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GEOLOGICAL RECONNOISSANCE 



VAN BUREN COUNTY. 



No. 7— SUGAR-LOAF MOUNTAIN OF VAN BUREN COUNTY. 



The table-land of the south-western part of this county, on to which we 

 ascended soon after leaving White county, supports a pine forest on the 

 siliceous soils, derived from the disintegration of sandstones of the millstone 

 grit series. This table-land is elevated 400 feet above the general drain- 

 age of the country, and 375 above a group of dark shales, including car- 

 bonate of iron, which are well exposed at " Bald Lick," near the foot of 

 the descent, on our route leading to Sugar-loaf springs. This shale, with 

 its associate ore, has much the appearance of the Gilbert shales of Searcy 

 county ; but these shales of Van Buren County, occupy a position, in all 

 probability, beneath sandstones, the equivalent of the Bee rock. From 

 20 to 25 feet of these shales are exposed in the ravines at the Bald Lick, 

 having a dip to the south-west of 8 deg. ; this dip is, however, local both in 

 direction and degree, since only a mile or two to the north, the strata were 

 observed to dip east of north at a more gentle angle. 



The Sugar-loaf mountain, of which a sketch is given in the wood-cut 

 that heads this section, is a conspicuous, isolated hill, cut off by denudation 

 from the main ranges of this county. A measurement with the aneroid 

 barometer, gave its height 440 feet above the Huntsucker farm. By com- 

 putation, it must be about 500 feet above Little Red river, which sweeps 

 around its north-eastern base. 



