652 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TERRITORIES. 



invested with criimbling mjiterial from a few inches to a foot or more in 

 depth. 



The sandstones are more frequently of various shades of green, but are 

 also yellowish, and pass into shades of brown. They are compact and 

 hard when unexposed to the weather, and are usually tine-grained, but 

 also occur of a gravelly character. Disintegrating less rapidly than the 

 contiguous clays, masses are often seen resting upon narrow cones of 

 the latter, contributing greatly to the picturesque and ofttimes fantastic 

 appearance of the buttes. 



The buttes in some localities contain beds of impure limestones, 

 highly calcareous clays, and harder siliceous clays. In others they con- 

 tain thin seams of tibrous arragonite, brown and striped jaspers, flint, 

 and not unfrequently nodules of agate and chalcedony. Many of the 

 table-lands and lesser buttes in the vicinity of the Uintah ]\louutains 

 are thickly covered with drift from the latter, consisting of gravel and 

 bowlders of red and gray compact sandstones or quartzites. The 

 bowlders are generally small, but assume larger i^roportions approach- 

 ing the Uintahs. In many cases the drift completely covers the buttes, 

 descending upon the declivities so as entirely to conceal their structure. 

 Usually, however, it is accumulated in the ravines of the declivities, 

 leaving bare the intervening ridges of light-colored clays and sand- 

 stones. 



Many buttes in other localities are nearly or quite free from drift 

 materials. Others, again, are strewn with more or less angular frag- 

 ments of rock, consisting of the harder materials from the terraces 

 themselves, and these likewise occur with the mingled drift from the 

 mountains. In some localities the stones strewn over the lower buttes 

 and plains are broken and flaked in such a manner as in many cases to 

 assume the appearance of rude works of art. With them there are 

 mingled implements of art of the rudest construction, together with a 

 few of the finest finish. In some places the stone implements are so 

 .numerous, and at the same time are so rudelv constructed that one is 

 constantly in doubt when to consider tljem as natural or accidental and 

 when to view them as artificial. Some of the plains are so thickly 

 strewn with the natural and artificial splintered stones that they look 

 as if they had been the battle-fields of great armies during the stone 



age. 



Representations of a few of the flaked stones are given in Figs. 1 

 to 12. These with little doubt may be viewed as rude implements of 

 art. The vast numbers of similar stones to be found on the buttes and 

 plains near Fort Bridger, and their gradation to undoubted accidental 

 fragments with which they are mingled, alone renders it improbable 

 that they should be considered as such. 



The splintered stones, including the implements of art, appear greatly 

 to differ in age. Some of the specimens of black and brown and striped 

 jaspers, and of black flint, resembling the chalk flint of Europe, are as 

 sharp and fiesh in appearance as if they had been but recently broken 

 from the parent block. Others are worn, and have their sharp edges 

 removed, and are so deeply altered in color as to look exceedingly 

 ancient. Thus some of the specimens composed of brown or black 

 iasper have the surface of a dull, chalky aspect extending to the depth 

 of the fourth of an inch. 



The question arises who made the stone implements and when, and 

 why should they occUr in such great numbers in the particular localities 

 indicated. 



My friend, Dr. J. Van A. Carter, residing at Fort Bridger, and well 



