He thought there was nothing finer in the world, not even in Greece, where he acknowledged never to have been.
It will be remembered that at their third meeting the committee decided to use cast-iron for the Columbiad, and in particular the grey description.

This metal is, in fact, the most tenacious, ductile, and malleable, suitable for all moulding operations, and when smelted with pit coal it is of superior quality for engine-cylinders, hydraulic presses, &c.
But cast-iron, if it has undergone a single fusion, is rarely homogeneous enough; and it is by means of a second fusion that it is purified, refined, and dispossessed of its last earthly deposits.
Before being forwarded to Tampa Town, the iron ore, smelted in the great furnaces of Goldspring, and put in contact with coal and silicium heated to a high temperature, was transformed into cast-iron.

After this first operation the metal was taken to Stony Hill.

But there were 136 millions of pounds of cast-iron, a bulk too expensive to be sent by railway; the price of transport would have doubled that of the raw material.

It appeared preferable to freight vessels at New York and to load them with the iron in bars; no less than sixty-eight vessels of 1,000 tons were required, quite a fleet, which on May 3rd left New York, took the Ocean route, coasted the American shores, entered the Bahama Channel, doubled the point of Florida, and on the 10th of the same month entered the Bay of Espiritu-Santo and anchored safely in the port of Tampa Town.