M g Gee — Southern Extension of Appomattox Formation. 27 



miles farther northward, at Highland, there is a still better 

 development in which there is so large an element of pebbles 

 that the deposit has been extensively worked as a source of 

 gravel for railway ballasting. At these localities the forma- 

 tion exhibits the usual characteristics, save that in the first 

 pebbles are small and rare. In the second locality the abundant 

 pebbles . consist predominantly of sub-angular fragments of 

 chei't an inch and a half or less in diameter, with no represen- 

 tatives either of the quartz and quartzite of the northeast, or 

 of the siliceous dolomite found at Tuscaloosa. At Hattiesburg 

 the formation is exposed in the uplands overlooking Leaf 

 river, and about Ellisville it crosses the divide between that 

 river and the Tallahoma, the usual characteristics being dis- 

 played in both localities ; at Vossburg there is an extensive 

 accumulation of the deposit, which is here fairly stratified and 

 exceptionally friable, on the divide between the Leaf and 

 Chickasawhay drainage basins ; and at Brandon the exposures 

 are less extensive than but similar to those at Yossburg. 



In the vicinity of Meridian there are numerous exposures, 

 some of which aie erratic in character : Over the ridge formed 

 by the peculiar siliceous rocks of Eocene age called by Smith 

 the Choctaw buhrstone, the Appomattox is uncommonly 

 obdurate, and the distinct cross-bedding is outlined in fine 

 sand rather than in clay : yet despite the uncommon obduracy 

 of the material it has been completely removed from the 

 greater part of the surface throughout much of this belt of 

 high relief. On the northeastern side of the isolated knob of 

 Buhrstone a mile south of Meridian there is a bed of brown 

 or orange-red sand corresponding in many respects with, and 

 probably justly referable to, the Appomattox, though the 

 usual heavy bedding is absent, the characteristic cross-bedding 

 is inconspicuous, and the mass is much more friable than usual. 

 On the lowlying lands three miles northeast of Meridian the 

 Appomattox generally forms the surface ; but it here contains 

 an exceptional element of clay, and in many sections appears 

 to merge into the Eocene clays assigned to the Hatchetigbee 

 formation by Smith and Johnson, just as another phase merges 

 into the Potomac (Tuscaloosa) in another locality. 



So the Appomattox formation may be briefly described as a 

 series of obscurely stratified and frequently cross-bedded 

 loams, clays, and sands of prevailing orange hues, with local 

 accumulations of gravel about waterways ; the materials vary- 

 ing somewhat from place to place, but always in the direction 

 of community of material between the formation and the 

 older deposits upon which it lies ; while as a whole the deposit 

 retains so distinctive and strongly individualized characteristics 

 as to be readily recognized wherever seen. 



