THE 



JOURNAL OF GEOLOGY 



OCTOBER-NOVEMBER, igo8 



STRUCTURAL GEOLOGY OF THE MIDDLE YANG-TZL 

 KIANG GORGES 



E. C. ABENDANON 



During the first half of the year 1904 I made an exploration trip 

 in the province Ssi-ch'uan of West China, which I reached by going 

 up the Middle Yang-tzi-kiang from I-ch'ang to Chung-king. The 

 results of this journey are published in the Revue Universelle des 

 Mines (1906), of which a separate edition^ also appeared. The 

 reason why I now return to this subject is to compare my results 

 with those obtained by Messrs. Bailey Willis and Eliot Blackwelder, 

 who — and this is a curious coincidence— reached I-ch'ang on the same 

 day (June 9, 1904) as I did, after our travels in China. To my regret 

 this coincidence did not lead to our meeting, either at • I-ch'ang or 

 on board the steamer to Hankow. Their researches and personal 

 views were published in the splendid work, Research in China, under 

 the auspices of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, in April, 1907. 



In this description of the structural geology of the Middle Yang- 

 tzi-kiang^ I shall go much more into details than in my publication 

 about the Red Basin. On the other hand, I shall only cursorily 

 describe the encountered formations and not enter into the peculiarities 

 of the separate strata. In contrast to my former description I shall 

 not this time mention my observations in an upriver direction, but 

 in a downstream one, this manner having the advantage, as we shall 



1 Geologic du Bassin Rouge de la province Se-Tchouan en Chine. 



2 The accompanying map has been put together, as far as topography is concerned, 

 from those of Arthur Kniep and R. H. Sargent. 



Vol. XVI, No. 7 587 



