112 J. J. STEVENSON — CARBONIFEROUS OF APPALACHIAN BASIN 



rence. Lesle}^ found them increasing eastward from a few feet on the 

 western outcrop to upward of 150 feet in Martin county, these being his 

 "Licking shales." Across Floyd and Knott counties the increase is 

 even more marked ; so that in Pike and Letcher they reach an apparent 

 maximum of 450 feet. The calcareous bands and concretions, first be- 

 coming abundant in Lawrence and characterizing the shales along the 

 w r estern border even to the Tennessee line, are even more prominent 

 here and are distributed through about 300 feet of the section, while the 

 number of coal beds belonging to their general horizon has increased to 

 at least four. The increased number of coal beds throughout the section 

 renders detailed comparison with more western localities impossible, as 

 the work has not been connected fully, but the upper limit of the Potts- 

 ville appears to have been traced carefull}'. For more than 50 miles 

 the tracing was checked above by the Ferriferous limestone, and beyond 

 that the peculiar characteristics of the upper coal beds made identifica- 

 tion easy. 



The information at present available is not sufficient to justify a posi- 

 tive identification of any one bed as the Sharon, as it is represented 

 apparently by several beds. The equivalent of the Quakertown is equally 

 uncertain. Below the Mercer, which is identified positively, there are 

 three beds, each occasionally of workable thickness, at 40, 140, and 165 

 feet, all of them above the great mass of shale and sandstone, which also 

 contains several thin coal beds. The middle bed is thought by Professor 

 Crandall to be the probable equivalent of his number 1 (Sharon), but 

 this suggestion is merely tentative in the absence of detailed sections. 



Kentucky coal bed number 3, taken as the Mercer in this paper, is 

 readily identifiable with the Elkhorn coal bed of Pike county, which 

 Professor Crandall thinks is the equivalent of the " Imboden coal bed '' 

 of southwestern Virginia. It is of great economic importance in the 

 adjoining portions of Knott, Floyd, and Pike counties, as well as in 

 -Letcher. As usual, it is subject to extreme variations, often abrupt; 

 but it is frequently of workable thickness under large areas and yields 

 a superior coking coal. At 100 to 130 feet above it is number 4, the 

 Tionesta, the Lower Splint bed, which is so characteristic throughout 

 Breathitt, Leslie, and Perry and is so well known farther north as the 

 Upper Cannel or the Hunnewell Cannel of Greenup and other counties. 

 Underlying this coal bed is a great sandstone, to which reference has 

 been made in the description of other counties, with at most localities a 

 thin coal bed under the sandstone. At somewhat more than 100 feet 

 above this bed is the Upper Splint, as in the counties at the west, with 

 a cannel at about 150 feet higher, both belonging to the Allegheny for- 



