on and near the Erie Canal. 239 



Sulphuric acid in large quantities is produced in a diluted 

 and m a concentrated state in the town of Byron, Genessee 

 county, thirty miles west of Genessee river, and ten miles 

 south of the Erie canal. It is on the land of Benjamin Gris- 

 wold, near the house of David Kilborn, three hundred feet 

 east of the transit line, which is the east boundary of the 

 Holland Purchase, It has been known in that vicinity by 

 the name of the sour spring about seventeen years. As tra- 

 vellers may be induced to visit this remarkable place, the fol- 

 lowing directions may be useful. Go to Holley village, on 

 the canal, twenty-five miles west of Rochester, and sixty- 

 eight miles east of Buffalo on Lake Erie. At Holley, take 

 the carriage road south to Byron hotel, a distance of twelve 

 miles : the distance from the hotel is two and a half miles in 

 a westerly direction. 



The following description I copy from my manuscript 

 journal of a geological tour on the Erie canal line, in com- 

 pany with a section of Rensselaer school students. We vi- 

 sited that place on the 3d of July, 1828. 



Here is a hillock two hundred and thirty feet long and one 

 hundred broad, elevated about five feet above the surround- 

 ing plain. The hillock resembles the longitudinal section of 

 an egg, with the convex side uppermost. Its greatest extent 

 is north and south. It consists of a kind of ash-colored an- 

 alluvion, containing immense quantities of exceedingly mi- 

 nute grains of iron pyrites. It is mostly covered with a coat 

 of charred vegetable matter, four or five inches thick, and 

 black as common charcoal. The same charred coal extends 

 some distance from the base of the hillock on all sides. It 

 appears as if it had been recently burned over, though it is 

 in a meadow where no fire had ever been, at least for seve- 

 ral years. Its charred state is caused wholly by the action 

 of the sulphuric acid. Several holes have been dug in the 

 hill, which now contain turbid dilute sulphuric acid ; also the 

 depressions in meadow ground surrounding it. Should cu- 

 riosity or interest induce the proprietor to dig a trench about 

 it, or to make an artificial pond on one side, which might be 

 occasionally drained and cleaned, a very interesting bath of 

 dilute sulphuric acid might be constructed. 



The strength of the acid increases in a drought. When 

 I examined it, considerable rain had recently fallen, and the 

 acid was very dilute in most places. It was strong in some 

 places, and appeared to be perfectly concentrated and near- 



