122 University Geological Survey of Kansas. 
cending waters rising from below the shale beds, it is difficult 
to understand how the shale beds could have much influence. 
With fissures so close together that ascending water could 
spread laterally from fissure to fissure, what influence would 
such shale beds have? 
(c) It has already been pointed out in these pages that the 
ground water in the mines is not so entirely artesian in effect 
as has been claimed, especially by Bain. It has been shown 
that local rains have a tremendous influence on the amount 
of water in the mine, and that throughout the Galena area 
local rainfall, which is close to forty-five inches per year, is 
sufficient to account for almost all the water pumped from 
the mines. But it should be remembered that all over the 
entire surface from Springfield westward rain water is work- 
ing down into the rock masses which now carry the ore. The 
altitude of the hilltops in the vicinity of Springfield is about 
1500 feet above sea level, and the valleys perhaps 200 feet 
less. The surface slopes quite regularly from here to Spring 
river, where the altitude is less than 900 feet. Throughout 
the entire distance the surface of the country is covered to a 
considerable extent by sink holes into which water is con- 
ducted and there sinks out of sight and unquestionably joins 
the ground water which is working its way westward. Now, 
we are asked to ignore this large amount of surface water 
which joins the general underground water and to believe 
that from the relatively small catchment area in the vicinity 
of Cedar Gap, where the Silurian porous formations come to 
the surface, almost the entire amount of mine water is ob- 
tained. Certainly there are two errors here. First, this 
catchment area is so small it could not supply more than a 
tithe of the total amount of water pumped from our deep 
mines ; and second, it does not account for the large amount 
of surface water which sinks into the ground. I think likely 
the rainfall in the vicinity of Cedar Gap may be almost en- 
tirely ignored at Galena. 
(d) Van Hise and Bain have used the wide-spread presence 
of dolomite throughout the mining district as an argument 
in favor of ascending waters, stating that the local limestones 
have so small an amount of magnesia they could not have 
