Alabama, Georgia and Florida. 165 
These specimens are the more interesting as they seem to approx- 
imate the formation from whenec they come, to the celebrated Maés- 
tricht beds of the Alps; while they at the same time evince its relation 
to the cretaceous group now known, through the labors of Dr. Mor- 
ton and others as one of our most extensive geological deposits. 
The same collection contained pieces of Hyalite, or silicious sinter, 
whose appearance led me to conjecture that they were of compara- 
tively recent origin, and even to imagine that the process of silicifica- 
tion may not yet be wholly suspended in these waters: the thermal 
character of the water discharged from this spring, as well as from 
numerous others in the vicinity would favor the supposition: and I: 
confess when I reflect upon the specimens before me, and upon 
these immense gushing fountains, distributed every where over the 
Floridas, which never intermit in their discharge of water, and which 
apparently comes from great depths below the surface, I cannot avoid 
indulging the theory that the silicifying process of strata here and 
there in numerous places from North Carolina to the Gulf of Mexico, 
was the result of thermal fountains, whose activity has long since 
ceased, and whose only remaining vestiges in the country are the 
springs, like those of Suannee, above alluded to. 
five days’ journey through an almost uninhabited country during 
the most unpropitious season of the year, alone prevented me from 
visiting the Suannee spring, which’ is justly regarded as a great 
curiosity in that country; besides, being a place of considerable resort 
in the summer, on account of its medicinal qualities. I was able 
to obtain some information respecting it, from gentlemen at St. Mary’s; 
and in particular from Rev. Mr. Pratt, who had visited it during the 
previous year. 
But before describing the spring, it may be interesting to give some 
sketch of the Suannee, or Little St. John river, into which the foun- 
tain in question discharges. The great characteristic of this stream 
is its limpidity, on which account it is sometimes called the pellucid 
river. It begins its course in the great swamp Oaquaphenogaw or 
Okefonoco, near the source of the Great Satilla river, and pursues a 
southerly direction, at last emptying itself, after a course of two hun- 
dred miles, into the south-western point of Apalachie bay. Its breadth 
through the greater part of the course varies between eighty and two 
hundred yards, and its depth from ten to twenty feet. It isno where 
fed by brooks or streams ; but appears to derive its waters wholly 
from fountains breaking up from its bed and banks. By ——, 
