1893.] NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 189 



PLANT DISTRIBUTION AS A FACTOR IN THE INTER- 

 PRETATION OF GEOLOGICAL PHENOMENA, 

 ^ WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO LONG 



ISLAND AND VICINITY. 



BY ARTHUR HOLLICK. 



In "The Medical Repository," Vol. IIL, 2d Ed., pp. 325-335, 

 and Vol. V., pp. 212-215, published in the years 1805 and 1802, 

 respectively, Samuel L. Mitchill indulges in speculations con- 

 cerning the mineralogy and geology of Long Island and its 

 vicinity. From his articles I quote as follows : 



Long, or Nassau Inland. This piece of land, which forms the east 

 and south sides of the bay and harbour of New Y'ork, extends north-east- 

 wardly about 120 miles, and terminates in a fork ; the shorter extremity 

 of which is called Oyster-Pond [Orient Point], and the longer, Montauk- 

 Point. . . . A ridge of hills runs almost the entire length of it on the 

 north side and completely divides its waters. . . . The face of the 

 country, on the one side of this elevation, which may be called the Spine 

 of the Island, is exceedingly different from that on the other. On the north 

 side it is variegated, uneven, and very much diversified with hills and 

 dales ; while on the south, little else is discovered by the traveller than a 

 Hat surface, sloping very gradually away toward the ocean. 



This will stand as a very excellent general description of 

 Long Island topography as we recognize it to-day, but the 

 speculations concerning its geology, which follow, reveal the 

 curious conceptions of men of science at that time, and cause 

 us to smile involuntarily. He says : 



From a survey of the fossils in these parts of the American coast, 

 one becomes convinced that the principal share of them is granitical, 

 composed of the same sorts of materials as the hiffhest Alps, Pijrennees, Cau- 

 casus, and the Andes, and, like them, destitute of metals and petrifactions. 



The occurrence of no horizontal strata, and the frequency of vertical 

 layers, led him further to suppose, thai these strata are not secondary collec- 

 tions of minerals, hut are certainly in a state of primrnal arrangement. . . . 



What inference remains now to be drawn from this statement of 

 facts, but that the fashionable opinion of considering these maritime 

 parts of our country as flats, hove up from the deeps by the sea, or brought 

 down from the heights by the rivers, stands unsupported by reason, and 

 <!ontradicted by experience. 



