ee 
=n 
Geology. — 417 
3 but also to the people of the state of Vermont to whose well know 
patriotic spirit and love of advancement, science is now indebted for a 
valuable and most welcome contribution. e 
The greater part of Vermont has long been disputed ground between 
the advocates of several rival theories. ‘Upon one of these,—the Taconic 
System, much light has lately been thrown, by discoveries made within 
is State as our readers are well aware; but there are other great prob- 
lems such as the geological age of the Green Mountains and of several of 
the formations lying in the neighborhood of this chain which still remain. 
The officers of the Vermont Survey have wisely left these open, while at 
the same time they have given their own views and also published at 
length the opinions of other investigators who have arrived at opposite or 
somewhat different conclusions. 
A great belt of gneiss enters from the south and runs north through 
the whole length of the state, (about 160 miles) dividing it into two por- 
tions of which the eastern is somewhat larger than the western. This 
gneiss constitutes the principal mass of the Green Mountain range, and 
being both metamorphic and un cossiliferous, there are no means of de- 
step in this process is to ascertain the general structure of the range, 
Whether it bs ick the whole anticlinal or synclinal. If it be anticlinal 
i iti is evi i be solved 
morphic condition. It is evident that this great problem can 
on : Mere library work will not do. The chapter 
rey ood ld works written by O. HL Hitcheock, and he is of the 
Opinion that upon the whole the Green Mountains have an anticlinal 
struct 
Main range of the Green Mountains, but a short distance east of this 
principal chain there is a smaller belt which does not run the whole 
Aut. Jour. Set. —Sudoxp Senuss, Vou. XXXILI, No. 90.—Mar, 1863. 
53 ; 
