Saliferotis Rock Formation in the Valley of the Ohio. 51 



afford fifty pounds of salt to every fifty gallons. Twenty two miles 

 below the rapids, a stratum of flint rock from nine to twelve feet in 

 thickness, comes to the surface and crosses the river, making a slight 

 ripple at low water. This rock has a regular dip to the south, and 

 at McConnelsville, five miles below, it is found at one hundred and 

 fourteen feet; and two and a half miles further down, it is struck, at 

 one hundred and sixty feet. Where wells have been sunk through 

 this rock, it affords a sure guide to the saliferous deposit, as the in- 

 termediate strata are very uniform in quality and thickness, and the 

 practical operator can tell, within a foot or two, the actual distance 

 to be passed between the two rocks, although the interval is six hun- 

 dred and fifty feet. Above the point where the flint rock crops out, the 

 rock strata appear to have been worn away, so that as you ascend 

 the river, the salt rock comes nearer to the surface, until at the forks 

 of the Muskingum, it is only two hundred feet below. This flint rock 

 is so very hard and sharp grained, that it cuts away the best cast 

 steel from the augers, nearly or quite as rapidly as the steel cuts away 

 the rock, and requires three weeks of steady labor, night and day, to 

 penetrate ten feet. With a few exceptions, the other strata are readi- 

 ly passed. 



The lower salt rock often occasions much difficulty to the work- 

 men, from the auger's becoming fixed in the hole. The sand of this 

 rock, when beaten fine and allowed to settle compactly about the 

 augur in the bottom of the well, becomes so hard and firm, as to re- 

 quire the greatest exertions to break it loose, frequently fracturing 

 the stout ash poles in the attempt. From the sand and small parti- 

 cles of the rock brought up by the pump, the salt stratum appears to 

 be of a pure pearly whiteness ; and the more porous and cellular its 

 structure, the greater is the quantity of water afforded; as more free- 

 dom is given to the discharge of gas, which appears to be a very ac- 

 tive agent in the rise of the water, forcing it, in nearly all the wells, 

 above the bed of the river, and in some to twenty five or thirty feet 

 above the top of the well. 



Salt region on the Big Kenhawa. 



As before stated, salt was first made there in 1808; the indications 

 of salt being discovered at an old buffalo lick, near the margin of the 

 river, six miles above Charleston. Numerous wells are now dug for 

 six miles above and five miles below the lick. The " gum" or coffer- 

 dam, is usually sunk into the rock about eighteen feet below the bed 



