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vein of hard, blackish bitumen, possessing almost the hardness and 

 splendor of jet. This vein of indurated bitumen was a foot, and 

 even more, in thickness. The professor saw, also, some specimens 

 of marble, from this mountain, containing small bivalves; and 

 obtained, from the same mountain, two marine shells, the one in 

 a petrified, and the other in a pyritified state ; as well as a most 

 elegant serrated tooth, resembling those of the shark, which mea- 

 sured three inches and a half in height. Hence he concludes, that 

 this mountain must, at some former period, have been covered by 

 the sea. 



The indefatigable Rosinus, who also visited this mountain, re- 

 lates, that a large quantity of potter's clay is dug here, and fre- 

 quently with it fragments of wood, with black bitumen, and some- 

 times pyrites. He also describes hard flint stones, containing 

 charcoal ; and reeds, or at least their impressions, which, with an 

 abundance of marine remains, were dug out of the bowels of the 

 earth, in the same mountain. 



Professor Hollman also gives us, in the same work, a particular 

 description of the circumstances, most worthy of notice, which he 

 perceived in the examination of a mountain, near AltendorfF, so 

 famous for its salt-works, on the borders of Hesse. The height of 

 this mountain appears to be about 2500 feet, exceeding that of the 

 mountain, just described, in the neighbourhood of Munden, full 

 seven hundred feet. His astonishment was here still more excited 

 than when contemplating the wonders of the former mountain. 

 Under an immense roof, formed by a vast stratum of stone, which 

 was from eighty to a hundred and forty yards in thickness, was a 

 vein of fossil coal, in most places of upwards of twelve feet in depth, 

 which had long been dug to supply fuel for the neighbouring salt- 

 works, and of which an incalculable quantity still remained. This 

 fossil coal, resting on a bed of bituminous wood, agreed almost in 

 every respect with the small vein of bitumen he had observed 



