Geological Collections. 253 



surface was rent, and little fissures were formed, which vomited a large quan- 

 tity of dry sand, composed of silica, lime, oxide of iron, impregnated with 

 common salt, a little sulphur, and a bituminous substance. In some places 

 jets of water were thrown out, mixed with sand ; and this water contained 

 sulphate of alumina, the muriates of soda and lime, and sulphuretted hydro- 

 gen. The country people believed it to be sea water. Even in the month 

 of September, this water was met with on digging. At first, it injured 

 vegetation a little, but irrigation with pure water speedily removed this 

 effect. The sand projected was probably derived from the beds, more or 

 less thick, which underlie the vegetable mould, — since, in a well at Guada- 

 mar, the earth dug out, at the depth of seventy feet, is a blue marl, 

 apparently identical with the matter thrown out. The beds being horizontal, 

 the undulatory movements would compress certain parts of it, and, the 

 weaker giving way, there might be driven out crushed, and sometimes dry 

 substances. At Benejuzar, the fissures were three or four inches in 

 diameter, and with the sand, there were thrown out fragments of jet or 



Geological Structure of the Gduniry rotifid j^tgiers. — m. Ilozet finds, in 

 the geological structure of the country around Algiers, a striking resemblance 

 to that of the coast of France on the opposite side of the Mediterranean. 

 The formations are, — 



1. A talcose schist passing into mica slate, differing little from that 

 which forms the coast of France from Toulon to beyond Fort Lamalgue. 

 On this schist the city of Algiers is built. The vegetation on this deposit 

 is magnificent. 



2. The talcose schist passes into a well characterized brown mica slate 

 irregularly stratified, dipping to the south at angles from 30° to 45°, and 

 containing veins of quartz, in which are found splendid crystals of tourma- 

 line. It then becomes a perfectly characterized gneiss, which rises into 

 mountains that command the cit^ and castle of Algiers, 



3. The strata of gneiss everywhere disappear under a coarse calcareous 

 sandstone, passing into a puddingstone, and which resembles in every 

 respect the calcareous sandstone of Montpellier. This stone is employed 

 for building, and is burned into a bad quicklime. 



4. The plains and valleys are covered with a diluvium of red or yellow 

 marl, presenting the same characters as in Germany and France. 



The first two groups, observes M. Rozet, present a very remarkable 

 geological phenomenon, — a gneiss, which has all the characters of a primi- 

 tive rock, rests upon talcose schists, which appear to belong to transition 

 formations, and there exists an insensible gradation of rocks between them ; 

 but, on the other hand, the portions of micaceous schist imbedded in the 

 gneiss evidently prove that rock to be of a more recent formation, though 

 it be the lower. Thus appears verified the beautiful theory of M. Cordier, — - 

 " In the primary formations, those deposits are the most recent which 

 occupy the lowest level." See M. RozeVs Meuioire, Jour, de Geol. Vol. II. 

 No. V. 



The Fossil Elephant and the Pakeotherium found in Deposits of the same 



Age Professor Jarocki, of Warsaw, states, that in digging a well, in June, 



1829, there was found, in a white quaztzose, slightly calcareous sandstone, 

 the head, a tusk, and a grinder of an elephant, now preserved in the Museum 

 of Kvzeminiec. Several other bones, which were too firmly attached, were 

 left in the rock. Here then, (says Professor Pusch, in a Memoir on the 

 formations of Podolia and Southern Russia,) we have an elephant in the 

 middle of a rock containing only sea shells, and at a depth of 456 feet 

 beneath the surface. Now this rock is identical in mineralogical and 

 palaeonthological characters with the tertiary sandstone, near Szydtow and 

 Chmielnik in Poland, or with the upper marine sandstone of Paris. Tfeis 



