Ferruginous Deposits. 



129 



Petroleum. — This singular production is seen issuing from the earth 

 at various points along the shores of the Sandy river; and "burning 

 springs^' of carburetted hydrogen are very common ^ not only along 

 the margins of the streams and at the foot of cliffs, but also at con- 

 siderable heights on the sides of the mountains. One of these be- 

 tween the West and Ti _ 

 the wonder of the wild hunters of this solitary spot. It discharges 

 the gas through the side of a high hill, or mountain, and has been on 



fire for several y 



blackening and scorching the earth for many 



feet around its mimic crater. At night it is very luminous and is 

 seen at a great distance ; by day it is distinguished only by the 

 smoke. Between the two Sandys, twenty or thirty miles from the 

 Ohioj is a deposit of quartz rock, forming a considerable ridge of 

 twenty or thirty feet in height. It is seated on the borders of the 

 iron deposit and is probably a contlnuatibn of the stratum, or deposit 

 found in Ohio, and traced on the map of the coal region. The al- 

 luvial land on jthe Ohio, between these two streams, is very fertile 

 and thickly settled by intelligent farmers. Near the mouth of Guy- 

 andot, on the higher alluvions, are seated a large number of mounds 

 m parallel rows. The vicinity of fine hunting grounds probably at- 

 tracted a thick population near them. 



Great Ferruginous Deposits. 



Bordering south westerly and northerly on the main coal meas- 

 ures of the valley of the Ohio, are found extensive deposits of the 

 hydrate of iron. It appears in the different beds under various forms. 

 In some an argillaceous ore ; in others a brown or red oxide^ but all^ 

 evidently deposited from water. Some of the deposits appear to 

 have been made from fresh water^ as fluviatlle and paludine shells 

 are found imbedded in great quantities, in one of the ore beds; 

 which bed reposes on limestone containing marine shells. This ore 

 bed also contains numerous remains of the branches and fragments 

 of the roots of aquatic plants, and the remains of extinct species of 

 trees, as wall be more fully shown by drawings of some of these re- 

 mains, when we describe each stratum. So far as can be ascertained 

 from the imperfect geological surveys that have been made of this 

 ferruginous region, the deposit extends from the base of the Cum- 

 berland mountains, on the heads of the Kentucky and Cumberland 

 rivers, to Geauf^a county, Ohio, and perhaps to Lake Erie. It em- 

 braces an avera£»-e width of from fifteen to twenty miles, and pur- 



VoL. XXIX.— No. 1. 



17 



