■148 COAL UNDER SOUTH-EASTERN ENGLAND. 



for water, with one exception. A very deep trial, known as the Sub-Wealden 

 Boring, was made : not for the purpose of finding coal, however, but for the more 

 general one of proving the underground succession of the beds beneath the lowest 

 part of the great Wealden Series in Sussex. From this trial came most valuable 

 information. Jurassic beds were found to a very great thickness, and there is every 

 reason to expect that they continue to a good depth below the 1,900 feet to which 

 the boring was made, as the Middle Division of the Series was not wholly 

 pierced. 



Geologists who have worked much at the subject were well agreed that the 

 neighbourhood of Dover was, for various reasons, one of the best for a trial for 

 underground coal. At Dover has been made the only trial fui- coalm the South- 

 East of England (though others are in progress or in prospect), and it has been 

 successful, for Coal Measures were reached (in 1889) at a depth of 1,113 feet below 

 Ordnance Datum, beneath Cretaceous and Jurassic beds. The Coal Measures 

 have since been pierced to a further depth of 762 ' feet, in which thickness nine 

 seams of coal, with a workable thickness of about 14 feet, have been found. 



The second part of our theory as to the underground structure of the South- 

 East of England has therefore been partly pro\ed, and the existence of one coal- 

 field has been shown. 



It remains now to consider whethei things should be left as they are, or 

 whether it will not be well to make other trial-borings in search of other hidden 

 coal-fields, and my own opinion is strongly in favour of the latter view. The 

 extension of the Coal Measures from Dover and the thickness of the formation in 

 that neighbourhood will of course be worked out, and I believe it is meant to put 

 down a shaft on the site of the trial-boring, a work of no great difficulty, and of 

 less depth than many of our colliery-shafts. 



Amongst other tracts the Eastern Counties should certainly be thoroughly 

 examined. Though the only published evidence we have is from the Harwich 

 boring, yet it should be remembered that this alone, of all the deep trial-borings 

 for water above alluded to, has reached Carboniferous rocks, giving us therefore 

 fair reason to speculate on the presence of Coal Measures at no great distance. 



Some fresh evidence however has just turned up, and though it does not show 

 the existence of Coal Measures, it does show that old rocks of some sort come 

 nearer to the surface in part of Suffolk than anywhere else in the London Basin, as 

 far as is yet known. I cannot now enter into details, which it is hoped will soon 

 form the subject of a special paper : enough to say that the depth at which old 

 rocks have been struck, a few miles from Bury St. F^dmund's, is about 5:0 feet 

 below Ordnance Datum. 



Again, we are not certain what line our underground Coal Measures may lake 

 from Dov'er, and the opinions of geologists vary somewhat on the matter. On the 

 one hand most hold that the extension will be found to trend westward, toward 

 Bristol; but on the other hand some think that it may take a more northerly turn, 

 toward the Midland coal-field, in which case the Eastern Counties would clearly 

 benefit. It seems to me that there is no need to limit ourselves to either 

 view : both extensions may occur. 



I would point out that it is not to be expected that every trial should be 

 successful. Failures to find coal must be expected ; but even failures will teach 

 much, and will not only give us much information as to the character of the beds 

 dee]> underground (a matter of great practical importance in the search), but may 



5 Tfiese figures are corrected, since the Report was written, from later iiiform.ition. 



