PAL.3E0KT0L0GICAL REPORT OF GEOLOGICAL SURVEY. 527 



Battery-rock coal. Though in the eastern coal-fields some workable 

 beds of coal have been found, not only in and below the conglomerates, 

 but even in the red sandstone, there is not, apparently, in the 

 western coal-fields of Kentucky, a true bed of coal formed in this 

 position. Opposite Caseyville, below the conglomerate rocks, hang- 

 ing over the landing on the Illinois side, there is a thin black 

 shale, itermixed with thin layers of coaly matter. This shale does not 

 contain any fossils. The same shale has been reached at Caseyville, 

 by boring a well below the conglomerates ; but it does not contain any 

 trace of coal, neither did the shales, though of soft texture and nearly 

 black, show any remains of fossils of any kind. In Pennsylvania, the 

 shales of the bituminous eoal, or of the anthracite, exposed below 

 the conglomerates, contain specimens of large pieces of Catamites and 

 Lepidodendron. 



No. 1 Coal. Above the conglomerates, and often reposing on them, 

 there is a thick formation of black shales, varying in thickness from 

 20 to 70 feet, or more. It sometimes contains two beds of coal, one 

 well developed, from 3 to 6 feet thick, and a thin one below. General- 

 ly the position of the large bed No. 1, B, depends on the thickness of 

 the shales. From the topographical observations it ought to be 70 

 feet above No. 1, A. But the palaeontology of the opened coal, topo- 

 graphically indicated as No. 1, A, having proved exactly the same as 

 those indicated as No. 1, B, the only conclusion to which I can come 

 is this, either in the western coal-fields of Kentucky there is a single 

 bed of coal, formed in the shales above the conglomerates, and then, 

 No. 1, A, and No. 1, B, are the same; (this is my settled opinion;) 

 or the palseontological characters of the shales are the same in their 

 whole thickness, which is scarcely possible. In Pennsylvania, where 

 the bed of shales contains two, and sometimes three, seams of coal, the 

 shales of each peculiar bed of coal present a different appearance, and 

 different fossil plants are found in connection with them. These fossil 

 plants are especially the prints of the bark of large trees, Sigillaria, 

 Catamites, especially Lepidodendron, (pi. 7, figs. 1, 4, 10); the cones 

 of these last trees, Lepidostrobi, (pi. 7, fig. 3 ;) many other fruits of the 

 genera Trigonocarpon, Cardiocarpon, and Carpolithes, (pi. 7, figs. 5 to 

 9.) These fruits are generally compressed, resembling flattened al- 



