464 
holgate: some physical properties of coal. 
and make a fairly good coke ; they will not however yield up to the 
average of the tar compounds. 
The Beeston Bed is less tough than the above. It does not con- 
tain as many spores as does the last-named, and consequently it is 
softer and more easily broken. It breaks down more readily into 
small before being used. The upper and the harder part is a good 
house and a fair furnace coal ; the lower portion is also used as a 
house coal but of inferior quality, also for raising steam. The whole 
seam is used largely for gas-making, exclriding the lowest part or 
Doggie which is not worked. 
The top part of the Middleton Little Coal seam is nearly allied 
in its properties to the Middleton Main Coal, whilst the bottom part 
more nearly resembles the upper part of the Beeston Bed. 
The middle part I have before described as containing numerous 
spores, and being suitable for furnaces. There still remains to con- 
sider the class of coal that habitually breaks into small, just as those 
above-named break, some into large and some into medium-sized 
pieces, and which are consequently poor in quality. Amongst coals of 
this class, in this neighbourhood, are the Halifax Beds, Black Bed, lower 
part of Crow Coal and Beeston Beds, both known as Johnnies or 
Doggies, the latter known also in some neiglibourhoods as Churwell 
Thick and the Shertcliffe Beds. 
Here allow me to say a few words about cleavage in coal, to 
fully understand the importance of which, we shoidd see the coal in 
position in open workings. In these positions we may see that 
the whole of the strata, whether of sandstones or shales, through 
which the coals run in comparatively thin seams, show distinct lines 
of jointing or cleavage, the distances between the joints varying with 
the different minerals. The coals themselves, even the different 
parts of the same seam, vary very much in the distances between 
these cleavages. We maj^ have a coal cleaving into pieces at about 
G inch wide and attached to it above or below, as in the case of the 
Middleton Little Coal, one of a totally different kind, cleaving at a 
distance of only half an inch or even less. 
If we examine them closely we shall find that the dull-looking 
tough coal containing spores or fish remains, cleaves at the greatest 
