R52 The American Geologist. June, 1892 
PROF. I. C: WHITE’S “STRATIGRAPHY -OR Raa 
BITUMINOUS COAL FIELD OF PENNSYL- 
VANIA, OHIO AND WEST VIRGINIA.” 
JOHN J. STEVENSON, New York. 
The geologists of the first geological survey of Pennsylvania 
labored under very serious disadvantages in the western part of 
the state; they had no barometers, not even good Locke’s levels; 
much of the country was still wilderness; there were no railroad 
cuttings; even the cuttings made for the turnpikes had become 
covered with debris or sod; coal shafts, except near Pittsburgh or 
some other large city were unknown; records of borings were 
andreamed of; where twenty coal pits are open now, there was 
barely one then. Remembering these disadvantages, we are not 
surprised by defects found in the work of the older geologists, 
but we are astonished at the wonderful skill with which the struct- 
ure was worked out and at the accuracy characterizing most of 
the detailed examinations. But too often the distauce between 
one good section and the next was so great that identifications 
were sometimes made at hazard, so that a feeling of uncertainty 
prevailed respecting the true relations of different parts of the 
Coal Measures column. 
For this reason, prior to the work of the second geological 
survey of Pennsylvania, great difficulty was experienced in mak- 
ing comparisons of the Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia 
sectious; Newberry made identifications of the lower coals of 
Ohio with the lower coals of Pennsylvania; the writer did the same 
for the upper coals of those states and offered some suggestions 
respecting the relations of the West Virginia beds to those of 
Pennsylvania. The groupings and identifications were quite as 
good as could be expected under the cir¢umstances; for which 
reason, doubtless, they have been permitted to rest in the peace 
of oblivion for about twenty years. But the excellence of the 
work done by the older Pennsylvania geologists as well as by 
those of the Ohio survey was discovered when the 2d Pennsyl- 
vania survey undertook the correlation: for, after Prof. I. C. 
White had completed the work along the state line and had cor- 
rected the defects in the work of those who had preceded him, he 
found no difficulty in utilizing the material gathered by his pre- 
decessors. His memoir, lately issued as a bulletin of the U. 8. 
