Sharp Mountain rises behind the town; beyond it, on the left, is seen a part of Second Mountain, and the gap through which the Schuylkill flows.
Near the gap is a part of Mount Carbon and Morrisville. On the slope of the hill, in the centre, is the Catholic Cathedral, and near it the
German Catholic Church. On the right, in the distance, are the pleasant mansions of Mr. Patterson and others. The Norwegian Creek
Railroad is seen in the foreground.

st., and many others less remarkable; but imparting an air of neatness and comfort not often seen in towns of such rapid growth. In the lower part of the town, we have Thomas Ridgeway's, and several others, comprising part of what is usually called Morrisville, which, with Mount Carbon, forms a striking entrance to the town from the south.

We must not omit to mention M. B. Buckley's beautiful addition to Pottsville, distinguished by the name of Greenwood; occupying a point remarkable for its beauty, and the varied scenery which it commands. Among the improvements, we remark a large stone hotel, and a row of handsome stone houses. In the rear, on the river-road to Port Carbon, there is a large brewery, in full operation, established by A. Y. Moore, enabling us to boast of beer fully equal to that of Philadelphia.

Adjoining Morrisville, as we remarked above, stands Mount Carbon, which, under the fostering care of John White, now fully equals any part of the town in appearance. During the past season, many valuable additions have been completed; particularly a hotel, which would do credit to a city, and a row of stores. The Norwegian railroad terminates here.

Mount Carbon comprises the southern extremity of Pottsville. It stands on the Schuylkill, at the foot of the Sharp mountain, lying in the valley between that and Second mountain. Its situation is romantic; the abrupt hills, rising almost perpendicularly around, are strikingly grand; while the Schuylkill, winding through the gorges of the mountain, completes a scene of picturesque beauty unsurpassed by the points in whose praise our northern tourists are so fluent. Sharp mountain itself is a remarkable natural curiosity; resembling a rampart-boundary to the coal region on the south.

The original town of Mount Carbon received considerable additions during the last year. Since the closing of navigation, the lock at the mouth of the canal has been renewed, under the superintendence of Mr. Mills, the agent for the Canal Co. In the pool above are the docks of Messrs. Ellmaker, Audenreid, and White and Coombe, who have two docks at the rear of their storehouses, each 28 feet wide; and in length one is 100 and the other 150 feet. Beyond are Mr. Eldridge's landings, adjoining the range now constructing for Messrs. Thouron and Macgregor. On the opposite side lie the boat-yards of Mr. Shelly, and the extensive landings of the North American Co. Again on the left are Mr. S. J. Pott's wharves; those of Messrs. Morris ; and Mr. C. Storer's boat-yard, on which we perceive he is erecting a screw-dock. The latter lie at the foot of Morrisville.

The pool below the bridge affords wharves to the storehouses of Messrs. Moore and Graham, Nathans, Thurston, and others. Several new landings are here constructing, the margin of the river presenting every facility for works of this nature. The principal buildings lately erected are a range of stone stores and dwelling-houses, the hotel on Centre-st.; and on Market-st. six stone and twelve frame buildings. The hotel is a beautiful edifice of stone, 45 feet wide by 82, exclusive of the piazza, which presents a promenade to each story, embracing a view of the mountainous scenery around. These improvements are owing to the enterprising spirit of Messrs. White and Coombe.

The Mount Carbon railroad, projected as an outlet for the rich coal formations of the Norwegian creek valleys, was commenced in Oct. 1829, under the superintendence of William R. Hopkins, chief-engineer, and John White, president. At the termination the road is elevated upon 31 piers of masonry, erected upon the landings; thence it passes through the gap of Sharp mountain, across the landings before mentioned, following the valley of the Schuylkill to Morrisville. At this point we have, on the left, Messrs. Morris's mines, and on the opposite side of the river, on the Lippincott and Richards tract, the mines now worked by Mr. Baraclough. The road here leaves the Schuylkill, at its junction with the Norwegian creek, stretching up the valley of the latter, parallel with the Greenwood improvements, directly through Pottsville, to the forks: a distance of 6,208 feet from the piers. Below this are the mines now working by Mr. M'Kechney, and several openings on land belonging to D. J. Rhoads, Esq.

