erally sold at ten cents per bushel. The product of a | thin seam, 10 to 14 inches thick, on the Nodaway River, is sold at twenty cents per bushel. The miners, it is said, prefer to work a bed from 2 to 23 feet thick to one of greater thickness, and consider all beds over 18 inches thick as workable coal; but if so, they differ from those of other States. The estimated area within which workable coal may be reached within 200 feet of the surface is about 7000 square miles. TABLE XXVI.-Analyses of Missouri Coal [by G. C. Broad in the Western States, they are therefore almost twice as durable in the fire, with proper access of air. The existence of a semi-anthracite or semi-bituminous coal in the West is the more surprising as the formation is level and undisturbed, bearing but little evidence of metamorphism or change by internal heat. There is, however, rock of undoubted igneous origin 60 miles south of Johnson county, in Hot Springs county. The igneous rocks are no doubt near enough to the surface to have excited an igneous action, and to have expelled the greater portion of the gaseous matter. The peculiar fissured structure of the Spadra coal favors the idea that the volatile matter was expelled not only by prolonged chemical action, but by heat, which causes an expansion of the particles, and that severing the coal gives it a friable tendency and a peculiar subdivision into cuboidal lumps." Sulphur. Water. Volatile matter. Carbon. Ray. 2:41 10.05 Pettis.. 4:41 3.95 38.55 45.40 33:10 46.26 16.69 St. Louis.... 9.55 38.28 42.99 Johnson.. 7:29 42.27 46.95 3:49 Lincoln. 45.85 7.82 8.94 34.75 45.38 10.93 7.80 33.20 55.75 3.25 5.82 38:01 54.53 1.64 12-05 40.75 43.50 3.70 FIG. 28.-Map of Arkansas Coal-field. ARKANSAS.-The coal-measures of Arkansas cover an area of 9043 square miles along the course of the Arkansas River in the western portion of the State. The measures lie horizontally, consequently the coal is easy of access. Two beds of coal have been opened, but only the lower is of workable thickness. The best coal yet found in Arkansas is the Spadra coal, in Johnson county, a semi-anthracite, which in some places is 34 feet thick. The seams of coal on both sides of the river are from 10 inches to 1 foot in thickness. Sebastian county the coal is 44 feet thick, with two clay partings of 1 inch each: 1 foot of the top coal is shaly. In the southern part of Franklin and Johnson counties the coal is 2 feet thick. The accompanying analyses (Macfarlane, p. 499) show the character of the coal: In FIG. 29.-Map of Nebraska Coal-field. NEBRASKA. The vast treeless prairies of Nebraska would make its coal-deposits peculiarly valuable, but most of the State is beyond the western rim of the Missouri field, and the coal of the rest is in beds too thin to be worked profitably. The coal-bearing area of the State is a triangular section in the south-west corner. Several beds are found in this, but the coal, though sometimes of good quality, is only from 5 to 22 inches in thickness, and will not pay for mining. Prof. Hayden, after an exhaustive examination of the field, declares that the rocks of the Nebraska coal-field belong to the Upper Barren measures and contain no workable beds. favorable locations the thin seams are mined for local use, but are scarcely able to supply even this demand. оссиру FIG. 30.-Map of Kansas Coal-field. KANSAS.-The coal-fields of this State are a contin1:50 uation of the measures of Iowa and Missouri. They the whole of the eastern portion of the State, bounded on the west by an irregular north-west and south-westerly line through Marshall, Lynn, Wilson, and Montgomery counties, and covering an area of 17,000 square miles. The coal-measures are nearly horizontal, with a slight dip to the north-west. No faults are found in the beds. The upper portion of the measures con "These analyses," Dr. Owen says, "prove the coal to be semi-bituminous, like some of the coal in George's Creek Valley, Md.; but, in fact, these coals contain more carbon, and are anthracite or semi-anthracite. Being far richer in fixed carbon than most of the coals tains only traces of coal. Most of the coal crops out in Upper Kansas, and is not very thick, but furnishes a supply for domestic uses. The coal is not pure, owing to its being so near the top of the measures. The seams are thin in the northern portion of the State; in the lower portion there are two beds of uniform quality and thickness. The first, the Osage seam, found in Linn and Bourbon counties, is 2 feet thick; and the second, or Cherokee, the most important bed in the State, crops out in the centre of Cherokee county, extending thence into the Indian Territory. It is 6 feet thick on the average, and of good quality. These beds are the productive ones of the State. The coal is 300 feet below the surface. At Leavenworth, and in that portion of the State, shafts have been sunk 710 feet before finding coal. The Kansas coal is a good bituminous, does not crumble, and differs from most Western coals in being remarkably free from sulphur. In Western Kansas there are thick beds of brown coal. The beds crop out west of Salina, in Saline county. They are from 3 to 7 feet thick. Prof. Swallow, State geologist, gives the following summary section of the coal-measures of Kansas: 1. Lower Carboniferous formation..... 