Germany, on the west side of the Rhine, is exceptionally fortunate in the possession of the famous Pfalz-Saarbruecken coal-field, measuring about 60 miles long by 20 miles wide, and covering about 175 square miles.  Much of the coal which lies deep in these coal-measures will always remain unattainable, owing to the enormous thickness of the strata, but a careful computation made of the coal which can be worked, gives an estimate of no less than 2750 millions of tons.  There is a grand total of two hundred and forty-four seams, although about half of them are unworkable.

Beside other smaller coal-producing areas in Germany, the coal-fields of Silesia in the southeastern corner of Prussia are a possession unrivalled both on account of their extent and thickness.  It is stated that there exist 333 feet of coal, all the seams of which exceed 2-1/2 feet, and that in the aggregate there is here, within a workable depth, the scarcely conceivable quantity of 50,000 million tons of coal.

The coal-field of Upper Silesia, occupying an area about 20 miles long by 15 miles broad, is estimated to contain some 10,000 feet of strata, with 333 feet of good coal.  This is about three times the thickness contained in the South Wales coal-field, in a similar thickness of coal-measures.  There are single seams up to 60 feet thick, but much of the coal is covered by more recent rocks of New Red and Cretaceous age.  In Lower Silesia there are numerous seams 3-1/2 feet to 5 feet thick, but owing to their liability to change in character even in the same seam, their value is inferior to the coals of Upper Silesia.

When British supplies are at length exhausted, we may anticipate that some of the earliest coals to be imported, should coal then be needed, will reach Britain from the upper waters of the Oder.

The coal-field of Westphalia has lately come into prominence in connection with the search which has been made for coal in Kent and Surrey, the strata which are mined at Dortmund being thought to be continuous from the Bristol coal-field.  Borings have been made through the chalk of the district north of the Westphalian coal-field, and these have shown the existence of further coal-measures.  The coal-field extends between Essen and Dortmund a distance of 30 miles east and west, and exhibits a series of about one hundred and thirty seams, with an aggregate of 300 feet of coal.

It is estimated that this coal-field alone contains no less than 39,200 millions of tons of coal.

Russia possesses supplies of coal whose influence has scarcely yet been felt, owing to the sparseness of the population and the abundance of forest.  Carboniferous rocks abut against the flanks of the Ural Mountains, along the sides of which they extend for a length of about a thousand miles, with inter-stratifications of coal.  Their actual contents have not yet been gauged, but there is every reason to believe that those coal-beds which have been seen are but samples of many others which will, when properly worked, satisfy the needs of a much larger population than the country now possesses.