THE CARBONIFEROUS FORMATION. 



78. The territory on which this formation appears, in Mississippi . 

 is so small (as will be perceived by a glance at the map) that its 

 geological relations can hardly be satisfactorily studied within the 

 limits of the State ; its outcrops are comparatively few, and of 

 small extent, in consequence of its being thickly overlaid, in most 

 places, by masses of pebbles, and other materials of the Orange 

 Sand formation ("HIS). It is the more difficult to ascertain the order 

 of superposition of the several strata, because in different localities, 

 they appear partly horizontal, partly at various inclinations to the 

 horizon, in opposite directions. Thus in its extreme southern 

 portion (at Grisholm's Factory or Bay Spring) the heavy ledges of 

 siliceous sandstone show a slight southward dip ; at the Cypress 

 Pond, on SS. 25 and 17, T. 5, R. 11 E., the dip of the sandstone, 

 overlaid by limestone, is decidedly to the northward ; and again, 

 at Eastport, we find a black calcareous slate, like that which, in 

 Alabama and Tennessee, is at the base of the Carboniferous system, 

 at the high points of the surface, without any appreciable dip, and 

 overlaid by cherty strata which elsewhere seem to be overlaid by 

 limestone, and are, probably, equivalent to the siliceous sandstone 

 of Bay Spring. It would seem, therefore, as if some of the folds 

 of the strata, caused by the upheavals in Tennessee and Alabama, 

 extended, at this point, into Mississippi. 



7',». The fossils thus far collected, according to a general exam- 

 ination, kindly given them by Prof. W. D. Moore, of the University, 

 distinctly place the greater portion of the outcrops within the 

 limits of the Warsaw and Keokuk Limestones of the Iowa Report, 

 as will be seen from those mentioned below ; but thus far, 

 observations are insufficient to allow of separating those belonging 

 to each of these groups. There are probably, also, a number of 

 undescribed species ; and it seems likely that lower, and perhaps 

 even higher groups of the subcarboniferous series may hereafter 

 be found to be represented. 



