THE STORY OF A PIECE OF COAL WHAT IT IS, WHENCE IT COMES, AND WHITHER IT GOES BY EDWARD A. MARTIN, F.G.S. 1896 PREFACE. The knowledge of the marvels which a piece of coal possesses within itself, and which in obedience to processes of man's invention it is always willing to exhibit to an observant enquirer, is not so widespread, perhaps, as it should be, and the aim of this little book, this record of one page of geological history, has been to bring together the principal facts and wonders connected with it into the focus of a few pages, where, side by side, would be found the record of its vegetable and mineral history, its discovery and early use, its bearings on the great fog-problem, its useful illuminating gas and oils, the question of the possible exhaustion of British supplies, and other important and interesting bearings of coal or its products. In the whole realm of natural history, in the widest sense of the term, there is nothing which could be cited which has so benefited, so interested, I might almost say, so excited mankind, as have the wonderful discoveries of the various products distilled from gas-tar, itself a distillate of coal. Coal touches the interests of the botanist, the geologist, and the physicist; the chemist, the sanitarian, and the merchant. In the little work now before the reader I have endeavoured to recount, without going into unnecessary detail, the wonderful story of a piece of coal. E.A.M. THORNTON HEATH, _February_, 1896. CONTENTS. I. THE ORIGIN OF COAL AND THE PLANTS OF WHICH IT IS COMPOSED II. A GENERAL VIEW OF THE COAL-BEARING STRATA III. VARIOUS FORMS OF COAL AND CARBON IV. THE COAL-MINE AND ITS DANGERS V. EARLY HISTORY--ITS USE AND ITS ABUSE VI. HOW GAS IS MADE--ILLUMINATING OILS AND BYE-PRODUCTS VII. THE COAL SUPPLIES OF THE WORLD VIII. THE COAL-TAR COLOURS CHART SHEWING THE PRODUCTS OF COAL GENERAL INDEX LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.