758 T. E. SAVAGE 



was derived from plant tissues that had been charred by fires pre- 

 vious to their accumulation, and that these charred fragments had 

 been carried into the coal basin by streams in such enormous 

 quantities as to cover the surface of practically the entire area of 

 the present coal beds, 5,000-8,000 square miles or more in extent; 

 that this process took place not only once but was repeated as many 

 times as there are persistent dull, charcoal-bearing laminae, requir- 

 ing scores of recurrences of such charcoal deposition during the 

 accumulation of the vegetable matter of each of the large coal beds. 

 It assumes such a depth of water above the accumulating vegetable 

 matter that the charred fragments brought in by the streams could 

 be freely floated out above the mass of vegetable matter already 

 present to every part of the basin, and, most impossible of all, 

 that the streams that carried such vast quantities of charred vege- 

 table matter carried little or no mud or mineral sediments. If it 

 is assumed that the water of the basin was so shallow that the clay 

 and sand brought down by the streams were strained out in the 

 meshes of the tangled plant debris at the margin, then the same 

 vegetable sieve would catch the charred plant fragments and not 

 permit them to be distributed to every part of the accumulating 

 coal beds. This explanation is not in harmony with the facts of the 

 vertical and horizontal distribution of the mineral charcoal bands 

 in the coal beds. 



The modification of this view assumes that the mineral charcoal 

 represents partially burned vegetable matter resulting from fires 

 sweeping over the surface of the marshes in which the vegetable 

 matter of the coal beds was accumulating. It is not probable 

 that fires started by lightning would travel over water-covered 

 swamps with only the living undergrowth and green leaves and 

 branches of the trees to support the flames, and if they did, 

 they would not leave such uniform and thick layers of charcoal 

 as occur in well-developed dull laminae. If it is assumed that 

 the surface of the vegetable matter that had accumulated in 

 the swamp had been exposed and dried before the fires swept 

 over it, then the conditions involved would be similar to those 

 under which the charcoal is interpreted as having been formed 

 by the partial atmospheric decay of the upper surface of the 



