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stratification of our Coal-field, as divided by a line, running 
in an easterty and westerly direction, and coincident with 
the Calder Yalley on the south side of Wakefield. The 
measures southward of this line may be said to characterise 
the South TorhshirCy or by way of distinction, I should 
prefer to style it, the Barnsley Seotion, or series of strata. 
Whilst those on the north side of the line, are more character- 
istic of what is known as the West Yorkshire Coal-field, and 
may be generally distinguished by Sections, which have long 
been associated with the several important seams, known as 
the Stanley Main,'' the " Middleton," and the " Low Moor'' 
Beds of Coal. These lines, of great physical distinction, are 
important on an occasion like the present, chiefly as afiecting 
the identity of particular seams on each side of them. A 
few years have sufficed to solve many interesting doubts of 
this nature, which formerly excited geological controversy. 
As, for instance, whether the thick (9 feet) seam, familiarly 
known as the "Barnsley Bed," which seems to find its 
northern limit, for all practical purposes, in the divisional line 
I have referred to, is not represented on the north side of such 
line, by the seams known as the Warren House and Gaw- 
thorpe Beds. This identity is now accepted. And I believe 
it is equally well established, hy the results of more enlarged 
experience, that the Stanley Main Seam, onthe north side of 
our divisional line, has its representative in the two distinct 
beds in the Barnsley Section, commonly known as the 
" Upper and Lower Beamshaw " Beds. 
Such being the accepted facts, we get a clear and well- 
established definition, of the entire section of the West 
Biding Coal-field, from its upper or latest deposited beds, (the 
Glass Houghton and Shafton Beds), down to the level or zone 
of the " Barnsley Coal." In this we may assume an aggre- 
gate thickness of 400 or 500 yards of various stratifications. 
These include, besides the several beds of coal, too well 
