an GEOLOGY OP THE THIRD DISTRICT. 



The Clinton group consists of many different kinds of rocks or masses ; from which circum- 

 stance, the name of Protean group was given to it the first year that it was examined. It 

 then embraced the Niagara or Lockport limestone and shale, which formed the upper part ; 

 they were separated on account of their importance in the west, and their disappearance in 

 Herkimer county. The name of Clinton was given to the lower part, the characteristic 

 masses being found around the village of Clinton in Oneida county, and as a tribute to one 

 who spared no effort to extend a knowledge of science, and to add to its acquisitions. The 

 group consists of green and black-blue shale, greenish and grey sandstone, red sandstone often 

 laminated, calcareous sandstone, encrinal sandstone, and red fossiliferous iron ore beds. 



The most persistent member of the group is shale. When long exposed, it is always of a 

 greenish hue, but the greater part is bluish when recently quarried : the latter color disap- 

 pears, and yellow or grey green takes its place. The next member is the greenish sandstone ; 

 tliis is in thin layers, and the surface generally covered with fucoids. The color applies better 

 to the parts which have been long exposed, and not to fresh-quarried masses, which have a 

 bluish tint similar to the fresh-quarried shale. The third persistent member is the iron ore 

 beds ; these arc two in number, and extend with very little interruption throughout the district. 



The other masses, though some of them are thick, yet they are found but in a few towns, 

 and will be further noticed when treating of their localities. 



The group commences to the east of Saltspringville, judging from some loose masses and 

 fragments by the road-side south of that village, but no other indication of its existence was 

 observed east of Squak or Otsquak creek at Vanhornsville ; there an extensive exposition of 

 some parts occurs, but the order of their arrangement is not so obvious as it is further west. 

 At the foot of the dam are many blocks containing iron ore, in which the Broad agnostis (A. 

 latus) may be seen. In deepening the race, a bluish green shale was thrown out, which con- 

 tained a few small bivalves, unnamed and undescribed, and the Clinton hemicrypturus, the tail 

 of which is given in the wood cut. This trilobite has not been found out of this group ; nor 

 has the genus Agnostis been seen in this district in any other mass but this and the lower part 

 of the water-lime group, until recently, when it was found in the pentamerus limestone, the 

 next rock in succession to the water-lime group. 



The low hill to the east of the road, a little below the factory, is composed of thin layers 

 of greenish grey sandstone, separated by shale of the same color, the surface of the sand- 

 stone covered with fucoids. Lower down the creek, on the opposite side, there is a similar 

 hill with sandstone, but colored deeply red with oxide of iron, which has also colored the road 

 and soil around it for some distance, and imparts the same shade to whatever comes in contact 

 with it, showing transfusion rather than combination. 



The lower termination of the group is at the new mill below. The mill is built upon the 

 top of the Frankfort slate, upon which rests the Oneida conglomerate, showing a thickness of 

 but a few feet. It is covered with shales, followed by grey sandstone with fucoids and pebbles, 

 with thin layers of shale, the whole of which is capped with laminated red sandstone. Further 



