16 Running JVotes, Agricultural and [July, 



the joints and striations of this peculiar family in the most perfect 

 manner. In the interior of these, nodules of argillaceous iron ore 

 not unfrequently occur, of the size of a man's fist. Though vast 

 quantities of these calamites have been taken away, cart loads of 

 them still remain. In the mouth of the mine, over the ditch, they 

 still stand thickly in the shale of its sides, extending in some cases 

 from the roof to the floor, and all of them vertical, or nearly ver- 

 tical in position. When submerged, they evidently were grow- 

 ing on their native bed ; and they could not have been acted upon 

 by strong currents of any kind, when imbedded in the muddy de- 

 position. 



On the morning of the 11th, accompanied by JVIr. Clarkson, 

 Mr. Bryden, and an assistant,* I entered the deserted gallery No. 

 3, to explore the main mines. We penetrated a mile, — searching 

 a multitude of deserted chambers, for choice specimens of the 

 gorgeous fossil Flora of the coal beds — Sigillaria, Stigmaria, 

 Favularia, Filices, &c., &c. In the galleries, a part of the time, 

 we could walk erect, but when we diverged from these, we scram- 

 bled, now over broken masses of slate fallen from the roof, and 

 now over heaps of refuse coal — often crawling on our hands and 

 knees — and once or twice I was fain to drag my 7iot attenuate 

 person, through narrow outlets and openings, by grovelling a-la- 

 mode serpent ! The corners of the slate, and the smooth sharp 

 edges of the broken coal were any thing but an anti-fraxinal 

 application to skin or clothing! A beautiful white fungus, re- 

 sembling the finest down, sometimes in the form of stalactites, 

 sometimes in festoons, hung dankly from the rapidly decaying 

 props and other wood employed in the mines. Striking a prop 

 occasionally with my hammer, I found most of them in an ad- 

 vanced state of decay. Broken ones lay here and there. When 

 they give way, the roof of slate, as has been before remarked, 

 piece by piece gradually falls in. We nought a specimen of 

 Sigillaria, seen a few weeks previously by Mr. Clarkson. It was 

 buried under tons of slate ! 



• Robert Eaton — whom I here name for the convenience of others, he be- 

 ing the only individual I know of in Carbondale, who is in the habit of col- 

 lecting fossils on orders from abroad. 



