Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 15 



view. To render it adequately available in the inquiry into the nature 

 of the processes by which the deposits of salt were formed, it will be 

 necessary to subject to analysis specimens of rock-salt from every bed 

 that may exist in each deposit, and from every part of each bed, espe- 

 cially from wherever a variation may occur in the concretionary struc- 

 ture ; together with specimens of all .the intervening layers or veins of 

 earthy matter, which must be subjected to as rigorous and as minute 

 an examination as those of the salt itself. For the deposition of the 

 various salts associated with chloride of sodium in sea-water and in 

 rock-salt, takes place, with each of them, at a different stage of eva- 

 poration of the solution, and is dependent, in some degree, on the 

 comparative proportion of the chloride which may remain in the fluid. 

 If the beds of rock-salt, therefore, have been deposited from such a 

 solution, the associated saline bodies will necessarily be found dis- 

 tributed, in each deposit, and in proportions respectively to the chloride 

 of sodium, accotding to the varying circumstances of the evaporation 

 by which they were produced. Further, if the salt has been subjected, 

 subsequently, to igneous fusion, the situations in the mass and the com- 

 parative quantities of these associated substances, (and possibly also 

 the state of combination of their elements,) will have undergone consi- 

 derable changes, arising from the difference in specific gravity between 

 them and the common salt, and the chemical action of so elevated a 

 temperature ; while the degree of influence attributable respectively 

 to these circumstances, and their mode of action, can readily be esti- 

 mated and allowed-for, by the Chemist, so as to afford the means of 

 replying to the queries upon the subject, of the Geological Inquirer. 

 May 7, 1829. E. W. B. 



EQUIVALENT FORMATION, IN ENGLAND, OF THE " SALIFEROUS 

 rock" of north AMERICA. 



The brine-springs of Salina, in the State of New York, which have 

 been alluded-to in a paper " On the existence of salts of potash in 

 brine-springs and in rock-salt," inserted in the last Number of the 

 Phil. Mag. and Annals ( vol. v. p. 4 1 1 ) arise in a formation, which has 

 been termed, by Professor Eaton, in his Geological Survey of the 

 district adjoining the Erie canal, " saliferous rock." This deposit, in 

 common with all the muriatiferous formations of North America, us 

 Dr. Bigsby informs us, excepting those of California, is remarkable 

 for not containing rock-salt. In the Erie-canal district, it appears, 

 ample opportunities for discovering it have been enjoyed ; but nothing 

 has been found, except cavities, dispersed through the strata, once 

 evidently occupied by crystals of chloride of sodium, as described in 

 the preceding notice. 



The circumstance of its containing brine-springs and these cavities, 

 appears to show that the saliferous rock is in reality the equivalent 

 of tlie new-rcd-mndslone, as I'rof. Eaton andl)r. Bigsby have re- 

 presented ; and not of tlie " old-rcd-saiidnlone, similar to that of Mon- 

 moutli, ' as Mr. Feutiierstonhaugh, in a recent communication to 

 the GeoloKical Society (Phil. Mag. and Annals, N. S. vol. v. 

 ^ ■ L2 p. 139 J 



