Dover.— Coal. 63 
western country is prolific m species of insects, plants and land ani- 
mals, without limit; and shall these immense waters, embracing 
nearly one fourth of a hemisphere, be restricted according to the 
opinions of some to a few species of bivalve shells, and those only 
such as are common to both sides of the Alleghany Mountains? A 
still stronger proof than that of analogy, is found in the specific dif- 
ferences of the molluscous animals themselves. Dissections and 
comparative examinations of the animals, show a specific differ- 
ence, even stronger than the outlines of the calcareous coverings. 
I have myself dissected many shells, for this very purpose. "It is 
furthermore contrary to the general economy of nature, to bring forth 
and perpetuate varieties, either of plants or animals, except when 
under the cultivation and artificial direction of man. 
Dover.—Ten miles below Zoar, we passed the village of Dover, 
with four or five stores, and two or three large flouring mills. The 
sites for water power machinery, along the canal, are very numerous, 
and as yet only partially occupied. The Tuscarawas winds through 
broad and rich bottom Jands, in many places more than two miles 
wide from hill to hill. The adjacent country is moderately hilly, 
and clothed with dense forests, which are every where fast falling 
before the axe of the woodman, and rich wheat fields, orchards and 
meadows are occupying their place, 
- Newcastle— Coal. —May 17: Sixteen caibde below Zoar, at New- 
castle, coal is found at a less elevation, and much more abundant. 
The deposit here is six feet in thickness, and extensively worked. 
Wooden slides, on the sides of the hills, conduct the coal from the 
mouths of the mines to reservoirs on the banks of the canal; from 
thence it is carried in boats to the summit, and to the valley of the 
Scioto. It is said to be of an excellent quality. At the present 
day, with all the lights that have been thrown upon the subject by 
chemistry .and the study of fossil plants of the coal series, no well 
instructed and-sound geologist would hazard the long exploded the- 
ory of the mineral origin of coal, by ejection from the interior 
the earth. Although some bituminous shales are. destitute of the 
impressions of plants, more than nine tenths of them abound with 
these authentic proofs of the vegetable origin of coal; and J have 
never seen a piece of slaty bituminous coal, from any part of the 
valley of the Mississippi, that was not filled with thin layers of ve- 
getable fibres, resembling nee and lying between all the hori- 
zontal folia of the specimen. Whence all these impressions of 
