120 THE IRON ORE DISTRICT OF EAST TEXAS. 



hilly, but with a general lowering of level until the flat bottom lands of the 

 Sabine River and the region of the Caddo Lake system is reached. Through- 

 out the lower region there are a few conical shaped hills protected from the 

 general leveling process going on rapidly by a capping of ferruginous sand- 

 stones and broken fragments of ore. 



STRATIGRAPHY. 



For the division of the county into a northern (that lying north of the Lit- 

 tle Cypress Creek) and a southern division (or that portion of the county lying 

 southward of the same creek), there are other reasons beside the simple geo- 

 graphical fact that these two districts are separated by a large creek having a 

 margin of broad bottom lands, or the question of altitude The two divi- 

 sions are different from a stratigraphical point of view. In the southern 

 field there is a considerable extent of country overlaid by a rich brown or 

 dark orange-red sand, containing a considerable quantity of ferruginous 

 gravels, siliceous pebbles, and fossil wood. To the north of the Cypress this 

 brown or orange-red sand is not to be found anywhere. In the southern 

 field the overlying sands generally lie upon sands having a lighter yellow or 

 white color, and where these sands are wanting the upper brown sand rests 

 immediately upon thinly laminated red and white sands or clayey sands, or 

 their equivalents, the unstratified mottled red and white clayey sands. North 

 of the Cypress the universal covering is a gray sand resting upon beds of 

 laminated iron ore or upon a very heavy deposit of alternate strata of gray 

 clay and gray sand. In this deposit, which appears to he somewhat similar 

 to the borings from the deep well at Jefferson, the gray clay usually lies in 

 strata from two to four inches in thickness and the sands in somewhat thicker 

 strata. Occasionally the clay assumes a heavy bedded or even an unstrati- 

 fied condition, in which the deposit is frequently from five to seven feet in 

 thickness. The total thickness of the deposit of gray clay and sand is not 

 known. In one place iP has been pierced to a depth of thirty-one feet with- 

 out passing through it. 



The following three sections show the structure of this part of the county: 



I. Well at M. B. Alexanders house, on A, Dean headright. Altitude about 300 feet. 



1. Gray unstratified sand 10 feet. 



2. Laminated iron ore and sandstone ... 5 feet. 



3. White sand 5 feet. 



4. Alternate strata of grayish white sand and clay. The clay appears to be lying 



in strata of from 2 to 4 inches and the sand from 4 to 5 inches. At 45 



feet the sand becomes thicker at the expense of the clay 31 feet.+ 



51 feet. 



