134 STEVENSON— INTERRELx\TIONS OF THE FOSSIL FUELS. 



pressed flat. The color is brown or reddish brown, but usually the 

 bark is black. Stems and coals are not in separate layers but are 

 intermingled. At times the coal is very impure and spaces between 

 the stems are filled with loamy mud. Occasionally one finds nests 

 of soft, deep black, sometimes granular coal, resembling linden char- 

 coal. The fresh material can be worked with a knife, saw or plane; 

 after complete drying, it can be pulverized only with difficulty. The 

 w^ood-like coal, dried at iio° C, has carbon, 53.22, hydrogen, 5.56, 

 oxygen and nitrogen, 37.95, ash, 3.27. This is better than the average 

 as generally the ash is higher. 



The " gas coal " of Falkenau occurs, according to Katzer, as the 

 top bench of the middle coal bed at that place, and is somewhat more 

 than 30 inches thick. The lower benches of the bed are thin, irregu- 

 lar and of poor quality. Yon Giimbel's^^" study of this Falkenau 

 material showed that it consists chiefly of much disintegrated vege- 

 table matter. Treated with Bleichflussigkeit, it exhibits the needles 

 of intermingled Faserkohle. With these are abundant pollen exines 

 and very many minute bodies resembling those seen in diluvial brown 

 coals. The deep brown spores of lichens or alg^e are clearly recog- 

 nizable. The voluminous mostly white ash, 7.75 per cent., consists 

 of clay flakes and quartz grains with some fragments retaining plant 

 texture. This composition, as ascertained by v. .Giimbel, is very 

 much like that of a Lebertorf. 



The Lower Miocene deposits of Brennberg near Oedenburg in 

 Hungary were studied by Nendtvich,^^® who described the coal as a 

 lens. It has suflr'ered much from disturbance, the dips varying from 

 40 to 50 degrees and crevices in the coal are filled with Russkohle 

 (soot-coal) and slate. The thickness in the deeper part of the basin 

 is from 10 to 20 fathoms, but the bed decreases toward the borders. 

 The woody structure is distinct in some portions of the coal, which 

 are finely fibrous and in part like ebony. The faux-toit is well- 

 marked, consisting of alternating layers of coal and clay, and shows 

 leaf impressions. According to Grand'Eury, the underclay contains 

 no roots. 



IS" C. W. V. Giimbel, " Beitrage," etc., p. 145. 



188 Q M. Nendtvich, " Ungarns Steinkohlen," etc., Haidinger's Bcrichte, 

 Bd. III., 1848, p. 38. 