On the last branch, which is 14,200 feet in length, the first lateral above the forks belongs to the North American Co., and leads to their Centreville collieries, where they have twelve openings, upon the celebrated Lewis and Spohn veins. This coal is in high estimation, and has greatly aided in establishing the reputation of Schuylkill county coal, in the eastern markets. Beyond this, the road passes through Benjamin Pott's lands, and again strikes the Spohn vein at the east mines of the North American Co. The Hillsborough tract comes next, on the right, on which are several openings. Here we diverge to the left, through the celebrated Peach mountain tract, belonging to J. White, and pass five openings made by him. Next the Rose hill tract, owned by L. Ellmaker: on these lands are several mines, leased by the Messrs. Warner, Wade, and others, near the town of Wadesville: a thriving little place, laid out by Mr. Ellmaker. Above the town, the lateral road from Capt. Wade's mine comes down. The east branch terminates upon the Flowery field tract, belonging to Messrs. Bonsall, Wetherill, and Cummings. This land has been extensively worked by various individuals.

The West Branch commences at Marysville, on the Oak hill tract, and is 16,400 feet in length. On this estate are the mines leased by Messrs. Smith, Hart, Maxwell, Wade, Hall, Dennis, Gallagher, and Martin. Among those are the celebrated Diamond and Oak hill veins. We must

not omit the hotel kept here, by Mr. B. Gallagher, at a convenient distance from Pottsville for an excursion. Below Oak hill are the Green park and Clinton tracts; the former belonging to John White, and the latter to Mrs. Spohn. At Green park there is one opening under the superintendence of Mr. James Dill. Adjoining this is the Belmont estate-also John White's. Next the Thouron tract, a portion of which has been purchased by Benj. Pott; the Spohn vein passing through it. Contiguous are the Spohn, Lewis, and Duncan estates. The railroad here passes B. Pott's saw-mill, and extends in a perfectly straight line, a mile in length, nearly to the junction with the main road.

Since the above extract was published, now twelve years, many important changes have taken place. Old mines have been exhausted or abandoned, and new ones opened; a great number of new railroads have been constructed; several mines have been explored, and profitably worked, below the water level. The geology of the region has been fully explored; the Pottsville, Reading, and Philadelphia railroad has been opened, in 1842, affording daily communication in seven hours to Philadelphia, and promising to effect a complete revolution in the transportation of coal; the speculations of 1836 have expanded and exploded. Pottsville has increased its population from 2,424 in 1830, and 3,117 in 1835, to 4,345 in 1840; and is now a compact, bustling place. Its trade, no longer driven back and forth by the tide of speculation, has settled, or is settling, into a steady channel, well understood, and well managed by capitalists, merchants, and miners. The town now contains a handsome Episcopal church, and a splendid new Catholic cathedral, both in the Gothic style; a German Catholic church, and neat edifices for the Presbyterian, Baptist, and Methodist denominations; an academy; a spacious town hall; a splendid hotel, called Pennsylvania Hall, and several other spacious hotels; a furnace, at which iron has been successfully made with anthracite coal; a forge and rolling-mill; a large foundry; a steam-engine factory and machine shop; a boat-yard, brewery, &c.

The Danville and Pottsville railroad, designed to connect the Schuylkill Navigation, at Pottsville, with the Susquehanna at Danville and Sunbury, was projected in 1826, and was completed in 1834 as far as Girardville, a small hamlet of three or four houses, ten miles north of Pottsville. Sixteen miles are also completed on the Sunbury end. The death of its chief patrons, the late Stephen Girard, and Gen. Daniel Montgomery, of Danville, with whom the project originated, has retarded the progress of the work. On the ten miles near Pottsville, a tunnel of 700 feet long, and four inclined planes, have been constructed at an enormous expense; but the tunnel 2,500 feet long, into the Girard coal-mines, on Mahanoy, is but partially completed. Until this is done, this part of the road cannot be profitably used, and the superstructure is now rotting in the sun. (A notice of the opening of the Reading railroad will be found on page 142.)

