458 MINING INDUSTEY. 



unusual ease. The mode of ownership of these claims is in an unsatisfactory 

 condition. No surveys have yet clearly defined what part of the public domain 

 belongs to the Pacific Railroad Company, and which are the alternate sections, 

 so that the holders of coal land have only a possessory title, liable hereafter 

 to be displaced whenever a survey shall demonstrate the ownership of the 

 Railroad Company. That corporation makes it a point to lay claim to every 

 available mine within the extreme limits of the national land grant. A few 

 of these claims were discovered before the railroad land was withdrawn from 

 market. Such are those claims in the region of Coalville, which were all 

 taken up under the pre-emption act by Mormon settlers prior to the approach 

 of the railroad. The land policy, however, of the Mormon Church having 

 been arbitrary and peculiar, it is difficult to say where the final ownership of 

 these lands is vested. The paradox of a community claiming land under a 

 government against whose laws they rebel, casts a shadow over all their titles. 

 In case their ownership is denied by the government, the lands become again 

 open to pre-emption, but subject to the conditions of the railroad grant, and 

 it is more than probable that a large number of the important claims would 

 fall into the possession of the already overloaded monopoly. Between the 

 Mormons and the railroad company only a few plucky prospectors have been 

 bold enough to open and hold mines, and they have been careful as quickly 

 as a good exposure of coal was assured to sell out and realize as rapidly as 

 possible. Until a survey is made defining clearly the possessions of the 

 Pacific Railroad Company, or else an act is passed by Congress declaring the 

 whole belt open to pre-emption, no thorough development can be applied to 

 the coal system. The labors of this Survey, however, define very clearly the 

 geographical distribution of all the uncovered portions of the coal series, 

 wherever they occur within its limits. 



Upon the geological map of the region east of the Wahsatch, in the 

 Atlas accompanying Volume I, the three prominent formations, with their con- 

 stantly changing relations to the coal series, wiU be found fully laid down. 



The following interesting communication by Professor F. B. Meek 

 expresses in decided terms the data upon which the lower coals are referred 

 to the Cretaceous and those which prove their gradual transition into the fresh- 

 water Tertiary horizon : 



