APPENDIX E : POLITICS, STATISTICS, ETC. 
243 
to limit the deep side of the coal, and indeed almost all knowledge of 
it to the vicinity of Sodbury wherefrom the Lias is superadded (& with 
its high clay hills capped with Oolite much of the way), is known to be 
the cover of the Coal-series quite to the extent of the main range in 
Gloucestershire and Somersetshire. No wonder that under such 
variable circumstances generally strange and almost unknown to 
practical men in their respective Districts there should be such a variety 
of opinions. 
These, I conceive, are some of the most knotty points which 
experimental Geology has to unravel, but the chief object of this essay 
being to show things as they are I shall set down a list of the respective 
coal districts with the occupancy of each. 
[This part of the subject is not yet commenced]. 
Having thus briefly stated how the coalfields of Britain are occu- 
pied and the local and imperative demands upon each, I may now be 
allowed to draw the reader's attention more particularly to a Geo- 
logical view of the subject. 
The various beds of coal so well known at the respectiv^e works 
may be said to range through the interior of England parallel to the 
general ranges of their overlying strata rather N.E. & S.W. of a 
Meridianal line. They range across Scotland from E. to W. and 
through South Wales in nearly the same direction but much less in 
extent, on the shore of N. Wales. On the eastern border of Wales, 
Shropshire and Herefordshire, some detached portions occur which, 
with the longer and more valuable detachments thereof on the west 
side of the Summit of Drainage at Coolbrook-dale and in Lancashire 
and Cumberland and several thousand acres in the forest of Dean, 
lying between the Severn and Wye comprise a general view of those 
situations where coal has been long and extensively wrought. The 
latter and all in the west side of England's summit of Drainage as well 
as the great coalfield in South Wales and a few others may be considered 
as detached portions of the main range before described. Some of 
these as the South Wales & Dean Forest we are sure can have no 
connexion between them or with any other beds of coal northward of 
Staffordshire can any of the coal on the western side have any connexion 
with that on the eastern side of the summit of Drainage. Some on 
the eastern side also, at about Newcastle under Lime are probably 
detached or lie too far from the main range of coal which accompanies 
the superimposed series of Eng;lish strata to be considered therewith, 
Q '2 