As the mines in favorable situations, above the water level, become exhausted, it is necessary either to seek new ones at a greater distance, and an increased cost of transportation, or to dive deeper into the bowels of the earth. The latter course has been adopted in several valuable mines, about Pottsville, by Mr. Charles Lawton, Messrs. Potts and Bannan, Mr. Charles Ellet, the Delaware Coal Co., Milne and Haywood, and Mr. George H. Potts, and others. Mr. Lawton is undermining the very town of Pottsville itself. These veins are inclined at an inclination of about 40°. A wide shaft, or descending passage, is first sunk, at the

inclination of the vein, wide enough for a double-track railroad, upon which the loaded cars are hauled to the top of the mine. The Miners' Journal says, (in 1842)

The colliery of Potts and Bannan is one of the most interesting of the kind in the region; and will well repay the trouble, and we might add the fatigues, of a visit. The colliery is better known as the Guinea hill, or Black mine, and is one of the deepest in our coal basin. The depth of the slope is 400 feet, which, at an inclination of 40 degrees, would give a perpendicular depth of 252 feet into the very bowels of the earth. The pitch of the vein, as soon as it loses the influence of the hill, is very regular; and the coal becomes of a purer and better quality, and is found in greater masses between the slates. The colliery is worked with two steam-enginesone of fifty-horse power, and the other of twenty. The former is used in pumping the water which accumulates in the mines, and the latter in hoisting the coal in cars to the mouth of the slope. The pump used in the colliery is of cast-iron, 12 inches in diameter, and extends the entire depth of the slope-400 feet. The column of water brought up by the engine, at each lift of the pump, is equal in weight to about 8 tons.

At the depth of 200 feet of this slope, a tunnel has been driven 90 yards south to the Tunnelvein, and 70 yards north to the Lawton vein-both through solid rock; which enables the proprietors to work three veins, with the present engines and fixtures. As the visitor leaves the slope, and finds himself, lantern in hand, groping his way through the gangway into the heart of the mine, he is half bewildered and startled, as the almost indistinct masses of coal, slate, dirt, &c., fashion themselves into something bordering upon a dark, dusky, and even forbidding outline. It scems as if you had fallen upon a subterranean city, buried by some great convulsion of nature; and the illusion is still further heightened by observing workmen busily engaged, apparently in excavating the ruins. Or, if you are highly imaginative, and have read the Odyssey, you might readily fancy the feelings of Ulysses, that "godlike and much-enduring man," when he paid a visit to the infernal shades, for the purpose of ascertaining the shortest and most direct cut to his beloved Ithaca. Homer, however, does not inform us whether or not the shades carried lamps in their caps, without which the pick would be of little use to our miners.

PORT CARBON, (which must not be confounded by our readers with MOUNT Carbon,) is a very busy and thriving village on the main branch of the Schuylkill, two miles northeast of Pottsville, and at the head of the Schuylkill navigation. This place is happily located, surrounded almost by lofty mountains, well stored with the mineral wealth of the region, which can be conveyed to the landings with great facility. The town was laid out in 1828 by several enterprising individuals; the lots adjoining the landings by Abraham Pott and Jacob W. Seitzinger: Lawtonville, adjoining to the westward, was laid out by Wm. Lawton, Esq.; and Rhoadsville, on the continuation of the river Schuylkill, by Daniel J. Rhoades, Esq. :-the whole of which constitute Port Carbon. Mill creek enters the Schuylkill here, and a railroad along its valley brings down the produce of the mines in the vicinity of St. Clairsville and New Castle. The Schuylkill valley railroad, with its numerous lateral intersections from the various openings in Mine hill, brings in a vast amount of coal. This road passes through the small villages of PATTERSON, MiddlePORT, NEW PHILADELPHIA, and TUSCARORA. These villages were laid out about the year 1828, and have increased more or less according to the mining business near them.

