TRANSAOTIONS Of SECTION C. 733 
The coal basins of Belgium and France owe their origin or geological and 
geographical position to the one great line or axis of disturbance which can be 
traced from the south of Ireland to Frome (Somersetshire) through the Pembroke, 
South Wales, and southern end of the Somersetshire coalfield, and parallel to the 
disturbed axis of the Mendip Hills, to Mells, Elm, Nunney, and Frome, then lost 
under the unconformable overlap of the Jurassic and Cretaceous strata of Wilts, 
Hants, Sussex, and South-east Kent, until again revealed and determined through 
the two, if not three, deep and remarkable borings, that of West Brabourne, 
5 miles east of Ashford, to the depth of 2,003 feet. The partly completed and 
important boring at Ropersole, south of Barham, 1,773 feet 6 inches, and the 
pioneer borehole by Mr. fF’, Brady at Great Fall, west of Dover, in 1892, to the 
depth of 2,225 feet, and now the site of the two deep coalpits, immediately west of 
the Shakespeare Tunnel. Mr. Brady’s trial proved the thickness of the overlying 
Jurassic and Cretaceous rocks to be 1,112 feet, touching the true Coal Measures at 
1,118 feet, terminating with the four-foot seam of coal at 2,225 feet, but the floor 
of the Dover Coal Measures is yet unknown, 
In Belgium and North France the Carboniferous rocks have been persistently 
and practically followed along a given line, but in England the Coal Measures of 
Gloucestershire and Somersetshire have not been traced eastwards, or beyond the 
well-defined eastern escarpment of the Bristol and Somerset coalfield, ranging 
from north to south from Tortworth to Frome, or from the eastern end of the 
Mendip range beyond Frome. 
We now know without doubt the range and thicknesss of the Jurassic rocks 
below the overlying Cretaceous series in South-east Kent at Brabourne, Ropersole, 
and Dover, where the most complete succession hag been determined, and a 
complete series of the cores preserved, from the top of the Gault to the base of the 
Lower Lias inclusive, from the Brabourne borehole, and a ‘I'riassic conglomerate 
new to this area, and also the French and Belgian line of coal basins. 7 
Comparative Thickness between the Brabourne Boring and that of Dover. 
Brabourne 1 Ft. in. Dover (Mr. F’. Brady, C.E.) 
ae Gault . ; : 72.6 Grey Chalk and Chalk 
£ 2% } Neocomian . | 231 0} 182 ft. Marl - 2 
# 2S | Weald Clay ~ | 198) 0 Chloritic Marl $s 
“© | Hastings beds .| 206 6/| 121ft. Gault. ae 
2 Portland Oolite . 14 0 Lower Greensand, | ® 3 
-- |KimmeridgeClay | 242 0/| 241 ft. Wealden and Hast-| 0 
ss |Corallian . .| 305 0 ings Beds 
2 .; 4Oxfordian . . |) 243-0 Upper, Middle, and) .2 
Big |Bathonian. .| 189 1| gisg Lower Oolites with | 44 
© | Middle Lias : 74 8 ; Lias at the bot-{ #® 
i \Lower Lias : 98 1 tom 5° 
Triassic Triassic Conglo- | 48 4 Coal Measures with) o a» 
48 ft. 4 in. merates eight workable |S _ % 
1157 ft.; seams containing [ § $ a 
1936 2 16 feet of bright|3°° 
Paleozoic { Paleozoic Rock $8. 5 bituminous coal Aa) 
88°5 ft. | unknown 
2024 7 
There canbe little doubt as to the value of the Dover or South-eastern Kent coal 
basin, with its present known or determined resources; when we consider the great 
' capacity of the French, Belgian, and Westphalian coalfields, with their numerous 
and successful workings, and the determined and scientific way in which their 
wealth has been, and is now being developed, at times under great difficulties, we 
! Five miles east of Ashford, 
