818 COAL-PIELDS OF OHIO. 
western Virginia, Prof. Rogers remarks: "How 
magnificent is the picture of the resources of this 
region, and how exhilarating the contemplation of 
all the happy influences upon the enterprise, wealth, 
and intellectual improvement of its inhabitants, 
which are rapidly to follow the successive devel- 
opment of its inexhaustible mineral possessions. 
In a country where the channels of nearly all the 
principal rivers have been scooped out, in part, 
through beds of coal; where some of them are paved 
with the richest ores of iron ; and where the very 
rock itself, the steril sandstone of the cliffs and 
mountains, is enriched at certain depths with abm> 
dant stores of salt, what more is needed to fulfil 
the happy destinies that await it, than to awaken 
enterprise to a due appreciation of the golden 
promises it holds out, and to direct industrious and 
active research to the thorough investigation of the 
character, position, and uses of the treasures it 
contains 1"* 
COAL-FIELDS OF OHIO. 
Were we to state that the whole of the south and 
eastern part of the State of Ohio was one magnifi- 
cent coal-field, we believe we should not vary far 
from the truth ; but, as explorations have been made 
as yet, comparatively, in few places, we must limit 
our brief description to such deposites as have been 
exposed to view, or penetrated in borings for salt. 
" The immense beds of bituminous coal," says Dr. 
Hildreth, " found in the Valley of the Ohio, fill the 
mind with wonder and surprise as it reflects on the 
vast forests of arborescent plants required in their 
formation. Age after age, successive growths of 
plants springing up in the same region were en- 
* Besides coal and iron, Virginia contains gold, copper, lead, 
salt, limestone, marls, gypsum, magnesian, copperas, and alum 
earths; thermal, chalybeate, and sulphuretted springs; excel- 
lent marbles, granites, soapstones, sandstones, &c. 
