118 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF ALABAMA. 



was equally variable. The black was generally pulverulent 

 like black oxide of manganese, the grey, compact but soft, 

 the reddish brown in intervening streaks of the usual hard- 

 ness of soft iron ore. This constituted the largest part of 

 the bed. This bed is in the proper manganese horizon, be- 

 tween the Black Shale and the LaGrange Sandstone, and 

 from 50 to 80 feet beneath the latter. A hundred yards to 

 the northeast were seen blocks and pieces of chert, cemented 

 together with blue oxide of manganese. These, as has been 

 seen, constitute a characteristic out-crop of manganese ores. 

 They were here seen in a hollow, and at a lower level than 

 the ore just described. Small pieces of pyrolusite were 

 found scattered about. The locality is one worthy of care- 

 ful search. 



Nearly opposite to this place, on the other side of the 

 valley, in Sect. 16, same Tp., was seen in a deep gorge an 

 interesting out-crop of manganiferous material in a compact 

 bed, about one foot thick, of a soft, brown, crumbly, brown 

 grey color. This too is in the manganese horizon, probably 

 60 to 70 feet above the Black Shale. All the rocks above 

 this bed were colored, and stained with manganese, in vary- 

 ing shades from light brown to blue black. Scattered, small 

 pieces of its ore were picked up, and afforded additional evi- 

 dence of its existence here, though none of its amount or 

 quality. This is W. N. W. from where it was seen in S. 23, and 

 it is possible that a manganiferous belt crosses the valley 

 also in that direction. 



The next promising locality where manganese was seen, 

 is in S. 23, T. 14, R. 1 W. It has been already referred to 

 in the description of the brown or limonite iron ores. Good 

 chunks of pyrolusite, from 1 to 15 pounds weight, were seen 

 here, scattered among masses of manganiferous iron ore. It 

 strewed the ground along near the base of the hill for a 

 hundred yards in length, and a breadth of twenty to thirty 

 feet. The Black Shale is not exposed, and its proximity to 

 that is unkown. Above it, and between it and the LaGrange 

 Sandstone, is a bed of limonite ore, and about 100 feet of 

 .Lower Siliceous strata. Unless that formation is here of 



