50 REPORT—1846., . 
GEOLOGY AND PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 
On the Origin of the Coal of Silesia. By Professor GoprEert of Breslau, 
Communicated by Sir R. I. Murcuison, G.C.St.S., PRS, 
Tue Society of Sciences of Holland at Haarlem, proposed in the year 1844, the 
following prize questions :— 
Ist. To point out by accurate investigation of the different coal-measures, whe- 
ther the beds of coal derived their origin solely from the vegetables which once lived 
upon their present locality, or whether they originated from plants which had been 
floated thither from other places. 
2nd. To inquire whether different coal layers have had a different origin. 
At the session of that Society of the 23rd of May, 1846, a paper sent in by me 
was honoured with both prizes : the suggester of the questions, Professor Von Breda, 
received a silver medal. 
Regretting very much that I am unable to attend the present meeting of the 
British Association, I beg to submit to the Society’s indulgent criticism some ex- 
tracts from the before-mentioned paper, the materials for which were derived from 
the coal formations of Silesia. I am now about to extend this inquiry, at the re- 
quest of the Prussian authorities, to the other coal strata situated in the Rhenish 
provinces of Westphalia. : ; 
Geologists had rarely found in former years any well-preserved plants in the coal 
itself, and had inferred its composition from the plants that lie in the shale, 
&c. associated with the coal: my observations in Upper and Lower Silesia prove 
the correctness of this inference, as I have met with extended coal layers in 
which the plants (Sigillaria, Stigmaria, Calamites, Lepidodendra, Nogyerathia) are 
still so well preserved that we can distinguish with the naked eye the individual spe- 
cies. Thesestems, or more properly their barks, lie pressed flat one upon the other, 
commonly without the inner parenchyma (yet sometimes the latter is preserved 
and converted into coal), in such a manner that we are able still to recognise, under 
the microscope, the cells of the parenchyma. Besides this, the so-called mineral 
charcoal, or fibrous anthracite, does not occur here in single little fragments as it 
is found elsewhere in the coal, but in broad compressed stems a foot long, which 
offer the structure of the Araucariz of our present period (Araucarites carbonarius, 
mihi). 
According to the predominance of one or the other genus of plants, I distinguish 
at many places in Upper Silesia, coal of Sigillaria, Araucarian coal, and Lepido- 
dendron coal, of which the last is far the rarest. 
In consequence of these observations I can now give a very simple explanation 
of the way in which coal has been formed. The Sigillariz (Stigmaria), Lepido- 
dendrez, Calamitez, containing a softer parenchyme, soon began to be decomposed 
and disaggregated ; but when this process of decomposition was terminated, by early 
depositions covering the vegetable mass, and the formation of coal was rendered 
possible, the Araucariz, which were much harder, and therefore not equally ad- 
vanced in decomposition, were introduced into the mass in longer fragments, in 
which the ligneous structure, viz. the parenchymatous wood, cells and medullary 
rays, are still clearly discernible even under a simple lens. By a more detailed re- 
search into the situations which are occupied by all the species of plants detected in the 
coal itself (which species amount to eighty in number), compared with those plants 
which occur in the slate-clays and sandstonesof the Silesian coal-pits (which produce 
about four millions of tons a-year), certain positive relations, or modes of distribu- 
tion, became apparent, such as could not be overlooked. I observed a separation 
into groups, or the consociated occurrence of certain species; the failing of one 
species and the substitution of another of the same genus in one and the same coal 
stratum ; and also a different condition of the vegetables in the strata superimposed 
one on another. 
Besides this, the mode of preservation of the fossil plants (ferns with flexible but 
browned leaflets, &c.), the uniform continuity of many strata with the same thick- 
ness over a space of many German miles, the multitude of upright stems, of which 
as many as 200 have already been observed, with other conditions not noticed here, ~ 
are proofs of tranquil deposition over the present localities, 
