82 Mr. F. Forster's Observations on the South Welsh Coal Basin. 



No. XIV. — Observations on the South Welsh Coal Basin. By Mr. 

 Francis Fokster, Colliery Viewer. 



Read June 15, 1830. 



Conceiving it to be one of the objects of the Natural History 

 Society, to collect information from every source, relative to the 

 various Coal districts of Great Britain, I have been induced to lay before 

 them the following observations, accompanied by a section across 

 the Mineral Basin of South "Wales, collected from a variety of surveys, 

 from personal observation, and from actual borings and sinkings, made 

 under my direction, during several years' residence in Carmarthenshire. 



The South "Welsh Coal-field, independent of its geological interest, 

 (arising from its great extent, its perfect formation as a Coal Basin, and 

 the remarkable variation in the quality of its numerous seams of Coal,) 

 cannot, I think, fail to be generally interesting, when considered as the 

 district in which nearly one-half of the immense supply of British Iron 

 is raised, smelted, and manufactured ; as the source from which the 

 Cornish mines not only derive their supply of Coal, but by which the 

 whole of their produce is reduced to the metallic state ; and lastly, as 

 the market to which the Metropolis must turn for a supply, whenever 

 the distant period arrives that the Coal of our northern districts either be- 

 comes so scarce, or so difficult and expensive to procure, that its pre- 

 eminent footing in the London market can no longer be maintained. 



Before proceeding to a general description of this district, it may, per- 

 haps, be interesting, briefly to allude to the various papers already pub- 

 lished concerning it. At so early a period as the year 1570, an Essay 

 on the relative position of the strata forming this mineral basin was 

 written by Mr. Owen, of Henllys, in Pembrokeshire. An epitome of 



