PSEUDOMORPHS OF CALCITB AND DOLOMITE. 389 



WELL ON AVESTFIELD LITTLE RIVER SOUTH OF WESTFIELD. 



Artesian well at Crane Brothers' paper mill, on Westfield Little River, 

 south of Westfield; bored by Daniel Dull, New York. Sunk 1,110 feet in 

 conglomerate; unsuccessful and now closed up. A soft, black, pulverulent 

 layer reported. 



PSEUDOMORPHS OF CALCITE AND DOLOIVUTE AFTER HOPPER- 

 SHAPED CUBES OF SALT. 



It has been reported for many years that chiastolites occurred in the 

 sandstone in West Springfield, but I can not find that anything has been 

 published upon the subject. 



Specimens containing small white crosses of about the size of ordinary 

 chiastolites and having- some resemblance to them were brought to me 

 some years ago by a student, who informed me that they were discovered 

 by Mr. B. Hosford, of Springfield. These specimens were lost in the fire 

 which destroyed the Shepard collection. Later, through the kindness of 

 Mr. J. S. Diller, I received another specimen with permission to sacrifice it, 

 and I had several slides cut from it. It shows white squares and triangles 

 on a black ground of fine-grained, shaly, bituminous sandstone, but this 

 ground is not marked off from the rest of the surface of the sandstone b-s* 

 any square or round boundary representing the cross-section of a prismatic 

 ciystal in which the white lines should be diagonal, so that the resemblance 

 to chiastolite is only superficial. These slides are figured in the Miner- 

 alogical Lexicon' of the three counties. 



On touching the white areas with acid an abundant eff"ervescence 

 occuiTed, and under the microscope they proved to be made up of calcite, 

 quite white and coarsely granular down the central portion of the bands 

 and very finely granular and gathered in minute rounded concretions just 

 visible with the lens on either side of these central bands, the concretions 

 grouped with more or less of the dark material of the sandstone inter- 

 vening, so as to give the whole a brownish shade. The calcite was not 

 confined to these bands, but impregnated large portions of the sandstone, 

 so that, when ^Dolished, parts where there was no calcite remained didl and 

 other patches took a fine polish. It is plain that cubical crystals of salt 



1 Bull. U. S. Geol Survey No. 126, 1895, under "Salt." 



