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WHAT IS COAL? AND WHERE IS
IT FOUND?
The following paper, by Dr. Craig, was read
at the (net meeting of the Literary Society. Wo
publish it in the hope that it will lead to further
vcntilatiou of the subject:
There are insuperable difficulties in answering
satisfactorily the first question-"What is
coalP" Moat persons would at onoe answer
Coal is decomposed vegetable matter I coal is
buriod forests I Lot us consider what reason
able proofs we have of such being the origin of
coal,
1. First, in some kinds of coal, plant life has
been traced, even to the number of 200 or 250
different species, consisting of ferny spores,
bark fibres, mosses, and low orders of under
growth and jungle. It is remarkable, however,
that some of tho different species of plant life
are to ke found in actual growth now. Pictures
have beon engraved of leaf shales, of cones as of
fire, of slender branching sprigs, of swamp like
flora: many of these being microscopic ; but all
showing an ago of plant life totally removed
from tho present.
2. Secondly, in some coal beds have been
discovered apparent trunks of trees standing up*
right, or resting horizontally in the coal strata;
while fossil branches have been traoed up abovo
the coal seam, and fossil roots have been found
1 below it. In these instances, however, it is
equally remarkable that only the bark of the
buried trees has become coal, that is the fibrous
portion, but not the tree itself, nor the branches,
nor the roots, The interior of the tree has
either rotted away and disappeared, or it re- |
mains almost untouohed by time. These im<
bedded trees are very muoh dreaded by coal
miners, because not amalgamating with the rest
of the ooa), they may form a treacherous wall,
or still more dangerous roof, ready to fall in
when least expeoted.
8 A third proof of vegetable matter is ID tbe
strange footprints which Have been described as
tbe footprints of sauries, or lizards, imprinted on
swampy peat; and in the appearance of rain
drops, or like bubbles in a mossy surface,
suddenly checked as bv a maglo hand, as the
moss and pent were being compressed into oottli
By some such marvellously sudden compression
it would seem that frogs and toads have been
Imprisoned in their living tombs, to sleep for
thousands of years, until the miner's pick and
wedge have as suddenly opened the doors of
freedom and liberty I
4. Many scientists have thought to find a
fourtU proof of plant life iu coal by tracing 86ft*
shells and algao or seaweed ; and so have en
deavoured to provo that coal is marine, owing its
primary formation to the sea and its marino
deposits. This theory cannot lie maintained,
though it would seem that salt wa'er, as well as
fresh water, had aided the original formation of
coal seams and coal beds If then the plant life
theory be correct, and tljat immenso strataa of
coal liayo been formed by the compression in
connection with heat, and a combination of gases
and acidff, of huudreds of species of vegetable
matter, all, or nearly all, of which aro uuknown
in (ho plant life of the present age, wo necessarily
come to these conclusions
First, tuat wherover coal is found there must
have been, for unlimited periods of time, vast
tnngled growths ever accumulating in the region
of extensive swamps, whioh further contributed
fibrous flora; or continually washed and com
pressed by flooded stroams and rivers. Then
mineral deposits of limestone and shale being
added, and the wholo mass, in the lapse of
centuries, being decomposed and compressed
gases, fluids, and acids fulfilling their work too
-wo have coal in strata, seams, and beds.
Secondly, that these coal stratas wore formed
in long agea previous to this present orrior of tlie
enrth, in which order of itB oreation we live now,
In one or more of the many catas trophies through
which our world has pasac-d theso ancient deposits
have been concentrated and completed as coal,
and it fills our hearts with inconceivable dismay
when we see huge rifts opened, many to the.
depth of 10,000 feet, and down into their dark
duugeons these vast strata hurled. When we
remember that coal drives have lieen carried over
l£ miles under the sea at Whitehaven, in
Cumberland, and that rich coal seams are being
worked on the summit of the Rocky Mountains
in North America, there roust have been
many startling phenomena in the mysterious
record of this enrth'B history in far off ages I
There must have been many of these world
ohanges or catastrophies, for in some of the
deeper shafts as many as five, or even ten, dif
ferent seams of coal are found, varying in width
and iu depth, all of which at one time, and for
centuries at least, had been surface deposits
washed over by floods, and supportiug infinite
plant lifo unknown to us now. Such is coal, the
grand collection of " black diamonds," rightly
so called in more senses than ono I There are,
of courso, very great difficulties in the plant life
theory.
