Fossil Columnar Madrepore. 



99 



Geology of the Gauhj River, 



Sandstone is the prevailing rock in all the region of the Gauly 

 hills and niountainSj until we approach the heads of some of the south- 

 erly branches. Limestone in any considerable quantity, is not seen 

 from the mouth of the Elk^ below Charleston, until it appears in the 

 valley of the Greenbrier river, and continues over to the heads of 

 the Gauly. The lime used for building in all this space of one hun- 

 dred miles in length, by thirty or forty in breadth, is either transport- 

 ed in wagons from the Greenbrier river, or in boats upon the Kena- 

 vvha from the mouth of Elk river. 



Fossil Columnar 31adrepore. 



Six miles above the mouth of the Gauly, on a branch called Bell 

 creekj I found a very interesting locality of huge masses of fossil mad- 

 repore, in a bed of bituminous shale. They are found in detached 

 blocks^ generally circular, and flattened on the sides, resembling mill- . 

 stones in form. They are from one foot to three feet in diameter, 

 across the disc of the mass, and a foot in thickness. The shale or slate 

 bed in which they lie, is about six feet thick ; and composed of thin 

 layers, which bend and accommodate themselves to the shape of the 

 block. Reposing on the slate, is a thin bed of limestone conglom- 

 erate, composed of small irregular fragments, about four inches thick; 

 above the conglomerate lies a deposit of thin sandstone slate, of a 

 dark carbonaceous color, and forty feet in thickness. A bed of bi- 



r 



luminous coal, four feet in thickness, reposes on the slaty sandstone. 

 Above this, slate and sandstone rock, for eight hundred feet, compose 

 the side of the mountain. The whole deposit^ from the slate to the 

 bed of the river, is highly charged with petroleum, and of a dark, 

 nearly black color. It is quite extensive being fpund under the base 

 of the adjoining hills, and runs more than a mile distant. The sur- 

 face of the bowlders is waterw^orn, and has all the marks, of attrition. 

 They are composed of cone shaped pieces, from one inch to three 

 inches in lengthy and from half an Inch to an inch in diameter; ter- 



minating in a point 



The surface is striated circularly, and the striae 



pass one into the other, like a nest of thimbles. Figure No. 27, (p. 

 14 of the wood cuts^) will give a correct impression of the form of 

 this fossil. 



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