128 PEOCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [DeC. 23, 



In the same series in the Suichang district, and, indeed, all along 

 the south bank of the Yangtse where this rock is exposed, a deposit 

 of coal occurs. It seems to be a semianthracite mixed with a con- 

 siderable amount of argillaceous impurities ; the structure is some- 

 what lenticular, readily breaking into conchoidal lumps with smooth 

 bright surfaces. In no locality have I found more than a single 

 seam averaging some 3 feet in thickness. Though of inferior quality, 

 from its frequent outcrops (owing to the convolutions of the strata) 

 it has been worked to some extent by the Chinese— these mines, 

 however, being generally little more than surface workings, a shaft 

 some 3 feet high and perhaps 2J feet wide being driven into the hill- 

 side at an angle of about 45° with the horizon till the coal is struck. 

 No system of drainage is attempted, the holes being generally situ- 

 ated at a sufiicient elevation to admit of a natural exit for the water. 

 The seams being for the most part vertical or highly inclined, no 

 galleries are driven, the coal being only removed from the immediate 

 neighbourhood of the shaft, up which it is carried by naked boys in 

 wicker sleighs. 



Por most purposes this coal is unsuitable ; a similar kind brought 

 down from Hunan, however, is burnt to a considerable extent by 

 the steamers trading between Hankow and Shanghai ; it throws out 

 a considerable heat, but, from the amount of extraneous matter con- 

 tained in it, is apt to run to slag and choke the furnaces. The seams 

 seldom crop out at any considerable altitude, so as to allow of free 

 drainage if worked deeply, while the quality and thickness of the 

 seam is not sufiicient to render heavy machinery profitable. As 

 the coal occurs in immediate proximity to iron, it may possibly be 

 found useful for smelting at some future period. I have found only 

 one fossil in connexion with this bed in anything like a good state 

 of preservation — ^the leaves are set alternately, and have a well- 

 marked midrib with parallel striae, which seem likewise to be con- 

 tinued in the stems. There is, however, a possibility of this plant 

 belonging to the same bed as those before noticed (p. 121), the expo- 

 sure of the rocks not being sufficiently continuous. 



Taking the whole Tungting system there is a striking resemblance 

 between it and the Devonian and Subcarboniferous rocks of the south 

 of Ireland — the same succession of grits and shales at the bottom, 

 and a similar development of limestone above ; while the type of the 

 few fossils found seems likewise to approach that of the Lower Car- 

 boniferous rocks of Europe. 



With ISTo. 8, described in the Table as the Upper Limestone, the 

 system, so far as my knowledge extends, ceases ; I have in no locality 

 been able to trace the ascending sequence. On the Yangtse, how- 

 ever, immediately to the west of the Suichang district described 

 above, a series of coarse sandstones and quartzose grits interspersed 

 with brownish shales succeeds, though apparently not conformably. 

 Near the village of Hwangshihkang, situated on the river some seventy 

 miles below Hankow, these rocks are largely developed ; the prevail- 

 ing dip is E. or W., or nearly at right angles with the older rocks, 

 which are found in bold hills overhanging the river a few miles lower 



