302 S. p. EMMONS UINTA MOUNTAINS 



Professor Ed. Suess and Professor Wm. M. Davis. I have - elsewhere* 

 stated some of the physical impossibilities which Powell's hypothesis in- 

 volves, and will therefore not enlarge iipon them here. I have always 

 been a firm believer in the theory that the iiplift of a mountain chain is 

 immensely slow, and, further, that it is continuing at the present day, 

 as I have had occasions to demonstrate by facts disclosed in the imder- 

 ground workings of mines. In the Uinta mountains it is easy to find 

 facts in support of this theory without resorting to the hypothesis of the 

 antecedent origin of Green river. As is well known, the forming pf the 

 Uinta arch commenced at the close of the Cretaceous, as is evidenced by 

 the fact that the flanking Tertiary beds lap unconformably over the up- 

 turned edges of the older strata, which when exposed are seen to stand at 

 angles of 30 degrees and upward. There are three series of Tertiary 

 beds filling wide basins both north and soiith of the Uintas — the Wasatch 

 (or Vermillion Creek of the Fortieth Parallel), the Green Eiver, and the 

 Bridger formations, all of Eocene age and with an erosion interval be- 

 tween each. Now, while each of these series of beds occupy a practically 

 horizontal position throughout their basins, at the very edge of the Uinta 

 mountains they can be seen to be slightly upturned against their flanks, 

 the lowest series at the greater angle, 15 degrees or even 20 degrees in 

 places, and the more recent beds correspondingly less, which means that 

 the continued rising of the mountain mass had dragged up the adjoining 

 edges of the beds resting against their flanks — a movement which, being 

 continuous, has necessarily been greater in the case of the older beds. 



* Science (new series), vol. vl, July 2, 1897, no. 131. 



