lviii REPORT OF THE STATE GEOLOGIST. 



Beginning at the Louisiana line with a breadth of nearly one hun- 

 dred and fifty miles, stretching southwest in a gradually narrowing belt 

 and probably fading out in Caldwell County or just beyond, there is 

 found a series of hills of greater or less elevation which are capped 

 with ferruginated material, varying from a sandstone with a small 

 amount of oxide of iron in the matrix, to limonite ores of high grade. 

 Of this division only a few of the counties of East Texas have been 

 fully examined, but enough has been done to show the probability that 

 the greater amount of workable ores of this belt lie east of the 96th 

 meridian, although there may be localities west of that line at which 

 ores of value occur. These ores are associated entirely with rocks of 

 the Tertiary and later periods. 



In the Cretaceous no iron ores of any consequence are known except 

 in the extreme west, where deposits of ochre seem to occur in connec- 

 tion with strata belonging to the Fredericksburg Division of the Lower 

 Cretaceous Series. 



There are only a few ores of any value found in the Carboniferous 

 area, and those of the Permian are not of much importance. 



The Central Mineral Region, however, contains, in connection with 

 its deposits of older rocks, large deposits of very valuable ores, includ- 

 ing magnetite, red hematite, and various hydrated ores. 



Finally, in Trans-Pecos Texas, Iron ores of the hematite and magnetic 

 types are found in veins of considerable thickness. 



Thus it will be seen that the distribution of the ores is general, ex- 

 tending entirely across the State from east to west. 



The ores of East Texas all belong to the class of limonites, or brown 

 hematites. They have been divided according to their physical struc- 

 ture, due to the manner of their formation, into three general classes : 

 1. Laminated Ores. 2. Geode, or Nodular, Ores. 3. Conglomerate 

 Ores. To which it may be necessary to add a fourth, Carbonate Ores. 



The origin and character of these different classes of ores were dis- 

 cussed in the First Annual Report, and the results of our further studies 

 will appear in this Second Annual Report. In brief these are : 



Laminated Ores. — These ores are brown to black in color and vary 

 in structure from a massive to a highly laminated variety in which the 

 laminae vary from one-sixteenth to one-quarter of an inch in thickness, 

 frequently separated by hollow spaces, and sometimes containing thin 

 seams of gray clay. The average thickness of the ore bed is from one 



