strength are desirable. Its introduction to general use in St. Louis would add much to the architectural effects produced by her public and private edifices.

Brick. The pipe-clay and sands of the drift will furnish a large amount of the very best materials suitable for manufacturing the most durable and beautiful brick. The argillaceous portions of the bluff make a very good article. It is generally diffused, and is almost universally employed for that purpose. Nearly every township in the State has an abundance of these clays.

Fire-bricks are manufactured from the fire-clays of the lower coal series in St. Louis County. These bricks have the reputation of possessing fine refractory properties. There are many beds of fire-clay in the coal measures; and besides, some beds of the Hudson River group, in Ralls and Pike Counties; of the Hamilton group, in Pike and Marion; and of the vermicular sandstone and shales on North River, seem to possess all the qualities of the very best fire-clays. The quantity of these clays is great, almost beyond computation. No possible demand could exhaust them.

Fire-rock has often been observed. Some of the more silicious beds of the coal measures are very refractory, as many have discovered. The upper strata of the ferruginous sandstone, some arenaceous beds of the encrinital limestone, the upper part of the Chouteau limestone, and the fine-grained, impure beds of the magnesian limestones, all possess qualities which will enable them to withstand the action of fire. But the 2d and 3d sandstones are the most refractory rocks yet examined, and are well adapted to use where great strength and firmness are not demanded. They are used in the furnaces at Iron Mountain and Pilot Knob.

Paints. There are several beds of purple shales in the coal measnres which seem to possess the properties requisite for paints used in outside work. Nos. 10, 31, and 50 of this formation have shales of a bright-purple color and firm texture. But No. 10 possesses the best qualities. It has a more uniform texture and color, and is much more abundant than either of the others. This bed is exposed in the bluff opposite to Bethlehem; at Fort Kearney, in a bluff ten miles below that station, opposite Sonora; at the mouth of the Little Nemaha; and at Dallas, Weston, and Parkville. Mr. Park, of the last place, has used it with oil, both alone and mixed with white-lead, for outside work; and several years' exposure have proved it very durable. Its color is more brilliant when prepared with oil; but when mixed with white-lead it produces a dark, dull, peach-blossom color, which is very agreeable and appropriate for some purposes. Its properties as

a fire-proof paint were also tested by Mr. Park. An inch board was covered with a thick coat, when coals were burned upon the painted side until the whole thickness of the board was charred; but the paint remained firm and uncracked. He has also compared it in use with the famous Ohio paint, and thinks ours the best. At several of the above localities thousands of tons could be thrown from the beds into a boat lying in the river beneath.

Cements. All of the limestone formations in the State, from the coal measures to the 4th magnesian, have more or less strata of very nearly pure carbonate of lime, which will consequently make good quick-lime. But few if any of the States have such an abundance, and so general a distribution of this important article of domestic use.

All the limestones whose physical characters indicated hydraulic properties have been collected, and some of them subjected to analysis. So far as can be judged from the results obtained, we have many beds of hydraulic limestone. Several beds of the coal measures are hydraulic.*

Vermicular Sandstone and Shales.--The middle beds are hydraulic, as indicated by the analysis.

Lithographic Limestone.-The upper beds come in this class. Cape Girardeau Limestone.-The analysis and description show good hydraulic properties.

Magnesian Limestones.-Several beds in these formations are hydraulic.

Chouteau Limestone. The upper division of this formation, as it is developed in Boone, Cooper, and Moniteau Counties, gives the best indications of excellent hydraulic properties. The beds are about thirty feet thick, and have a uniform texture and composition. These very much resemble the hydraulic strata at Louisville, and can furnish any desirable quantity.

Vermicular Sandstone and Shales.-The middle beds of this formation, both in Marion and Cooper, have superior hydraulic properties. This is especially indicated by the dark-clouded beds which were passed through in sinking the well of Mr. Winston Walker, in Cooper.

Hudson River Group.-The upper and lower beds of this formation give good evidence of being hydraulic.

From present indications, the hydraulic limestones of our State may be expected to supply the home demand and furnish large quantities for exportation.

ROAD MATERIALS.-In a country where the superficial deposits

* See Second Annual Report, page 168.

make such bad roads it is a matter of no small importance to have an abundance of good materials for highways. The limestones, so abundant in the country, are much used for macadamized roads. But the rapid pulverization of limerock, and the consequent mud and dust, particularly in towns and cities, render it very desirable to point out a more durable and economical substitute. The coarse gravels of the boulder formation and of the river beds furnish an abundance of the best possible substitute. These deposits contain gravels of any degree of fineness, from the sand suited to the formation of footpaths to the pebbles best adapted for carriage-ways. Any amount, of any given coarseness, may be obtained by screening, in all parts of the country, either from the drift or the river-beds. These pebbles have the advantage of limestones in several particulars:

1st. They are more durable, being fragments of chert and the harder igneous and crystalline rocks, which have withstood the action of those unknown but all-powerful causes which have worn away and ground to dust so large a portion of our superficial rocks, and transported to our territory such quantities of the rocks in situ, several hundred miles to the north. Those from the river-beds, also, have been exposed to aqueous action for unknown ages.

