bed there, or 12 miles by land. Some coal operations commenced here some few years ago, having in view the supply of the towns along the Mississippi, as far even as New-Orleans. The present supplies of coal to the lower country are obtained from a vast distance up the Cumberland and Tennessee rivers, but especially from Wheeling, Pittsburg, and the intermediate points, 900 miles farther from the market than the Illinois coal of Muddy creek. The estimated expense of delivering this coal at New-Orleans, by arks, is about $2 25 per ton; while the minimum price of coal there is 25 cents a bushel; $7 50 a ton. In winter time from 50 to 62 cents per bush., or $12 to $15 per ton, have been occasionally the retail price there. This Muddy Creek coal seam is a horizontal bed 6 or 7 feet thick, above which is another vein, not hitherto worked.

"Coal can be thrown from the mouth of the drift into a boat. Its quality is most excellent, igniting readily, and caking together perfectly, without making much clinker. It has been used for 50 years by the old French settlers, to make edge tools, which have borne a high reputation.

"What is termed St. Louis coal, supplied to the steamers, burns with a good flame, and cements like that of Pittsburg; ashes dark gray, in small quantity, and consumes with little waste. It is often mixed with yellow sulphuret of iron, in flakes, occurring on each face of the sectional fracture; and consequently is not, we understand, in so good repute for the purposes of iron manufacturing."

At Hawsville, on the left bank of the Ohio, 120 miles below Louisville, is a coal bed four feet thick. The upper 18 inches of this bed consist of Cannel coal; the remainder is common bituminous coal, two and a half feet.

The price of this coal at New-Orleans,* was 62 cents to $1 per barrel, of two and a half bushels. It is in request there for the use of the towboat companies.

Hawsville is about 258 miles above the mouth of the Ohio. The coal seam is nearly horizontal-appearing on both sides the river, in a position remarkably favorable for loading into vessels lying in the Ohio. It is a compact, largely conchoidal coal, producing a bright flame; does not cement or adhere together in burning, but on the contrary, falls into profuse white ashes. Although 700 miles in advance of Pittsburg, it has been hitherto, we are told, unable to compete with that coal, which is floated down the Ohio in arks, and, it is said, can be mined cheaper.

The Hawsville Cannel is especially liked for steam engines. For domestic use we think it is objectionable, on account of the great quantity of very white ashes which are left after combustion, filling up the grates, &c.

CUBA COAL.

In Cuba, a seam of Asphalte, or Chapapote, as it is called, is found about three leagues from Havana. There are other seams of this highly bituminous substance in other parts of the island, and although it is said to be an excellent "combustible, when much flame is a desideratum, for such purposes as evaporation, and for heating furnaces; and in this respect it must be superior › many descriptions of fuel whose proportion of volatile matter is less ;" yet I cannot learn that it is gaining ground as a fuel, for even the generation of steam; and it is quite certain that the depot of coal for the Royal Mail Company's steamers,

*The coal consumed in New-Orleans is brought, principally, down the Mississippi ; the price ranges between 75 cents and $1 75 per barrel; 13 of which barrels are estimated equal to a ton. The following table (from the Statistics of Coal) exhibits the increase of consumption of coal in that city for a series of years:

1830..40,800....1836....85,328.

.1841....121,233....1844..227,788...1846..262,800

1832..50,000....1838....99,220....1842....140,582....1845..281,600...1847..356,500 1834..60,000....1840.... ...99,919... ....1843.... ..255,568.

is supplied oy coal imported from the British dominions, as will appear from the following extract:*

"The trade in coals from Great Britain to the West Indies is limited. They are partly required for furnaces, but the principal quantity consists of a particular description of coal for steam purposes, under contract with the British government, and is a trade of comparatively recent origin. The government stations are Jamaica, Antigua and Barbadoes, and some coals go to St. Thomas's. The average price of coals there is about 45s. to 47s., ($10 90 to $11 40,) according to the demand. They have been freighted from London, costing 20s. per ton there. The freight from Newcastle to the West Indies is 27s. 6d. to 30s."

Years.

“English Bituminous Coal imported into the West Indies.

1831.

1832.

1840.

"In the West Indies, the price of coal varies from 45s. to 47s. per ton for government contracts; it has been occasionally much higher.

"The importation of copper ore from Santiago, and other ports of Cuba, constitute a very considerable portion of the trade of Swansea. The ships employed in the trade are from 300 to 500 tons burden. The chief back freight for these ships is Welsh coal. It was feared by the shippers of this Welsh coal, that the discovery of a supposed bituminous coal of high value, at more than one point within a few miles of a shipping port of the island of Cuba itself, would materially diminish, if not entirely cut off, the market for the supply of the free-burning coals of South Wales. Owing, however, to other circumstances, rather than to any deficiency in the quality of the Cuba asphaltum, there has not, at present, been experienced any change in the importation of foreign coals; but the demand in a tropical climate can never, we think, for obvious reasons, be very extensive."

Beds of asphaltum are also found in Barbadoes.

TEXAS COAL FIELDS.

