OF ARKANSAS. B19 
gravity. Between Sul- 
pher rock and Parson 
Rogers’ dwelling, it is 
|Feet. 
coe eee . _ jonly eighty feet thick; 
b | x | 9 \Light-colored earthy looking limestone, “ white ; 
u | oil | rock”? between Batesville and 
LLP Spring creek, it has ex- 
panded to one hundred 
Nee ML 40 Maguesian limestone, containing galena, blende, f ; 
Mi Mo carbonate of zinc, and some copper pyrites. |and eighty feet or more. 
ML It forms the substratum 
upon which the town of Batesville is built, and crops out about one mile 
to the north. Seven or eight miles south of Batesville, this member dips 
beneath the drainage of the country. East and west, along its strike, it 
can be traced as the surface rock from the highland, on Black river, pasz- 
ing through Sulphur rock and Batesville, to the western boundary of the 
State. Though very persistent, in its lithological character, this member 
is, atsome places, almost entirely replaced by limestone, with, locally, 
one or more beds of intercalated dark argillaceous shale. 
Member (e) was first observed, along my line of survey, at Mr. Me- 
Donald’s, in a little branch called Shakeray, a tributary of Mud creek, 
where it is not more than three or four feet thick, the upper part of a 
dark-gray color, and splitting into large thin sheets. The lower part is 
ferruginous, more compact, and quarries into blocks six or eight inches 
thick; it will probably be found, when analyzed, to contain a considerable 
amount of iron; in fact, I was impressed with the belief, while at some of 
the localities of this shale, near Sulphur Rock and Batesville, that it would 
prove to contain enough iron to justify smelting.* 
Going west from McDonald’s, this black shale increases in thickness, 
and is found in the bottom of wells, and in the deep cuts of ravines, as 
far west as Spring creek, three miles north-west of Batesville, where it 
attains a thickness of thirty-five feet or more; and though undoubtedly 
belonging to the subcarboniferous period, has the lithological character of 
the devonian black shales of Indiana and Kentucky. Itis charged with 
bitumen, possesses a strong, fetid odor, splits into thin sheets. and decom- 
poses too easily to permit of its being used for roofing buildings. At 
Spring creek, this member contains the same black, compact, and ferru- 
ginous stratum found in the vicinity of Sulphur Rock, which is here 
Me 
*Owing to some nnknown cause, the packages shipped by me, early last spring, to the office of 
the Arkanses Survey, have not yet been received. One of these packages contained the principal 
specimens of this shale, collected in Independence county, the manganese ores from near Batesville, 
and many other important samples of the roeks in that region: consequently no analysis can, at 
present, be given. Enquiries have been instituted, and it is hoped these missing boxes may yet be 
found at some of the shipping points along their route. 
