SCIENTIFIC SURVEY. 305 



cessively T5° N. 10° W., 90°, and "75° S. 10° E. Many of the 

 pebbles are distorted in some way, as they are very apt to be in 

 disturbed localities. The pebbles are composed of granite, a schis- 

 tose rock, sandstone and hyaline quartz. All kinds of them in 

 certain layers are flattened, elongated, and sometimes indented, just 

 as if all them had been somewhat plastic ; and when the strata 

 were elevated by the great plicating agency, these layers of peb- 

 bles, on account of their yielding nature, were compressed into a 

 smaller bulk than before, the different fragmentf; altering their 

 shapes so as to be accommodated to all the crevices of the mass. 

 Even the granite pebbles have been distorted here, which is not 

 common elsewhere ; they appearing the most unyielding. These 

 pebbles are commonly flattened in the direction of the dip, show- 

 ing the force to have been a pressure simply, without the tension 

 of curvature which seems to have elongated pebbles elsewhere in 

 the direction of the strike. 



Last year we called attention to this subject so fully that we will 

 add nothing now, (See page 1T8, et seq., where is a sketch of elon- 

 gated pebbles.) It is a new subject in geology upon which but 

 few geologists have yet given their opinions. No geologist doubts 

 that many fossils have been distorted by pressure, and that exerted 

 in the same manner in which we suppose the pebbles have been 

 misshaped ; and if fossils can be distorted by pressure, why not 

 pebbles, which must have been somewhat plastic during the pro- 

 cess of metamorphisra ? For instance, Dana in his Manual of 

 Geology, page 109, says : (though he has not expressed any opin- 

 ion respecting the distortion of pebbles,) '/These uplifts of the 

 rocks, besides disturbing the strata themselves, cause distortion 

 also in imbedded fossils,— either (1) a flattening from simple pres- 

 sure, or, in addition, (2) an obliquity of form, or else (3) a short- 

 ening, or (4) an elongation." This language would describe 

 admirably the changes undergone by these pebbles in the same 

 circumstances. 



We will only say further in relation to this subject, that this is 

 the finest locality to exhibit these phenomena of any yet observed 

 within the State. It shows the process just as finely as near New- 

 port, ^. I., which was described last year as the classic ground. 

 Every feature exhibited near Newport may be seen also in this 

 plantation. Both the altered and unaltered pebbles are present, as 

 if to show the differences by contrast. This locality is in an older 



