66 



dividing the Upper from tlie Lower Coals, acting both as a physical 

 or natural as well as an economically impassible barrier in the 

 centre of the basin to the Lower Coals of the Radstock and 

 Coal-Pit Heath areas. This great belt of Sandstone is also 

 represented in the South Wales coal-field, and occupies the 

 same geological position. 



In the Upper Coal Measures of Radstock, Farmborough, 

 Coal-Pit Heath, and Parkfield, 16 seams of coal occur ; in the 

 intervening Pennant, 3 ; in the Lower series, worked on the 

 north flank of the Mendip Hills, at Ashton, Kingswood, Tate, 

 and Cromhall, from 25 to 30 occur. The 16 seams in the Upper 

 Measures (above the Pennant) g-ive the united thickness of 27 

 feet. The ^Pennant' Rock, although 2000 feet thick, only yields 

 five feet of workable coal, and the 26-7 seams under the Pennant 

 about 66 feet — or nearly 100 feet of workable coal occur in the 

 area known as the Bristol, or Somerset and Gloucester, coal- 

 field, which stretches from Cromhall to the north flank of the 

 Mendip Hills. 



Mr. Etheeidge claimed the attention of the Club to some of 

 the statistical facts connected with the wrought and unwrought 

 quantities of coal in the basin, showing that the Royal Com- 

 mission had been able to gather statistically, and upon reliable 

 data, that no less than thirty-five millions of tons of coal had 

 been extracted from the Somersetshire, or Radstock and 

 Paringdon area, and fifteen millions from the Upper series of 

 Gloucestershire, or the Coal-Pit Heath and Parkfield area ; and 

 this in the north tract, from only four seams. From the Pennant 

 in the Nailsea Field, only 437,000 tons, and north of Kingswood 

 722,000 tons; or united, this centre barrier has yielded only 

 1,210,006 tons. It appears also that the Lower Measures of the 

 coal-basin had yielded, up to the time of enquiry, no less than 

 58 millions of tons of coal — the area from whence it has been 

 extracted being Vobster, Mells, Holcombe, Sutton, Timsbm-y, 

 &c., on the south ; from the centre area at Ashton, Bedminster, 

 Nailsea, &c. ; and from the northern tract at Kingswood, 

 Stapleton, St. George's, Yate, Cromhall, &c. This, with an 

 additional five millions of tons for which no proper records or 



