CAYUGA COUNTY. 
287 
seen beyond Wayne county, and but very little is there exposed ; and it is only by boring that 
a knowledge of its mass can be obtained. Its great thickness in Onondaga, its absence 
or obscurity in the fourth district, and the discovery of four feet of gypsum at Howland’s 
island as reported in 1839, the gypsum being nearly forty feet below the level of Seneca river, 
are circumstances which tend to show a change, if that boring can be relied upon, in the 
extension of the red shale to the west. 
The gypseous portion of the group widens greatly going west. At the east end of the 
county, it is very little over four miles ; but along Cayuga lake and its outlet, the part con¬ 
taining plaster is actually seen for ten miles ; and including the boring, about fourteen miles ; 
solely owing to the removal of its overlying masses, which, from Owasco outlet to the south 
side of Springport, show a curving of the limestone range in its rear, and the removal con¬ 
sequently of all its north and western portions. 
Very little gypsum is quarried at the east end of the county : the only quarry noticed was 
on Owasco river, about two miles and three quarters south of Port Byron ; the quarries be¬ 
ing on the lake, and near to Springport, as detailed in the annual reports, and under the head 
of the group. 
The hopper cavities were noticed at the hill and road side to the south of Port Byron, but 
none were seen along Cayuga lake; the gypsum there exposed, appearing, like the mass to 
the south of Port Byron, to be above the cavities. 
From the exhibition of gypsum near Springport, there is ample for many years supply from 
the masses near to the lake, and which are but thinly covered. Further east, and in a 
northeast direction, there must be a never ending quantity, but which would require a dif¬ 
ferent mode of extraction from that which is now followed. 
Having no knowledge of the details of the new boring at Montezuma, nothing further suggests 
itself with regard to that saline. Nothing can be more commendable than enterprises of this 
kind, even if but negative results are obtained; but if successful, the field of industry is en¬ 
larged, and the resources of the people measurably increased. The boring is one of promise ; 
the water flows over the tube at the rate of forty-nine gallons per minute, and is said to be of 
good strength. 
The Water-lime group exhibits the same characters and associates as in Onondaga, and is 
readily traced from point to point along its range. It is quarried to the northeast of Auburn ; 
shows itself at the outlet just below the factory, and near the road from Auburn to Spring- 
port; appears in the brook at Springport, and is quarried at Blanding’s on the lake shore. 
At nearly all these places, the water-lime layer or layers are seen, and of as good quality, so 
far as judgment could be formed without actual trial, as any further east. In many parts of 
the range of the group, some of the layers of the blue limestone show numerous flinty accre¬ 
tions from replaced columnaria, as in Onondaga county, etc. 
The Oriskany sandstone appears in the quarry of the New-York Company ; it is about 
two and a half feet thick, and its fossils in great numbers. They are numerous also at Yaw- 
ger’s quarry, near the road to Springport. Its thickness is about three feet. Throughout 
Cayuga it holds its place, but varies in thickness. 