"Coal is well known to exist abundantly in Texas, although the country has not been geologically examined. There is no doubt but coal prevails at intervals entirely across the country, in a north-east and south-west direction. Its general position is about two hundred miles from the coast.

"On Trinity river, two hundred miles from Galveston, the coal region there was investigated in 1846, and found to be more extensive than was anticipated. A company, under the title of the Trinity Mining Coal Company,' was incorporated by an act of the Texan Congress, in 1840. Both anthracite and semi-bituminous coal, somewhat like the Cannel, in appearance, occur here.

“Mineral coal, in great abundance, prevails not far from the Mustang Prairie. It is also found, accompanied with excellent iron ore, in the vicinity of Nacogdoches. According to report, this coal is abundant, rich, and of a fine appear

ance.

"A bed of coal extends across the Brazos river, towards the Little Brazos and the San Andres, down which stream it may without difficulty be transported at high water.

"Near the city of Austin, on the eastern border of the Colorado, is a peak, called Mount Bonnell, overlooking Austin, and having a fall of seven hundred feet perpendicular, to the bed of the Colorado. This and other hills, although not scientifically examined, are known to contain beds of anthracite coal.

"On the Rio Grande, south-west of Bexar, is a great abundance of bituminous coal. The navigation of this river is reported to be free for eight months in the year."

Statistics of Coal

This, I believe, includes all our information on the subject of the Texas coal region.

PANAMA COAL.

The coal of this region appears to be brown coal, or lignite, and like that of Talcahuano, in Chili, is supposed to belong to the tertiary formation. This is the character of the coal, so far as we know, of the whole of South America, nor have we any positive evidence of the existence of true coal on any part of this immense continent. Of the quality of the South American brown coal, we have the most contradictory accounts: by some it is said to be of good quality, whilst by others it is condemned as inferior.

I have thus, I suppose, fairly represented the sources of this fuel that would be likely to come into market in competition with the Alabama coal, on the Gulf of Mexico, and still farther south and west; as well as the prominent conditions under which it is found, so far as they would be likely to affect its price and supply in that market. I do this principally with the view of furnishing data to such of our citizens as may feel disposed to investigate the subject in a commercial point of view.

It now only remains for me, in conclusion, to show the comparative value of our coal, for the purposes to which it is likely to be applied.

Although I have not access to an official report on the coal used in the gas works in the city of Mobile, I am informed that it is highly valued for the manufacture of gas. But even in the absence of this practical knowledge, we have abundant evidence of the adaptation of our coal to this purpose, as well as to other ordinary uses, in the following analyses, for which we are indebted to Sir Charles Lyell :

The Virginia coals, which are the most bituminous in the United States, furnish the principal part of the coal used in the gas works of New-York, Philadelphia and Charleston. And until recently, the Black Heath mines furnished the chief supply for the former cities.

The value of coal for the production of gas, other things being equal, will depend on the amount of hydrogen they contain. In the five preceding specimens the hydrogen stands thus:

And the value of coal, as ordinary fuel, is derived from the carbon and hydrogen. Now these analyses, in this relation, settle the position of the Alabama coal.

COAL FOR STEAM PURPOSES.

In connection with the value of bituminous coal, when applied to steam navigation, Mr. Trimble gives some experiments made by steamboats on the Ohio. The result is as follows:

Four and fifty steamboats, using twenty cords in the twentyfour hours, and running two hundred days per annum, will consume an amount of wood, whose value, at $2 50 per cord, would be..

By the use of coal, during the same, and producing similar effect..

Annual saving..

The following considerations are urged in favor of coal :

1. It makes a more uniform and more easily regulated fire than wood. 2. The economy in the use of coal over wood is three-fifths.

$4,500,000 1,500,000

$3,000,000

3. The weight of equivalent quantities of coal and wood, is as one to three. 4. The bulk

do.

do.

do.

5. The labor and expense of putting on board, as one to four."

2.-TOPOGRAPHY OF MIDDLE GEORGIA.

one to nine.

We take the following from a contribution made by Dr. Pendleton, to Fenner's Medical Reports of the South:

That region of country properly known as Middle Georgia, and to which this paper relates, is bounded on the south by an isothermal line, running diagonally through the state, about 30° south of west from Augusta to Columbus, varying but little in a direct route through Milledgeville and Macon. The northern line may be considered as running parallel with this from Elbert county on the Savannah river, through Walton, to Heard county on the Chattahoochee. This forms the true isothermal line between Middle and Upper Georgia-the one being suited to the production of cotton, the other almost exclusively restricted to grain.

