Mr. Barnes^ Section of the Canaan Mountain^ §*c. 17 



masses are termed strata when in general we speak of geog- 

 nostic relations.* A curious miniature instance; of the strat- 

 ification of which we are speaking, and one which corrobo- 

 rates our supposition, that the strata have subsided horizon- 

 tally ; was observed in the township of Chatham, four miles 

 westward of our section. The road passes through a hill of 

 slate-rock which has been excavated to open a passage. This 

 slate like almost all the other rocks in this part of the country, 

 is inclined south-eastwardly or totvards the ocean. Parallel 

 seams in this rock are filled by rhomboidal quartz, (aa.) which 

 is perfectly horizontal in its direction. This quartz in its dis- 

 position, so exactly resembles the fibrous sulphate o/(bb.) 

 Barytas ^l CarHsle that at the first sight the impression was 

 strongly made that it was the same mineral but on approach- 

 ing the bluff, the illusion vanished. This quartz is very re- 

 markable. The strata are horizontally not more than an 

 inch or an inch and a half thick, parallel, and all the frag- 

 ments, like those before you, of a regular rhomboidal form. 

 The rock in which the quartz is disposed, is a soft argillace- 

 ous slate, which is so rapidly decomposing into the soil of 

 the hills before mentioned. The supposition, that the stra- 

 ta have been separated, and that the western part has fallen 

 down to its present level is confirmed by a reference to Ma- 

 clure's sections which show in this range, the transition on 

 the west reclining against the primhive on the east. In his 

 northernmost section, the transition is lower than the prim- 

 itive, in the next section, the two are of an equal height; and 

 in the part which we are considering the transition is a lit- 

 tle higher than the primitive. By a reference to Maclure's 

 or Cleaveland's Map, it appears, that the hue on which the 

 two formations meet, runs north and south, from Canada to 

 the highlands, on the Hudson. This line traverses the 

 Green mountain. The two formations meet at its top. So 

 here, the Hancock mountain is in the same range, as the 

 Green mountain, and very near south of it, and the two for- 

 mations meet at its top. The fact that the two formations butt 

 against each other in a line nearly straight for more than 

 three hundred miles, cannot perhaps in any other way, be so 

 satisfactorily accounted for, as by supposing that some migh- 

 ty convulsion has rent asunder the Continent from the St. 



* See plate. 



Vol. V...,No. L 3 



