444 



REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 19041 



to prevail over many hundred square miles of area, this explanation 

 seems scarcely sufficient. 



Peter's work on the chemical composition of the soil was very 

 thorough, and, taken all in all, the work done by this survey on prob- 

 lems relating to the soil was of greater importance than any previously 

 produced. The method followed by Doctor Peter himself has, how- 

 ever, been proven by recent Avork to be of comparatively little value, 

 the fertility of a soil, as announced years earlier by Emmons, being 

 dependent more upon its physical than chemical properties. 



In 1855 G. G. Shumard accompanied, in the capacity of geologist, 

 the expedition under command of Captain Pope for the purpose of 

 boring artesian wells upon the western plains along the line of the 

 g. g. shumard's thirty-second parallel. An abstract of his report was 

 withVope'T" 6 ' 1 ' 00 given in the Transactions of the St. Louis Academy of 

 Expedition, 1855. s c i enceSj I, 1856-1860, though, so far as can be ascer- 

 tained, no final report ever appeared. 



Shumard announced the finding of Permian fossils about 30 miles 



above the mouth of Delaware Creek, in the 

 country lying between the Rio Pecos and 

 the Rio Grande. At Delaware Creek the 

 oldest rocks were Cretaceous, overlaid by 

 Quaternary. The Guadalupe Mountains he 

 described as consisting of white, gray, and 

 bluish-black limestone, containing fossils, 

 some of which appeared to belong to the 

 Coal Measures and others to the Permian, 

 the beds being finally set down as of Permian 

 age. The Sierra Alto was shown to have a 

 granitic nucleus, from which the stratified 

 rocks dip away on either side. 



Silurian rocks were found in the El Paso 

 Mountains, and the Jornada del Muerto was 

 shown to be a small trough composed mostl} T of limestone, sandstone, 

 and shales, covered to a depth of 5 or feet with loose detritus. 

 The upheaved edges of these underlying strata formed the mountains 

 on either side. The Organ Mountains were shown to be of limestone, 

 belonging to the Coal Measures. 



By an act of the legislature of the State of South Carolina in 1855 



Oscar M. Lieber was appointed director of the geological, mineral- 



ogical, and agricultural survey of the State, a position which he held 



up to 1860. During this period he made four annual 



south Carolina, reports, the first bearing date of 1857 and the last 1860. 



I8SS-1860 



This, it will be remembered, was the third survey of 

 the State undertaken at public expense, the first being purely agricul- 

 tural, under the direction of Edmund Ruffin, and the second geological 

 and agricultural, under direction of M. Tuomey. 



Fig. 57.— Oscar Montgomery Lieber. 



