REPORT OF THE STATE GEOLOGIST. lxvii 



BROWNWOOD-RANGER SERIES. 



This condition, so favorable for the production of coal, was followed 

 by an epoch of alternate deep and shallow water, during which were de- 

 posited the limestones and sandstones of the Brownwood-Eanger divis- 

 ions. In these beds there is a considerable amount of salt, some oil, and 

 a little gas, but no commercial use has yet been made of them. 



WALDRIP-CISCO SERIES. 



These beds are succeeded by another series of coal beds — the Wald- 

 rip-Cisco Beds. In them is repeated in great measure the characters of 

 those already described, as far as their lithology is concerned — beds of 

 alternating clays, shales, fire-clays, and limestones, with seams of coal 

 of varying thickness. So far two seams have been noted in these beds 

 in the Colorado field, while there are three in the Brazos. The coals of 

 these beds seem to be considerably more sulphurous in some localities 

 than in others, but in no place have there been sufficient openings made 

 in them to prove what their value would be away from the part already 

 affected by surface decomposition and the action of surface waters. 



These seams outcrop from Waldrip, at the Colorado Kiver, in a north 

 northeast direction to Montague County, and there is but little doubt 

 that the careful investigation now being made of them will show many 

 places where deposits of great value exist. 



COLEMAN-ALBANY SERIES. 



The deposition of these coal beds was followed after a time by a 

 condition of muddy waters, in which were laid down beds of shales, 

 clays, and limestones of the Coleman- Albany Division, which, so far 

 as investigations have gone, are barren of coal. 



With the close of this series ended the deposition of the materials 

 now placed among the Coal Measures proper. 



The rocks of this system west of the Pecos Kiver are not suffi- 

 ciently known to divide them into series and finally correlate them 

 with the beds just described. In the Guadalupe Mountains we have 

 an exposure of about three thousand feet of Carboniferous strata in 

 three distinct series. The lower beds are dark limestone, without fos- 

 sils, as far as observed. Overlying these are fifteen hundred feet of 

 yellow quartzose sandstone, with bands of limestone, and containing 



