86 POPULAR GEOLOGY. 



Coal and Ironstone are brought from the different pits to Low-moor in 

 waggons which are draAvn by stationary engines, some scores of miles of 

 wire roping being used for that purpose. The further we go to the south- 

 east and the deeper the coal sinks in the earth. Some of the coal-pits 

 about here being above 200 yards in depth. 



In order to give the reader a further illustration of the "succession of 

 rocks" in our neighbourhood I will just give a brief summary of the 

 different formations from Halifax to Low-moor. Halifax as we have seen 

 in a former paper, stands upon the Millstone grit-rock, upon that rock lie 

 about 200 yards of Lower Coal-strata occupying the slopes of Ringby and 

 Beacon hiUs which are again covered by the Flagstone-rock of Ringby and 

 Northo-ivram. These rocks sink below the surface, beyond Hipperholme 

 and are covered by the Middle Coal-measures. At the place where I am 

 now standing, there will be nearly 300 yards of these Middle Coal-strata 

 resting upon the Flagstone-rock and consequently about 500 yards of strata 

 lying upon the IMiUstone-grit-rock. This estimate agrees pretty nearly 

 with the well-known dip of the strata,-about one yard in twenty or nearly 

 ninty yards per mile to the south east, this place being somewhere between 

 five and six miles in the above direction fi-om Halifax and about the same 

 height above the sea level. Of coiu-se, the above summary is but a rough 

 approximation and has no pretensions to mathematical accuracy. 



If we travel further to the south-east these Middle Coal-strata are in 

 turn covered by the Upper Coal -measiu-es, and finally the great Carboniferous 

 system disappears under the Magnesium Limestone. 



After rambling about from pit to pit, and meeting with varying 

 success I at length arrived at a great heap of shale and stone, which had 

 been brought up from a pit now in process of sinking. Here I found a 

 great number of fossil ferns. It is truly wonderful how fresh and perfect 

 they look (and the same may be said of most fossils) when first exposed to 

 the light of day, after being such a vast length of time enveloped in their 

 stony folds. You could almost fancy they were but of last years growth, 

 though they never look so well again "Yet a thing of beauty is a joy for 

 ever." They were aU small in size, the following genera being most 

 prevalent: — Spenopteris, Neuropteris and Pecopteris. I also found one 

 specimen of Asterophilites or Star fern and a few specimens of what seem 

 to be Clubmosses. We have no species in existence in our day that bears 

 any resemblance to these fossils; the nearest to tliem in form being our 

 Spleenworts, Buckler, and Shield ferns. Fossil ferns are named from the 



