86 
GEOLOGY OF THE FIRST DISTRICT. 
4. Sulphate of Magnesia, Muriate of Soda, and Muriate of Lime. 
Sulphate of magnesia is frequently found efflorescing in acicular crystals, or as a pulveru¬ 
lent powder with the sulphate of lime, at and near the pyritous stratum at the base of the 
water-limestones around the Helderberg mountain, in Albany county ; also at the locality of 
sulphate and nitrate of lime, a few rods below the High falls of the Rondout in Marbletown, 
Ulster county.* It may probably be found in many localities along the base of the water 
limestone series, from Sharon springs, by Schoharie, Bethlehem, Kingston, and thence through 
the Mamakating valley to Carpenter’s point on the Delaware, and wherever iron pyrites are 
associated with the magnesian limestone. It also occurs in some of the mineral springs. A 
strong spring of epsom salts occurs at Coeymans in Albany county, and the same salt efflo¬ 
resces on the clay at the same place ;t and on another clay bank at Lansingburgh, six miles 
north of Troy,:}; on land of Judge Hickock. Sulphate of magnesia has been found on a cal¬ 
careous sandstone overlying limestone, ten miles northwest of Coeymans, on the Helderberg 
mountain in Albany county and at another locality on the Helderberg, crystallized, but the 
locality not specified.|j Another locality has been observed at Hudson.^ 
Muriate of soda has been found in the interior of the First Geological District only at licks, 
where animals have been in the habit of resorting to lick the clay and soil, where saline mat¬ 
ters effloresce or ooze from the earth. Deer-licks are common in Delaware county, and they 
probably were in many of the other counties, while they were inhabited by the wild animals ; 
but a knowledge of them is lost, or confined to the old inhabitants, and will soon be entirely 
obliterated, unless the localities be published by those interested in preserving such know¬ 
ledge. The licks, as they are called, do not always indicate muriate of soda, though the 
principal ones contain that salt. 
Salt is said to have been formerly made by the hunters, three and a half miles from Col¬ 
chester, Delaware county,** on the land of George Doane, on the east fork of the west branch 
of Downe’s brook, one fourth of a mile north of the road from Walton to Colchester. The 
water was not perceptibly saline to the taste at the time of my visit in September, 1840 ; but 
there was distinct evidence that it was a place of resort for cattle, although there was an 
abundance of good water near the same place. 
At a salt lick three and a half miles from Delhi, Delaware county, in the valley of Elk 
creek, a salt well was bored three hundred and ninety-four feet a few years ago, and the 
brine became stronger as far as they bored. The strength was not ascertained, but it 
* Assembly Document No. 50, 1840 : Geological Report, p. 245. 
t Eaton. Silliman’s Journal, Vol. 15, p. 241 and 242. 
X Id. Ibid. Vol. 15, p. 242 ; and Agrieultural Survey of Rensselaer county, p. 28. 
Cleaveland’s Mineralogy; Webster’s Catalogue, p. 6; Geological Survey of Albany County. 
II Robinson’s Catalogue of Minerals, p. 132; Webster’s Catalogue, p. 6 ; Geological Survey of Albany County. 
«ir Ibid. 
** Assembly Document No. 50, 1840; Geological Report, page 233. 
