Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 27.djvu/546

528 texture from the vicinity of Austin. Some of these take a good polish, and might be used as marbles.

No lithographic limestones that can compare with the imported stone have as yet been found in this country. Silverville, Indiana; Glascow Junction, Kentucky; and Saverton, Missouri, each produce fine, even-grained stones of a drab color which have been put upon the market at various times as lithographic stone, but so far as is known to the writer the Missouri stone is the only one now used for this purpose.

The total amount of sandstone quarried in the United States during the census year was 24,776,930 cubic feet, valued at $4,780,391; the same being the product of 502 quarries representing an invested capital of $6,229,600.

Sandstone-quarrying in the United States doubtless began with the itinerant working of the extensive Triassic deposits of "brown-stone" in the vicinity of Portland, Connecticut. Where now are excavations upward of one hundred feet in depth, were then steep cliffs overhanging the river, and from these the inhabitants of Middletown and neighboring localities early began to carry away material for general building purposes as well as for monuments and gravestones. To such an extent had this system of free quarrying been carried, that as early as 1665 a resolve was passed similar in purpose to that relative to the granite bowlders on the Quincy Commons, to the effect "that no one shall dig or raise stone at the Rocks on the east side of the river" (now Portland) "but an inhabitant of the town, and that twelve pence shall be paid to the town for every ton of stone taken." Not long after this the quarries thus opened passed from the possession of the town into that of private parties, and what is now known as Brainard's quarry is said to have been operated since 1700. There are now three quarries situated in a line along the river's bank at this place, from which have been taken altogether some 4,300,000 cubic feet of stone, or enough to build a wall nearly two and a half feet high, and one foot thick, around the entire State!

Of the same geological age and general appearance as those of Connecticut, though varying slightly in color and texture, are the brown and red sandstones quarried in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland. In all of these the cementing material that binds together the rounded and angular grains of which they are composed is largely iron oxide, which gives the color to the stone and yet leaves it soft enough to be worked at only a very moderate cost.

On account of their pleasing colors and easy working qualities these stones have been great favorites for general building purposes, as the monotonous rows of brown-stone fronts in New York city too well attest.

Of about equal importance with these brown Triassic stones are the light-colored subcarboniferous sandstones of Ohio and elsewhere.