26 GEOLOGICAL MEMOIRS. 



mulitic dolomite. The great Eocene deposits of fossil fuel at Tokod, 

 Dorog, &c. are imbedded in freshwater strata, overlaid by Eocene 

 marine deposits. Estuarine deposits are found at Sarisap. The 

 Neogene epoch is represented by inferior plastic clay (" Tegel") occur- 

 ring in a few localities near Gran, by far-spread sandstones and sands, 

 and in the south-west by Cerithium-limestone. These deposits, 

 together with extensive layers of diluvial clay (" Loss"), rest on the 

 isolated and evidently disturbed strata of the Eocene period. The 

 Eocene coal of this district, being unfit for the preparation of coke, 

 has hitherto been set aside by the use of the Banat and Funf-kirchen 

 coal, and on account of the little attention paid in Hungary to fossil 

 fuel in general. The beds of argillaceous Ironstone occurring on the 

 limits between the Tertiary sandstone and Dach stein-limestone or 

 Nummulitic dolomite, are too insignificant to be of practical value. 



[Count M.] 



On the Coal-beds o/Offenburg. By M.Ludwig. 



[Proceed. Imp. Geol. Instit. Vienna, August 1857.] 



The coal of Offenburg (Grand-Duchy of Baden) is imbedded in a 

 zone of Carboniferous Sandstone, 720 — 840 feet in breadth, between 

 the steep gneiss rocks at the mouth of the Kinzig valley. The coal- 

 beds themselves, dipping at high angles, have originally been thought 

 to be veins. The author proves them to have been deposited hori- 

 zontally, or nearly so, in the bottom of a basin, the upper portions 

 of which have been subsequently brought together by a sinking 

 movement along a diametral line, so that at present the disturbed 

 beds offer many difficulties to regular mining operations. The thick- 

 ness of the upper (anthracitic) chief bed varies between 1 and 30 

 feet ; the lower chief bed, the scantily coking coal of which resembles 

 the variety called Pitch-coal, is between 1 and 4 feet in thickness. 

 The chief bed continues beneath the depth of 5/0 feet hitherto 

 attained. 



The anthracitic variety of the Offenburg coal has been recently, on 

 M. Haumann's instigation, tried as fuel for railroad-locomotives ; 

 and the experiment has perfectly succeeded. 



The bed, and especially the slate, immediately covering the chief 

 bed, contains a number of fossil plants, among which Professor Geinitz 

 has found the following species : — 



Calamites cannseformis, Schl. Cyatheites asper, Brongn. 



Asterophyllites longifolius, Sphenopteris lanceolata, Gutb. 



Sternb., sp. Sph. Hceninghausi, Brongn. 



Hymenophyllites dissectus, Sph. microloba, Gopp. 



Brongn. Aspudiaria undulata, Sternb. 



Cyclopteris flabellata, Brongn. Asp. tetragona, Sternb. , &c. 



South of Offenbach, near Zursweiler, the gneiss is overlaid by 

 variegated sandstone, spreading far off southward, together with the 

 Carboniferous strata, found in a shaft which was sunk near Diersburg. 



[Count M.] 



