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General Remarks on the Coal Formation of the Great Valley of 

 the Scottish Lowlands. By Lord Greenock, C. B., LL. D., 

 V. P. R. S. Ed., F. G. S. 



(Read 15th December 1834. ) 



There is perhaps no geological problem of greater interest 

 than that by which the conditions of the globe, in respect to the 

 distribution of land and water, at the epoch of the coal formation, 

 might be determined, if the necessary data for its solution could 

 be obtained. We possess sufficient evidence to shew that, since 

 that period, most of the continents and islands of the present day 

 have been elevated above the waters, under which they were ori- 

 ginally formed ; but such proofs are altogether wanting when we 

 endeavour to restore, in imagination, the probable extent of the 

 older formations that might then have existed as dry land, but 

 which now lie buried in the depths of the ocean, or have since 

 been covered by an accumulation of more recent deposits. 



If we consider the immense quantity of detrital matter, that 

 must have been required to form beds of such prodigious extent 

 and thickness, as many of those which are met with in the coal- 

 fields of different parts of the world ; we shall naturally be led to 

 the conclusion that, in the immediate neighbourhood of these 

 deposits, much more extensive tracts of land must have existed, 

 in connection with each other, than could possibly have been af- 

 forded by the older portions of the present countries. For what- 

 ever might have been the conditions of the globe, in this respect, 

 at that epoch, we have convincing proofs in the organic remains 

 of plants, which abound in all the members of the carboniferous 

 series, as well as in the acknowledged vegetable origin of the coal 



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