the Mode of Deposition of the Coal Strata. 249 



now be going on in the fresh-water lakes of every wooded re- 

 gion. If this had been the case in the very remote epochs as- 

 sumed by many geologists, we never could have expected to 

 have found the coal strata in the invariable position, with respect 

 to other beds, in which they are actually placed. If, as some 

 able writers have taught, the progress of nature has, in all past 

 ages, been regular and uniform, fresh-water lakes must at all 

 times have existed, vegetable deposits of coal must at all times 

 have been in progress; and we should consequently have 

 found such beds in every part, indiscriminately, of the surface 

 of the earth. Such, however, is by no means the case ; and 

 no part of the geological system is more exactly defined than 

 the nature of the districts in which coal may be expected to 

 be found. 



If we find, then, an insuperable argument against the theory 

 of a slow deposition, in undefined periods of great extent, in 

 these entire trees which intersect various parts of the coal-mea- 

 sures, to what species of action are we to attribute the rapidity 

 of formation which these carbonometers, if I may so call them, 

 so plainly indicate? Are we to ascribe this rapidity of action 

 merely to the formation of the actual strata in which such trees 

 have been found, or are we, on the contrary, to extend the 

 principle, by fair analogy, to other portions of the series both 

 above and below these interesting and instructive indexes? We 

 may surely be permitted to reason from analogy, that if any 

 one portion of an extensive series, exhibiting throughout a si- 

 milarity of character, can be proved to demonstration to have 

 been deposited in so short a space of time as to cover up and 

 retain in equal preservation a vertical stem of 60 or 70 feet in 

 length, the other portions of the same series must have been 

 deposited in a manner extremely similar* if not strictly identi- 

 cal. If we have, then, a reasonable ground for such conclu- 

 sion, can we continue to look upon the coal strata as lacustrine 

 deposits, from fresh water, formed in the course of thousands, 

 or as some think, of millions of years? It must be evident that 

 either the facts to which I have alluded are erroneous, or the 

 usual line of reasoning on the coal-measures must be un- 

 founded. The facts, however, speak for themselves, and are 

 fully open to the inspection of every one. It may therefore 

 be fairly assumed that suspicion must rest upon the theories 

 in question. 



In the paper by Mr. J. Phillips to which I have already 

 alluded, we find sections of the coal strata in the neighbour- 

 hood of Halifax and Leeds, in one instance amounting to 

 about 50 yards, and in the other to upwards of 1 70. These 



Third Series. Vol. 3. No. 16. Oct. 1833. 2 K 