MINERSVILLE is beautifully situated, 4 miles N. W. of Pottsville, in the bosom of a valley through which meanders the western branch of the Schuylkill. It is the most important town on the West Branch. It con⚫tains a flouring-mill, steam saw-mill, foundry, car-manufactory, two or three neat churches, and 1,265 inhabitants. The West Branch railroad passes through the place. Nearly all the towns in Schuylkill co. were laid out by several different speculators, each preferring their own hill or valley, or landing-place, as the case might be, and each starting with a little cluster of frame houses. Consequently all such towns are like Washing

ton city in one respect, cities "of magnificent distances." Minersville forms no exception to the remark-it consists of three or four once distinct settlements, now nearly merged in one. It was laid out in 1829, and in 1831 was incorporated as a borough. Its early growth was remarkably rapid, as will appear by the following from the Miner's Journal of Dec. 1830:

A little more than a twelvemonth ago, the present site of the town dwelt in all the loneliness of uncultivated nature, since whicn its aspect has undergone a wonderful change in improvements and population. Along the margin of the stream the West Branch railroad extends, and terminates at Schuylkill Haven, distance seven and a half miles from Minersville, affording an easy and expeditious mode of transportation. The principal street bears the name of Sunbury, on which are situated all the stores and public buildings. It was formerly the old Sunbury road, communicating with the rich valleys in the direction of the Susquehanna. The northern portion of the village is of firm, dry soil, gradually rising, and affording a southern exposure-of favora ble character for private dwellings. Seven large, houses have already been erected during the present season on this spot by Messrs. Bennett & Gilmore, together with a number of small buildings in the same quarter. Last spring there were but six dwellings in all, since which there has been an increase of forty-nine substantial houses. The place contains six taverns, in any one of which are to be found respectable accommodations, eight stores, well supplied with every article for country consumption, 'six blacksmith shops, one saddlery, one bakery, two tailors' shops, and two butchers-all seeming to be in a thriving way. The population is estimated at 500 inhabitants. On Thursday evening, the 9th inst., a concert was given at Minersville by the diminutive songstress, Miss Clark, at which a numerous audience attended. Her warblings, a year ago, would have found an accompaniment in the uninterrupted solitude of a wilderness, instead of being listened to with marked pleasure by an animated and numerous assembly.

On the West Branch, about two miles west of Minersville, is the little village of Llewellyn, which obtained its name from the Welsh miners employed in the vicinity. Two and a half miles northwest from Llewellyn is the immense tunnel of the New York company now in progress, under the superintendence of Mr. Deforest, the company's agent. This tunnel, which is wide enough for a double track railroad, and has already been driven about 900 feet directly into Broad mountain, is opened for the purpose of cutting the coal veins at right angles to their range. From the tunnel drifts are made at right angles to it into each vein of coal, and by means of these drifts the miners work out the breast of coal. But perhaps the reader who is a stranger to the anthracite region may not comprehend these terms. A tunnel among the miners is what has been described above. A drift is a passage barely wide enough for a horse and car, or man and car, to pass,-entering generally at the edge or end of a coal vein, and following its range nearly on a level. The coal veins in the anthracite region are generally inclined at angles varying from 30 to 60 degrees with the horizon, and usually crop out, or reach the surface of the hill, at a greater or less height. Sometimes they bend over the hill or saddle over, as the term is-without coming to the surface at all. The height between the water level and the place where the vein reaches the upper surface of the hill, is called a breast; and a vein is said to have more or less breast according to its height in the hill. The first practice in mining coal was by quarrying, as at Mauch Chunk; or by opening vast caverns, with columns of coal, as at Carbondale and Wilkesbarre; or by sinking shafts from the top of the hill, and hauling up the coal, as at first in Schuylkill co., and as still in use for mines below the water level; but all these modes have yielded to the easier and cheaper mode of drifting. The gorges of the small streams through Mine hill and Broad mountain offered the best sites for drifts. But many