Notes on the Analysis of "Iron-stone" by Hitrert 

 Bradford ViCkery,* Dalhousie University, Halifax. 



Read 19th of January, 1914. 



Iron-stone is the name which is applied in popular 

 usage to tho rock which is at present finding considerable 

 application as a building material in and about Halifax. 

 For this purpose it has several advantages, and some dis- 

 advantages. On account of its structure and the presence of 

 well-developed joint-planes, it is quarried into rectangular 

 blocks with a fair degree of ease. The flat su'rfaces of the 

 planes allow of its being built into a smooth wall, and the 

 familiar iron-rust stains, where the rock has been exposed to 

 the weather allow of artistic effects being produced by placing 

 the colored blocks in symmetrical positions. 



A decided disadvantage, however, lies in the difficulty 

 which has been experienced in finding a cement which sticks 

 closely enough to t\he stone to prevent seepage of water 

 through the masonry, thus producing unsightly stains on 

 the interior wall. This difficulty is being obviated, it is 

 hoped completely, in the case of the new Science Building 

 at Studley bj^ building the wall double, using iron-stone 

 outside and granite as a lining, for ordinary cement forms 

 with granite a weather-proof wall. 



From the geological standpoint, iron-stone is metamor- 

 phosed shale of great age, belonging as it does to the Pre- 

 Cambrian period. In the course of geological time it has 

 become greatly changed so that the orginal shale has now be- 

 come a hard 'slate. Several influences have combined to 

 produce this result. It has been very severely folded, in some 

 places even crumpled, so that the originally flat-lying beds 

 are now found in all attitudes, even approaching the per- 



* Contributions from the Science Laboratories of Dalhousie University (Chemistry). 



(209) 



