1881.] 



NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADELPHIA, 



151 



N0TE3 ON THE TERTIARY GEOLOGY OF THE SOUTHERN UNITED STATES. 

 BY ANOELO HEILPRIN. 



In the following notes the author makes no pretense at unravel- 

 ling the many knotty points connected with the Tertiary geology 

 of the southern United States; he has merely brought together 

 such facts, old and new, and certain conclusions drawn from these 

 facts, as may possibly serve to facilitate the inquiry into this as 

 yet imperfectly known branch of American geological history. It 

 is with this view of rendering the material treating of the subject 

 more accessible to the working geologist that some of the pub- 

 lished sections are here reproduced. 



A convenient starting-point in Eocene stratigraphy is afforded 

 by the famous bluff exposed on the Alabama River near Claiborne, 

 Ala., and which has yielded the fossils known to geologists and 

 paleontologists as those characteristic of the " Claiborne Group." 



Section of Claiborne Bluff. — Probably the most trustworthy 

 section of this bluff is that afforded by Tuomey (" First Biennial 

 Report of the Geology of Alabama," 1850, p. 152), as follows : 



Note. —Tuomey does not give the thickness of bed "(Z," but it appears 

 from the concurrent statements of different observers to be about 17 feet. 

 The total height of the bluff above the Alabama River would therefore 

 appear to be in the neighborhood of 190 feet. 



