RECAPITULATION OF PALEOZOIC FORMATIONS. 189 



This is the last of the Paleozoics mapped in the Ha}' den atlas along- the moun- 

 tain front in Colorado (except the Sangre de Cristo Range) and all but the last of the 

 Triassic, though a small area of the latter is represented at the southern extremity of 

 the Greenhorn Mountains. Part of this tract is embraced bj^ the Walsenburg quad- 

 rangle, where Hills has mapped the " Triassic" beds under the name of the Badito for- 

 mation, which, however, he places somewhat doubtinglj^ in the Carboniferous. The 

 upper half of this formation consists of bi'ick-red sandstones about 100 feet in thick- 

 ness, generally massive, but sometimes shah'. It is supposed b}' Hills to correspond 

 to part of the Fountain formation. The lower half consists of about the same thick- 

 ness of very coarse conglomerate of a brownish- red color. In the Sang're de Cristo 

 Range, according to Hills, the stratigraphic section corresponds ver}' nearly with 

 that at the southern exti-emity of the Greenhorn Mountains, except Avith respect to 

 the thickness of the conglomerate. There is in each case about the same amount of 

 capping red sandstone, but the coarse conglomerate and sandstone upon which it 

 rests attains, in the Sangre de Cristo Range, a thickness of several thousand feet. 

 Like the Fountain beds both in the Pueblo and in the Pikes Peak quadrangle, the 

 Badito formation is succeeded by the Morrison formation, which here, as usual, 

 probably is more or less closely the equivalent of the Jurassic of the Hayden atlas. 



The sequence described by Hills in the Walsenburg folio and the comparisons 

 made by him with the Sangi'e de Cristo Range make it almost appear as if in the 200 

 feet of strata exposed in that area the dividing line between the Wj'oming and 

 Fountain formations was contained, part of the Badito belonging to one and part to 

 the other formation. If the upper or brick- red portion of- the Badito formation be 

 really the equivalent of the Wyoming formation, then the latter, greatl}' reduced in 

 bulk, must be present in the Sangre de Cristo Range, a point of some interest in the 

 distribution of that formation. Of course on this supposition it would be the lower 

 and not the upper portion of the Badito which is equivalent to the Fountain. How- 

 ever, it seems to me a little more probable, from the fact that the Wyoming forma- 

 tion is apparently absent hi the Pueblo quadrangle and over so much of the Sangre 

 de Cristo Range, that the brick-red sandstone of the Walsenburg quadrangle does 

 not really represent it, but is a local manifestation of the Maroon formation. 



South of the Wet Mountains the line of outcrop i.s taken up by the Sangre de 

 Cristo Range, composed largeh' of the Arkansas sandstone, whose age is Upper 

 Carboniferous. The Triassic and even the Jurassic seem here to be absent, con- 

 cealed, it is safe to say, beneath the overlapping Cretaceous. The Paleozoics of the 

 Sangre de Cristo Range are discussed in a separate section. 



The relation of these formations lying along the Front Range to one another 

 and to the Red Beds in the interior mountain region, and also their geologic age, are 

 questions in the highest degree perplexing. 



