Connecticut western news., 1877-01-05
Ashley Falls Rocks.

EDITOR PEAsR.
 Having recently examined the rocks at the ''Falls" with much interest, 1t occurred to me that some of your readers might like to take glance of them through my eyes, and be induced to look at them with their own when summer suns shall have knocked off the chains in which winter now holds them bound. was very fortunate in hay ing your kind and honored father as my pilot and guide. Unknown to each other, either by face or name, our meeting was purely accidental. but by turn of our nat urally kindred spirits, united when brought in contact, they need no other introduc- ton. l found him thoroughly acquainted with the Falls, having had personal knowl- edge of all it's movements a large part of the passing century, as we'll as that long period of which the rocks themselves are the only historian. His knowledge was minute and definite, extending from the tracks of the water on the top of tte rocks, to the secret passage at the bottom of the pond, through which the water has occa- sionally given our old friend Bates dodge, and left his mill wheels dry. AS looked at now, there are 70 'talls' except what are made by the dams. Between the road and tue mills the river parts. one branch carry ing the saw and the other the grain mill. These branches unite little below the dams, thus encircling the island on which the saw mlll stands. Judging from the basin below the dams, and the position of the rocks, we infer that the OLD FALLS, the immense Great Grandfather Falls, was but little below the island, and was con siderably .shigher than the present dams. That they ireceded or moved back until they cut through the ridge at or near the railroad bridge, and drained the broad lake east. So far, think, one can read with out difficulty. The footprints of the fall ing stream as it travelled back are very dis tinct. But the rocks themselves, their character and position, are problem more difficult than the changes in the course of the stream, and carry us back in the ''life and times" of time beyond the wear ing. The rock would be classed by geologists with mica slate. Quarrymen speak of the grain of rocks. They will split with or in the grain. Now what they call the grain, the geologist calls layers or strata, and the rock that has grain-strata, layers-he calls stratihed, slaty, etc. The rock may lie so that the layers or strata are horizontal, so that water. if poured on them, would not know which way to run. If one edge is lower, then the strata dips, and the dip is toward the lowest edge. If the west edge is sunk, or the east raised (which is the same) the dip is west, and SO of any other position. The strata may be horizontal or perpendicular, or at any angle between. This dipping of the strata is a very simple thing, but of great importance D deciding multitude of questions. Now the rocks at the Falls have been so hove up, tumbled up, and twisted up, that hardly any two of them look alike, or have the same dip. For instance, in the road west of the river and between the road and the mill, the dip is southwest, but varying
 
 foot of the dam it is reversed-being about 45 deg. and north of cast. On the island, west of the road to the saw mill, the rock, part of which is fire stone, has large al- most perpendicular easterly dip. East of the road and near the saw mill, the strata are so twisted, and the surface of the rock Is so pot-holed by water yod can hardly tell how 1t lies. This island seems to have felt the uplifting and disturbing force very severely. The east bank below the dam has large dip, 60 deg. to 80 deg. easterly. En tho road and near the river east of the road the strata is in a complete tumble Some ot 1t horizontal, some dipping slightly east. The ridge east of the road and west of the railroad has well.marked easterly dip of about 45 deg, or what some people call half dip. How deep this jumbllng ex- tends, no one can tell. It seems like the work of some gigantic power putting shoulder beneath, raising up, pitching some of 1t east, and some west, and leaving some masses standing on the edge of the strata, and others lying horizontally. l have little doubt but that passages by which all the water in the pond has escaped more than once, and was never afterward heard from, was at the meeting of some of these disjointed masses. MT. P. tells me that it Is now as tight as stone and cement can make it.
 Mir. Pease gave me, and can furnish you, many interesting items of early history con- nected with '' Ashley Falls" Items which it will be difficult to recall, if the fathers are permitted to carry them away when they go hence. One question for those better acquainted with the location than am. If you build dam across the stream from rock to rock at or near the railroad bridge, and make it as high as the rocks, will the water run over it, or jump on the cars. ride south, by your office, or will it find some other channel to the river9 love to trace the old channel.
 Pittsdeld, Dec, 1876. SIR.
 HOuSatOniC R. R O.