lately discovered near St. Helen's, 169 



lower part of the middle Lancashire coal-field, about 119 

 yards above the Rushey-park mine, the last thick seam in the 

 series, and between two beds of coal, the Sir Roger and a yard 

 mine. 



By the kindness of my friend, Mr. John Hawkshead Talbot, 

 I am enabled to give the following section showing their posi- 

 tion : — 



yds. 



rCoal 



Dirt 



Sir Roger mine-^ Coal 



Dirt . . 



LCoal 



Warren containing fossil trees . 17 



Stone (white grit) 16 



Coal and dirt 1 



When I visited the place the trees had been exposed some 

 time, and hundreds of people had inspected them. They ap- 

 pear to have been the wonder of the neighbourhood, and ex- 

 cited not only considerable interest, but an unfair share of cu- 

 pidity. The proprietor of the quarry was anxious to preserve 

 them, and gave such orders to his servants ; but although placed 

 in a perpendicular wall of rock, parties provided with ladders 

 came during the night twice and stole portions of the roots. 



Three specimens were originally standing in the quarry, but 

 the centre one has been removed. No. 1, the tree on the south 

 side of the quarry, is considerably the largest, and displays roots 

 which Nos. 2 and 3 did not do to an unpractised eye. 



Both the gritstone rock and the indurated silty clay in which 

 the fossils were found afforded specimens of Lepidodendron, 

 Calamites, Pecopteris nervosa, a Neuropteris, and several other 

 coal plants. 



The diameter of the largest specimen, No. 1, at the base is 

 about two feet nine inches, and at the top about one foot two 

 inches. Its height is now near seven feet*, but the workmen 

 informed me that two feet had been taken of the top, so that 

 it originally was about nine feet high. Scarcely one half of 

 the tree is exposed, the other half being still encased in the 

 matrix, in which it is imbedded. Four main roots have been 

 uncovered ; these evidently spring from the base of the tree in 

 pairs, like the roots of the trees found at Dixon Fold, on the 

 Manchester and Bolton Railway. Two of the roots had been 

 removed before I saw them, with the exception of about eight 

 inchesfrom their commencement, but the third I traced fourteen 



* These dimensions are not from absolute admeasurement, there being 

 difficulties in the way which prevented me from taking such. 



