*i'20 LIGNITES. 



series is the same; while the scattered fragments 

 extend further than I originally thought it necessary 

 to say; not foreseeing that my own intended omissions 

 in Scottish geology were ever to become a means of 

 discovering in what the knowledge of others consisted. 

 Of the lignite which occurs at Frankenberg, the 

 geological position is doubtful; audit is found also in 

 Thuringia, at Pernitz near Vienna, at Wolfseck, near 

 Haagen, and in many other places, where it is wrought 

 for coal; as is the case in Bohemia and Hungary; 

 the mines of Buda, in particular, being remarkable. 

 I cannot discover that the geological positions of 

 these, and of some others which I need not quote, are 

 clearly understood; but it is certain that some of them 

 have been mistaken for the true coal series. The 

 same error seems to have been committed respecting 

 that of Bornholrn, of which the correspondences ex- 

 tend wide over the north ; as is also true of that at 

 the foot of the Apennines, which occurs in the Vicen- 

 tin and Veronese, at Castelnuovo, and elsewhere, ac- 

 companied by trap. Some lignite beds occurring in 

 certain parts of America, seem also to have been si- 

 milarly mistaken ; but I need net prolong the enu- 

 meration of localities among such obscure examples. 

 If I name that lately found in the north, at Melville 

 Islands, it is chiefly on account of the presence of such 

 a substance in regions, of which the vegetation is now 

 so cramped. 



It seems now admitted by Brongniart, to whom I 

 in indebted for these foreign examples, that the sup- 

 posed coal of the south of France is a lignite forma- 

 tion, occupying a higher part of the series than the 

 last examples, and lying in the green sand deposit. 

 There are extensive mines of this in Provence", about 

 Marseilles and Toulon, where twenty-eight beds are 



