* 
36 Finch on the Tertiary Formations 
The plain to the south of this is well known to consist prin- 
cipally of sand, distinguished by the evenness of its surface, 
and nearly the whole of Long Island. at the depth of thirty 
to fifty feet, consists of a stratum of sand and gravel, in which 
are various shells, venus, ostrea, murex. In the same stra- 
tum are found boughs and trunks of trees, bark and damag- 
ed wood. Nearly the whole of this island may therefore 
be considered as forming a part of the plastic clay and sand 
formation, unless indeed the sand hills near Brooklyn may 
be considered as part of another formation. Upon: Staten 
Island the plastic clay is conspicuous in several situations. 
In New-Jersey this formation occupies a very exten- 
sive tract of country; the clays from Amboy, the port 
where they are shipped, have been long celebrated in com- 
merce. In ascending the stream of the Raritan, I had 
great pleasure in tracing this formation on the south-east 
shore, to within three miles of Brunswick ; it probably ex- 
tends across the whole of New Jersey. At Bordentown, 
on the Delaware, it is very conspicuous: the banks of the 
. 
river, for two miles south of that town, afford as good an op- 
few feet. Beds of lignite and blue clay, interspersed with 
iron pyrites, with which in one or two ‘situations the shore 
is covered; large masses and beds of ochre of the most 
brilliant appearance ; the waters of the Delaware colored: 
by the wreck ofthese strata; altogether present a fine view 
to the admirer of tertiary formations. In some instances 
the banks are undermined by the river, or by land springs ; 
large masses of the cliffs give way, and what are called land 
slips occur, in which sands, clays, lignites and pyrites are 
mingled with the wrecks of the kalmia, liriodendron, carex, 
and magnolia. 
I have been informed by Professor Vanuxem of South 
Carolina College, that amber has been found in the lignite 
of this formation ; some of the white clays of commerce are 
obtained at a distance two miles up the creek at Borden- 
town. 
It is probably a continuation of the same plastic clay and 
sand which appears in New Jersey, on the river Delaware, 
three miles above Philadelphia. It is there distinguished 
