Maech 13, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



393 



The Wliite Ash bed is not more than 15 

 feet below the upper plate and the Waldo 

 led, as found in the bore hole, not more 

 than 10 feet above the lower plate of 

 trachyte. 



The White Ash has been mined at many 

 pits along Coal cainon for a distance of 

 nearly three miles, beginning at about a 

 mile and a half from Waldo. It is the im- 

 portant bed of the region and the only one 

 now mined. Four pits, two of which are 

 now in operation, show the bed. At the old 

 Boyle mine, about a mile and a half above 

 Madrid, the coal is a hard, di-y anthracite, 

 slipped and jointed throughout ; some por- 

 tions closely resemble the graphitoid an- 

 thracite of Ehode Island. 



The Lucas mine at Madrid was idle when 

 visited, but work had been stopped for only 

 a short time. The southerly levels of this 

 mine yield an anthracite of excellent qual- 

 ity, equal in appearance and composition to 

 the average anthracite of Pennsylvania ; 

 but a rapid change is shown in the north- 

 erly levels. Jointing becomes annoying at 

 a little distance fi-om^the slope, and the coal 

 is wasted in the breaker ; within 350 feet 

 evidences of great pressure and disturbance 

 accumulate, and the coal is laminated like 

 that from some Vespertine mines of south- 

 west Virginia, with the polished surfaces, 

 often curved, frequently not more than one- 

 fourth of an inch apart. This, however, is 

 still anthracite, and work was stopped in 

 these northerly levels only because of great 

 waste in breaking. 



The Cunningham mine, at the lower end 

 of Madrid, entered a tender coal at the crop ; 

 the slope was pushed 1,100 feet, but no an- 

 thracite was found. The coal burns with 

 flame. 



The White Ash mine, about half a mile 

 north from the Lucas, is the important pit. 

 At one time trains might be seen coming 

 from its slope made up of cars carrying, 

 some of them anthracite, others the tender 



semi-bituminous, and others still the rich 

 bituminous coal which has given this mine 

 its reputation. The bituminous coal, con- 

 taining 39 per cent, of volatile combustible, 

 is obtained from the northerly levels, but 

 the southerly levels yield for the most part 

 what is called tender coal. The latter is 

 dull, very tender, and much of it has an al- 

 most cone-in-cone structure. It is reached 

 in the southerly levels at varjdng distances 

 from the slope. The passage from bitumi- 

 nous into anthracite through this tender 

 coal is shown in the sixth level southerly 

 where tender coal was reached at 125 feet 

 from the slope and anthracite at 450 feet. 

 The passage is gradual. The anthracite 

 makes its appeai-ance at the bottom and 

 thickens gradually, crushed coal being re- 

 placed by laminated and that by the harder 

 almost homogeneous coal, the change being 

 completed within 50 feet. 



The Coking bed was worked some years 

 ago at about two miles above Madrid, 

 where its coal was coked in ricks. 



The Cook- White is no longer mined, but 

 it has been opened at many places along 

 Coal caflon, and the changes in character of 

 the coal are clearly shown. Above Madrid 

 fragments on the old dumps show that the 

 coal is anthracitic ; a pit at the lower end 

 of Madrid, almost midway between the 

 Cunningham and White Ash mines, shows 

 a tender coal which bears some resemblance 

 to that from Pocahontas, in Virginia ; analy- 

 sis shows that it contains about 30 per cent, 

 of volatile, which is about what should be 

 expected, if its changes are similar to those 

 of the White Ash. 



The Waldo bed is not reached in the upper 

 part of Coal canon, but it has been mined 

 extensively further down. The only inter- 

 est it has here is its existence in the bore 

 hole west from Coal caflon, where it is not 

 more than 10 feet above the lower plate of 

 trachyte and shows no evidence of any 

 metamorphism whatever. 



