OF NORTH AMERICA. 
103 
are found near cape Florida, and extending some distance along the coast of the bay of Mexico; in 
some situations, the calcareous matter of the shells has been washed away, and a deposit of silicious 
flint has taken their place, forming a porous flinty rock, which is used with advantage for mill-stones. 
Considerable deposits of bog iron ore, occupying the lower situations, and many of the more ele- 
vated and dividing ridges between the rivers are crowned with a sandstone and puddingstone, the 
cement of which is bog iron ore. 
Quantities of ochre , from bright yellow to dark brown are found in abundance in this formation, in 
flat horizontal beds alternating with other earths in some places ; in others in kidney form masses from 
the size of an egg to that of a man’s head, in form resembling much the flint found frequently in chalk 
formations. 
PRIMITIVE FORM.VTION. 
The south east limit of the great primitive formation is covered by the north w'estern boundary of 
the alluvial formation from the Alabama river in the Mississippi Territory, (near which it is succeeded 
by the transition and secondary formations) to the east end of Long-Island, with two small exceptions ; 
the first near Augusta on the Savannah river, and near Cambden in South Carolina, where a stratum of 
transition clayslato intervenes, and from Trenton to Amboy, where the oldest sandstone formation covers 
the primitive along the edge of the alluvial. 
From Rhode-Island (the greatest part of which is transition rock) to Boston, the primitive touches 
a transition formation, which most probably extends to the eastward, until it meets the alluvial along 
the sea coast by Elizabeth Island , cape Cod etc. etc. the eastern edge of the primitive from Boston to 
the bay of Penobscot is bounded by the ocean. 
The north western boundary of this extensive range is marked by a line running to the eastward 
of lake Champlain, twenty or thirty miles we.stward of Connecticut river, to the westward of Stockbridge, 
twelve miles east of Poukepsy, skirting the high lands, then crossing the Hudson river at Philipstown, by 
Sparta about ton or fifteen miles east of Eastown, on the Delaware, three miles east of Reading on the 
Schuylkill, and a little west of Middletown on the Susquehannah, where it joins the blue ridge, and continues 
along It to Magotty Gap; from thence to four miles east of the lead mines at .Austinville, and following a 
south western direction , by the stoney and iron mountains, six miles S. E. of the warm springs in Buncomb 
county. North Carolina, to the eastward of Hightown on the Cousee river, and a little to the westward of the 
Talapousee river, it meets the alluvial near the Alabama river, which runs into the bay of Mexico at Mobile. 
In general the strata of this primitive rock run from a north and south to a north east and south west 
direction, and dip almost universally to the south east at an angle of more than 45 degrees from the horizon; 
the highest elevation is towards the north western limits, which gradually' descends to the south east where it 
is covered by the alluvial, and the greatest mass, as well as the highest mountains, are found towards the 
northern and southern extremities of the north western boundaries. 
The outline of the mountains of this formation is generally circular waving , in detached masses , with 
rounded flat tops, as the white hills to the north, or conically waving in small pyramidal tops, as the 
peaks of Otter, and the ranges of hills to the south; (has the climate any agency in the forms of the 
northern and southern mountains?) their height does not appear to exceed six thousand feet above the 
level of the sea , except perhaps the white hills, it is even probable that those mountains are not much 
higher. 
Within the limits prescribed to this primitive formation, there is a range of secondary, extending 
with some intervals from the Connecticut to the Rappahannock rivers, in width generally from fifteen 
to twenty five miles, bounded on the north east from Connecticut river to New-IIaven, by the sea, where 
it ends, to recommence on the south side of Hudson river ; from Elizabeth towm to Trenton , it touches 
the alluvial. From a little above Morrisville on the Delaware to Norristown, Maytown on the Susque- 
hahnah, passing three miles west of York, Hanover, and one mile west of Fredericktown, it is bounded 
