56 
down to the humblest organism yet discovered, the Eozoon 
Canadense of the British North American Laurentian Beds. 
The conclusion of this Paper was followed by several rounds 
of applause, which were broken by the noble Chairman rising 
to invite discussion. In doing so, he said that the lecture, or 
rather oration, to which they had just listened (and which 
had been delivered throughout without the aid of any note), 
was one which few men would be capable of delivering. He 
knew not which to admire most — the learning, clear diction, 
remarkable illustration, or admirable delivery displayed. 
Mr. Sykes Ward said that there was one part of the Paper 
in which he differed from the reader ; he believed that 
Mr. Tew had given far too glowing an idea of the value of 
the mineral wealth under Pontefract. They might geologi- 
cally discover that they had sixteen or seventeen beds of coal, 
the one underneath the other, but they had no instance on 
record that it was possible to work that number ; and more- 
over, it frequently happened that coal which might be traced 
continuously in a bed, was of much less commercial value in 
one position than in another. They ought to know something 
of the commercial value of the coal in its relative position 
before they allowed themselves to be deluded into the waste 
which was now going on. He feared that even within a 
century they would find their manufactures very much 
impeded and deteriorated from the destruction of our coal 
fields. Sometimes the getting of coal from a lower bed quite 
injures and destroys that in the upper bed ; similarly the 
getting of the coal from an upper bed causes water to 
accumulate in such a manner, that it is afterwards impossible 
to work the coal in the lower bed. As Secretary of the 
Society, he wished to state that they would be extremely 
glad to receive some short Papers, giving practical details as 
to the most economical way of working our coal fields. 
