BLANCHARD OR DEFIANCE MORAINE. 597 



The upper 75 feet is usually a compact till, below which there is a fine sand 

 extending to the rock. About 2 miles northeast of Wellington, at a cheese 

 factory, a well penetrated 91 feet of drift. The channel has been traced no 

 farther northeast. The drift has completely concealed its course, hence it is 

 only by borings that it can be traced. It probably leads into the Lake 

 Erie Basin. 



Near Fitchville, where the moraine crosses the Vermilion River, there 

 are exposures of rock. The knolls which constitute the spur along the east 

 side of this stream contain much gravel and sand, while the main moraine 

 in that vicinity is composed largely of till. Gravel probably occurs in 

 the sharpest of the knolls along the main moraine, but no exposures were 

 observed. 



The esker ridge in the northwestern part of Fairfield Township 

 presents no deep exposures, but is probably composed, in the main, of 

 gravel and sand. The surface is a poorly assorted material, grading on the 

 one hand into till and on the other into sand and gravel. 



There is gravel at slight depth in the northern portion of the spur from 

 Macksville northward, the capping of till being but 5 to 10 feet in thick- 

 ness. Many of the basins which occur in this region are dry, even 

 when without outlet, a pretty certain indication that they are underlain by 

 gravel and that the till which covers the knolls does not pass underneath 

 the basins. The large knolls ni Peru Township, west of Macksville, 

 exhibit a variable structure, there being rapid transitions horizontally from 

 till to gravel and sand. A well 50 feet in depth, at Mr. Ruggles's, on a 

 high point about three-fourths of a mile south of the center of the township, 

 passed through 23 feet of till in its upper portion, the remainder being sand. 



Isaac Lafever, a well driller residing at Chicago Junction, states 1hat 

 the drift in that village is 100 to 120 feet in thickness. There is a contin- 

 uous sheet of till for 60 feet, beneath which is a thin bed of gravel fi'om 

 which some wells derive water. Beneath the gravel is a sandy till, harder 

 and drier than that above. It contains pockets or thin beds of gravel, from 

 which some of the wells obtain water. The well at the Dole House 

 entered rock at 107 feet. In a town well just east of the railway junction 

 gas was found in the drift at a depth of 95 feet. It bubbles up in connec- 

 tion with the water. About 1^ miles south of Chicago Junction, on the 

 crest of the moraine, there are several wells from which gas is obtained in 



