OUTLINES. 
137 
of mica; and this remains a prominent feature of these slates on Talley 
River, 12 or 15 miles above Murphy, and on the Tennesse near the mouth 
of Tuckasege, and on Hiwassee 8 or 10 miles above Murphy. The dip 
of the rocks, which is generally steep, 10° to 60, and 80° and 90° S. E. 
for several miles from the stale line, until Long Ridge is passed, after 
which it turns to the 1ST. "W\, to within 3 or 1 miles of Murphy, where 
the easterly dip is recovered. About Murphy the crystalline dolomitic 
limestone is encountered, with accompanying beds of shining clay slates 
and shales and a thin bed of quartzytes, which lie along the valley of 
Valley River, to its head; being accompanied throughout by frequent 
outcrops of limonite. This limestone and its accompanying iron ore and 
clay elates is repeated on Peachtree Creek, 4 or 5 miles east of Murphy, 
and this reduplication seems to follow up the east side of the wide valley 
of Valley River, parallel with the former, which keeps to the northwest 
side, at the distance of 2 to 3 miles, and less, towards the head of the val- 
ley. To the southeast of this valley, in theKoneteh Mountains, and across 
the upper Hiwassee into Clay, is a succession of clay slates, with gneiss- 
like gray slates, as described above, and etaurolitic mica slates. A little 
above Valleytown a small body of quartzytes is passed and then a heavy 
bed of shining dark clay slates, which run nearly north from this point 
through the Valley River Mountains and into the Nantehaleh Mountains 
to the east of Nantehaleh River towards the mouth of that stream. 
These slates are much disturbed, broken and crumpled. Beyond these 
are light colored and grey argillaceous, and occasionally micaceous slates 
and shales, with alternations of gneissoid slates for two or three miles, 
after which, on Nantahaleh, come in, with a change of the dip to the west, 
the gneisses and hornblende slates of the Laurentian. 
The reversals of the dip in the section below Murphy are easily traceable 
across the valley of the Cheowah and the Tennessee, on the latter, a little 
below the mouth of Tuckasege. The Tennessee river section shows much 
fewer and smaller beds of conglomerates than the ITiwassee, and also less 
of clay slates and mica 6lates, but a greatly exaggerated development of 
the quartzose slates, gneisses and grits. 
The limestones of Valley River follow the valley of Notteley river south- 
westward into Georgia, crossing the Toccoa (ITemptown creek tributary) 
12 miles S. E. of Ducktown. To the northestward they pass through 
Red Marble Gap of the Valley River Mountains, and outcrop along Red 
Marble Creek, and several miles below its mouth, are last seen at Blowing 
Cave. These limestones are generally white, but are often found of vari- 
ous colors, — pink, grey, black, mottled and banded. They are accom- 
panied by large beds of white, compact to granular steatyte, which is mas- 
