132 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
" The manner of boring for coal through these ancient rocks (the 
Silurian), of which many other examples are cited in this work, has 
unfortunately affected some of the inhabitants of this tract. At Mathon 
Lodge (Malvern), in 1832, I found open shafts which had been sunk 
to a depth of about 120 ycuria in the Lower Ludlow rock, where it 
ought to have been apparent to any one, however ignorant of 
geological phenomena, that the limestone of the adjacent ridge of 
Croft Farm and Castle Copse must, by its inclination, be carried 
beneath this very shale. This, as well as other absurd trials in the 
incoherent shale of the ' Silurian System,' whenever it happens to be 
black, has been caused entirely by the lithological and mineral 
character of the rock, which in truth does not differ very materially to 
an unpractised eye from the shales of the coal measures." — Silurian 
System, p. 411. 
I have hitherto been considering cases in which there can be no doubt 
that coal must be entirely absent ; and hence where speculation must be 
perfectly hopeless. I shall now, however, call attention to circumstances 
of a different nature — where there seems every reason to believe that coal 
is below the district to be examined, but at so great a depth as to render 
it practically beyond reach. Some two or three such cases, and the 
facts connected with them, I shall now give, in the order in which 
they occurred in cases within my own experience. The first was about 
four miles to the east of the borough of Droitwich, in Worcestershire, 
where mining operations were commenced at the instigation of a gentle- 
man who had bought an estate in the district, mainly, as I thought, from 
a belief that the prevalent tradition of " coal having been found there 
many years ago" was founded on fact. Having secured his purchase, the 
first thing he did was — not to obtain the opinion of a geologist, but to 
send into Staffordshire for a " practical miner," with whose report he 
was so satisfied as at once to commence boring, as a preliminary step to 
the sinking of a shaft. 
The boring went on from day to day as rapidly as such operations 
can be accomplished, and each day the report to the proprietor was, that 
they were nearer the coal — until, from about the depth of 150 yards, 
some coal was absolutely brought to the surface. This was tested — it 
was indeed coal, and burnt well, which is not to be wondered at when 
it is considered that it was a portion of Staffordshire coal, which had 
been put down by a dishonest workman. However, this fraud not being 
