SALINE SPRINGS. 



355 



furnishes the water is a white, porous sandrock, 

 sometimes tinged with red. On the Muskingum 

 there are two distinct strata of this rock, known as 

 the upper and lower salt-rocks, the distance be- 

 tween them being over 400 feet. The upper is 25 

 feet thick, and the lower 40 ; it is this which furnishes 

 the strongest brine and in the greatest quantity. 

 This rock lies at different depths in the " valley," 

 being deeper near its centre or most depending por- 

 tion, and rising nearer the surface on its borders. 

 On the Muskingum it is 800 feet below the surface; 

 on the Kenawha, 400. Thus, at the former place, it 

 lies far below the present surface of the ocean, it 

 having been pierced at 900 feet, which is 300 be- 

 low tide-water at the mouth of the Mississippi. 



Throughout the Muskingum Valley, a distance 

 of sixty geographical miles, the saline rocks sink 

 deeper and deeper into the centre of the valley, 

 from a depth of 250 feet to that of 1000. Thus, at 

 Zanesville, salt water is obtained at 350 feet; at 

 Taylorsville, nine miles below, at 450 feet ; at 

 M'Connelsville, eighteen miles below, 750 feet ; and 

 at Bald Eagle at 1000 feet. The strength of the 

 brine also increases in nearly the same ratio ; so 

 that fifty gallons from the lower wells afford as 

 much salt as two hundred and fifty from the upper 

 ones. There are at present on the Muskingum 

 about seventy brine-wells, and as many furnaces, 

 which manufacture annually about half a million 

 bushels of salt. The salines on the Kenawha fur- 

 nish about 1,500,000 bushels per annum. On the 

 Holstein, the saline wells are from 200 to 300 feet 

 deep. 



Petroleum and Carburetted Hydrogen.* — Pe- 

 troleum is a mineral oil, the product, as is supposed, 

 of the vegetable decomposition which produces bi- 

 tuminous coal. A similar article is produced by 



* From Dr. Hildreth's Report to the Legislature of Ohio* 

 1838. 



