WEED.] 



LIVINGSTON TO CINNABAR. 329 



canic breccias, the rocks being basic andesites and lava Hows similar 

 to those described m the Snowy Mountains. The colors are usually 

 dark, but rarely brilliant brick reds and purples prevail, as will be 

 noticed on the slopes west of Daileys. The tufaceous beds often con- 

 tain plant remains, and silicined tree trunks are not uncommon, to- 

 gether with agates, amethysts, and chalcedony. Hyalite is abundant 

 and remarkably fine specimens have been obtained from the summits. 



[ By .). 1'. [DDINGS. ] 



The railroad from Livingston to Cinnabar passes in view of a transverse 

 section across the end of the Snowy range, (ait nearly at right angles to 

 the strike of the beds. The general geological structure of the range 

 is that of an anticlinal fold, the upper portion of which has been 

 entirely removed by erosion, and which has been variously modified by 

 faulting, especially at the southwestern end. The main body of the 

 range consists of crystalline schists and granite, forming a high plateau 

 and still higher peaks that reach 11.0(H) and 12,000 feet in altitude. 

 Along the northern and southern Hanks of the range the overlying 

 Paleozoic strata dip away from the crystalline axis. While this is the 

 structure of the greater part of £he range it docs not obtain for that 

 portion of it passed in review by the railroad south of the main axis. 



On the east, south of Deep Creek, a chain of rocky and precipitous 

 peaks extends for about 12 miles to Mill Creek. These mountains consist 

 of Arcluean gneisses and schists, and constitute the end of the core 01 the 

 great Bear Tooth range. They are extremely fugged, with narrow 

 gorges or gulches cutting deeply into their mass. Their highest sum- 

 mits are 11,000 feet in altitude, or a little over 6,000 feet above the 

 river level. Each of the great gulches has once been occupied by a 

 glacier whose lateral moraines may be seen stretching far down into 

 the open valley. The upper portions of the mountains are bare and 

 forbidding and few of the summits have ever been ascended. Back of 

 these peaks, to the east, the crystalline schists extend in a broad, flat- 

 topped mass whose surface constitutes a high plateau 10,000 feet in 

 altitude, but which has been dissected by canyons 3,000 or 4,000 feet 

 deep. The surface of the plateau is finely glaciated and is covered 

 with ponds and lakes, the rocks being almost Completely destitute of 

 soil or vegetation. 



The most southern and highest peak of these gneissic mountains is 

 Mount Oowen, 11,190 feet in altitude. It is immediately north of the 

 valley of Mill Greek, opposite Chicory station. At the southern base of 

 Mount Ooweil is a double fault that has thrown down the country south 

 in two displacements of over 3,000 feet each. These faults, and one at 

 the south base of Sheep Mountain, have destroyed the anticlinal 



