Report of a Geological Reconnaissamce Made in 1835 from the Seat of Government by Way of Green Bay and the Wisconsin Territory to Coteau de Prairie (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1836. Excerpt: ... glomerate, and ending with the weald clay, both inclusive, (a very remarkable deficiency, which I was the first to point out, in the year 1828, ) I shall merely advert to the prominent characters of the different mineral beds, that any student into whose hands this report may come, may have an opportunity of applying those characters to any rocks he may meet with, which are not in accordance with those of the rocks hitherto alluded to. In an economical point of view, the formations in question, not containing the precious metals, or much of the useful ones, or embracing any important deposite of coal, are not so much to be regretted, except, perhaps, on the score of the fine freestones they include; but nothing, as will hereafter be seen, can exceed the surprising interest which the organic remains embraced in them have excited. We now come to a series of formations constituting the new red sandstone group, which varies very much in its structure in different portions of Europe. The whole group, however, maybe divided into five portions--the variegated marls of the Vosges in France, the muschelkalk of Wurtemberg and other parts of Germany, the new red or variegated sandstone, the magnesian limestone or zechstein, and the Exeter red conglomerate or todtliegende. These will be briefly noticed in the ascending order. The Exeter red conglomerate, or supposed equivalent of todtliegendes, is a conglomerate formed of beds which have preceded it, fragments of the carboniferous limestone forming a considerable portion of its structure. It is called in Germany todtliegende or dead stratum, in contradistinction to a bed of copper slate which rests upon it, and which is worked for the metal it affords, itself producing none. The magnesian limestone or zechstein varies..