250 
SECTIONS ON THE DONETZ. 
The right bank of the Donetz at Izium presents steep escarpments which expose 
interesting sections of these Jura rocks, both at that town and at several localities 
above and below it. The uniform composition of these strata leaves no doubt, that 
they belong to one and the same division of the series ; and they pass under cre- 
taceous rocks, of which we shall treat in the next chapter. We shall not employ 
many words in describing these different localities, though we must enter sufficiently 
into detail to render apparent the characters which unite them, and the marked 
differences which separate them from the basins already described. 
Sviatagora . — In advancing to the north, after our examination of the great car- 
boniferous tracts of the Donetz (p. 89 et seq.), the point at which we first observed 
any strata of Jurassic age was at Sviatagora, about eight versts below Izium. Near 
the celebrated convent of that place these beds rise up very gradually from beneath 
picturesque masses of white chalk which have weathered into “ needles,” and 
resemble the light and airy spires of a Gothic church h The strata which imme- 
diately lie beneath the white chalk, are sandstone and sand, intermixed with some 
courses of clay, analogous to, but not identical with, certain great masses of grit 
which a little higher up the Donetz are invariably inferior to the white chalk, and 
seem, as we shall hereafter show, to form a part of the cretaceous system. These 
sandstones are of greenish-grey colour, and disintegrate readily. The alternating 
clays are reddish and compact, passing to shale, in some parts plastic and highly 
argillaceous, in others sandy. The white Jurassic limestone which is surmounted 
by the sands and sandstone, is in parts oolitic, and towards its base pisolitic ; but 
the chief mass is not so distinguished, and simply resembles many of the earthy 
white limestones of La Rochelle in France and of Portland in England. 
In the middle part of this section we found a fragment of a Terebratula re- 
sembling T. spinosa and some indistinct corals. The thickness of the white lime- 
stone at this spot is about forty feet, and the beds dip at an angle of twelve to 
fifteen degrees to the south, whilst the overlying chalk is rather less inclined but 
in the same direction. 
Kamenka . — The second locality in ascending the banks of the Donetz, at which 
the Jurassic formation crops out, is about three versts below the little village of 
Kamenka. The beds are here less inclined than at Sviatagora, not exceeding three 
or four degrees in their dip to the south. The brook Kamenka, which flows 
1 In early times the cells in the chalk beneath these natural spires were used as convents by the monks. 
