Jgg THE GEOLOGISTc 



a small township on the junction of a river of that name with the 

 Ohio, some 24 miles up which tributary, on either bank, was the 

 ground which I had come to examine. At Guyandotte I got a good 

 starting-point by the discovery that a sandstone there was the 

 equivalent of the coal grits" of the Staffordshire miners. This sand- 

 stone is coarse-grained and calcareous, effervescing readily with acids, 

 but still harsh to the touch from its large quartzose grains. Such 

 calcareous bands are wonderfully persistent in the roof of the coal 

 seams, both at home and in America. 



As this bed dipped at a scarcely appreciable angle from the Allegany 

 country towards the Ohio flats, it became evident that in going up the 

 Guyandotte towards its mountain-source, I should meet with older beds ; 

 and thus, as I started from the roof of the coal, I should expect soon to 

 meet with the coal measures themselves. 



Section 4, 



1, Millstone Grit. 2. Coal, 3. Lower New Red. 



Here, then, the river sections greatly exposed the nature of the 

 country, and as the coal commenced on the northern edge of the property 

 it became of importance to trace its southern limits — and by doing so 

 I became acquainted with every seam of coal, as these, one after 

 the other, became exposed in the creeks opening upon the Guy- 

 andotte, until ultimately all sign of coal was lost, and a hard 

 rock presented itself, which I could readily identify as the floor of 

 the coal. This peculiar rock was a rough, hard, gritty sandstone, 

 with occasional impressions of such plants as mark our own coal 

 measures — Stigmaria, Sigillaria, Lepidodend/ron, Calamites, Ferns, and 

 other relics of an ancient flora, which difi'ered much less from our 

 own of that period than the American and European floras do from 

 each other a!; the present day. 



Ey this investigation the limits of the coal were easily determined, 

 and as the seams cropped out on the hill sides, above the river, there 

 could be no difficulty in making out its quantity — the more easily, as 

 the beds were exceedingly regular, not faulted, and the dip but slight 

 from the Aileganies to the Ohio. 



