44 
ON THE GEOLOGY AND NATURAL HISTORY 
At several places soon after crossing Grasshopper creek, we met with some highly fos- 
silifcrons beds along the small streams, at an elevation of apparently about eighty feet 
above the Kansas. Below we give a section of these beds seen at a locality some eight 
miles southwest of the point where the exposures mentioned on Grasshopper creek were 
observed: 
Feet. 
1. Rough seams and layers of concretionary limestone of bluish tinge with partings of clay, containing Terc- 
hralula millepunctata, Sp Rig era suhtilita, Spirifer cameratus, S. KentucJcensis, Rctzia Mormonii , 
Rhynclionella Ufa, Productus Norwoodii, P. splendens?, P. semireticulatus, P. Prattenianus, Orthi- 
sina, similar to O. umbracidum, also Fenestella, and Chcetetcs, of undetermined species, ... 4 
2. Black shale, shading upwards gradually into laminated blue clay, . . . . . . . 2J 
3. Hard blue or gray limestone, with Spirifer cameratus, Spiritjera sultilita, 31/jalina, Pecten, &c., . . 1 
4. Bluish gray soft clay, with seams of hard limestone, .......... 3 
5. Light gray, somewhat granular limestone, with a few round grains, and very small pebbles of quartz, . 2 
At another place on the south side of the Kansas, about twelve miles southwest of the 
point where the last section was seen, there is an abrupt bluff near the old Baptist Mission, 
composed of the following beds in the descending order: 
Feet. 
1. Slope, no rocks exposed, ............... 20 
2. Hard yellowish gray limestone, with fragments of fossils, ......... 4 
3. Slope, no rock exposed, ............... 18 
4. Light gray, rather hard, fine-grained sandstone, ........... 3 
5. Slope, .................. 20 
6. Fine-grained sandstone, in thin layers, not well exposed ; apparently ....... 2 
7. Slope, with occasional outcrops of hard gray limestone, ......... 16 
8. Yellowish and dark gray laminated clay, or soft shale, with layers and nodular concretions of argillaceous 
carbonate of iron, near base,* ............. 90 
9. Hard bluish argillaceous limestone, of which there was exposed in the bed of a small stream, not more 
than 13 or 15 feet above the river, a thickness of .......... 1 
After passing this locality, we heard of a coal mine some three or four miles south of 
here, near the base of an isolated hill, known as Shunganunga mound. We did not visit 
this mine, but were informed that it is considerably above the summit of the last section, 
and that the bed is about eighteen inches in thickness. The coal is said to be of good 
quality. 
Above here, on both sides of the Kansas, the country continues to be rather low, no part 
of it being, apparently, more than two hundred feet above the river. For a long distance 
above this there is a beautiful broad level bottom prairie, on the north side of the 
* There may be some thin beds of limestone in this portion of the section, as every part of this ninety foot bed 
was not well exposed. 
