104 J. B. TYERELL ON THEEE DEEP WELLS IN MANITOBA. 



No. 5 — A specimen from 411 feet consists of grains, varying greatly in size, of clear, 

 white quartz. Some of these grains are qnite angular in shape, and many are stained on 

 the outside with iron. With the sand grains are mixed small cubical crystals of pyrite. 

 In a paper published in 'The American Journal of Science' for September, 1890, the 

 writer gave the Dakota formation in this well a thickness of 55 feet, but he has since 

 found reason to believe that a specimen of sandstone labelled 369 feet is not to be depended 

 on, and the record has therefore been altered as above to agree with the log kept by the 

 driller, thus reducing the thickness of the Dakota to 19 feet. 



No. 6. — A specimen from 509 feet is a moderately hard, fine and even-grained, light 

 grey limestone, through which are scattered small subaugular grains of colourless quartz 

 and grains of pyrite. A specimen marked 510-540 feet consists of similar limestone, with 

 fragments of light and dark grey clay shale. 



No. 1. — A specimen from the lower part of the band consists of a mixture of light 

 blue-grey clay shale, particles of limestone, some few crystals of colourless quartz, and 

 particles of opaqu.e white gypsum from the top of the band below. 



No. 8. — A specimen marked 550-565 feet is made up largely of fragments of opaque 

 white gypsum, mixed with a few fragments of limestone, crystals and fragments of 

 colourless quartz, and small nodular masses of pyrite. 



No. 9. — A specimen marked 565-645 feet consists of a soft, light brownish-red, fine- 

 grained shale, mixed with fragments of light grey shale and particles of limestone. In 

 the clayey mass are also many minute and very perfect crystals, as well as irregular 

 particles of clear transparent quartz. 



No. 10. — A specimen from 718 feet consists of a light pink, hard, compact, fine- 

 grained limestone that effervesces strongly in H.Cl., leaving a similarly coloured fine 

 clayey precipitate. With the limestones are many fragments of a fine-grained, white 

 sandstone, and a very few white, opaque particles of gypsum. A specimen from "TIO feet 

 is a mixture of fragments of cream-coloured limestone and reddish shale. It effervesces 

 strongly in H.CL, leaving a residue of dark grey and buff-coloured shale, fine grains of 

 quartz and small particles of pyrite. 



No fossils have been obtained from the palaeozoic rocks drilled through in this well, 

 and in the absence of direct stratigraphical correlation their exact age cannot at present 

 be determined. However, their geographical position clearly shews that they are of 

 post-silurian age, and the absence of dolomites excludes them from the middle or Winni- 

 pegosan formation of the Devonian. It is also altogether unlikely that fossils would have 

 been so uniformly absent from the drillings if some of the lower highly fossiliferous beds 

 of the Mauitoban formation or Upper Devonian had been passed through. Many of the 

 limestone fragments from near the bottom of the bore correspond closely with the lime- 

 stone outcropping near the mouth of Mossy River, at Point Wilkins, etc., belonging to 

 the higher portions of the Manitoban formation exposed in natural sections, and the 

 known southwesterly dip of a few feet to the mile would account for the diifereuce in 

 elevation of the beds. 



It is therefore probable that the palœozoic beds passed through in the Vermilion 

 River boring represent an upward continuation of the Point Wilkins limestones, and' 

 therefore in the main overlie the highest Devonian beds seen on the shores of Swan Lake 

 or Lake Winnipegosis. 



