388 
the manufacturing communities of 
the world absent from the soil of 
Brazil. 
The northern half of the empire 
is physically not unlike the plain 
of Northern Italy on a large scale. 
Covered with forests springing from 
a rich alluvial soil, and watered by 
the Amazon and its giant branches, 
it is prodigiously fertile. The 
southern half is hilly, and some- 
times mountainous, and gives birth 
to the Rio de la Plata. One of the 
peaks of the Organ Range rises be- 
hind the harbour of Rio de Janeiro, 
to an altitude of 7,500 feet. These 
and the neighbouring hills contain 
minerals and gems in abundance, 
and the Government has, with great 
spirit, undertaken a mineral survey 
of these southern provinces. 
It was once supposed that this 
great empire —rich in precious 
stones, and nearly all the metals, 
from gold to iron inclusive—was 
devoid of one natural product, use- 
ful, if not absolutely essential, to 
the full utilization of the other 
mineral treasures —namely, coal ; 
but such a supposition was alto- 
gether erroneous, as recent investi- 
gations have fully shown. A writer 
in a recent number of the ‘ Quar- 
terly Review’ * for 1860, mentions 
(on what authority is not stated) 
the existence of a coal-field upwards 
of 60 leagues in extent, and 40 miles 
from the sea. Considering that 
Brazil has a seaboard of more than 
2,000 miles, the description of the 
locality is sufficiently vague; but, 
as far as it goes, the information is 
strictly correct; this, however, is 
all that was known on the subject 
on this side of the Atlantic till very 
recently.t 
* No, 216, page 338 in foot note. 
+ A correspondent of the ‘Mining 
Journal,’ No. 1484, states that “ years 
since samples of the coals were sent to 
this country, and analysed by Dr. 
Percy.” It may also be stated that 
specimens of coal from Brazil were 
shownin the Exhibition of 1862, and 
were reported on by Mr. W. W. Smyth, 
in Jury Reports. 
Notes and Correspondence. 
[ April, 
To a countryman of our own, Mr. 
Nathaniel Plant, we are indebted 
for a full account, through his 
brother, Mr. J. Plant, Curator of 
the Salford Museum, of the position 
and resources of three distinct coal- 
fields which he has recently ex- 
plored in the southern part of the 
empire; the largest presents some 
features of peculiar interest, which 
we proceed briefly to lay before our 
readers. 
The first notice of these minerals 
seems to have been taken by Mr. 
Bonliech, son of the Governor of the 
province of Rio Grande do Sul, in 
which the largest of the three coal- 
fields is situated. This was in the 
year 1859, and it was probably 
through the report of this gentle- 
man that the writer in the ‘ Quar- 
terly Review’ obtained his informa- 
tion. The matter, however, seems 
to have been lost sight of until the 
end of 1861. When Mr. Plant, who 
for several years had been exa- 
mining the mineral districts of Rio 
Grande, in the service of the Im- 
perial Government, determined to 
make a fuller exploration of the 
coal-district, and he has now sent 
to this country an account of the 
very remarkable deposits of mineral 
fuel he met with, together with 
those unbiassed witnesses—photo- 
craphic views, and rock specimens.* 
The Candiota field is the largest 
of three which have as yet been dis- 
covered. It extends from lat. 32°S. 
to 28°S., and is thus at the southern 
extremity of the province of Rio 
Grande do Sul. It is traversed by 
the river Jaguarao and several of 
its tributaries, along whose banks 
the seams of coal crop out. There 
are two great seams of bituminous 
coal, the lower being 25 feet in 
thickness, the upper part of which 
is shown in the sketch, and is sepa~ 
rated by only a very few feet of 
shale from the upper bed (or series 
of beds), which is 40 feet in thick- 
ness. 
* These have been laid before the 
Geological Society of Manchester by 
his brother, 1864. 
