12 Mr. N. J. Winch on the Geology of 



Fell, and Whickham Banks, though no where in the vales of the 

 Tyne and the Team, which severally intersect those elevated por- 

 tions of land. The conclusion is obvious, that the present irregu- 

 larity of hill and dale has been occasioned by the partial destruction 

 and dispersion of the uppermost rocky masses, which constitute the 

 coal formation. 



That part of the trough in which the greatest thickness of the 

 coal measures is found, seems to lie in the vicinity of Jarrow ; and 

 from this point the beds appear to rise to some considerable distance 

 on each side, particularly in a western direction. The average dip of 

 the coal measures is 1 inch in 20 ; but this inclination is by no means 

 uniform in every part of the district. Thus that seam of coal called 

 the High Main which lies buried at Jarrow, under 160 fathoms of 

 beds of stone, soon rises to the clay in a north-easterly direction, and 

 bassets out in the cliffs between Cullercoats and Tynemouth. In its 

 north-westerly range it reaches Benwell hills, and at Pontop nearly 18 

 miles due west of the sea shore at Sunderland it is met with at 38| 

 fathoms from the surface. In a southerly direction it is found at 

 52 fathoms on Gateshead Fell, but bassets out before it reaches the 

 Wear. 



The principal substances besides coal, which constitute the Coal 

 formation, are shale and sandstone ; which as they vary in hardness 

 or colour receive different provincial names from the miners. It is 

 not possible to discover in the Coal measures any regular order of 

 succession, which will apply to the whole Coalfield, and it is even 

 with difficulty that in very limited portions of it the continuity of 

 particular seams can be traced. This arises from the variable thick- 

 ness and the rapid enlargement and contraction of the different 

 beds ; that which in one section is scarcely perceptible, having at- 

 tained in a neighbouring pit the thickness of several fathoms. It is 



