106 KANSAS ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 
fineness. _As no feldspar grains were found in the sand, it would seem to have 
originated from the Dakota sandstone rather than to belong to the Tertiary 
sands to the west or to the glacial sands farther east. 
The fossils of this formation are those of the Equus beds according to Dr. S. 
W. Williston. Those reported are:* Megalonyx, subsequently described as M. 
leidyi Lind., Hquus major DeKay, Spherium striatum, Lam., S. suleatum 
Lam., Pisidium abditum Haldeman, Anodonta sp., Valvata tricarinata Say, 
and Gammaria sp. 
It may be well to note here the physical characteristics of the rocks through 
which the valley containing the Equus beds and the present valley of the Smoky 
Hill are cut. The former is in the main cut through soft, easily eroded Permian 
shales. The northern vart has been cut through a considerable amount of Dakota 
sandstone. The 200 feet and more removed from the north of this is largely Da- 
kota (60 feet of Permian). The section at the Smoky Hill buttes will give a good 
idea of the general nature of the rock —a few feet of soft sandstone at the bottom, 
then 110 feet of shale, and 200 feet of sandstone (soft and friable), now a covered 
slope, constitutes the section. The latter is probably sand, as the water perco- 
lates through it freely down to the top of the shales, where it breaks forth as 
springs. The upper part of the 200 feet is a comparatively hard sandstone 10 or 
12 feet in thickness. Though the texture of the above may vary, and does, for 
different localities, the hardness and friability remain practically constant, mak- 
ing the material admirably suited for rapid erosion. This is true of the entire 
eastern portions of McPherson and Saline counties. 
OriGin.t 
Two papers have been published on this formation, one by Professor Udden,* 
the other by Professor Sharp.{ The latter expresses the opinion that it is of gla- 
cial origin. It was thought that the ice formed a dam across the Kansas river 
somewhere below, and that the water backing up to Salina burst through the 
divide at the place where the north end of this formation is situated. In evidence 
of this theory he cites some boulders on Battle hill as being of glacial origin, 
dropped or deposited by a stranded iceberg from the terminus of the ice sheet. 
The boulders on Battle hill, Battle Hill township, McPherson county, are not 
the rounded quartzite boulders of the moraine, but cross-bedded sandstone of the 
Dakota formation lying nearly in place. They are about three feet thick, hard 
and angular, some of them quite large. There is also an absence of other moraine 
material which a melting iceberg or ice sheet would certainly have deposited. 
Rocks very similar to these may be seen in place a mile southeast of Salina, two 
miles north of Twin hills (northeast corner of Delmore township, McPherson 
county ), and four miles west of Battle hill. Here the soft, almost incoherent, 
sandstone removed from beneath the hard sandstone has allowed the large blocks 
of the latter to gradually tip and tilt over the surface of the hill, and some of them 
have worked their way down its sides some distance. In one of these, on the 
northeast face of the hill, the lower part grades into the brownish Dakota sand- 
stone. 
The elevation of Battle hill is about 1,550 feet, which is about the same ele- 
vation as the highest deposits of the Equus beds. The elevation of the terminus 
* Udden, American Geologist, Vol. VII, No. 6, June, 1891. 
{Some of this discussion was furnished by Prof. E. Haworth, as the work was done in con- 
nection with the University Geological Survey. 
t Bulletin Kansas State Board of Agriculture, quarter ending March 13, 1894, part 2, pp. 26-30. 