2. Lower coal series, contains 24 layers, 5 beds of coal-(1) 6 to 10 in., (2) 3 ft., (3) 2 to 4 in., (4) 2 to 6 in., (5) 5 to 7 in....... 120 feet. 353 5. Pawnee limestone series, 9 layers-6 in. coal... 112 6. Marais des Cygnes series, 25 layers, 4 seams of coal-(1) 2 to 3 ft., (2) 1 ft. to 2 ft. 6 in., (3) 1 ft. 8 in. to 2 ft. 9 in., (4) 2 in.... 7. Well Rock series, 11 layers-coal 1 to 5 in...... 238 303 75" NEOSHO FIG. 32.-Map of Texas Coal-field. TEXAS. An outspur of the great Missouri coal-field covers the north-eastern portion of the State of Texas for about 6000 square miles. This coal is a regular bituminous. The formation belongs to the Carboniferous age. It extends into Stephens and Young counties, where explorations have shown the presence of two beds, about 40 feet apart. Some beds are 3 feet in thickness, and others vary from 4 to 6 feet. The strata lie nearly horizontal and cover a very large area. The quality of the coal is not very good, being high in ash and full of sulphur. This coal-field extends south to the Colorado River. An analysis of this coal is added: Analysis of Coal, Young co., Texas. BENTONVILLE Fixed carbon........ FIG. 31.-Map of Coal-field of Indian Territory. INDIAN TERRITORY.-Indian Territory has 13,600 square miles of coal-measures, with some good coal, but its character and other details have not been ascertained. At McAllister is an extensive bed of valuable bituminous coal. Within three miles of that place a plot of at least 1000 acres is worked by the Osage Mining Company, a Kansas corporation, and produces eighty cars of coal a day, all of which is sold to the Missouri, Kansas, and Texas Railroad, or shipped via the Missouri, Kansas, and Texas Railroad to Texas, It is a very superior gas coal. The vein is also worked at Savannah, ten miles south, and again crops out at Atoka, forty-five miles south, on the Missouri, Kansas, and Texas Railroad, and is known to stretch far to the east. The Choctaw Nation leases to the Osage com Ash..... Sulphur.. Lignites occupy large areas in Texas. 46.59 11.96 *70 100'00 One bed runs south-west through the State, commencing at the Sabine River, 20 miles below the 32d parallel of north latitude and extending to the Rio Grande River. Another bed of lignite runs parallel to this through Cass county and on through Cherokee county. There is a small field of coal in Brown, Coleman, Comanche, and Hamilton counties. This is said to be a semi-anthracite. Good cannel coal is reported to be found in Webb county. It belongs to the Tertiary formation, and makes a good gas coal. LIGNITES AND LIGNITIC COAL. The lignitic coals of the western portion of the United States are destined to play an important part in the industrial development of that part of the North American continent, as they are, with few exceptions, the only form of mineral fuel to be found west of the 100th meridian. Lignite is the stage next above peat in the formation of coal, and varies greatly in both appearance and chemical composition. Its color varies from light yellow to deep brown or black. Some writers restrict the term "lignite" to fuel which shows a distinct woody structure, and make a separate variety of the more compact and higher grade between this and bituminous, which they call "brown" coal. The distinction is more apparent in Europe than in It will have been noticed that the coal-field of Kan-America, as in this country the gradations are so minute pany. as to make it almost impossible to say where the lignites end and the brown coals begin. As might be supposed from their intermediary position between peat and true coals, lignites belong to a later geological period than the Carboniferous. They occur principally in Cretaceous and Tertiary formations, but the beds, which often are of great thickness, present the same general characteristics as those of the true coals. Like them, each bed is underlaid by a seam of fire-clay, the soil in which the plants grew, and overlaid with shales and sandstones; and, like them, they are regularly interstratified with the surrounding rocks. Many instances occur, too, in which local causes have changed portions of lignite beds to bituminous, and even to anthracite, the coal in each case being simply a higher development of the lignite; showing that they are essentially the same substance. Lignites of the Eastern Hemisphere. LIGNITES have been used in Europe for many years, though their inferior qualities as heat-producers make