J 2 HISTORY OF OHIO. 



lake, is, (where no stream has brought down its alluvial depos- 

 ite,) composed of pebbles and sand, water worn, abraded and 

 smoothed, by friction, in water. The whole belt of land, near 

 est the lake, is composed of sand and water worn pebbles, all 

 along its southern shore. The strip of land, which we have 

 described, is elevated about seventy feet above the present 

 surface of the Erie, and immediately south of, and touching 

 its waters, and generally about two or two and a half miles in 

 width, is succeeded on its southern side, by another elevation 

 of about seventy feet in height, above the land, lying imme- 

 diately along the present lake Erie. The second ridge con- 

 sists of slate rock, which shows on its northern edges, every 

 where, marks of the violence of the waves and rocks, and ice 

 driven against it by the winds, in a storm. This slate rock, 

 which lies under the second rise of land, is evidently older 

 than lake Erie, and it is composed of secondary slate, crumb- 

 ling into a blue clay, where long exposed to the action of the 

 atmosphere, rain and frost. This slate rock contains some few 

 remains of small shells, but more frequently, we find in it, 

 zoophitse. Reposing on this old clay slate, east of Sandusky 

 city, in Ohio, we often see sandstone, of the same age, with 

 the slate, or perhaps of even a more recent date. West of 

 Huron river, in Huron county, limestone, lies upon the slate 

 rock. Among the sandstones, we have every variety, of sec- 

 ondary, in colour, and hardness, cemented by much, or a little 

 lime. Some sandstones are cemented by iron. Its grains are 

 quartz, frequently very fine, but sometimes very coarse, so 

 much so, as to be called pudding-stone. Some of these rocks, 

 in the county of Huron, when first raised from their native 

 beds, may be conveniently sawed into suitable slabs for build- 

 ings, for grind and whetstones. Some eight miles, or more, 

 south of the mouth of the Geauga or Grand river, at Fairport, 

 there are, what are called "the little mountains," consisting of 

 sandstone of a very coarse grain. At an early date of our set- 

 tlement of that region, mill-stones were made of this pudding 

 gtone. It proved not to answer that purpose very well, being 



