314 THE IRON ORE DISTRICT OF EAST TEXAS. 



sandstone," or "gumstone." Sometimes the greensand has become hardened 

 without losing its green color, and in such cases we have a green rock of very 

 similar nature to the yellow one just described. Such a material is found in 

 Doyle's Gap and on the slope of the Mount Selman iron range in Cherokee 

 County. The glauconite in this green rock is generally mixed with a large 

 amount of clay of the same color, and in some places the clay almost entirely 

 replaces that mineral. This presence of clay probably accounts for the hard- 

 ening of the bed, as it has acted as a cement in indurating the glauconite. 

 Sometimes also finely disseminated carbonate of lime is the cementing ma- 

 terial in such rock. 



u The other sandstones are more limited in extent and only locally valuable, 

 being due to the action of ferruginous solutions on the loose sands which 

 covered the beds of ore and lie along the hillsides." 



THE OIL SANDS. 



" Ten miles east of Palestine is seen a series of black and chocolate colored 

 sands, lying horizontally and containing specks of mica. They are impreg- 

 nated with bituminous matter, sometimes in the form of stiff sticky asphalt 

 and at others as mineral oil. In this neighborhood six wells were bored for 

 oil by a Palestine syndicate in 1887, but little or no oil was found. The fol- 

 lowing two sections of borings from data collected by Mr. J. L. Mayo, con- 

 tractor, show the associations of the oil bearing strata: 



1. Soil * 15 feet. 



2. Rusty sand (some oil) 3 feet. 



3. Chocolate colored hardened sand 6 feet. 



4. Alternate strata of sand and clay 34 feet. 



5. Sand impregnated with oil 14 feet. 



6. Clay and sand 43 feet. 



7 . Quicksand and water 6 feet. 



8. Blue lignitic clay 159 feet. 



9. Loose sand . . . .... 30 feet. 



1. Rusty clay 15 feet. 



2. Quicksand ' 15 feet. 



3. Light colored clay 22 feet. 



4. Sand impregnated with oil 36 feet. 



"Oil bearing sands were passed through in all the borings, and oil is occa- 

 sionally seen in the creeks and springs of the neighborhood, but in none of 

 the borings was it found to flow in any quantity. The reason of this is 

 doubtless due to the fact that the oil bearing stratum has been cut through 

 by numerous creeks, and the oil, if indeed it ever did exist in any quantity, 

 has been drained off. 



