50 



E. M. MUSEUM MEMOIRS. 



the cafions, and therefore the ridges of rock between them, ran North and 

 South. 



At the particular place where the section was begun the surface of the 

 plain was 36 feet above the bed of the first caflon. Almost everywhere else the 

 descent was too precipitous to admit of climbing down, but at that point a 

 bank of debris joined the edge of the plain with the bed of the cafion. Two hun- 

 dred and fifty feet from the foot of this rose the first ridge. It was 40 feet thick 

 at the base, 19 feet on the west side and 24 on the east, and made up of two 

 strata of sandstone. The lower was of very hard, coarse brown sandstone, a 

 foot thick. The upper was of fine grayish sandstone easily cut and scratched 

 with a knife. The brown stratum was one of the most marked and peculiar of 

 the beds, and wherever it was found its presence has been indicated on the pro- 

 files by cross-lining. The color was not superficial and therefore not due to expo- 

 sure, but was the same throughout. Its hardness was very great, and where at 

 all affected by the weather, split up into large slabs and flakes. The gray strata 

 were composed of a mixture of feldspar, clay, and coarse or fine quartz sand. 

 The relative proportion of these ingredients was not the same in all the beds. 

 In some the feldspar was wanting and the clay much more abundant than the 

 sand. In others the quartz sand was of a very decided green color, which made 

 all such strata very marked. It happened almost invariably that the green beds 

 immediately underlay the brown, and were, so far as known, the only fossilifer- 

 ous ones. Yet even these yielded little that was of enough value to bring 

 away. Often in clambering over the boulders and sandstone slabs that covered the 

 bottoms of the caftons, bits of bones, easily recognized by their pink tint, were 

 observed, and beyond them other and still other fragments forming a long line 

 of bone chips leading to some elevated spot on a bank where was the carapace 

 or plastron of a turtle completely weathered to pieces, or the broken remains of 

 a crocodile jaw. Some parts of femurs and ribs, odd foot-bones, and a few teeth 

 were, indeed, picked up. But it was not till the Bad Lands close to the foot of 

 Haystack Mountain were searched that fossils of any value were obtained. 



The position of the mountain is shown on the geological map of southern 

 Wyoming which accompanies the report of Mr. Clarence King. Yet it was 

 thought advisable to determine as carefully as possible the precise location of 

 that portion of Haystack where the best " finds" were made. For this pur- 

 pose compass-bearings' and sextant angles were taken both to and from Black 

 Buttes, Pine Bluffs, and such other prominent points as the country afforded, and 

 from the data so collected the spot has been marked by a cross, as accurately 

 as the scale will permit, on the sketch-map already referred to. As there 

 indicated the beds are believed to be on the northern edge of an exposure of 



• The compass-bearing of the summit was N. 38° E. from Pine Bluffs, and S. 83° E. from Black Buttes. 



