i\6 OBSERVATIONS ON THE GEOLOux 



ginning in North Carolina, and running parallel to, and within 

 the distance of from twenty to thirty miles of the edge of the 

 primitive through South Carolina, Georgia, and part of the 

 Mississippi Territory; in some places this bank is soft, with a 

 large proportion of clay, in others, hard, with a sufficiency of 

 the calcareous matter to be burned for lime, large fit Ids of the 

 same formation are found near' cape Florida, and extending 

 some distance along the coast of the bay of Mexico; in some situ- 

 ations, the calcareous matter of the shells has been washed away, 

 and a deposit oi silicious flint has taken their place, forming a 

 porous flinty rock, which is used with advantage for mill-stones. 



Considerable deposits of bog iron ore, occupying the lower 

 situations, and many of the more elevated and dividing ridges 

 between the rivers are crowned with a sandstone and pudding- 

 stone, the cement of which is bog iron ore. 



Quantities of ochrt, from bright yellow to dark brown are 

 found in abundance in this formation, in flat horizontal beds al- 

 ternating with other earths in some places; in others in kidney 

 form masses from the size of an egg to that of a man's head, 

 in form resembling much the flint found frequently in chalk 

 formations. 



PRIMITIVE FORMATION. 



The south east limit of the great primitive formation is co- 

 vered by the north western boundary of the alluvial forma- 

 tion from the Alabama river in the Mississippi Territory, (near 

 which it is succeeded by the transition and secondary forma- 

 tions) to the east end of Long-Island, with two small excep- 

 tions; the first near Augusta on the Savannah river, and near 

 Cambden in South Carolina, where a stratum of transition clay- 

 slate intervenes, and from Trenton to Amooy, where the oldest 

 sandstone formation covers the primitive along the edge of the 

 alluvial. 



From Rhode-Island (the greatest part of which is transition 

 rock) to Boston, the primitive touches a transition formation, 

 which most probably extends to the eastward, until it meets 

 the alluvial along the sea coast by Elizabeth island, cape Cod 



