42 ECONOMICAL GEOLOGY. 



place, but it probably belongs somewhere in No. 2 of the foregoing 

 section. It was only some three or four inches in thickness. No. 3 

 of the section I am inclined to regard as the re'pfesentative of coal 

 No. 5, and a thin coal occurs with it at some other points on the 

 northeastern borders of the coal field. This would make the coal 

 below it the representative of coal No. 4 of the general section, and 

 further evidence in favor of this conclusion will be given further on. 

 The quality of the coal obtained in the vicinity of Lowell is inferior 

 to that obtained from the Streator seam, and also much inferior to 

 that afforded by the lower seam in the shafts at Peru and LaSalle, 

 which of itself is an indication that the Lowell coal is not identical 

 with that. 



On Sec. 24, T. 32, E. 2, the section observed was similar to that 

 at Lowell, with the exception of the Trenton limestone, which is 

 here at least 30 or 40 feet below the river level, the intervening 

 space being occupied by the lower beds of the Coal Measures, which 

 apparently thin out in a northerly direction before reaching that 



point. The section here is as follows : 



Feet. 



No. 1. Sandstone 10 to 12 



No. 2. Shale 6 to 12 



No.3. Black slate 2 



No. 4. Shale and argillaceous limestone , 4 



No. 5. Black slate, with rock bands 6 



No. 6. Clay shales ,_ 15 to 20 



No. 7. Covered space 4 to 5 



No. 8. Coal in river bed .. 1& to 2 



Forty-seven feet below the base of the foregoing section another 

 seam of coal, 30 inches thick, was found by boring at this point, 

 which I have no doubt is coal No. 2 of the general section, and the 

 lowest seam in the shafts at LaSalle and Peru. 



At Patterson's shaft, on Sec. 81, T. 32, E. 3, this lower seam is 

 worked, and it affords a clean, hard, bright coal, about 3 feet thick, 

 overlaid by a dove-colored clay shale, quite unlike any beds out- 

 cropping on the Vermilion, either above or below this point. Coal 

 No. 4 appears to have thinned out toward the south before reaching 

 this point, while No. 2 and the accompanying strata thin out in the 

 opposite direction, so that there is no representative of the coal or 

 the shale above it in the vicinity of Lowell. 



At Kirkpatrick's ford, on the Vermilion, we met with the first out- 

 crop of the Streator coal, in ascending that stream. The section at 

 this point is as follows : 



