The Story of a Piece of Coal - What It Is, Whence It Comes, and Whither It Goes by Edward A. Martin
page 32 of 147 (21%)
page 32 of 147 (21%)
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falls the greater the possibility of its drifting farther still, since in
sinking, it would fall, not vertically, but rather as the drops of rain in a shower when being driven before a gale of wind. Thus we should notice that clays and shales would exhibit a regularity and uniformity of deposition over a wide area. Currents and tides in the sea or lake would tend still further to retard deposition, whilst any stoppages in the supply of silt which took place would give the former layer time to consolidate and harden, and this would assist in giving it that bedded structure which is so noticeable in the shales, and which causes it to split up into fine laminae. This uniformity of structure in the shales over wide areas is a well ascertained characteristic of the coal-shales, and we may therefore regard the method of their deposition as given here with a degree of certainty. There is a class of deposit found among the coal-beds, which is known as the "underclay," and this is the most regular of all as to the position in which it is found. The underclays are found beneath every bed of coal. "Warrant," "spavin," and "gannister" are local names which are sometimes applied to it, the last being a term used when the clay contains such a large proportion of silicious matter as to become almost like a hard flinty rock. Sometimes, however, it is a soft clay, at others it is mixed with sand, but whatever the composition of the underclays may be, they always agree in being unstratified. They also agree in this respect that the peculiar fossils known as _stigmariae_ abound in them, and in some cases to such an extent that the clay is one thickly-matted mass of the filamentous rootlets of these fossils. We have seen how these gradually came to be recognised as the roots of trees which grew in this age, and whose remains have subsequently become metamorphosed into coal, and it is but one step farther to come to the conclusion that these underclays are the ancient soils in which the plants grew. |
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