18 
THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE APPOINTED TO RECOM- 
MEND A LINE OF SECTION ACROSS THE YORKSHIRE 
COAL FIELD. 
BY MESSRS. xMORTON AND HOLT. 
The Committee appointed to make arrangements for the 
execution of a longitudinal Section of the Yorkshire coal 
sfl-ata, beg to present the following Report of their pro- 
ceedings : — 
It will be recollected that the original proposal for a sec- 
tion of this magnitude emanated from the Council of the 
Manchester Geological Society, who were anxious to com- 
pare the stratification of their own coal field with that of 
Yorkshire, hy means of a continuous section across both. 
This important suggestion was referred to the consider- 
ation of your Committee, and at the Society's meeting, held 
in December last, at Leeds, a line of section was defined 
which commenced at the Sheffield and Manchester Railway 
tunnel, near Penistone, and traversed the coal field in a 
North- Easterly direction towards Goole ; and in order that 
a strict comparison of the Yorkshire and Lancashire strata 
might be instituted, it was thought that the section to be 
undertaken by the ManchesJter Society should commence at 
the same point, and proceed Westward. 
It afterwards appeared, however, that a line of section 
down the valley of the Etherow would not fully develope the 
Lancashire coal field ; and at the same time, it was consi- 
dered that a North-Easterly line from Penistone would not 
exhibit the Yorkshire strata so completely as a line of sec- 
tion taken in another locality. It became a matter of con- 
siderable doubt, therefore, whether any continuous line of 
section could be adopted, proceeding Eastward and West- 
ward from the Penine chain, which should at once be the 
means of comparing the geological structure of both coal 
fields, and of thoroughly developing the stratification of each. 
The attention of the Committee and of the Society was 
