APPENDIX O. (COAL-FIELDS OF POLAND AND SILESIA.) 
651 
N. 
Permian Rocks near Bachmuth (p. 114) and on the Suchona (p. 178). 
As some geologists who follow our traces in Russia may be of opinion, that the red sandstones and 
yellow limestones near Bachmuth, which we have considered of Permian age, ought rather to be classed 
with the Carboniferous system, we will merely say, that a recent survey of the junction of the equiva- 
lents of the Permian rocks (lower red sandstone and magnesian limestone) with the subjacent coal 
measures in the West Ruling of Yorkshire, has convinced us, that there, as in the environs of Bachmuth, 
the two deposits are naturally connected by mineral transition and conformable stratification. In both 
cases, that which comes under the head of Permian, is simply the continuation of the carboniferous group 
under a peculiar and modified type. 
Not having detected fossils on the Strelna and Suchona in our first survey, the name of “ calcaires 
muets’ was then applied to the limestones subordinate to the red marls of that tract (p. 178) ; but the 
subsequent researches of Count Keyserling have rendered that sobriquet inapplicable, by the discovery of 
the Terebratula Gcinitziana and T. elonyala (see Permian Table, p.222). 
O. 
Coal-fields of Poland and Silesia. 
Having explained in the work, that throughout the Russian empire there is no productive coal-field 
above the carboniferous limestone, and that nearly all the Russian coal occurs in that formation, it is in- 
teresting to lemark how, in receding from that peculiar eastern development and on entering into Poland 
and Silesia, the deposits of this age assume the prevalent type of Western Europe, and consist of coal 
with sandstone and shale in masses, which (like those of the Belgian and British coal-fields) distinctly 
overlie the carboniferous or mountain limestone. In traversing the carboniferous tracts of the kingdom 
of Poland west-north-west of Cracow (see Map), we found the mountain limestone at the surface to the 
north of Krzezowice, but that rock subsiding to the west, is succeeded at Sicrza (the mines of Count A. 
Potocki) by true overlying coal-measures, which are worked by galleries on slightly inclined planes. Still 
further to the west these coal-measures greatly expand (also very slightly inclined) around the govern- 
ment mines of Dombrova, Bendzin, &c. (kingdom of Poland). The chief masses of coal, which are there 
w orked in open quarries, exceed in magnitude any examples of the old or palaeozoic coal with which we 
are acquainted. In the cuttings, for example, near Bendzin, the coal is at one spot actually nine lachters 
or near sixty feet thick, and therefore double the dimensions of the strongest British seam, that of the 
Dudley ten-yard coal. The overlying sand and shale are loaded with impressions of fossil plants, which 
are almost invariably found prostrate and much broken ; and M. Pusch, now engaged in directing the 
works, informed us, that he never met with more than one instance of a vertical fossil tree- stem amid a 
very great profusion of ancient vegetation. In alluding to the vast thickness of this Polish coal, we may 
observe, that portions only of the sixty feet constitute fuel sufficiently good to forge the iron of the mines 
of the Imperial government. 
The eastern limb of this coal-field passes into Prussia, and is worked at Konigshutte, &c. in Lower 
Silesia, where, although the coal-seams are not so thick as on the Polish side of the frontier, the coal- 
seams are of good quality and are turned to the best profit. As this coal-field is evidently an upca«t 
through surrounding secondary formations (Muschelkalk, Jura, &c., see Map, PI. VI.), it may at some 
future day be advantageously won by deeper shafts over a considerable area. 
The little coal-field of Upper Silesia occurs as a one-sided trough in the mountainous tract between 
