where they grew. ground for supposing that place to have been a sea-bed, we may, under all the circumstances of our total ignorance concerning their primitive characters, assume generally, that they were vegetable productions of the primitive sea, notwithstanding the similarity of their forms to some of our actual terrestrial vegetables; and, which have either ceased to exist, or which now exist only in depths of the ocean which we have not been able to

As we have found such strong

scrutinise. Since several species, and even genera of animals, both marine and terrestrial, have ceased to exist from the time of the last great catastrophe, many marine vegetable forms may have also ceased to exist in the ocean, from the same epocha; and, the strong probability that coal formations subsist in an ancient sea-bed, tends more to establish that the plants which they contain were marine, than the unknown natures and equivocal characters of these, can establish that they were fluviatile.

And, this probability that coal was originally marine vegetation, may guide us to a final explanation of the phenomena which caused M. D'Aubuisson to entertain the doubt above mentioned; in the statement of which, he approximates so nearly to the Mosaical geology. "The intermediary class (he observes, with Wer

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ner), pertains to an epocha, when a revolution "took place in nature, which, according to the evi"dence of the numerous indications which we see, was

VOL. II.

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perhaps the MOST VIOLENT of those that happened during the formation of the mineral crust of the globe. There is, indeed, great uncertainty in fixing the limits between this class and those "which adjoin it; but, I think that they will be assigned with sufficient exactness, if we say; "that the intermediary class is composed of the same rocks as the primitive, but alternating with some others containing relics of organic beings, "and a particular sandstone. We may, perhaps, further say; that the intermediary soils "are those which succeed, in the order of time, "from coal-beds to the first appearance of organised beings. I purposely avoid affirming, "in this definition, whether or not the coal pertains "to the intermediary class1; a point, on which geologists hesitate.”

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Thus, he abstained from deciding, whether the coal-deposit should be classed with the secondary formations, or, with the transition (fragmentary); and he left the question for a time, sub judice. Mr. Conybeare, on the other hand, takes a different course. In giving judgment on the question, he decides at once, that it belongs neither to the one nor to the other, but that it constitutes a distinct Medial class between the two; by relation to which, the classification of all the other formations ought to be regulated. He acknowledges, that " if he had been

' Tom. ii. p. 199, 200.

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obliged to refer the coal-formation either to the flatz or to the transition class of Werner, he "should not have hesitated in preferring the "latter alternative';" and he assigns strong reasons for that preference: namely, 1. the greater conformity of the coal-beds to the inclinations, contorsions, and disturbances of the transition (or fragmentary) formation beneath it, than to the horizontal planes of the flatz formations above it: 2. the greater analogy of its chemical and external characters with the former, than with the latter and, 3. the passage of its inferior surface into the fragmentary rock called greywacke, so that in many instances the limits between the two can only be arbitrarily assigned. And, thus it is, that M. D'Aubuisson afterwards decides, in his Table des Matières prefixed to his work: "The coal-formation ought to be placed amongst intermediary formations; it is its ultimate term: "such is my definitive opinion."

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Yet, these several characters undeniably prove, that coal is the earliest of the formations resting on the fragmentary base; on which it immediately reposes, and into which it is very frequently incorporated. Mr. Conybeare states, "that it is interposed between the saliferous "sandstone and the older sandstone formations,

or, where these are absent, resting on the transi"tion rocks" and M. Beaumier further states, "that in many places at Forez, the coal is super

and which will have taken place, either during the long-continued incumbency of the primitive sea, or, in the violent and tumultuous agitations of its mass during the progress of its departure: for (says M. D'Aubuisson) "coal has been produced "in all epochas, both of intermediary and secondary formations';" that is, when the most ancient beds of marine vegetation were overwhelmed by the loose and moveable soils of the sea, on which fresh vegetation took place, until it was again overwhelmed in a similar manner; and this operation, in many instances, frequently repeated which appears to " account for such a surprising accumulation of vegetable matter arranged in repeated strata separated from each "other by intervening deposits of clay and sand2;" and to account also for the faults or failures in the desiccated strata of those deposits, resting on a material diminishing in bulk.

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Thus, then, the phenomena of coal, viewed by the light of the Mosaical geology, both illustrate and receive illustration from, our general argument, that the surface of our present earth was never extricated from the primeval ocean until the last or diluvial revolution, which first exposed it by the transfusion of the waters into a deeper receptacle; and, thus we are brought to render more precise and specific the general description of coal which was proposed in the first instance; and to sug

1 Tom. ii. p. 377.

CONY BEARE, Geol. of Engl. p. 345, 6.

gest, with augmented probability-that coal is a vegetable substance, consisting of marine vegetation bituminised and mineralised, in its native bed, under vast accumulations of different marine masses which composed the moveable soils of the primitive sea.

It would be gratifying to learn, that the eminent chemist who first applied his mind with any success to this inquiry, or his able and distinguished friend the author of the "Manual of Chemistry," or the cautious and dispassionate philosopher who has prosecuted the inquiry with such admirable sagacity, has been disposed to lend the benefit of his skill and science to the examination, at least, of the subject, which is here, with great deference, suggested for their consideration.