them less popular than the true coals. They are found in England, France, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, Greece, Scandinavia, Russia, Austria, and perhaps other European countries, as well as in the island of Madeira, in Greenland, Iceland, Asia Minor, Persia, Siberia, Thibet, India, Australia, Tasmania, and indeed in most parts of the globe. In many places where the geological formation makes the presence of lignites probable they have not yet been sought for, and in many other places they have been found, but not worked. Some varieties emit a disagreeable smell when burning; some, like the "Cologne earth" of Germany, crumble to powder when dried, and are used as pigments. The following are analyses of European and Australian lignites: The lignites of Western America resemble the "brown coals" of Europe in holding a large amount of water, the proportion of this ingredient in most of them being from 12 to 15 per cent., though some have as low as 4 and others as high as 20 per cent. They do not show a woody or fibrous structure, but are compact and generally black, with a very high lustre, resembling in appearance some of the bituminous coals; with which, indeed, they are, for practical purposes, almost identical. Only the geologist can distinguish between the best lignites TABLE XXVII.-Proximate Analyses of Western Lignitic Coals. Ultimate analyses give the true value of coal as a heat-producer. The "volatile matter" in proximate analyses includes some combined water that tends to diminish the heat. The nitrogen also is an impurity. The following table of analyses is from Prof. Rossiter W. Raymond: and bituminous coal. The percentage of ash is low sulphur seldom reaches 1 per cent. The volatile for lignites, varying from 2 to 6 per cent., while the products driven off at a dull red heat vary from 25 to FIG. 33.-Cross-section of Coal Hill, Wyoming Territory [by W. S. Sheafer, M. E., 1880]. 0 400 200 300 400 37 per cent., and the amount of fixed carbon is from 45 to 60 per cent. They are superior to European lignites, but differ from the true coals, and hence are termed "lignitic coal." Hayden's Report of the U. S. Geological Survey of Colorado for 1873 gives tables of all reliable proximate analyses of these lignitic coals, and the preceding table is abstracted from them. (See Table XXVII.) As the heat-producing power of the coal is dependent on a chemical union of the atmospheric oxygen with the carbon and hydrogen in the coal, thus forming carbonic acid and water, the amounts of these products represent the amount of heat which has been produced as the result of their formation; while the ash and moisture present diminish the percentage of combustible ingredients and the heat-producing power of the whole, the moisture being a further disadvantage, as it requires a considerable amount of heat to expel it. These coals are found in a series of sandstone and fire-clay, probably of Lower Tertiary age. The fossils contained are chiefly leaves of deciduous trees. No ferns or fossil plants, like those common to the true coal-measures, are found in this formation. The coalbeds are often of great size, reaching a thickness of 27 feet on Bear River, Utah. They are remarkably free from impurities and without slate partings. pyrites may be detected in small flakes and thin disks. All the coals tend to crumble after having been exposed to the weather, and this tendency to crumble is the cause of great waste at the mines. With rare exceptions, when submitted to the coking process they retain their form or crumble into a dry powder. As a fuel for locomotives and for domestic purposes the coal answers well. It kindles and burns freely, making a bright fire, with a yellow blaze and comparatively little smoke. The presence of iron pyrites in coals so easy to crumble as these, suggests the possibility of spontaneous combustion. Iron WYOMING LIGNITIC COAL.-The largest single deposit of coal yet discovered on the American continent is the Twin Creek coal in the Green River coal-basin, in Southwestern Wyoming, where the writer's explorations show 250 feet of coal in a thickness of about 3000 feet of measures. (See fig. 33.) The number of beds is not known, but twenty-two of workable thickness have been developed, and there are traces of nearly or quite as many more, most of which are supposed to be workable. On the line of the Utah and Wyoming Railroad, about 100 miles east of Corinne and 20 west of Ogden, two series of coal-deposits have been traced, which Dr. Hayden and Clarence King ascribe to the Cretaceous perioda notable exception to Dr. Hayden's theory that the Rocky Mountain lignites belong to the Tertiary formation. The first is in the Lower Fox Hill group, and the second in the Laramie group. South of where Ham's Fork of Green River cuts through Oyster Ridge two beds of coal have been opened; the upper is 10 feet thick, and