The Geology of the Tallulah Gorge. — Jones. 69 
luvial borders and a more rounded contour of adjacent hills 
as it approaches the Piedmont plain. 
The falls occur in a section of the gorge three-fourths 
of a mile long beginning half a mile below the bridge. Named 
in succession, they are : L'Eau d'Or, Tempesta, Hurricane, 
Oceana and Bridal Veil. None has a vertical fall of over 
ninety feet, though the total descent of the river from the 
first to the last fall is about 360 feet. 
At the Indian Arrow rapids, just above the falls, the river 
is a hundred feet below the principal street of the town, some- 
what arbitrarily assumed as the level of the upper edge of the 
gorge at this point. From here the gorge deepens and widens 
rapidly, reaching its greatest depth in the neighborhood of the 
horseshoe bend in the portion below the falls termed the 
'Grand Chasm. Here the gorge is 530 feet deep as measured 
from the roadbed of the Northeastern Georgia R. R., which 
runs for a short distance along the brink of the chasm. Ref- 
erence to the accompanying map and profile (Plate XI.) of a 
portion of the river will bring out these points more clearly. 
From the Grand chasm to the junction of the two rivers 
the gorge is somewhat shallower and with less definitely de- 
fined walls than in the region just described, some strips of 
cultivated land bordering each side of the river near its lower 
end. It is in the region of the falls and Grand chasm that 
the typical gorge character is best developed and it was doubt- 
less the wild, rugged scenery of this portion that suggested 
the Indian name "Tallulah" or "the terrible." 
Geological Features. 
Tallulah falls is situated within the region designated on 
any geological map of Georgia as the "Crystalline Area." 
This formation embraces all the northeastern portion of 
the state and is made up principally of granites, gneisses and 
crystalline schists. 
The exact position of these rocks in the geological time 
scale has never been determined. They are generally classed 
as pre-Cambrian. 
In the small geological map accompanying this article 
(fig. I.) three areas are shown — a quartz schist formation, 
a narrow belt of limestone antl a biotitc schist on cither side 
