176 Association of American Geologists and Naturalists. 



from which both it and the neighboring bitnminons coal have 

 been chiefly derived. From the position of the coke beds, as 

 compared with those of the bituminous coal, and the frequent 

 interlamination of the two, he proves that the non-bituminous 

 character of the former could not have arisen from the effects of 

 heat on a seam of bituminous coal, but must be ascribed to the 

 thorough carbonization and desiccation of the vegetable matter 

 before it was sealed in by the overlying strata. 



Prof. W. B. Rogers communicated a paper " on the Connec- 

 tion of Thermal Springs in Virginia with Anticlinal Axes and 

 Faults." In this paper he gives a list of more than thirty ther- 

 mal springs, having an excess of temperature over the ordinary 

 constant springs of the neighborhood of from two to nearly sixty 

 degrees, comprising all the distinctly thermal waters which he 

 has thus far met with in Virginia. These are all situated in the 

 Appalachian belt, and without an exception issue on or near the 

 line of an anticlinal axis or a fault — or near the contact of the 

 Appalachian with the Hypogene rocks. Prof. R. laid much stress 

 on the fact that the warmest of these springs were generally those 

 which issued from the lowest formations. Accompanying the 

 paper were a series of short sections, illustrating the geological 

 position of a number of the most interesting of these springs. 



Prof. W. B. Rogers communicated a paper entitled " Obser- 

 vations on Subterranean Temperature made in the mines of east- 

 ern Virginia." In this paper Prof. R. gives the results of obser- 

 vations with the thermometer at depths varying from one hun- 

 dred to nearly eight hundred feet, all indicating an increase of 

 temperature downwards. Some of these results procured under 

 favorable circumstances, he considers sufficiently accurate to war- 

 rant an inference as to the rate of increase of the temperature 

 with the depth in this region. These, it is believed, are the first 

 observations of the kind made in the United States, and, if we 

 except those of Humboldt in Mexico, the first in North America. 



Prof PI. D. Roger's offered some remarks on .the influence of 

 pyrites on the heat of the strata. 



Prof Hitchcock read a paper entitled '' Notes on the Geology 

 of some parts of Western Asia, derived principally from the Amer- 

 ican Missionaries," and exhibited numerous specimens in illustra- 

 tion of his remarks. 



