272 Note on the Coals of the Kanawha Valley. 



inferior in quality to the same bed in its northern extension. 

 The limestone overlying this coal in Northern Ohio and 

 Pennsylvania, as well as in the northern part of West Vir- 

 ginia, is here greatly degraded, being represented by only a 

 calcareous shale containing a few nodules of limestone. 

 The upper bed of coal is occasionally of workable thickness, 

 but is of no economical importance. When the section has 

 been completed this coal will probably be proved identical 

 with the one given in Dr. Hildreth's section at Pomeroy, 

 which is No. X of the Ohio section, and likely the equiva- 

 lent of the JJniontoivn coal of Pennsylvania. 



The Barren Group reaches to Charleston and runs out in 

 the hills a short distance above the city. It is about five 

 hundred feet thick and contains, as for as I am informed, no 

 worka.ble coals. It is interesting to note that along a rudely 

 north and south line, beginning at Pittsburg and running to 

 the Great Kanawha, the Barren Group varies but little in 

 thickness. 



The Lower Coal Group sinks under the river a short dis- 

 tance below Charleston. Its development here, as compared 

 with that observed in the coal field farther to the north, is ex- 

 traordinary. In northern West Virginia the thickness is 

 barely two hundred feet ; in the First Geological District of 

 Ohio it rarely exceeds three hundred feet ; wMle in either case 

 it contains only six or seven coal beds. In this valley it is 

 readily separable into two portions, the upper of which 

 is exposed along the river from Charleston to the Palls, a 

 distance of thirty-tive miles. Including the Mahoning sand- 

 stone it is not less than nine hundred feet thick, and con- 

 tains at least fifteen beds of coal, each of which is of 

 workable thickness at difi"erent localities. The lower divis- 

 ion is exposed above the Falls to Sewell Mountains, a dis- 

 tance of certainly thirty miles in a straight mie. It contains 

 only two or three beds of coal that are anywhere of work- 

 able size, and is made up chiefly of massive sandstones, with 

 rarely a thin shale or limestone. The estimation of its 