2d. They are less injurious to animals and carriages, as all the pebbles are water-worn and rounded.

3d. By their use we should avoid the impalpable dust of the limestone, so injurious to health and property in our cities. We should, also, escape much of the mud, which is scarcely less objectionable.

Should St. Louis but pave a single street with these pebbles, every person living or doing business upon it would at once see the difference in comfort and health. The impalpable dust of the dry weather and the liquid mud of the wet, would no longer soil the furniture and goods of the houses and shops, and clog the lungs and disfigure the garments of those passing over it. Material could be obtained from various parts of the State. Good pebbles are abundant in the streams of Marion, Boone, Cooper, and Moniteau. The Osage and its tributaries can supply any needed quantity, and there can be no doubt that the Gasconade and the Maramec have a good supply of them in localities nearer St. Louis. Small steamers could easily reach bars made up of good pebbles, on the Osage, the La Mine, and other streams, and obtain a supply sufficient to meet all demands.

Lithographic Limestone. This is a very fine, compact, eventextured rock, which resembles the best lithographic stones so closely that hand-specimens of them can scarcely be distinguished.

Messrs. Schaerff & Brother, of St. Louis, have tested this rock,

and pronounced some parts of it good. Excellent slabs large enough. for small engravings can be obtained with ease; but the jointed structure of the strata, and an occasional particle of iron pyrites, will make it difficult to get large slabs of suitable quality.

SPRINGS.-We have a great abundance of Springs, both fresh and mineral. The fresh springs are very numerous in all parts examined, and some of them are very large.

Bryce's Spring, on the Niangua, is the largest observed. The quantity discharged was carefully measured, and it was ascertained that 455,328 cubic feet of water were discharged per hour, and 10,927,872 cubic feet per diem. The Gunter and Sweet Springs are not quite so large; and, what increases their value, the quantity and. temperature of the water scarcely changes during the year. We have several varieties of mineral springs-chalybeate, sulphur, and brine. The most important chalybeate spring observed is in or beneath the ferruginous sandstone, west of Osceola. Salt springs are very generally diffused. The sulphur springs are also very abundant; and a few have acquired some considerable reputation for their sanitary qualities. Those most popular are the Chouteau Springs, in Cooper; the Elk Springs, in Pike; and the Monagan Springs, in St. Clair. We have seen sulphur springs in Marion, Pike, Howard, Cooper, Saline, Benton, St. Clair, and St. Louis Counties.

Petroleum Springs.-I am indebted to the Hon. Charles Sims for a bottle of petroleum, from what is commonly called Tar Spring, situated about five miles west of Coldwater Grove, which is near the middle of the western boundary of Cass County. The petroleum usually rises with the water, and forms a stratum on its surface; but, in drought, when the spring does not discharge water, it comes up in a pure state and fills the basin.

AGRICULTURAL RESOURCES OF MISSOURI.

In determining the value of a country, whether it be to secure national greatness or individual wealth and happiness, the character of the soil is of the first importance, as the largest portion of the wealth of individuals and the power of nations depend primarily upon the products of the earth; and, indeed, without a good soil, no nation can hope to enjoy any permanent prosperity and greatness.

It is doubtless true that the soil of Missouri surpasses that of any 'other equal portion of our continent in fertility and variety, and in adaptation to the varied wants of an enlightened people. While our soils and climate are surpassed by none for the production of corn, wheat, oats, grasses, hemp, and tobacco, nearly all the staple products of Europe and North America would do well in some parts of the State. In the northern part, the potato, the grasses, and cereals of the cooler northern States are most luxuriant; and in the southern portion we see the cane and cotton of the Sunny South; and in the central highlands, the cereals, grapes, and other fruits of Central and Southern Europe are yielding their rich harvests and delicious fruits as kindly as upon their chosen hills in Normandy and Italy.

There are many varieties of Soil in the State. deserve a more detailed description.

Some of them

1. Alluvial Soil. This variety occupies the bottom lands of all our large streams. It is based upon the beds of sand, clay, and humus of the alluvial formation, above described, and is one of the most desirable and productive of all in the State. Its physical properties are such, it is so light and porous and deep, that in wet weather the superabundance of water readily passes off; while, in drought, the roots sink deep, and the water below easily ascends by capillary attraction and keeps the surface moist. These scientific deductions are abundantly sustained by the experience of those who have cultivated farms on it for the past twenty or thirty years. When the crops on the neighboring farms have been parched by drought or drowned by excessive rains, those of the bottom farms have never failed from these causes.

The great fertility of this soil is very clearly shown by the tropical luxuriance of the natural vegetation. The timber is abundant and as large as any in the Mississippi valley. The most abundant trees are cottonwood; sycamore; white and sugar maple; box-elder; slippery