Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 25.djvu/221

 of about 60°. The coal-beds open out into a narrow valley, and have at one time been worked, but abandoned owing to difficulties attending the Taiping rebellion. In the neighbourhood of this place, in the Shenlung pass and in adjacent localities, a good deal of excellent iron ore, in the shape of haematite, occurs. Proceeding in a S.W. direction across the strike of the rocks, the coal-beds seem to be brought to the surface by a synclinal in the valley to the north of the Hwa-shan ; the older rocks then reappear, forming in the mountain an anticlinal, and again dipping to the south form another valley filled for the most part with the later formations, but with the harder rocks still appearing at intervals in low detached ranges. To the south of this valley the series 4 and 5 again occur, the coal- bearing beds appearing at the side of a narrow valley S.W. of Pahhwei-miau, beyond which, in a regular descending series, the lower beds again occur, running out in a long spur into the plain at the south (see section, p. 124).

" Although I have not noticed other outcrops of the coal-beds to the east of this line, I have no doubt of their occurrence, as the chert- bearing limestone is to be found in several localities approaching within a few miles of Chinkiang. Near Chinkiang itself, at a place called Lui-shan, five miles distant, and also at another spot near Kaotseh-chen, some fourteen miles away, this limestone seems to occur ; the succeeding shales are ferriferous. At Lui-shan, in some detached hills, apparently belonging to this portion of the series, I collected some fine specimens of haematite ; the beds cross the hill with a dip of about 60° towards the north ; they seemed to be about 30 feet in thickness, as, although not exposed for that distance, the surface was covered with particles of the ore. Simple quarrying is here all that is necessary to obtain the metal. Close by, within about 150 feet, the band of cherty limestone, about 200 feet in thickness, likewise was found lying conformably with the iron beds. This hill is about 200 feet in height, and within a mile of a navigable canal leading to the river Yangtse ; some specimens of the ore here were highly magnetic. Though I did not succeed in finding at this locality the coal-bed spoken of above, I have little doubt of its existence. The other locality is within two miles of a tile- and pottery-village called Paokiang-yau, itself about three miles from Kaotseh-chen, a village situated on the main road to Nanking, with which, as well as Chinkiang, it has likewise water communication. Here also the ore is accompanied by limestone ; but, owing to the intrusion of a large mass of porphyry, both iron and limestone are metamorphosed, the former into magnetic ore, the latter into white crystalline marble, much used by the natives for the manufacture of whiting.

" I also noticed beds of iron ore at the foot of the Chung-shan, within three miles of the Taiping gate of Nanking ; they were visible here at the head of a small valley which cut into the rocks underlying the Chung-shan series. My specimens collected here, however, were by no means equal to the others ; but, owing to their position, a good section could not be obtained of the beds."