On Basaliic Mounlains of Hesse. lOl 



gives a peculiar interest to the mountains of this nature that 

 exist on its limit ; such are the Meisner, the Blauekuppe, 

 near Eschwege, the StoflFelskuppe, and Pflasterkaute, be- 

 tween Eisenach and Marksuhl, the Steinsburg near Suhl, 

 the Dollmar nearMeinungen, and some other points situated 

 between these, which are all on the first of the lines noticed 

 at the limits. These mountains are moreover isolated in the 

 midst of secondary rocks ; their position is entirely indepen- 

 dent of the chains of mountains and principal valleys in the 

 neighbourhood, and it is at some leagues from them that 

 the extended basaltic rocks of Hesse and Franconia com- 

 mence. For that which relates to the Meisner, M. de Hoflf 

 refers to the works of Messrs Voight and Schaub. 



In the high mountains mentioned and described by M. de 

 Hoff, this remarkable fact is observed, the basalt does not 

 cover, as at the Meisner, the secondary rocks with which it 

 is in contact ; but, on the contrary, penetrates through them, 

 forming as it were wedges, that enlarge in proportion as they 

 descend. This fact had already been noticed by M. de 

 Voight, in his Mineralogische Reise, and in his Kleine 

 mineralogische Schrifte, and by Messrs Sartorius and Gcer- 

 witz, in the work entitled Die Basalte in der gegend von 

 Eisenach; but the new observations that M. de HofF has 

 been enabled to make, in the portions of basalt recently 

 laid open by quarries, and the plates with which his memoir 

 is accompanied, can no longer leave any doubt on this head. 



The mountain named Blauekuppe, situated one league to 

 the south of Eschwege, is isolated, of a form a little elon- 

 gated from S.W. to N.E., and composed, as is the surround- 

 ing country, by reddish or yellowish sandstone, in horizontal 

 beds from a decimetre to a metre [about 4 inches to 3 

 feet 3 inches] in thickness. On the summit of this moun- 

 tain, and in the direction of its length, a projecting crest 

 is observed, formed by a basaltic mass, which cuts down 

 through the sandstone beds, as may be proved in the quarry 

 situated to the south-west. 



At a distance from the basalt, the sandstone is in reddish 

 or whitish thin beds; it contains numerous small plates of 



