208 GEOLOGY OF ILLINOIS. 



visited the mines on the Saline river for the purpose of making this 

 report, no fresh shale was being brought from the mines, and the old 

 would not bear handling, especially when it contained pyritiferous fos- 

 sils, but would crumble into fragments. The most abundant shells are 

 Aviculopecten rectilaterarius, Productus longlspinus, Nautilus decoratus, 

 Solenomya soleniformis, Nueula. ventrlcosa, Orthoceras Rushensis, Pleuro- 

 tomaria Grayvillensis, Bellerophon carbonarius, and Ghonetes mesoloba. 



Coal No. 6. — Lies from sixty to seventy feet above No. 5, is from two 

 to three feet thick, and was formerly worked on the Saline river at Tol- 

 bert's mines, and on the Curlew mines' property, near Oaseyville, in 

 Kentucky ; the quality is said to be very good, but the old openings 

 have long since been filled up, and there was no chance of collecting 

 specimens or of seeing the solid coal. The outcrop of this seam was 

 seen at the localities above cited for No. 5. In the hill at Equality it is 

 of very poor quality, and is not over fifteen to twenty inches thick. At 

 this latter locality it is underlaid by a massive sandstone, and the latter 

 is underlaid by gray and buff silicious shales, with ironstones down to 

 the black shales overlying No. 5 coal. 



No. 7 Goal. — This seam lies from one hundred to one hundred and 

 twenty feet above No. 5, and is at some localities from eight to nine feet 

 thick. Its color is a jet black, it breaks into cubes and has numerous 

 cross fractures lined with salts of calcium. The bed is divided into two 

 seams by a parting of fire clay from half an inch to four inches ot more 

 in thickness, and near the top of the seam there is a very thin sulphur 

 band (bi-sulphide of iron), which seldom exceeds one-eighth of an inch 

 in thickness. That portion of the bed above the fireclay parting is 

 generally considered the best, and in Union county, Kentucky, at the 

 Curlew mines, this part of the seam is assimilated to a cannel coal. 

 No. 7 has been opeued and mined on the Independent Coal Company's 

 land in connection with No. 5 ; also, at Tolbert's, in section 21, township 

 10, range 9, and at Boswell's a half mile north of the former mines. At 

 these localities the bed is from three to four feet thick, the clay parting 

 is two inches thick, and is eight inches from the bottom of the bed. 

 The following section was taken at Boswell's mine, section 26, township 

 10, range 9 : 



Ft- In. 



Covered slope 



Thick bedded sandstone 9 



Flagstones 6 



Silicious shale 4 



Gray limestone : 3 



Black shale 2 



Coal -.--. 2 4) 



Fire-clay 2 } Coal No. 7 . . 3 2 



Coal 8) 



Covered 



27 2 



