EDUCx\.TED FARM LABOR. 61 



the Sound. These are the primary stratified rocks, the gneiss 

 and the mica shites. 



When these hills were elevated, the valley of the Connecticut 

 River was formed. This was an immense trough, especially 

 that part between the ocean and the north line of Massachu- 

 setts. The bottom was at least 14,000 feet* below the present 

 soil, and the hills, on either side, lifted their crags two or three 

 hundred feet above their present summits. And all over Ver- 

 mont and New Hampshire, instead of the round-topped hills 

 that now exist, there were towering pinnacles, jagged cliffs and 

 shelving precipices. 



These cliffs were worn and decomposed by the rain, battered 

 by the hail, split into fragments by the frosts and the lightnings, 

 and the fragments were washed down into the valley bottom, by 

 the streams. The great trough gradually filled up, while the 

 hills were rounded, smoothed and lowered. Long Island had 

 not yet appeared, and the tidal wave rolling in unbroken from 

 the open sea, laved the base of our hills from New Llaven to 

 Northfield, and strewed the sediment over its shallowing bottom. 



How long this day continued, we do not know, but this we 

 know, that it continued long enough for things of life to appear, 

 both in the sea and on the land. Enormous l)irds were there, 

 whose weight was a thousand pounds ; whose feet were half a 

 yard long, and whose stride was equal to two paces of a man. 

 They congregated together like cranes upon the shore, waded 

 the shallow waters, and left the prints of their feet in the mud, 

 which, turning to stone, has so perfectly preserved them, that 

 we can see the papillas upon the skin of their toes. 



Dr. Hitchcock has described the tracks of at least fifty species, 

 varying in length from one-half an inch to twenty inches. 

 The greater part of them were made by bipeds, most of them, 

 probably, by birds. But, at least a dozen were made l)y quad- 

 rupeds, most of which had hind feet much larger than the fore 

 feet, like the kangaroo, king of these animals ; and walking 

 among them upon two feet, was a monster with structure like a 

 frog, but huge as an elephant. 



* See History of Western Massachusetts, vol. 1, p. .386-7 ; written by Dr. 

 Edward llitclieock, Jr., Williston Sem. At Gill Falls it was 10,000 feel deep. 

 — President Hitchcock. 



