation, alternately superintending the weighing and delivery of the coals and salt, and taking note of the temperatures every hour. “The following is the result of working for 162 hours, a steam boiler, constantly fed with brine, the specific gravity from 23 to 25·100ths. Length of the boiler, 20 ft.; width, 8 ft. A triangular flue pan, 80 ft.; width, 8 ft. A triangular steam pan, 101·6 in.; width, 8 ft. forming a surface of 1,612 superficial ft. of brine. The quantity of coal consumed was 8½ tons. The quantity of fine salt produced was 356 cwt. Ditto of common and fishery 404 „ -------- Making 760 cwt. ======== “Being a product of four and a half tons of salt for every ton of coals consumed.”