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the bishoprick of Durham. About a mile from Langrow. in Cum- 
berland, is a stratum of bituminous earth, three feet thick, which 
contains parts of the trunks of trees, leaves, sprays of shrubs, and ' 
other vegetable substances, in such quantity that the far greater 
part of the stratum seemed to be formed by them. It also abounds 
near Outhorn in Yorkshire, at Kendall in Westmoreland, in Windsor 
Forest, in the Isle of Wight, and various other places. In that which 
was dug up in the Isle of Wight, besides the twigs and leaves of 
hazel, were found several hazel nuts, the shells of which were un- 
broken, but the kernels were decayed. 
How extensive and considerable the beds of peat may be in the 
vicinity of the metropolis, may be inferred from the following cir- 
cumstance : — Near a hundred years ago, in digging a wet-dock at 
Deptford, hazel nuts, with hazel, oak, and several other kinds of 
trees, were found. Within these few years, in digging the wet-docks 
of Mr. Perry, at Blackwall, on the opposite side of the river, and at 
the distance of nearly two miles, a similar stratum was dug into, 
yielding peat for a considerable thickness, in which were found 
hazel nuts, trunks of large trees, &c. In digging also, in the ad- 
joining marshes, called the Isle of Dogs, lately, for the purpose of 
forming similar docks, wherever the earth has been opened over an 
extent of several acres, peat has been also found, with hazel nuts, 
and several trees ; among these were chiefly oak, some yew and 
hazel, and a few firs : but these, as I am informed, were but of a very 
small size. At the depth of about six, eight, or nine feet, were also 
found bones of several animals, apparently of horses and oxen, and 
the fragments of the horns of deer. 
In almost every morass, which has been dug in the isles of 
Anglesey and Man, in Somersetshire, Cheshire, Lancashire, York- 
shire, Staflbrdshire, Lincolnshire, and indeed in almost every county 
of England, has this substance been found. 
In the account given by Captain John Perry, of the stopping of 
