12 THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



These "Leaps" consist of piles of oyster-sliells, varying from one to six or seven feet in deptL, packed closely 

 together and all ready to crumble, unless handled with great care. They begin in small quautily down nearly to 

 the falls at the bridge connecting Damariscotta and Newcastle, and thence continue nninterruptedly on both sides 

 of the river, up to the southern end of the bay. Here the heaps reach their greatest magnitude, and are best 

 observed upon the point of land which juts out into the southwestern part of the bay. Beyond this point, however, 

 scattering heaps are found along the shores. It has been estimated that not less than 8,000,000 cubic feet of shells 

 are thus piled up, and easily accessible. 



It was once supposed that these beds were fossil, or that they had been formed by water in some way, and then 

 elevated above the sea-level. But an examination soon dispelled this notion, which nobody now believes. Their 

 position, structure, and contents, show conclusively that they are the work of human hands,* and a product of the 

 very earliest American oyster-fishery of which we have any knowledge. 



' If one digs down through them, he finds at the depth of a few feet that he comes suddenly to the earth and 

 gravel of the natural soil. This is seen plainly in section at several points on the western shores, where the water 

 has eroded the bank. The line of demarcation between the shells and the soil is sharp ; there is no intermingling 

 whatever.! In many places, however, the shells from above have slid down the face of the high bank, entirely 

 concealing its face, and covering the beach below. This gives a fictitious appearance of great depth, which has 

 deceived some writers upon the matter, I think. The shells are almost invariably single. In an hour's digging I 

 found but one specimen where the two valves were together. They lie in all sorts of positions, in close contact 

 with each other, and so loosely that it is easy to pick them out of the bank one by one.| They are all of very 

 large size and some even gigantic. Shells have been taken out repeatedly that exceeded a foot in length, and one 

 of 15 inches is reported. They are, as a rule, long, narrow, and somewhat curved or scimitar-shaped. Broad and 

 straight ones are found, however. The shells are thick, but they flake away so in removal from the heap, that 

 scarcely more than the harder, nacreous, inner layers are usually obtained. Nearly all trace of color, inside and 

 out, has disappeared. 



They are not everywhere of uniform depth, but thin here and thicker there, as though cast up in heaps, and the 

 soil over them is very thin, and consists only of decayed loam; but there was once a small forest of spruce trees there, 

 and there still remain some very large and aged trunks and an abundance of bushes. At one place on the eastern 

 side the most extensive deposits of all crown the summit of a bluff or knoll CO feet or more in height, the face of 

 which seems terraced with shells, which extend back many rods from the river-bank.§ Scattered through the 

 banks, also, are the shells of the soft clam, quahaug, mussel, scallop, and various other remains, as I shall mention 

 hereafter. 



When the earliest explorers lauded upon the shores of North America, tley found that the Indians of all 

 regions were acquainted with the edible qualities of the various shell fish, aiid ate all that we now make use of.|| 

 They understood perfectly, also, the superior value of the clam and oyster, and everywhere along the New England 

 coast were accustomed to assemble at favorable points and have feasts of mollusks and maize, with much merry- 

 making. That fine old institution of Rhode Island and Connecticut, the clam-bake, almost the only thing that was 

 allowed to warm the cockles of a Puritan's heart, and still the joUiest festival in summer experience alongshore, 

 perpetuates the practice of the aborigines. Here, in southern IMaine, appears to have been a particularly, 

 favorable spot, isolated from the southern abundance of bivalves, and here the Quoddy Indians came in great 

 numbers. There is every evidence that these shores were much more thickly populated by the red men than the 

 coast regions either east or west of it. The word "Damariscotta" is said to mean "river of little fishes", and its 

 neighboring streams were equally famous for their finny wealth. In addition, the soil was fertile, the game very 

 abundant, and the climate pleasant. It may be said that, for an Indian district, the population was dense. 



* The evidence seemed conclusive, that these shell-mounds were not extinct oyster-heds, left exposed by some former uplift of the 

 Atlantic coast, hut the work of ahoriginal tribes, who repaired to this favored region at certain seasons of the year, and celebrated their 

 feasts with the delicious bivalve which must have formerly abounded in these waters. That these feasts were held periodically and, 

 perhaps, at considerable intervals, is shown by the condition of the larger deposits, and especially the large one which slopes to the water's 

 edge on the west bank of the river.— Moses, rroceetUiigs Central Ohio Scienlijic A-ftodolwii, i, p. 74. See also, Dr. Jeffries Wymau's 

 account in Second Jnnual Ecjtort, Ftabody Museum of Anhwology, Cambridge, 1809. 



tThe deposits are entirely free from any admixture of soil or dc'bris of any sort, and one is struck with the appearance which a 

 fresh section presents, the clean, white wall of shells looking like a kiln of freshly baked porcelain.— Moses, loc. cil., 74. Wherever we 

 found a deep section of shells so lately made that the surface had not decomposed, the o]>eu appearance of the shells was marked. They 

 were not mingled with fragments of bone or broken shells or with sand, presenting, in tliis respect, an entirely different appearance from 

 the great deposit of oyster-shells by water at the mouth of the St. Mary's river, Georgia, which I had an opportunity of carefully 

 observing two years ago. — CiIjVDBOURNE, Trans. Maine Hist. Soc, vi. 



} Another circumstance that strikes the explorer, is the extremely loose condition of the shells, even at the base of a deposit of great 

 depth. The shell may be drawn out with the greatest ease from any portion of the bank, and, with a little caution, in an entire state, 

 although readily crumbling if not handled with great care.— Moses, toe. cit., 74. The shells lie very loosely, are remarkably white and 

 friable, being in a state of partial decomposition and readily falling to pieces when handled. — Moses, loc. at., i, p. "i'i. 



§ One of the deposits, as surveyed by Mr. John M. Brown and myself, has the following dimensions : Shape, oval; length, 180 feet; 

 breadth, 100 feet; depth, 6 feet ; height of base above high-water mark, 4 feet. The top of the loftiest mound is 31 feet above high-water 

 mark. It descends abruptly toward the river, and at its base the action of the water has ionned a fine shell-beach. — JlOSES, loc. eil., 75. 



II See paragraph 6. 