contains 18 inches of fire-clay, 6 of hard sandstone, 72 of coal, 6 of soft fire-clay, and 18 of coal; or 7 feet 8 inches of coal in a 10-foot bed. The second bed is about 40 feet below this, and consists of 10 feet of coal, 6 inches of sandy clay, 1 foot 8 inches of dark slate and fire-clay, and 1 foot 8 inches of coal. The strike of these beds is nearly due north, and they dip westwardly 23 degrees. They are regular, and have been traced for several miles (fig. 34). A second series of beds appears in Coal Ridge, a hill parallel to Oyster Ridge and about 4 miles west of it. They first appear through the overlying Tertiary deposit 6 or 8 miles south of Bell's Pass, and rise gradually to about 300 feet above the valley of the north branch of the Little Muddy River. Observations taken at thirty-four shaftings located about 3 miles south of Bell's Pass show that the coal-beds underlie strata of fire-clay or sandstone, or both, varying in thickness from 3 to 100 feet, and averaging about 37 feet through the series. The beds themselves vary from 3 to 40 feet, averaging 11 feet throughout the series. The coal gen 12.00 1600 Ft. Coal, 4% feet. FIG. 34.-Oyster Ridge, Wyoming Territory. erally is of good quality, and but four or five of the whole series of beds must be regarded as certain to prove unprofitable in working, although in several instances coal has been reached without a thorough proof of the thickness of the deposit. In four shaftings the superincumbent strata are 300 feet in depth; in one, 200 feet. Several other beds, overlying the last of this series, were seen in other parts of this field, but not developed. The distances between the beds in the above section (see fig. 33) were estimated or taken from barometrical measurements, and are only approximate, as indeed the whole statement necessarily must be. It gives, however, an idea of the richness of this magnificent field. The beds have been traced for a distance of at least 10 miles in a north-and-south direction. The following are results of analyses of coals from Twin Creek. They are numbered according to their place in the series mentioned above: Other openings in Colorado are the Wilson, Brigg, No. 5. and Baker mines on Coal Creek. The coal-belt extends 16-909 north into Wyoming Territory, but is not found east of 36.948 the Black Hills. At Carbon, on the Union Pacific Rail43-979 road, in the Laramie Valley, 140 miles west of Cheyenne, 2-164 the bed is 7 feet thick. (See Table XXIX.) The coal 100 000 is good, but has much impurity. At Hallville, 142 Yellowish. miles farther west, are several coal-beds. The main No. 32. bed is about 6 feet thick. The next coal-mine is at Van 15 696 Dyke, 30 miles west. The coal here is 4 feet thick, and remarkably clean. This and the next coal, at Rock 3.898 Springs, have the best reputation among Rocky Mountain lignitic coals. The latter mines are 2 miles west of Van Dyke; the bed is 9 feet thick. At Evanston, 126 miles west of Rock Springs, the beds are 26 feet thick, 35.257 100'000 TABLE XXVIII.—Analyses of Lignitic Coals in Wyoming and and dip 15°. Iron pyrites are abundant; the coal clink Montana. I. II. III. IV. V. Moisture 17:31 13.88 14.71 4.72 7:00 Volatile matter. 36.18 38.81 ers to a great extent. These mines supply the Union TABLE XXIX.-The Coal-mines of the Union Pacific Railroad. COLORADO LIGNITIC COAL.-At Golden City, 15 miles years are shown in the following table: west from Denver, coal was first discovered in several small and vertical beds near together in the steep bank of Clear Creek, a half mile below where it passes out from the mountain. An extension of one of the beds toward the south was opened at the summit of the ridge. The bed was 10 to 14 feet thick, but irregular, sometimes pinching to a few inches, and then expanding to 8 or 10 feet. The average thickness is 5 feet. Two large coal-beds are opened at Ralston Creek, 5 miles north of Golden City. They lie in a vertical position, 25 feet apart. The upper or western bed has 9 feet of good coal, and the lower bed 14 feet. Marshall's mines are in the valley of South Boulder Creek, 22 miles from Denver. There are four coal-beds. The coal is brilliant. Lignitic coal has been found on both the east and west sides of the Platte River, but the only mines of importance are near the eastern foot of the Blue Hill range of mountains. The formation is a series of sand At Cañon City, Col., there is an independent coal field. The coal-openings are 6 miles below the town, on the Arkansas River. The strata lie, for the most part, in a horizontal position, except along the north and west sides. Here the pitch is steep, but flattens and forms a basin, the centre being 3 miles east of the base of Greenhorn Range, a spur of the Rocky Mountains. The basin is 10 miles long and 5 miles wide, containing in all 34 sq. miles of coal-bearing rocks. There are at least nine seams |