the United States of America, 33 



Sackawasen, along which it is to be carried as far as the forks 

 of the Dyeberry, about 20 miles. The canal was opened ia 

 April 1828 from the Delaware to the Hudson, the remainder is 

 in a state of rapid progress towards completion. From the 

 termination of the canal, a railway has been laid out, rising 

 about 500 feet to a gap in the Moosick mountain, whence it 

 descends 800 feet to the valley of the Sachawannock, a branch 

 of the Susquehannah. At this point is an immense bed of coal, 

 a portion of the great anthracite formation of Pennsylvania. 

 The great object, indeed, of this canal is to bring a supply of 

 this valuable fuel to the city of New York, and to those districts 

 on the Hudson in which wood has become scarce. 



As the coal of this region has been the source of a variety 

 of projects of inland navigation, besides the canal we have 

 just mentioned, it will be essential to the complete illustration 

 of our subject, that we should describe this formation. 



It may be traced from a point in Dauphin county, Penn- 

 sylvania, about fifteen miles north of Harrisburgh, the seat of 

 the state-government. It thence extends about E. N. E. 

 through the whole length of Schuylkill county, and incloses 

 the sources of the river of that name. On the borders of 

 Schuylkill and North Hampton counties it turns suddenly 

 to the north, and proceeds in that direction, until it reaches 

 the Susquehannah river, in the vale of Wyoming, when it 

 spreads out on both banks of the river, and includes the whole 

 valley. Here the formation resumes its original course, or 

 one more nearly N.E., and when the course of the river 

 abandons that direction, the coal can still be traced pursuing 

 that azimuth, up the valley of the Sachawannock ; along this 

 it extends to the very source of that stream ; and the last mine 

 that has been opened is at Belmont in Wayne county, the 

 north-eastern corner of the state of Pennsylvania. The whole 

 length of this formation is about 1 10 miles, the breadth from 

 four to eight miles. According to the investigations of the late 

 Mr. Cist, of Wilkesbarre, the coal extends beneath the whole 

 of this region, and is in many places from twelve to thirty feet 

 in thickness. The supply is, in truth, vast beyond calculation. 



The general character of the coal of this formation is what is 

 called by mineralogists anthracite^ and is similar to that of the 



JULY— SEPT. 1828. D 



