180 



JOURNAL, R.A.S. (OEYLON). 



[Vol. IX. 



North America the conversion of gaseous coal into anthracite 

 has been distinctly traced to the powerful chemical forces 

 evolved by the tilting up of previously horizontal strata. 



Mr. Alexander Dixon described, or intended to describe, 

 for the annals of this Society, a deep-seated deposit of what 

 no doubt was drift timber carried down by floods in the 

 Kelani river, and which was discovered in the course of the 

 borings made in connection with the erection of the new 

 railway bridge near Colombo. Deposits of this kind may in 

 the process of far future ages give Ceylon coal, or at least 

 lignite, but at present I fear our formations include nothing 

 more nearly approaching coal than the apparently poor species 

 of peat found at Muturajawela near Colombo, in Nuwara 

 Eliya, and some other swampy places, apparently the result, 

 chiefly, of decomposed aquatic and semi-aquatic plants, such 

 as flags, rushes, and grasses. On the Nilgiris, I believe a 

 somewhat similar but evidently superior formation is used 

 as fuel, after being compressed^and dried, but I am not aware 

 that any experiment in this direction has been tried in 

 Nuwara Eliya. The owners of the brewery and of the 

 adjacent tea plantations might probably find it worth while 

 to test the combustible value of the black peaty matter, com- 

 pressed into bricks and thoroughly deprived of moisture. 

 For use in tea houses, however, there might probably be the 

 objection of the peaty smell, while anthracite, if it really 

 existed, would be, like coke, free from objection on the score 

 of odour, and for tea house purposes its intense smokeless 

 heat would render it specially valuable. 



The table of descent amongst mineralogists seems to be 

 from the diamond to graphite, next to amber, and then coal, 

 peat, and petroleum. In connection with coal formations and 

 petroleum springs, shales are always found, but certainly no 

 writer on Ceylon has ever said that any formation, even 

 remotely resembling oil-bearing shale, has been seen in our 

 rocks, any more than that a Ceylon well-digger has ever 

 " struck ile." Seeing that Indian rock strata include the 

 diamond, while the gem-bearing rocks of Ceylon, rich also in 

 graphite, show no trace of the brilliantly crystallized carbon 

 which shines in crown and diadem as the diamond, the case 

 might, some would say, be reversed as regards anthracite, 

 which although absent from the Indian continent might exist 



