Scientific Intelligence — Geology and Mineralogy. 185 



Not far from the geographical centre of Vermont, in the town of 

 Randolph, on ascending a hill a mile east of the centre village, may- 

 be seen a ledge of argillo-mica-slate, in which the planes of lamina- 

 tion do not coincide with those of deposit. The former have a di- 

 rection of north Zb^ east (true meridian), and a dip of 30° to the 

 north, 55° west. The true strata have a direction of north and 

 south, with a dip of 65° west ; and although much less conspicuous 

 than the cleavage planes, are distinguished, Avithout much difficulty, 

 by a slight difference of materials, in consequence of which they 

 weather unequally, so as to form shallow grooves with a well-rounded 

 excavation of 3 to 6 inches wide, and an inch deep. The coinci- 

 dence of the direction of these grooves, with the ordinary cases of 

 drift-furrows, and their obliquity to the planes of lamination, which 

 are obvious to the passing traveller, who may not, without special 

 examination, recognise the true stratification of the rock, as well as 

 the well-rounded excavation of the grooves, due, no doubt, to the 

 gradual transition in the characters of the strata, combine to present 

 a case of extraordinary resemblance to genuine drift-furrows. 



It is proper to add, that the examination of several hundred ex- 

 amples of rounded, smoothed, striated, and furrowed rocks, has 

 brought to light only this case, in which structural grooves bear 

 any resemblance to those which have resulted solely from an exter- 

 nal mechanical force. The suggestion of Mr Macintosh is, there* 

 fore, plainly incapable of general or even common application, al- 

 though cases may occur in which it is worthy of careful attention. 

 Indeed, President Hitchcock has himself* most scrupulously distin- 

 guished the drift-furrows from those which are due to structure. 

 Sir R. T. Murchison also remarks, that *' the greater number of 

 the deviously parallel scratches on the worn surface of the hard cry- 

 stalline rocks of the north, are, in our opinion, clearly mechanical, 

 and cannot be connected with structural condition." — American 

 Journal of Science, Literature, and Arts, vol. iii., p. 433. 



2. Food of the Mastodon. — fProc. Bost. Nat. Hist. Soc.J — Pro- 

 fessor Gray stated, that there had been recently placed in his hands 

 Kpccimens of earthy matter, filled with finely broken fragments of 

 branches of trees, which were said to have been found occupying the 

 place of the stomach in the skeleton of the mastodon exhumed on 

 Schooley's Mountain, N. I., and lately exhibited in Boston. As si- 

 milar observations are said to have been made in several instances. 

 Professor Gray was induced to examine the substance brought to him. 

 The wood evidently consisted of branchlets of one, two, and three 

 years old, broken, quite uniformly, into bits of half an inch or so in 

 length, with only now and then traces of the bark remaining on the 

 wood. The wood was not at all fossilized, and was but slightly de- 

 cayed. From the appearance of the branchlets examined, Professor 



Final Report on the Geology of ;^^HSsachusctts, p. 385. 



