Morse.! 



238 



[January 6, 



smaller trees that were caught by the elms as the torrent of clay 

 swept by. This slide }3roved very destructive to property, damaging 

 valuable intervale land by its overflow upon it, and by the complete 

 obliteration of the river bed, forming a dam which caused the river 

 to rise some fifteen or seventeen feet, thereby flooding the lower 

 floors of the Cumberland paper-mill, and for a time completely check- 

 ing its operations. The sunken area measures about eight hundred 

 and forty thousand square feet, and extends back from the river a 

 third of a mile. As in the slides of 1831 and 1849, the substratum 

 consisted of blue clay, above which was a stratum of sandy loam. 

 We have given these general descriptions of the three slides so that 

 one may be better prepared to understand the causes which led to 

 them. Let us now examine a few of the prominent features presented 

 by these disturbances. 



Fig. 1. Sketch of the Anunoncongin Land-slide.^ 



The sunken portion is broken up by ridges running parallel to the 

 exposed banks of the slide, except where the mass is forced into the 

 the river, and there these ridges are overturned, and oftentimes 

 buried. These ridges consist of the surface soil unaltered, bearing 

 upon them the trees, or whatever they originally supported. The 



1 Fig. 1 is reduced from a sketch by my brother, taken from within the sunken 

 area, looking towards the river. It shows very clearly the character of these 

 ridges. 



