490 THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 



and carried for weeks, with much pains, and some pain also, until the time when our 

 ardor cooled and our spirits lagged, and then we discharged and threw them away ■ 

 and sometimes we came across specimens again, still more wonderful, which we i>ut 

 in their place, and lugged along till we were tired of them and their weight, and we 

 discharged them as before ; so that from our eager desire to procure we lugged many 

 pounds weight of stones, shells, &c, nearly the whole way, and were glad that their 

 mother earth should receive them again at our hands, which was done long before 

 we got back. 



A RIDGE OF FOSSIL SHELLS. 



One of the most curious places we met in all our route was a mountain ridge of 

 fossil shells, from which a great number of the above-mentioned specimens were taken. 

 During our second day's march from the mouth of the False Washita we were as- 

 tonished to find ourselves traveling over a bed of clam and oyster shells, which were 

 all in a complete state of petrefaction. This ridge, which seemed to run from north- 

 east to southwest, was several hundred feet high, and varying from a quarter to half 

 a mile in breadth, seemed to be composed of nothing but a concretion of shells, which, 

 on the surface, exposed to the weather for the depth of eight or ten inches, were en- 

 tirely separated from the cementing material which had held them together, and 

 were lying on the surface, sometimes for acres together, without a particle of soil or 

 grass upon them, with the color, shapes, and appearance exactly of the natural shells 

 lying loosely together, into which our horses' feet were sinking at every step above 

 their fetlocks. These I consider the most extraordinary petrifactions I ever beheld. 

 In any way they could be seen, individually or in the mass together, they seemed to 

 be nothing but the pure shells themselves, both in color and in shape. In many in- 

 stances we picked them up entire, never having been opened ; and taking our knives 

 out, and splitting them open as we would an oyster, the fish was seen petrified in 

 perfect form, and by dipping it into water it showed all the colors and freshness of 

 an oyster just opened and laid on a plate to be eaten. Joe and I had carelully tied 

 up many of these, with which we felt quite sure we could deceive our oyster-eating 

 friends when we got back to the East ; yet, like many other things we collected, they 

 shared the fate that I have mentioned, without our bringing home one of them, 

 though we brought many of them several hundreds of miles, and at last threw them 

 away. This remarkable ridge is in some parts covered with grass, but generally with 

 mere scattering bunches for miles together, partially covering this compact mass of 

 shells, forming (in my opinion) one of the greatest geological curiosities now to be 

 seen in this country, as it lies evidently some thousands of feet above the level of the 

 ocean and seven or ei ght hundred miles from the nearest point on the sea-coast. 



AN IRON RIDGE. 



In another section of the country, lying between Fort Gibson and the Washita, we 

 passed over a ridge for several miles, running parallel to this, where much of the way 

 there was no earth or grass under foot, but our horses were traveling on a solid rock, 

 which had on its surface a reddish or oxidized appearance; and on getting from my 

 horse and striking it with my hatchet, I found it to contain sixty or eighty per cent, 

 of solid iron, which produced a ringing noise, and a rebounding of the hatchet, as if 

 it were struck upon an anvil. 



GYPSUM BEDS. 



In other parts, and farther west, between the Camanchee village and the Canadian, 

 we passed over a similar surface, for many miles denuded, with the exception of here 

 and there little bunches of grass and wild sage, a level and exposed surface of solid 

 gypsum, of a dark gray color ; and through it, occasionally,asfar as the eye could dis- 

 cover, to the east and the west, streaks of three and five inches wide of snowy gyp 

 sum, which was literally as white as the drifted snow. 





