STEVENSON, COAL BASIN OF DECAZEVILLE, FRANCE 271 



Feet 

 the fold, the condition being complicated by a small fault, 

 so that it has been rubbed into close wrinkles by the verti- 

 cal movement 7 



7. Coal and shale, involved in the fault, beyond which it is 

 almost vertical, but its laminae are curved with concavity 

 toward the fault 2 



There are few exposures in the hill west from Decazeville. The coal 

 passes under it at the decouverte. Just beyond the church square, one 

 sees the Vialarel mine at a short distance above the level of the street. 

 Around the hollow occupied by the mine buildings as well as along the 

 road leading to a hamlet higher up the hill, are exposures of massive 

 sandstone, with thin beds of shale and with many pebbles, though not 

 enough of them to make a conglomerate. This rock has no resemblance 

 to the conglomerates of the Campagnac system, which are exposed at 

 barely half a mile away toward the north beyond Eiou Mort ; it resembles 

 rather the sandstones above the Bourran bed. The coal bed reached in 

 this shaft was supposed to be the Campagnac, but a tunnel, driven 

 through from the decouverte, encountered no conglomerate. The bed 

 evidently belongs to the Bourran system and is low down in it, but its 

 precise relation to the great bed is still undetermined. The coal is 15 

 meters thick and of excellent quality. 



CHARACTER OP THE COAL 



The following analyses are by M. ISTeyron Saint-Julien, chemist of the 

 Decazeville company. 



Vol. mat. Fixed— C. Ash Fuel ratio 



1. Bourran 34 55 11 1.6 



2. Fraysse 35 59 6 1.67 



3. Domergue 35 51 14 1.5 



4. Firmy 35 57 8 1.6 



5. Miramont 37 53 10 1.44 



6. Vialarel 35 52 12 1.5 



7. Campagnac 32 58 10 1.8 



8. Bouquies b5 57 8 1.6 



9. Rulhe 37 56 7 1.5 



10. Soulier 28.3 54.6 17.1 1.94 



The analysis in each case is of dry coal, the moisture not exceeding 

 0.47. Nos. 1 to 6 are from the Bourran bed; from 7 to 9 are from the 

 Campagnac bed ; the one analysis from the Soulier bed is that of a hand 

 specimen taken from the old workings,^ so that it may not represent 



^ I am indebted for this analysis to M. E. Brocard, who collected the specimen and 

 secured the analysis after my departure. 



