6 SCIDE TO LOCALITIES. 



CONNECTICCT VALLEY : MERIDEN DISTRICT. 



A sijigle day's visit to the immediate neighborhood of Meriden, 

 Conn., will give a good view of the general features of the Triassic 

 formation, between the crystalline uplands on the east and west. 

 Reaching Meriden by evening train from Boston, the following 

 early morning may be given to the ascent of West Peak, the highest 

 of the Hanging hills, about three miles northwest of the city. 

 These hills are formed on tlie main extrusive trap sheet^of the 

 valley. The summit commands a fine view of the western uplands 

 and valley lowlands ; the former being a peneplain of Jura-Cre- 

 taceous denudation, now uplifted aud dissected by relatively nar- 

 row valleys ; the latter being a rough local peneplain, the product 

 of denudation in some part of Teitiary time, surmounted by re- 

 sidual trap ridges, ornamented with drumlins, and veneered with 

 washed drift. lu clear weather, Long island is seen distinctly 

 beyond the Sound. 



Lane's quarry in the main trap sheet, a mile north of the city, 

 may be visited next. It exposes the upper vesicular surface of 

 one lava flow, buried under the dense basal portion of a second 

 flow ; the compound mass being faulted. The fragmental deposits 

 of the anterior lava sheet, locally known as the Ash Bed, are ex- 

 posed about three miles northeast of Meriden on the road to Berlin. 

 An active walker might cross the fields from the last point and 

 ascend Chauncey Peak, from whose southern- bluff an excellent 

 view may be obtained of the several blocks into which the district 

 is divided by faults. A characteristic contact of the overlying 

 sandstones with the vesicular upper surface of the main trap sheet 

 is found in Spruce brook, at the northeast end of Lamentation 

 mountain, a few hundred feet south of a cross-road and about five 

 miles from Meriden ; but this extension of the trip would require a 

 horse and carriage. 



By the use of a team, a second day in this locality might include 

 a visit to the basal contact of the Triassic sandstones and conglom- 

 erates on their crystalline foundation, displayed well in the ravine 

 of Roaring brook, three miles west of Southington ; and the upper 

 contact of the overlying sandstones and shales with the intrusive 

 trap of Gaylord's mountain (the northern extension of the West 

 Rock ridge series) in another Roaring brook, three miles southwest 

 of Cheshire. A third day would allow an excursion to Middletown 

 and the great sandstone quarries of Portland, where the Connecti- 



