The Geology of Hingham. 3 



The greatest width across the town, direct east and west, is from 

 where Scituate touches the boundary to Weymouth. This is five 

 miles. Across the northern part of the town, at the point of its 

 junction with Hull and Cohasset, west to Weymouth River, the 

 width is a little over four and a third miles. Between these two 

 measurements it narrows on an east and west line to about three 

 and a third miles. 



Topography. 



The topography of Hingham is of sucli marked character as to 

 make it of exceeding interest to those who are at all acquainted 

 with surface geology. The writer therefore hopes to be able to 

 impart such knowledge of this in later pages devoted to the phe- 

 nomena of glacial action as will add much to the pleasure of 

 townsmen and strangers alike in travelling over its territory. 



The most noticeable features arise from the great number of 

 the beautiful hills belonging to a class called by Irish geologists, 

 Drumlins, signifying long, rounded hills, and by our own country- 

 man, Prof. Charles H. Hitchcock, Lenticular Hills, from their 

 lens-like form. They are distinguished by their oval and sym- 

 metrical outlines, by their composition, and by the direction of 

 their longest axes, which in this region is approximately north- 

 west and southeast. They are products of the ice period, in the 

 treatment of which a full account of them will be given. Otis 

 Hill, Turkey Hill, Prospect Hill, Baker's Hill, Squirrel Hill, Great 

 Hill, Planters' Hill, the Hills of World's End, the Hills of Crow 

 Point and neighborhood, and many others of lesser magnitude, 

 are of this character. Of much less prominence, but of not less 

 interest to students of surface geology, are the Karnes, so called, 

 consisting of ridges, hills, and hillocks, which occur over a large 

 portion of territory in the western part of the town. These, like 

 the Lenticular Hills, owe their origin to glacial action. 



In a very general way it may be said that the settlements of the 

 town rest upon four surfaces of different elevations, namely : one 

 along the harbor and spreading west towards Fort Hill and Wey- 

 mouth River ; Lower Plain, so called, which rises from the first- 

 mentioned, half a mile or more inland ; Glad Tidings Plain, a 

 slightly higher level which succeeds the last, three or four miles 

 inland, and which is separated from it by a depression of the land ; 

 and finally, Liberty Plain, the highest of all, reaching to the 

 southern boundary. 



This statement, however, though true of the several settlements 

 of the town, affords but a very inadequate idea of the diversified 

 character of the whole territory, for even the lowest region has 

 several of the high hills mentioned rising from it, and bordering 

 the second is Turkey Hill, having an altitude of 181 feet, which is 

 only inferior to the highest of all in town. 



