202 ROCHESTER ACADEMY OF SCIENXE. [Feb. 25, 



one hundred forty feet north and south. An abrupt high bank 

 e.xtends from the west end around the south side. The northern 

 bank is lower with a more gentle slope, and separates the peat marsh 

 from a lakelet on the northwest, near Goodman street, and from one 

 still smaller directly north. 



The unobservant eye would probably see nothing unusual or 

 interesting in this depression, as the surface is covered with a growth 

 of yellow birch and herbaceous plants, such as grow in moist woods. 

 Investigation, howexer, reveals the interesting fact that the material 

 beneath the forest mold is a deep accumulation of peat which has 

 undoubtedly filled the basin once occupied by a morainal lake. 



In the autumn of 1895 the attention of the class in Physical 

 Geology of the University of Rochester was directed to this marsh, 

 and an investigation of the deposit was made by the junior author, 

 assisted by Mr. R. B. P3nglish and Mr. C. J. Sarle. On October 

 22d, 1895, a small excavation was made by shoveling out the peat to 

 a depth of thirteen feet. From the bottom of this pit a pole was 

 thrust and driven twelve feet deeper. At this point it was evident 

 that something more solid than the peat was reached by the end of 

 the pole. Assuming the obstruction to be the bottom of the depres- 

 sion would give the peat a thickness of at least twenty-five feet. 



Below the plane of partial oxidation the peat is of a reddish yellow 

 or dull straw color when first removed. It is mainly coarse in texture, 

 showing distinctly its fibrous structure and vegetable origin. The 

 vertical section of the deposit is quite uniform in appearance, with the 

 exception of three narrow bands. Two of the latter, made up of 

 small brownish sticks or woody rootlets, are about three inches thick 

 and occur at a depth of three feet four inches and six feet respectively. 

 The third streak occurs at depth of eight and one-half feet. This is 

 darker in color and finer grained than the rest of the mass, and seems 

 to be the result of greater decomposition at that point. 



At a depth of six feet was found a pebble of quartzite. There 

 was no trace of an opening having been made through which this 

 might have fallen, and the peat fibres curxed around it in such a way 

 as to indicate that it had been dropped into the bed when the peat 

 was forming at that plane, and previous to the laying down of the 

 superincumbent mass. It seems not unreasonable to attribute the 

 occurrence of the pebble to human agency, as the upper six feet of 

 vegetable accumulation may have formed since the occupation of this 

 region by the aborigines. At nine feet below the surface was found 



