TACGNIC SYSTEM. 
431 
many places, like the Hudson-river group. On the Columbia turnpike from Hudson to Hills¬ 
dale, the slate, near the line between Claverack and Hillsdale, shows veins of the milky quartz 
in abundance ; and these veins contain chlorite, pyrites and brown spar, like the similar rocks in 
the western parts of Austerlitz, Canaan, New-Lebanon, and eastern parts of Ghent and Chatham, 
Farther east, the rocks become more talcose, and contain crystals of pyrites. They all dip 
to the eastward at high angles. Limestone, like that of the Lebanon and Little Hoosick val¬ 
leys, was seen on the east side of Ancram creek in Hillsdale, about a mile east of thu village, 
at the base of the mountain. It was succeeded on the east by talcy slate, which continued 
to the summit of the mountain. Diluvial scratches were seen in abundance on this road near 
the line between New-York and Massachusetts, near an angle of the valley up which the road 
passes, about two hundred feet above its bottom, on a point of the lower range of mountains. 
The rock on the north side of the road is ground off over a large area that is exposed. Their 
direction is N. 55° W. and S. 55° E. The rock is the talcy slate, with veins-.and nests of 
quartz containing pyrites, brown spar, and oxides of iron and manganese. The quartz resem¬ 
bles that from some of the gold mining districts of North-Carolina and Virginia. 
The position of the rocks, and their succession, are represented on the section from Hills¬ 
dale to Little-York in Massachusetts (Vide Plate 14, fig. 1). Sections across similar rocks 
in Columbia county are represented on Plate 14, figures 2, 3, 6; Plate 13, figs. 3 and 6; 
Plate 16, figs. 1,3; Plate 17, figs. 1, 2, 3. The same order of succession as that indicated 
on Plate 14, fig. 1, was observed in crossing west over the mountain from Little-York, four 
or five miles north of the line of section. At the western base of the mountain in the Ancram 
creek valley in Hillsdale, fine quarries of white and clouded grey marbles may probably be 
opened. On Mr. William Palmer’s land, the white limestone is deemed to be of good quality, 
but is not favorably situated for working extensively, in consequence of its lying so low. The 
localities where where the limestone is white and highly crystalline, are not very numerous 
in this valley; and this is mentioned here, only as affording the means of tracing its connec¬ 
tion with beds of the same rocks less changed by metamorphic agency. On the east side of 
this mountain range the white limestone abounds, and is extensively quarried for white marble 
in Egremont, Sheffield, West-Stockbridge, &c. On the east side of the mountain between 
Little-York in Egremont, and William Palmer’s in Hillsdale, the grey limestone (which is the 
same as the white, only less altered) was observed interstratified with the slate. About one 
mile from Hillsdale village, on the road to Green river in Austerlitz, limestone was seen in 
place on the banks of the west branch of the creek, and it continued in place at intervals to 
near the church, four or five miles north of Hillsdale. At one and a half miles on the east 
side of the road, across a bog of ligneous peat, the limestone crops out in a knoll, and is filled 
with cubic crystals of iron pyrites. The rocks, from the church above alluded to, when seen, 
were slate, talcy slate, and chloritic slate, with some grits, to Canaan gap, where the Albany 
and Boston turnpike and the railroad cross through the mountains. Limestone skirts the east 
side of the valley leading north into the Lebanon valley, of which it is a part. It is grey or 
light buff-colored, and more or less intersected by veins of calc spar and of quartz. The lime- 
