458 
GEOLOGY OF THE FIRST DISTRICT. 
Verplanck. This stratum is bounded on the west by hornblende slate, and on the east by 
hornblende rock. This stratum crosses the road about three-fourths of a mile north-northeast 
of Hardy’s hotel. 
Limestone forms the shore at Verplanck landing, and skirts it for one mile to one and one- 
fourth miles up Peekskill bay. 
Near Verplanck landing, the limestone is much injected with veins of hornblende, so as to 
unfit it for making lime. This place is well worth the attention of geologists, as showing the 
intrusion of one rock into another. At a small distance north of the landing, the limestone is 
free of hornblende, and is nearly a pure limestone, making very good lime, and which is said 
to be equal to the Thomaston and Rhode-Island lime. As to the quantity of stone here acces¬ 
sible and adapted for lime, we may estimate the mean height above high water mark at twenty- 
one feet over an area of fifty to eighty acres, lining the shore of the bay nearly a mile in length. 
Each cubic yard of rock will make at least four barrels of lime, including the necessary waste. 
This would give about 135,000 barrels to the acre ; or, for sixty acres, 8,100,000 barrels of 
lime. Two kilns were burning as perpetual kilns at the time of my visit. They produce 
twenty-five barrels of lime per diem, with a consumption of one ton of anthracite coal.* The 
expense of quarrying the stone is about thirty-six cents per cubic yard, or nine cents per barrel. 
The expense of coal is about twenty-five cents per barrel. The lime was stated to be selling 
at New-York, at the time of my visit, for one dollar and fifty cents per barrel; giving a profit, 
after deducting every expense, including teams, attendance, freight, casks and cooperage, of 
fifty-three cents per barrel. If we allow a nett profit of only twenty-five cents per barrel, 
an acre of this limestone of twenty-one feet thick, is capable of yielding a clear profit of 
$33,880. 
Some parts of the limestone along the shore above Verplanck’s point seem adapted for 
marble, and if worked into, beyond the effects of atmospheric changes, might afford as good 
monumental marbles as the quarries of Berkshire county, Massachusetts. The rock, where 
it appears suitable, might be uncovered free of expense, by burning the stone for lime. Should 
the rock at this place prove suitable for a marble, it might be quarried and sent to market at 
less expense, as here it is on navigable water, and no land transportation required. The 
expense of sawing here would undoubtedly be greater, but the increase would not be equal 
to the expense of land transport twenty-five to thirty-five miles over the mountain to the 
Hudson river. 
Hornblondic rocks skirt the shore from Peekskill to within about two miles of Verplanck’s 
point. They are similar, and a continuation of the same bed that extends from Verplanck’s 
point northward, bounding the limestone on the east. This rock is in some places coarsely 
stratified, and then the strata dip to the westward twenty to thirty degrees. A thin stratum 
or bed of granite of a nearly white color, was seen on the shore three-quarters of a mile below 
Peekskill. Much of the hornblendic rock approaches in appearance to the Quincy sienite, and 
* This stone must be difficult to burn, or else the coal is not used to advantage, either from a defective form of the kiln, or bad 
management of the workmen. At Barnegate, ten times as much lime is obtained with the same fuel. 
