Beneath the sand containing the tooth, was found a gravel bed of 5 feet 

 in depth, consisting mostly of rounded pebbles resembling river gravel, 

 generally hornstone, many partially and some firmly adhering together. 

 Other pebbles shown me from the same bed were of iron ore, coal, and 

 micaceous sandstone. I was further informed that some remains of fluviatile 

 shells were found. I sent the tooth to Prof. Joseph Leidy of Philadelphia, 

 who pronounced it to be the last upper molar of a horse, probably an ex- 

 tinct species. From a similar gravel bed on the banks of Marais des Cygnes 

 a fragment of a tusk was given me, very much resembling that of a mam- 

 moth. Its whole length was said to be 7 feet 4 inches. About 10 miles 

 above Papinville, the banks of Marais des Cygnes River appear to be of 

 similar formation to the well of Ohlinger, consisting of about 12 feet of 

 brown sandy clay, resting on 10 feet of blue clay, with many pebbles of worn 

 gravel at the lower part. 



These gravel beds I consider of more recent age than the Drift, but older 

 perhaps than the Bluff or Loess, and we may regard them as altered drift. 

 They seem rather to abound on the Osage and its tributaries, and are often 

 reached in digging wells. The tooth from Maysville, Kansas, was found 

 in altered drift at a depth of 45 feet from the surface. Dr. Albert Koch ex- 

 humed the famous Missourium {Mastodon giganteus) from a bed of gravel 

 and clay, on Pomme de Terre River, 20 feet below the surface. In these 

 beds of altered drift, we may therefore expect to find many interesting re- 

 mains of mammals. 



October 18, 1869. 



Vice-President Wislizenus in the chair. 



Four members present. 



The Vice-President stated that the contract with the Board of 

 Public Schools had been duly signed. He expressed the hope 

 that the society would now prosper, and soon be able to replace 

 the losses which the Cabinet had sustained by the lire last spring. 



Mr. Spencer Smith remarked that he had recently visited a 

 newly discovered iron mine near Vineland Station, on the Iron 

 Mountain Railroad, on land belonging to Dr. W. S. Dyer. A 

 body of ore, thirty feet long and twenty feet deep, had been un- 

 covered. The deposit appeared to run under the Magnesian 

 Limestone, and was probably not a mere surface deposit. The 

 ore was the red hematite. Occasionally small pieces of yellow 

 ochre were found in it. 



