Mineralogy and Geology. 289 
of the town, about four miles from the village, and has been known 
about two years, although no account of it has (to the writer’s knowl- 
edge) ever been published. It appears to ae in great abundance, in 
cimens which have been asst to decay, pres p t 
unlike that of a mass of nails, which have been partially fused, and. 
melted together. Color when recently broken, pure 
Same mineral has been discovered on the farm of Mr. R n, 
in Antwerp, Jefferson county, about one mile east of the village of 
Ox-Bow, It occupies cavities in a coarse half decayed white limestone, 
is of low specific gravity, in consequence of numerous vermicular cavi- 
ties with which it abou nds, and oe te presents botryoidal sur 
nie studded with crystalline faces. From the presence of iron pyrites 
n small quantities, it can quickly stained with oxyd of iron, when 
ceeds to the weal 
Stalactitic quartz, a been found in limited quantities at a newly 
opened pit at the Parish iron mine, in the town of Rossie , St. aenetes 
county. The same has been found at the Sterling iron mine 
Antwerp, Jefferson county, with the surfaces beautifully encrusted vith 
cacoxenite. 
by J. hae — (in a letter to one nal the editors. Dr. 8 mith 
observes : nd associated with emery,—ealc spar; iron pyrites 5 
oe and massive protoxyd of iron; magnetic iron ores peroxy 
of iron; hydrous peroxyd of iron; emerylite and other micas; sismon- 
dine or chloritoid (they evidently being the same mineral) ; diaspore } ; 
@ mineral of waxy aspect having a similar composi ition to mica, being 
Probably a kind of amorphous mica ; a beautiful emerald green mineral, 
unalterable by heat and of considerable hardness, quantity in my pos- 
mation of Valleys, (om the Geol. ca ‘Exp. Exped., by J. D. Dana. Sou 
pe pe 
study of their origin. In some of these sandstone nite a the gorges 
: - *. . i 
le precipices of one, two, or three thousand feet. They are deep 
gulfs, with walled sides composed of horizontal layers of sandstone. 
Th ayers seem once to have been continuous: and what is the 
force which has thus channelled the mountain structure ? Are they 
stern rents in the bosom of the earth?”* Are they regions of 
subsidenc nee? Can it be that they were never filled, but were depres- 
sions left between the heaps | of accumulating deniitnent that constitute 
the sandstone, which depressions were afterwards enlarged by the sea 
during the elevations of Ae land?+ Or may we adopt the “ — 
* Strzelecki’s New South peas “i Van Diemens Land, p. 57. 
+ Darwin’s Volcanic Islands, 
Srconp Srries, Vol. LX, No. . 1850, 37 
