BOCK ISLAND COUNTY. 231 



Xo. 4. Bituminous shale (Coal Xo. 2 f) 3 to 4 feet. 



Xo. 5. Fire-clay 2 " 4 



1 Sandy, argillaceous and bituminous shale 50 



Xo. 7. Bituminous shale 3 



Coal 1 



Xo. . Sandstone, filled with Stigmaria I Xo. 1 6" 8 



Xo. 10. Coal ) 2 



Xo. 11. Sandy shales and thin-bedded sandstones partially exposed. 60 "70 



Xo. 12. Brown magnesian limestone, Devonian 10 



Neither of the coal seams appear to be well developed on this creek. 

 No. 1 is divided, and the divisions are so widely separated that they 

 cannot be worked together, and are both too thin to be profitably 

 worked as separate seams. No. 2 is represented by a bed of bituminous 

 shale, and No. 3, if represented at all in this section, is only about a 

 foot thick, and intercalated in a bed of bituminous shale. I am rather 

 inclined to the opinion, however, that No. 2 of the foregoing section is 

 only a local development, and that No. 3 coal lies above the sandy shales 

 forming the top of the section, and if found at all on this creek will be 

 immediately below the drift. 



On Big run near Brownsville a coal has been opened near the top of 

 the hill which I believe to be No. 3 of the Ilb'uois river section. The 

 seam is here about three feet in thickness, and is overlaid by a few 

 inches of bituminous shale passing upward into a brown sandy shale. 

 The slope of the hill below this seam for a distance of nearly a hundred 

 feet was so completely covered that no section of the underlaying beds 

 could be made here. The coal afforded by this seam was rather hard 

 and slaty and inferior in quality to that usually obtained from either of 

 the lower seams. About half a mile up the creek from this coal bank, 

 the following beds outcrop below the drift clays that cap the hill : 



Feet. 



Xo. 1. Shale, sandy ". 3 



Xo 2. Hard quartzose sandstone 3 to 4 



Xo . 3. Fire clay 4 



Xo. 4. Shales partly argillaceous and partly sandy 30 to 40 



The sandstone No. 2 of the above section is an excellent and durable 

 stone for heavy masonry, and the creek bed is full of large blocks of it, 

 on which the elements seem to have no effect. The Brownsville coal prob- 

 ably overlies the beds in the foregoing section. The beds in this vi- 

 cinity are the highest Coal Measure strata that we found exposed in this 

 county, and as the distance from No. 3 up to No. 4 is usually from 75 to 

 KID feet, it is hardly probable that any coal above No. 3 will be found 

 in the county. 



From the preceding section it will be seen that the coal seams of this 

 county are very irregular in their developments, and. with the exception 

 of No. 1, do not promise to be of much value in the production of coal. 

 However it is quite possible that at some localities remote from the river 