A latitudinal line running west from a point on the Savannah, would strike nearly a degree higher on the western boundary of the state; but the southern termination of the Alleghany Mountains assumes this diagonal line in Upper Georgia, and I have no doubt impresses itself on all the region below, even to the Atlantic-hence Augusta, in the east, is about as warm as Columbus in the west. This isothermal line runs directly parallel with the shore of the ocean, which seems to be conformed to the general geological aspects of the country. Thus, we perceive a granite ridge extending along the above-mentioned line between Lower and Middle Georgia, over which all the waters of the state and the adjoining states pour themselves in shoals or cataracts, and thence glide on by a gradual and easy descent to the ocean. The Savannah, at Augusta, the Oconee at Milledgeville, the Oakmulgee at Macon, and the Chattahoochee at Columbus, all have impassable reefs, constituting these cities the heads of navigation. The same line crosses Hancock county at the shoals of the Ogeechee, and by Garnett's Mills on Buffalo Creek; and I doubt not every tributary of all these rivers presents the same shoaly appearance in running over this granite ledge, which separates the Plutonic and Metamorphic regions of Georgia from the alluvial or tertiary. No granite is found below this line to the ocean, few rocks of any kind, and no shoals of water; all is a vast pine forest, with a grey, silicious soil, abounding in tertiary fossils, mostly Eocene and Pliocene.

Following the line of this Plutonic ridge, which is about fifteen miles in width, we find numerous deposits of Kaolin, of a beautiful, white variety, which will some day be brought into requisition for the manufacture of porelain ware. This is, doubtless, a decomposition of Serpentine or Felspathic rocks, which, not being able to stand the ravages of time like the everlasting granite, have dissolved to form another mineral of more value to man. In some places, as in Richmond county, these deposits form high cliffs, marking distinctly the ancient shore of the Eocene Sea, which once swept solitarily over the vast plain below.

Above this ridge there seems to have been an ancient valley, now filled with metamorphic rocks, through which the rivers glide with a much more gradual descent than they do higher up the country, where another and another granite ridge rises successively, on one of which rests, in beautiful and majestic proportions, one of the wonders of the new world, the Stone Mountain of De Kalb. Beyond this ridge the culture of cotton ceases in Georgia, except in

small patches for domestic use, and perhaps more extensively in the valleys of the Coosa, on the western borders of the state.

The native soil of Middle Georgia is a rich, argillaceous loam, resting on a firm clay foundation. But the face of the country being hilly, and in some places semi-mountainous, much of this good soil has long since been washed into the valleys beneath, under the wretched system of agriculture at first adopted in this country. In some of the richer counties, nearly all the lands have been cut down and appropriated to tillage, a large maximum of which has been worn out, leaving a desolate picture for the traveler to behold. Decaying tenements, red, old hills stripped of their native growth and virgin soil, and washed into deep gullies, with here and there patches of Bermuda grass, and stunted pine shrubs struggling for a scanty subsistence on what was once one of the richest soils in America.

The water courses have received the same tincture of the hills, especially after heavy rains, holding in solution a large proportion of alumina and the red oxide of iron, and presenting a muddy and forbidding aspect to one accustomed to the clear, pellucid streams of many portions of our country, especially the pine regions. There are no lakes, and but few lagoons or native ponds in this region of Georgia. Art, however, has not failed to make up the deficiency in this respect, by improving many of the thousands of mill-seats on the numerous streams that water this favored region, thus forming artificial ponds enough to produce a good crop of autumnal fevers for the anxious sons of Esculapius to reap an annual harvest from. These, however, when decidedly pernicious, have in some instances been abolished by law, to the no small comfort and health of the inhabitants within reach of their deadly borders. Agriculture also has come to the aid of suffering humanity, of late years. Many creeks and marshy lands are being drained for purposes of cultivation, which adds no little to the health and wealth of the country. The improved method of hillside ditching also is helping much to protect the soil from washing into the bottoms, and at once enrich and beautify the country.

The native growth of this country is oak and hickory, interspersed with the short leaf pine, poplar, gum, &c., all indicating a good soil. It is a little singular that when the lands are exhausted and turned out to rest, they invariably spring up with the long leaf pine. It is accounted for on the chemical principle of rotation in crops. The first growth had exhausted all the richer elements in conjunction with the cultivation, and now no forest tree but the pine could find sufficient nourishment in the soil to cause it to spring up and become a tree; partly from the fact, that it does not require so many of the salts, but mainly because it sends its root deep in the earth, and brings them up whence they had filtered away from the surface for ages. But this is a digression.

It is necessary for me to say a word in regard to the population. They are strictly an agricultural people, inhabiting what is properly a rural district, and are made up of two distinct classes, the white and the black. Formerly, when the country was in its pristine strength and glory, they averaged, probably, some twenty inhabitants to the square mile. Now it is reduced to about sixteen, and in some of the older counties it has been even lower than this, but they have, in the last ten years, been showing a gradual increase. The proportion of whites to blacks is considerably in favor of the latter, especially in the lower belt of counties, where cotton is a more lucrative article of produce.

3.-MINERAL WATERS OF ALABAMA.

The mineral springs that flow from the silurian rocks, are both saline and sulphurous. The most important and best known are Blount Springs. These have been so long and so frequently visited by the citizens, that they require no description. They have, moreover, been analyzed by Professor Brumby, and his analysis has been recently republished and widely distributed.

One fact is remarkable in these springs-they are situated in precisely the same geological position as the celebrated springs of Virginia, which are connected with the anticlinal axes. In the same valley, there is another spring near Brooksville, above Blountsville.

The St. Clair Springs also occur in a similar position. A bold limestone