First, we find no such preparatory coal
deposits now. The swaraps of the Ganges, the
floods of the Amazon, and the delta of the Nilo
are forming no coal for future ageB. The dense
jungles of India,, tho grassy savannahs of
America, and the forns and flora of tho tropics
aro doing nothing for the wealth of other races
after further world catastrophies when our order
is no more. In coal soams we find no imperfect
formation advancing to perfection. In the coal
strata all is finished.
Secondly, we do not find whole forests buried
and turned into coal, but seams and layers,
varying from 2 feet to 40 yards, reminding us of
tho glacier moraine, as though tho wholo deposit
had been carried down by water and left as the
stream passed ever on.
Thirdly, if tho plant life theory be correct,
and that dense foliage, flora, or fibre under,
intense heat have caused coal, how is it that
ooal is found in cold regions and where now, at
least, there are no trees at all, and no luxuriant
foliage P Benisath the barren hills of Wales or
Scotland, under the treeless steppes of Russia,
beneath the eternal enows of the Andes, or the
darkening ice fields of Canada coal abounds,
equally as in the temporate lands of Australia
and New Zealand, and as in tho heated forests
of Borneo or Hindostan.
A kind Providence has very widely distributed
coal. It abounds in Qreat Britain, the largest
known field being in South Wales, Qreat
Britain raises annually 128,000,000 tons; and
yet it has been calculated that of ooal known and
proved to exist, there are, in Great Britain
alone, to a depth of 4,000 feet, 143,000,000,000
tons left to work. That is a quantity, at
128,000,000 tons a year, to last.for 1,170 years
more, / /
Ooal is found in Franoe. Belgium, Prussia,
apparently the same seam; in Poland, Hungary,
Russia, India, China, Abysinnia, Natal, Tas
mania, Peru, the United States very largely,
Canada, Novp Sootia, Australia, and Japan, It
is said that iu Japan ooal galleries may be cut
as tunnels from the mainland to. the islands, so
rich are the seams.
What a wonderful treasure is eoai 1 For
smelting purposes, for steamers, for engine fires
and machinery, for gas, for the forge, for the
progress of a thousand inventions, and a thousand
thousand factories I
It is sad to read of the many fearful acoidents
to whieh the miners are subjeot. We read of
00 or 150, or over 200, hurried into death by
explosion, fire damp, or flooded workings; but
fathers and obildren, and children's children fill
up the hereditary ranks, and toil on, day and
night the same to them, orouohing, lying down,
to strike the endless piok. Children of twelve,
on hands and knees, propelling the coal waggons
to the shaft, girls and boys alike I Squalid
faces, tattered garments, still more squalid and
miserable homes. Is such a life worth living P
One death by accident for every 120,000 tons
of coal raised I One killed annually for overy
shift of 850 miners I 1,000 deaths per year in
Great Britain only. Yet few miners ever change
their life, , Their lives and labors are spent over
in the dark. We may hope that their minds
often rise to brighter and fairer regions, We
may remember one who attained to be at the
world's noblest and best-the Shipton eollier's
illustrious ohild,
In conclusion, every effort is being put forth
to lessen the dangers of tho tens of thousands of
coal miners by patent cages, pulleys, and
engines ; to educate the children; and to
ameliorate their homes, For ourselves in happy
sunshine, and in fair Australia, whether wo
contemplate the infinite wealth which coal brings
in its " diamond " light of a myriad larnpB: or
whether we look back to primeval ages, ana to
their plant life treasured in varied ferns and
flora; or to the Almighty Fiat, " Let there be,"
and " there was, "we cannot but wonder, marvel,
and adore I
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