64 Bulletin of the New York State Museum. 



compressor, four roasting kilns (on the hill north of the mine), and a 

 narrow gauge railway to the docks on the river. The railway is, 

 however, badly out of repair. This mine has been idle five years. 

 H. W. Livingston is the owner. 



BURDEN MINES, Livingston, Columbia County.— The Burden 

 mines may be described as being situated at Burden ; and, as com- 

 prising the openings on Mt. Thomas, and mines No. 3 and No. 2 

 south-east of Mt. Thomas. On the west slope of Mt. Thomas there 

 is a long open cut, 460 feet above the river and 50 feet below the top 

 of the hill. In it there is a fine exposure of the stratified ore and 

 the associated foot- wall and hanging- wall rocks. The ore at the south 

 end is 41 feet wide, including a thin bed of sandstone near the hang- 

 ing-wall. It has a laminated structure and contains more quartz than 

 the ores of No. 2 and No. 3 mines ; and is non-Bessemer. The ore 

 bed has been opened at three levels and to a depth of 140 feet, by 

 drifts running into the hillside on the course of the ore. 



No. 3 mine is about 1,000 feet south-east of Mt. Thomas mine and 

 in the low ground at the foot of the ridge. Its ore bed dips east- 

 ward at a moderately low angle. The workings are following the bed 

 east and southward ; and the average thickness of the ore is such that 

 the mine is worked to excellent advantage. 



Mine No. 2 lies south of No. 3, and the drifts of the two are only a 

 few rods apart, at their extreme limits north and south, respectively. 

 The ore bed was followed down, on the eastward-dipping, and then 

 up, on the west-dipping sides of a synclinal fold or trough. The 

 slights onsets also are noteworthy features of the structure revealed 

 in the mining. A large area has been worked out ; and the sur- 

 face over a part of the mine has fallen in the thickness of the bed. 



The ores of mines Nos. 2 and 3 are gray, subcrystalline and com- 

 pact. They are stratified ; and exhibit the slight variations in texture 

 and composition, which are marks of bedded deposits. Calcite 

 quartz and pyrite are the more common foreign minerals. The per- 

 centage of carbonate of iron varies according to the greater or less 

 admixture of these constituents. Roasting removes the larger part 

 of the sulphur, and raises the percentage of iron to about 50 per 

 cent. Analyses of selected ores show 50 to 52 per cent of iron and 

 .03 per cent of phosphorus. The phosphorus is low enough to make 

 it suitable for Bessemer iron. 



The Burden mines are connected by a narrow-gauge railroad three 



