142 Salt formation of Salina, N. Y. 



rate rock : it is not yet known to what depth this bed of gravel 

 extends. Mr. Ford, in behalf of the state, sunk a well into it forty 

 feet from the surface, about thirty rods southerly of the place where 

 Mr, Byington bored ; and Mr. Stephen Smith has lately bored into this 

 bed of gravel to one hundred and forty feet below the surface, find- 

 ing the strength of the water increase until it exceeds the old springs 

 at Salina. But that this layer of gravel overlies the salt formation 

 even under the marsh, is rendered most probable from the circum- 

 stance that some persons have lately bored at Gruri Point, west of 

 Salina, near the lake, (as I was informed by W. Kirkpatrick, Esq. su- 

 perintendent of salt springs,) upwards of two hundred feet in the red 

 rock from the surface, near the level of the lake, and have found the 

 salt water increasing in strength as they penetrated downwards; from 

 which it is clearly inferable, that the salt formation is one of consid- 

 erable thickness, which has not been bored through by Mr. Bying- 

 ton, or any one in that vicinity ; and that the source of the salt water 

 lies too deep to furnish any chance of its being exposed by the cuts 

 made in the rock by streams in that level country, constituting the 

 basin in which salt springs are found along the line of the canal. As 

 to the existence of gypsum associated with the salt formation, it is a 

 matter of general notoriety, that lumps of it are thrown up in digging 

 salt springs and wells in the village ; and in sinking a well at Mon- 

 tezuma, before that survey was made, one hundred and sixteen feet 

 deep, beautiful specimens of gypsum were found nearly transparent, 

 several of which I had for years on my mantel-piece as curiosities. 

 This well was sunk through a succession of layers of sand, gravel, 

 and indurated clay, comparing almost exactly with those described 

 in Holland's survey of Cheshire, as overlying the salt rock of theirs ; 

 from which, and the perfect coincidence not only of the formation 

 but the gypsum associated, there was a full general conviction, that 

 the salt formations of the canal district also contained beds of salt 

 rock; and which still continue undiminished where the facts are 

 known ; but as the statements made in that work may lead those at a 

 distance to entertain false notions of the character of this salt forma- 

 tion, and false theories of the formation of salt, I think it for the in- 

 terest of science that the facts of the case should be known, and 

 the friends of science cautioned to investigate more carefully the 

 grounds upon which a theory is based at variance with the known 

 facts in other parts of the world where salt springs are found. 





