--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Partridge, E. D. collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 10 number: 2 published: 1906-12 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'E. D. Partridge, "Submarine Coal Mining," *Improvement Era* 10, no. 2 (December 1906): 112–113.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1002unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1002unse start_page: 112 end_page: 113 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1906-12) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1002unse publication_year: 1906 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1906, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Submarine Coal Mining Submarine Coal Mining. It is quite an interesting fact that coa mining is going on all the time under the bed of the Atlantic ocean in Breton, Canada. There is a seam about six feet thick, of the best quality of coal, which is mined at a depth of from 700 to 1, 300 feet below the surface of the water. At the shore line the vein is 690 feet below the surface, and dips seaward about one foot in twelve. The present workings are over a mile from the shore line, and are un- — ON THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 113 der 30 to 40 feet of water, and nearly one-forth of a mile of strata. An area of about 1,620 acres has been thus mined. E. D. Partridge. B. S. Do Plants Feel? Linnaeus distinguished plants and animals by ascribing to the latter alone this character. But do not plants also feel? Why does the geranium turn its leaves toward the light? Why does the oxalis close its leaves in darkness? Why does the plant turn its growing tip upward when placed on its side? Why does the young tendril coil when you gently stroke it, and why does it uncoil when you have ceased to do so? Why does the so-called sensitive plant fold its leaves so quickly when rudely touched, and why does the bristled leaf of the Venus Fly-trap snap together upon its prey when a fly lights upon it? If plants move when they are stimulated, is it not positive evidence that they feel? In most plants the delicate, sensitive organs are enclosed in "wooden boxes," and movement is consequently rather slow; but some of the simpler plants with flexible cell-walls, receive sensations and move as rapidly and with as much ease as do the simple animals. Could we but penetrate the woody cell-walls of the old oak tree and observe what is taking place there, we would find a scene of activity quite equal in many respects to that taking place within the body of the horse, sufiicient at least to prove to us that