250 Mr. Weaver on Floetz Formations. [Oct. 



stone of Ottendorf, &c. And in the limestone itself, which is 

 most commonly of a reddish-grey cast, impressions of fishes have 

 been observed in two places, in a low and a high part of the 

 formation ; at Kunzendorf near Neurode, and at Rupersdorf 

 between Friedland and Braunau.* 



In the Netherlands. — As the coal tracts of Germany, now 

 noticed, bear a close analogy in structure to those of Scotland ; 

 so do those of the Netherlands correspond with some of the coal 

 fields in England. 



In the 24th volume of the Journal des Mines, M. Omalius 

 d'Halloy has taken an instructive view of the mineral constitu- 

 tion of the adjacent parts of France and the Netherlands ; and 

 M. Clere has given in the same work (Aug. 1814) a valuable 

 account of the Eschweiler coal basin ; from which it appears, 

 that the coal tracts of the Low Countries are generally confined 

 by a transition country, composed chiefly of associations of clay 

 slate with quartz rock, greywacke, and limestone. In these 

 tracts, the old red sandstone is of partial distribution, and the 

 carboniferous limestone, when it appears, reposes either on that 

 rock, e. g. on the Meuse below Namur, or upon the transition 

 country just noticed, e. g. in the Eschweiler district. And 

 here, also, as in many of the English coal fields, the immediate 

 foundation of the coal basin is formed by a broad belt of sand- 

 stone and sandstone conglomerate, interposed between the coal 

 formation and the carboniferous limestone. 



If the preceding view of the mutual relations of the first 

 floetz group in the British Isles and on the Continent tend to 

 establish, in this instance, the proposition of a general order, 

 combined with a variation in detail ; this is no more than what 

 is confessedly known to prevail also in the primary and transition 

 formations. The same doctrine appears, also, to hold good 

 when we extend our views to the higher and later portions of the 

 geological series. x\nd if we consider the British Isles, though 

 occupying but a small space on the surface of the globe, as 

 containing within their compass, the chief exemplifications of its 

 general structure, in fact, a type of its mineral conformation, 

 which is, probably, not far removed from the truth ; the following 

 distribution of the formations, in which the floetz constitute four 

 principal series, may not appear inapposite, upon a due examina- 

 tion of their respective characters and more prominent relations. 



* In the Petrefaetenkunde of Baron von Schlotheim, published in the year 1820, it 

 fc stated, that the author hag recently met with prtoladites, solenites, and venulites, in the 

 «oal formations of Germany. But the principal shells found in the coal tracts of that 

 country, are, it appears, as in England, freshwater shells. 



