196 PERMIAN OF TEXAS AND ITS OVERLYING BEDS. 



miles above its junction with the Salt Fork of the Brazos River. This flat 

 embraces an area of about 200 acres, and is entirely level, and barren of veg- 

 etation. It has been formed by the erosion of the upper strata of the sur- 

 rounding country, as is shown by the bluffs on either side and the isolated 

 conical hills here and there in the flat. 



In the midst of the flat is a bold running salt spring, whose waters spread 

 out over the surface of the flat when there is the least rise in the water, and 

 when the waters recede there is left an incrustation of salt from one-half to 

 one inch thick. These waters are very highly charged with salt, so that the 

 least evaporation causes the precipitation of the salt. Along the banks of the 

 spring branch the salt is in beds, very often several inches thick. No effort 

 has ever been made to manufacture salt at this place except in a small way, 

 but for a long while persons have been gathering the salt as they needed it 

 as it was deposited on the flat. 



That salt could be manufactured at this locality at a minimum cost and in 

 large quantities is very apparent. The spring flows at least 2000 gallons per 

 hour, and this water could be run into open vats and left for solar evapora- 

 tion, needing the labor of men enough to handle the salt. 



There are many other places where the same thing could be done in this 

 part of the State, and when it will be done is only a question of time. Cheap 

 transportation is the only thing necessary to put such enterprises on foot. 



COPPER. 



There are three distinct and separate copper-bearing beds in the Permian 

 strata — one of them in the Wichita Beds and two in the Clear Fork Beds. 

 The one in the Wichita Beds is most largely presented in Archer County and 

 passes thence northeastward. At that locality several years ago a mining 

 company took out and shipped to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, large quanti- 

 ties of the ore. The mine was abandoned on account of the expense of 

 shipping the ore, which had at that time to be hauled in wagons 150 miles 

 to the railroad, and shipped from there by rail to the furnace. 



The first belt of copper-bearing clays in the Clear Fork Beds occurs just 

 west or above the lowest beds of limestone. This deposit of copper is found 

 on California Creek in Jones County, and near Table Top Mountain in Bay- 

 lor County, and other places along the same horizon. Several tons of ore 

 were taken out in Baylor County a few years ago. 



The upper bed of copper is found at Kiowa Peak, near the northeast cor- 

 ner of Stonewall County, at a point about ten miles west of Benjamin in 

 Knox County, on Raggedy Creek in Hardeman County, and other places 

 along the same horizon. The ore is very nearly the same at all these local- 

 ities. It has the form of wood and yields from 40 to 68 per cent of metallic 



