Stevenson.J i-bO [Nov. 21, 



lower coal bed of the Quinnimont or Lower Coal measures has been digged 

 in ravines coming from the north. 



Limestone prevails along Lewis creek to its mouth, and the great calca- 

 reous sandstones with thin cherty beds so closely resembling the white 

 Medina are well shown at the Clinch river, which is reached at Black's ford. 

 The Trenton limestones are exposed near the top of the abrupt bluff on the 

 opposite side of the river, and the marbles are shown immediately beyond. 

 Soon one comes to the House and Barn synclinal, which is deeper and 

 broader than on Little Cedar creek near Lebanon, and holds at a little 

 way east from this road the narrow House and Barn mountain with its 

 crest of white Medina. This mountain is little more than a mile and a 

 half north from the Fincastle pike. The easterly side of the synclinal is 

 very abrupt and the Trenton marbles are brought up before the pike is 

 reached at Rosedaie, where one is in the red clays filled with fragments ot 

 white chert. 



The pike crosses the Elk Garden anticlinal at a few rods east from the 

 large brick house belonging to Mrs. Smith. The exposures are somewhat 

 indefinite in much of Elk Garden, as the beautiful region eroded by Cedar 

 creek is termed, and there may be more than one crest to the anticlinal as 

 there are both east and west from this place. The disintegrated clayey ma- 

 terial, carrying chert and occasionally brown hematite, prevails along the 

 pike until very near the fork of the road leading to Saltvllle, so that details 

 of structure cannot well be obtained. But on the Saltville road, near Mr. 

 W. A. Stviart's house, the south-easterly dip is pronounced thouijh com- 

 paratively gentle, being only fifteen degrees. It becomes undulating just 

 beyond the next fork in the road, and for some distance the rocks are 

 badly twisted. The Loop anticlinal, very well defined, is crossed within 

 a little way north from the road leading to Saltville by way of Rich moun- 

 tain. 



The marbles of the Trenton are shown on the main road at the foot of 

 the grade leading to Hayter's gap, and Trenton fossils abound just beyond 

 the S-bend in the road. Thence exposures are very good along the grade 

 all the way to the summit of Clinch mountain at Hayter's gap. The dip 

 is south-eastward, and varies from twenty to forty-five degrees ; but there 

 are many petty crumplings of the red Medina, even the thicker and 

 harder beds being folded closely upon themselves. The yellow more or 

 less fissile shales of the Hudson cannot be less than seven hundred feet 

 thick, while the red mud beds ot the Medina cannot be far from four hun- 

 dred feet. A fossiliferous layer occurs in the lower part of the red beds, 

 but the fossils are not so good in weathered fragments as those found in 

 Lyon's gap of Big Walker mountain. 



Red Medma and Hudson shales form the irregular terrace along the 

 north side ot the doubly-pointed mountain known at the west end as Little 

 Bear town and at the east end as Short mountain. This terrace passes 

 round the end of Short mountain into Ward's cove, where it is continu- 

 ous with the bench along Clinch mountain ; this is conspicuous in Thomp- 



