On Some of the Differences in the Deposition of Coal
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Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on October 2, 2021 77 after carefully drying, these were subiected without previous annealing to the heat of an intensely heated air furnace, and when thoroughly heated to the temperature of the furnace, suddenly withdrawn and exposed to a current of cold air. The following table shews the result obtained in each case :— ABCDEFGHIKL Degree of power of ) resistance to change )• 53664354634: of temperature. ) On comparing the results of these experiments, it appears obvious that those clays in which, according to the analysis given, the minimum amount of oxides of iron, and the alkaline earths is present in their composition, are the best adapted to resist fusion, or crack on being exposed to any sudden change of temperature; desiderata most essential for the purposes they have to be applied to. It is now universally admitted by chemists that clays are definite chemical compounds of silica, alumina, and water, the composition of such consisting of one equivalent of alumina combined with two of silicic acid, and two of water, and thus the various other bodies with which they are found associated are mere mechanical mixtures, to be regarded only as impurities; the presence of these substances materially impairing the qualities of the clays in which they are present. ON SOME OF THE DIFFERENCES IN THE DEPOSITION OF COAL. BY SAMUEL BAINES, ESQ., OF LIGHTCLIFFE. Coal is of such paramount importance to this, or even any district, that it woidd be a work of supererogation to dilate upon the fact. It would not be too much to say that we owe more to coal for the prosperity of our country than to that boasted Anglo-Saxon variety of the proud Caucasian family of man, to which we belong. Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on October 2, 2021 My remarks will apply more particularly to the West York shire Coal Field, though I think, with slight variations, they are applicable to all; * the prevailing opinion being that all coal has been changed by heat into the many varieties of stone coal, of Yorkshire ; cannel coal, of Lancashire; culm, of Wales ; or anthracite, of mineralogists. The major part of Yorkshire coal is the slate coal of mineralogists. Having on a former occasion advanced the opinion that the Yorkshire Freestone is an estuary deposit, it being but a continuous member of the coal series, further research confirms that opinion, and goes to convince me that the Yorkshire Coal Field and its intermediate strata is one large estuary deposit; one of the strongest evidences being the general thinning of the respective strata to the east, which would bear out the idea that some large sluggish river or rivers had quietly deposited the contents of their turbid waters from the North-west by West. I know of no supposition but that of an estuary deposit, to account for the basin or spoon shape of coal formations, except the extravagant one of satellites, that have fallen to our earth as their primary. The loose floated materials becoming more solid would have a tendency to settle in the middle (as there would be less support in the centre) as we have often seen the basset edge left behind at a greater angle, the change must be allowed to be great and complete between the finishing deposition of the sandstone grit and the commence ment of the coal series. From whatever quarter the debris that forms the carboniferous sandstone of this district came, I think it must have been worn on some beach, by powerful drifts, rapid currents, glacial deposits, or the wild dash of some primeval ocean's successive storms, and perhaps the tidal billows of a comparatively inland sea. To me there seems no need to call in any great astronomical change to bring about a more settled state of things. The currents of this inland sea or estuary, by which the Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on October 2, 2021 79 granitic debris has flowed, and met the river water in uproar ious contention, would consequently agitate the very bottom at every ebb and flow of its tide, by which some change in the currents of the oceanic deposited debris of the rivers might begin to form a sandbank at the very junction ; and where these forces were equal, or their powers exhausted, this sand bank or bar would have a tendency to check the force of both. We have seen similar efiects in the change of currents in the drifting of snow. The continual accumulation would shut out the ocean, and convert the river waters into a sluggish estuary; and all future deposits would be supplied from the river or rivers through the varied deposits of more than 600 yards of strata, alternating with sandstone, shale, coal, and ironstone, &c. Just in proportion to the gain of the sandbank on the river's current, would be the dry land or the estuary covered with water. I think this is sitfficient to account for the varied strata without the hypothesis of an alternate earthquake, or volcanic upheaval and submergence. There is no need of an upheaval to cause dry land, as the silt deposited from the rivers would raise the delta, and a little addition to the sandbank or slight submergence would put the delta under water again. I have a great objection to multiply causes in nature when we have daily before us adequate phenomena. It has been customary to account for the coal strata by upheavals and depressions, but there is no evidence of violence from the deposit of the sandstone grit until the last member of the coal series was finished. The only evidence of upheaval is at the Permian period, when the backbone of England, as it is sometimes termed, was raised. No doubt it was at this period when our coal series was so disrupted. There is no appearance of any erupted matter in the Yorkshire Coal Field; but there are trap dykes in the Northumberland and Durham series. I have no wish to go into the salt or freshwater origin of the intermediate shales, Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on October 2, 2021 80 sandstones, &c., of the carboniferous strata. No doubt there are both. The fossil pecten of the Halifax and Sheffield bottom coal shales, denotes a mixture at least of saltwater, and the enormous mass of freshwater mussels, of the middle coal and ironstone beds of Shelf and Low Moor, are a strong evidence of the strata having been deposited in a lake or inland sea. I think the major part of the vegetation from which coal has been derived, has grown upon dry land, or in swampy lagoons, similar to the Cypress Swamps of the Delta of the Mississippi, described by Sir Charles Lyell ;* also in Mr. Hawkshaw's Heminis- cences of South America ; and the researches of Mr. E. W. Binney, who, with praiseworthy industry, has laboured to explain those curious trees, the Lepidodendron and Sigillaria, of which the coal is so largely composed in the Lancashire and Yorkshire beds. I suspect, however, the annual fall of the foliage has contributed more to the deposit than the stems themselves, the reed-like calamite has evidently been a water-plant, from its being found in such abundance in the black shale, rather than in the coal itself, though there are beds of coal on the Continent, largely composed of cala- mites.f Mr. Binney says, "where the plants grew and the strata " in which they are found, were no doubt deposited under water " and shew no evidence of being dry land ;" p. 162. " The " presence of the remains of bivalve shells and fish in cannel " coal clearly proves that it was formed under the water;" p. 163. " In the upper new red sandstone, of Western Bank, " near Runcorn, in Cheshire, we have the first evidence hitherto " discovered of dry land in England." Again he remarks, " There is no positive evidence of dry land before the tertiary " period." Sir R. I. Murchison observes, " It may be weU to " state that there is no geological difierence between stone * P. 334. of his Manual. + Manchester Philosophical Society, see vol. 13, p. 1C7. Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on October 2, 2021 81 " coal and culm or bituminous and common coal. They " are in fact mere mineral varieties of the same sub- " stance which occur in formations accumulated at "the same period."* Sir 0. Lyell, in his Manual, p. 333, quoting Liebeg and Bischoff, says, " The disengage- " ment of all the gases gradually transforms ordinary or " bituminous coal into anthracite; to which the various *' names of splint, glance, culm, and many others have been " given." Liebeg, in his Chemistry, gives the following analysis of Mineral coal: " Hydrogen 13, carbon 24," and states that it " appears to be produced by long-continued de- " composition of wood or wood-coal, by which carbonic " acid and water, and carburetted hydrogen are separated; " when the whole of the hydrogen is removed in the form " of carburetted hydrogen the residue must be anthracite, " which is nearly pure carbon." Professor Johnston, in his inaugural address to this Society, said " Cannel coal con- " tained one atom more water than cokeing coal," which is very correct. Dr. A. A. Hayes, United States, in a paper read at the Dublin Meetiag of the British Association, in 1857, has evidently been struck forcibly with the dLflS.culty to account for the conversion of bituminous coal into anthra cite. No coal tar being found in the vicinity of the beds, how is the absence of this material to be accounted for but by supposing that it has been originally a different kind of deposit ? Dr.