24 Geology of the MusMngum Valley. 



outlet of the Muskingum valley, from the surface of the hills to the 

 depth of two hundred feet below the beds of the streams. It is taken 

 at a point two miles west of Marietta, where a search, recently made, 

 for salt water, was abandoned from a want of means in the operator 

 to continue the work. 



1. Hill top. Ash colored earth, in some places mixed with yel- 

 low sand — clothed with yellow pine, yellow oak, chesnut oak, k,c. 

 — 2 feet. 



2. Light blue sandstone, in thin beds, from one inch or two to 

 eight or ten in thickness ; mica between the layers : texture of the 

 stone very suitable for grindstones, being compact and sharp grain- 

 ed. — 10 feet. 



3. Light colored, coarse grained sandstone, with but little mica, 

 and cemented by lime. Compact and splitting into good building 

 stone ; lower part of the bed much finer grained and stained with 

 veins of dark carbonaceous matter. — 50 feet. 



4. Bituminous shale, with thin veins of coal of a few inches in 

 thickness near the bottom of the deposit. — 20 feet. 



5. Grey limestone — containing nodules of brown oxide of iron ; 

 no impressions or casts of fossil shells. — 2 feet. 



6. Argillaceous sandstone, in beds of from one to two feet in 

 thickness — contains no fossil casts of trees, or plants. — 50 feet. 



7. Brown marl, with nodules of red oxide of iron ; many of the 

 nodules and flattened pieces contain, when broken, fine impressions 

 of arborescent ferns. Portions of the trunks, two or three feet in 

 length, and three or four inches in diameter, much flattened, are also 

 found on this branch, and probably from this bed. I have frag- 

 ments, completely replaced by iron ore, in which the woody fibre is 

 very distinct in its large longitudinal fracture. The bed of the run 

 contains numerous fragments of various rich iron ore, scattered over 

 its bottom. Figures are given at Nos. 27 and 28, (page 12 of 

 the wood cuts,) in iron ore from this place. They are both of the 

 genus Neuropteris, but are probably undescribed species. No. 27 

 resembles Anomopteris, rather more than Neuropteris. — 6 feet. 



8. Slaty sandstone, very fine grained in the lower part of the bed, 

 containing impressions of fossil plants — upper part of the bed mixed 

 with considerable mica, and free from impressions. — 9 feet. 



9. Brown slaty marl, upper part of the bed ash colored ; lower 

 part, nearly that of Spanish brown, compact and heavy, filled with 

 casts of a thick leaved plant, generally vertical as if buried in a liv- 



