HeR!-!HEY.] 



The River Terraces of the Orleans Basin. 



Mr. J. S. Diller for examination by Professor F. H. Knowlton, 

 who submitted them to Professor D. P. Penhallow. I have not 

 found any large pieces in the condition of lignite, but small 

 fragments have an unmistakable coaly character. This is the 

 only late Quaternary lignite I have ever seen. 



The mucky layer contains very Little gravel, but is inclined 

 to stand in a steep bank. It wears into dark brown rounded 

 cobbles, which (as well as wood fragments) are abundant in the 

 tailing's. Over the muck there is from fifty to sixty feet of 

 finely and nearly horizontally stratified fine gravel and dirt 

 of a dull, reddish brown color. This material is local in origin, 

 being composed chiefly of slate debris from the neighboring 

 mountain. Many of the slate fragments have been rounded by 

 water action, and the undulating surface of the terrace shows 

 that the material is in the form of local alluvial fans. 



This Ferris Channel, from its superior height above the 

 river, is evidently not the same as that of the Pearch Mine, less 

 than one mile farther upstream: but my reason for including it 

 in the 120-foot group will come out later in the discussion. Tn 

 fact, this group has given me considerable trouble in correlating 

 in the Middle and Lower basins, as it is very complex. 



Graham Flat was situated on a point which projects far out 

 into the valley from the north, at about three-quarters of a mile 

 west of Orleans. It was about 800 x 1200 feet in extent, or about 

 twenty-two acres, of which about twenty acres have been mined 

 off. The bed-rock occurs in the form of several distinct channel 

 levels. The higher has a height of about 150 feet above the 

 river, and displays a broad rock platform, behind which there 

 is a shallow channel about 150 feet in average width. This 

 upper bed-rock level corresponds to the bed-rock level of the 

 Ferris Mine, as may be clearly seen by looking across to the 

 latter. The steep bank left at the close of mining operations 

 on the inner side of the mine has a height varying from 90 to 

 150 feet. In some sections it displays largely slate capped by 

 deep red residuary clay, but in others fragments of the terrace 

 deposits remain. One section presents six feet of brown sand 

 at the base, followed by fifteen feet of ordinary river gravel, 

 thirty feet of horizontally and heavily bedded reddish brown 



