180 M. R. CAMPBELL PALEOZOIC OVERLAPS IN VIRGINIA. 



andoah limestone found in close proximity, and that is in the bed of 

 Stroubles creek at the western extremity of the area. Here the purple 

 sandstone and shale strike northeast and southwest, and dip 35° to the 

 northwest, while the limestone within fifty feet has the same strike, but 

 stands vertical. 



Views of other Geologists as to Origin. — Faulting has heretofore been 

 assumed as the cause of this isolated anticline of Lower Carboniferous 

 rocks. J. P. Lesley, in his account of this region,* describes these 

 faults in the following indefinite way : 



"In Price mountain, between Blaeksburg and Christiansburg, the two coal-beds, 

 with their slates and red shale formation above them, have been curiously let down, 

 still in an anticlinal form, between two faults, so as to be inclosed between two 

 valleys of Lower Silurian limestone." 



He also gives a cross-section through Price mountain, drawn in accord- 

 ance with the above description, but he fails to explain the peculiar end- 

 ing of the formations, both east and west, and the singular fact that the 

 red shale is in contact with the limestones around the entire margin, an 

 occurrence that could hardly be produced by the kind of faulting de- 

 scribed. 



W. M. Fontaine has given a more detailed description of this moun- 

 tain, but seems equally at a loss to account for its peculiar structure- 

 He describes it as follows : t 



" The structure of this field, which bears the name of Price mountain, is one 

 of the most curious products of the force which has produced the numerous faults 

 in this region. . . . The field seems to be a prism of Vespertine strata, en- 

 gulfed by a double fault in the limestone, with its eastern end tipped lower than 

 the middle and western portions. The dip, of course, is nearly north and south, 

 away from the crest, and toward the limestone. 



" The amount of contortion and rubbing exhibited by the strata is surprisingly 

 small. The roof and floor of the openings made are as uniform and smooth as 

 those of our upper coals of the West, As a consequence, the coal is worked with 

 ease, and unlike that of Brush mountain, two miles off, shows but little rubbing, 

 and may be taken out in blocks of any size." 



J. J. StevensonJ gives a similar description of the structure of Price 

 mountain, but does not add anything new in the shape of a suggestion 

 as to the origin of the present structure. 



The foregoing quotations show that the present knowledge regarding 

 the structure of the mountain is very indefinite, and that the solutions 

 proposed are without that full knowledge of the details which can only 

 be obtained by careful mapping. 



* Am. Philos. Soc. Proc, vol. ix, p. 37. 



t Am. Jour. Sci., third series, vol. xiii, pp. 117-118. 



I Am. Philos. Soc. Proe., vol. xxiv, p. 69. 



