270 Scientific Proceedings, Royal Dublin Society. 



Mr. Potts of Dublin, who smelted a little iron with peat charcoal ; 

 they, however, were abandoned in 1858-59. 



In this field the amount of clay-iron-stone is considerable : some 

 of it, however, is inferior. Of coal there cannot be much ; perhaps 

 some 10,000,000 tons, of which only a portion could be economi- 

 cally wrought, especially during the present low price of coal and 

 high rate of wages. The coal in part is gaseous. 



Other minerals in Co. Cavan occur in veins in the Ordovicians, 

 such as copper in Farnham, near Cavan, and lead near Cootehill, 

 Shercock, and Ballyconnell. 



In the Ordovicians of Kill, near Kilnaleek (sheet 37), there is a 

 bed of anthracyte. This, when discovered in 1854, was sank on, and 

 according to Dr. Whitty's report, was] in one place four feet thick. 

 This, however, appears to have been a local swelling of the bed, as 

 elsewhere in the strike and in depth it was only a few inches wide. 

 About two miles southward of Shercock are beds of anthracitic 

 shales : these in bad winter, when fuel was scarce, have been worked 

 for fireing ; they were, however, only a make-shift in the place of 

 better, because at present they are of no commercial value. It is, 

 however, possible that here, as in Canada, anthracitic and car- 

 bonaceous shales may point to underlying oil or gas cisterns. 

 This seems worthy of further research. 



Clare. 



The rocks of this county belong to the Carboniferous and Ordo- 

 t'ician periods. Nearly half the western portion of the area is 

 occupied by Coal Measures, the northern portions of the extensive 

 West Munster Coal-field ; while to the east, in the neighbour- 

 hood of Lough Derg, hills of Ordovician rocks protrude up through 

 the Carboniferous. 



In Munster, especially Limerick and Clare, below the Calp and 

 Fenestella limestone (lithologically divisions of the Carboniferous 

 rocks) leady lodes often occur ; below the Fenestella limestone 

 the lead is usually accompanied, more or less, with copper and 

 sulphur ores. On both horizons the minerals do not occur in re- 

 gular lodes, but in pockets and " shoots," which, when worked out, 

 have no leaders to other deposits. Different, very rich pockets 



