MAE YL AND GEOLOGICAL SUEVEY 157 



The fossils of the Baritan formation in this county consist largely 

 of plant remains, and among these is a large proportion of dicotyle- 

 dons showing a very noticeable advance in grade of organization over 

 those of the Patapsco formation. Leaf bed occurs at upper White 

 Banks, at lower White Banks, at Turkey Point, Grove Point, and 

 other localities near the west end of the Chesapeake and Delaware 

 Canal. At Grove Point small pellets and grains of amber have been 

 found preserved with other remains of vegetable life. The drab clays 

 of this formation are commonly lignite-bearing and the logs, especially 

 toward the summit of the terrane, are occasionally teredo-bored. 



The Uppee Ceetaceous Eoemations. 



Deposits of Upper Cretaceous age are developed only in the south- 

 eastern portion of Cecil county. In the Eastern Shore portion of the 

 county, south of Back Creek and the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal, 

 the various formations occur in the banks and beds of creeks and 

 rivers wherever erosion has been sufficient to remove the surface 

 cover of Pleistocene sand and loam. Exposures of the deposits are 

 met with in the banks of both the Great and Little Bohemia creeks 

 and their tributaries and in Cabin John and Pierce creeks; but the 

 greatest development and most continuous outcrops are found at 

 Grove Point and up the Sassafras river as far as Eredericktown. 



The distribution of the Upper Cretaceous formations is quite con- 

 tinuous. Only one outlier is known, and this is located in the high 

 elopes of Maulden Mountain on Elk 'Neck. 



The materials which compose the beds of the Tapper Cretaceous 

 formations consist of clays, sands, greensands and marls, and are quite 

 uniform in their constitution over wide areas. Locally iron oxide 

 has entered so largely as to have transformed them into sandstone. 

 There is then the greatest contrast between them and the beds of 

 the Potomac. The latter are noted for their brilliant and gaily- 

 colored clays, which may be distinctly seen for many miles; the 

 former, however, are usually of the most sombre tints of drab, 

 greenish-black and black, with these monotonous colors only occa- 

 sionally relieved by the dull red tint of iron oxide. 



