72 GEOLOGICAL RECONNOISSANCE 
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VAN BUREN COUNTY. 
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ania aN CAN TER—HARLEY 
No. 7.—SUGAR-LOAF MOUNTAIN OF VAN BUREN COUNTY. 
The table-land of the south-western part of this county, on to which we 
ascended soon after leaving White county, supports a pine forest on the 
siliceous soils, derived from the disintegration of san dstones of the millstone 
grit series. This table-land is elevated 400 feet above the general drain- 
age of the country, and 875 above a group of dark shales, including car- 
bonate of iron, which are well exposed at “ Bald Lick,” near the foot of 
the descent, on our route leading to Sugar-loaf springs. This shale, with 
its associate ore, has much the appearance of the Gilbert shales of Searcy 
county; but these shales of Van Buren County, occupy a position, in all 
probability, beneath sandstones, the equivalent of the Bee rock. From 
20 to 25 feet of these shales are exposed in the ravines at the Bald Lick, 
having a dip to the south-west of 8 deg. ; this dip is, however, local both in 
direction and degree, since only a mile ortwo to the north, the strata were 
observed to dip east of north at a more gentle angle. 
The Sugar-loaf mountain, of which a sketch is given in the wood-cut 
that heads this section, is a conspicuous, isolated hill, cut off by denudation 
from the main ranges of this county. A measurement with the ancroid 
barometer, gave its height 440 feet above the Huntsucker farm. By com- 
putation, it must be about 500 feet above Little Red river, which sweeps 
around its north-eastern base. 
