.1867.J 303 [Ilayden. 



ver City. When we reflect that these Western plains are almost des- 

 titute of forest trees, and that the <jreat Pacific Railway is soon to 

 pass near this region, or perhaps throngh the basin itself, the value 

 of these lignite beds cannot be too highly estimated. Accompanying 

 the letter was an interesting geological section showing the connec- 

 tion and inclination of the lignite beds with reference to the moun- 

 tain rar)ges. It is frequently referred to in Mr. Berthoud's letter, 

 but cannot be reproduced in this notice. "Our coal seams extend, 

 to my knowledge, sixty miles due east from Pike's Peak in one di- 

 rection, south to Raton Mountains and the Raton Pass, and north- 

 ward to near Denver, on Cherry Creek, and on the west side of the 

 South Platte as far north as near the Cache la Poudre, and to the 

 foot of the main mountain range. Here in Golden City we have a 

 large outcrop of coal, which has been opened successfully, and which 

 inclines toward the mountain next the town. The following sketch. 

 No. 1, will give you an idea of the relative superposition, and the 

 curious succession of the modern deposits in regard to the erupted 

 feldspathic, granitic, talcose, and hornblende rocks of the main moun- 

 tain range. In one of the newly opened mines on the same outcrop 

 of the Golden City vein, which lies north on Coal Creek about nine 

 miles from Golden City, I saw in 18G1 the trunk of a tree taken out 

 of the eleven foot vein, there opened and mined, which trunk, 

 though turned into coal of a good quality, exhibited carbonized 

 bark, knots, and woody fibre, with concentric rings of growth, such 

 as our present dicotyledonous trees plainly show; indeed, one of the 

 miners remarked that from the bark, and the grain or fibre of the 

 coal, it was very much like bitter cottonwood {Fojmliis antjukifa), 

 examples of which grow close to the mine. In 186"2, while on a scout 

 east of Pike's Peak sixty-five miles, I found a bed of coal almost 

 identical with the Golden City bed, nine feet thick, lying almost 

 horizontal, with bluffs one and a half miles north, containing fine 

 specimens of belemnites. Again, in November, 1866, I went north- 

 east of Golden City to see the coal beds on Rock Creek, sixteen to 

 nineteen miles distant. I found beds of coal fourteen to eighteen feet 

 in thickness, almost horizontal, or dipping eastwardly at a small 

 angle; above them ferruginous sandstone, and vast beds of bog-iron 

 ore and clay-iron stone in nodules, with numberless fragments of 

 bones. In the sandstone I have obtained fossils like Hippurites. 

 But in none of the beds so far have I foutid a single marine or fresh- 

 water shell, with the exceptions I have before mentioned. Every- 



