1896.] MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 239 



to the smallest of sizes. Trituration of the lignitic clays 

 or shales of this same locality yield the spores of vegeta- 

 tion similar to that of the shales of the carboniferous 

 formation and coal strata. All of the various kinds of 

 chalky strata in this area yield by the same treatment 

 the forminiferal bodies in illimitable numbers. At 

 Safford, a station still higher up on the railroad and on 

 the southern limits of the cretaceous horizon, fine speci- 

 mens were secured of true chalk, being the north 

 American equivalent of the British chalk, and this also 

 by trituration yields foraminifera in a different state 

 of aggregation from that of the chimney rock area. 

 The matrix in which the foraminifera are embedded is 

 a mass of the minute amphidiscs or coccodiscs first 

 studied and referred to by Dr. Ehrenberg as character- 

 istic of the European chalk area or of the chalk of the 

 cliffs of Dover and Brighton in England. The analytical 

 methods which have been outlined herein are with equal 

 facility applied to clays or soft mineral deposits, as 

 some clearly defined mineral sediment of one kind or 

 another will be with certainty demonstrated. The 

 writer has had satisfactory returns through the method 

 on such diverse materials as the coal shales of the car- 

 boniferous period; the silicious sinter, or dust strata 

 derived from volcanic action in past time, the burned 

 shales of bituminous or anthracite coals,. and in the lig- 

 nite clays, kaolin clays, common plastic clays, the plios- 

 phatic diatomaceous marine fossil clays of Florida, and 

 the fresh water lacustrine fossil deposits, and marine 

 deposits. If one character of contents is destroyed, 

 something else of interest is unmasked; or made per- 

 ceptible in its stead. The area in Alabama and Miss- 

 issippi of which I have made allusion to herein had 

 already received the attention of distinguished geologists, 

 partly directly on the ground, or partly by correspon- 



