315 



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«» RfdJ ^aqiijdi'ffi ,f 



GEOLOGICAL COLLECTIONS, 



^il -1 l-*NCLUDING MINERALOGY. 



Fossil T^€4 tieaf Dalkeith. — In our last Number, we noticed a fossil tree 

 which has been recently discovered in the coal mines belonging to the 

 Marquis of Lothian, in the parish of Newbattle. We are now enabledj 

 through the polite attention of the editor of the Edinburgh Literary Journal^ 

 (a delightful work, " quod miscuit utUe duki") to insert a cut which gives a 

 sufficiently accurate idea of the position of the tree. 



XIISTE or STTBJFAOE 



This tree was found by the workmen while piercing the strata in a 

 horizontal or level line 23 fathoms beneath the surface. It traverses the 

 dip of the strata nearly at right angles — about 6 inches in the first 5^ feet 

 off the perpendicular line. The base of the part exposed is 4^ feet in 

 diameter, tapering in a conical form, as represented in the cut, to a diameter 

 of 3 feet at the top. 



Petrified Forest on the Banks of the Missouri. — On the western bank of 

 the Missouri, some miles above its junction with the Yellow Stone, and 

 about 48° lat., the summits of the mountains, at about 500 feet above the 

 surface of the river, exhibit a remarkable phenomenon : The surface is 

 covered with trunks, roots, and branches of petrified trees. Some of the 

 trees appear to have been broken off at the roots, others at some feet above 

 the surface of the ground. One trunk was measured, whose circumference 

 exceeded 15 feet Bull, de la Soc. Geog. Jan. 183L 



The Gold Mines of Western Transylvania Of all countries in Europe, 



Transylvania was reckoned, until lately, the richest in gold, and the most 

 favourable for the discovery of new mines of this precious metal. The 

 recently ascertained richness of the Ural chain, has placed it on a par with 

 the mountains of Transylvania ; and it may eventually prove more rich, 

 since its auriferous soils have not been dug up and impoverished, as in the 

 latter country. On the other hand, if the discovery of the ancient mines 

 of the Ural is owing to chance, the new auriferous deposits have been 

 examined according to the most approved rules of art, while in Transylvania 

 this last means of research has too often been neglected. The auriferous 

 soils are, for the most part, abandoned to washers, more or less ignorant, or 

 to wandering troops of enrolled Bohemians, who dig the soil without rule, 

 and do not avail themselves of all its riches ; or who, naturally idle, are 

 contented with finding the quantity of gold for which they are individually 

 taxed, and return immediately to their vagabond life. 



The districts have not been at all studied ; none of them has been 

 geologically examined; and even the superficial researches have not been made 



