314 GEOLOGY OF OHIO. 



Profile Section through Richland County. 



B 



A — Abrupt slope to the south frequently without any Drift clay, the level rocks coming 

 near to the surface, the significance of which will be more apparent after the description 

 of the counties further south is given. 



B — Undulating ridges of Drift such as have been described above, occasional granitic 

 bowlders being scattered over the whole, with frequently a thin bed of stratified sand 

 and gravel at bottom. 



To account for these facts, an agency is required which shall bring from 

 their home in the far north the granitic bowlders and pebbles, the Cor- 

 niferous limestone, and other hard rocks intervening ; shall pulverize to 

 a clay the soft, argillaceous rocks ; shall leave the hard rocks brought in 

 from the north rounded and striated; shall mingle all this material in- 

 timately with the debris of the friable local rooks, which are neither 

 water-worn nor striated, but are in sharp, angular fragments, and leave 

 the whole entirely unassorted upon the high lands in undulating ridges; 

 but upon the margins of the streams often washing away all the finer 

 material, wearing to a sand the debris of the soft local rocks, assorting 

 and depositing in different places the materials having different specific 

 gravities. The question what that agency probably was, will be discussed 

 when other facts bearing upon its full solution shall be accumulated. 



GOLD. 



One of the most interesting surface deposits of the county, and one in- 

 timately connected with the discussion of the Drift, is the gold found 

 about Bellville and other places in the southern part of Richland county. 

 The origin of the gold has been attributed to an ancient Drift agency 

 which brought in the pebbles of the Waverly Conglomerate ; but I am 

 quite confident that it should be referred to the surface Drift, and was 

 brought in by the same agency that transported the granitic pebbles and 

 bowlders. If referred to the Waverly Conglomerate, it should be found 

 at the base of this deposit. It is, in fact, found most abundantly about 

 on the level of its upper surface, and in perceptible quantities on the 

 slopes of the hills fifty to one hundred feet above it. If it came from the 

 Waverly Conglomerate, it should be most abundant where the quartz 

 pebbles of this Conglomerate are the most numerous, while at Belleville 

 and the immediate neighborhood, this Waverly rock is comparatively 



