602 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 



• 



the mountains were upheaved, and so slowly that many rocks have 

 been simply bent, not shattered. The oldest rocks that we are 

 acquainted with are those at St. Anthonj^'s Nose, on the Hudscm. 

 That the earth was not hot in its primary condition is proved bj 

 plants being found where they could not have existed if such was 

 the case. The rains of heaven fell upon the old mountains, and 

 took the debris and carried it into streams and rivulets, and these 

 into larger streams, and the large into the ocean; and these tides 

 and currents scattered it along the shore. Upon the western slope 

 of St. Anthony's Nose there was a deposit; another age of the 

 world went round, and the silurian deposit was made, but there 

 was this peculiarity about these formations : when the devonian 

 formation was 2,500 feet in thickness on the east, in the west it 

 was but some 100 feet. The carboniferous, period came next, and 

 filled up the valley in precisely the same way that the Coast Sur- 

 vey says that the Raritan bay is now filling up. The changes 

 Avhich have been attributed to fire was due to chemical efiects 

 alone. 



Succeeding the carboniferous, and part of it, was the permian, 

 and following in order of succession was the Jurassic, probablj^ 

 and then the cretaceous of Kansas, Nebi'aska and other new inland 

 States, to be followed finally by the tertiary, which completes the 

 jieoloo-ical series. Each of these arc formed in part from tho 

 debris of the last previous one, and wholly from those older than 

 itself. Currents on the land and currents in the sea have been 

 the agents of transportation only, receiving from the old, and 

 where the currents have ceased, thus laying down their Inirden to 

 be recemented to form the new. 



Several gentlemen asked questions tDuching the new theorj^, in 

 answering which Mr. Grimes occupied the remainder of the 

 evening. ^ 



Adjourned. 



American Institute Polytechnic Association, ) 

 December IWi, 1866. ] 



Prof. Samuel D. Tillman in the chair; Mr. T. D. Stetson, Secretary. 

 The chairman opened the proceedings by presenting the fol- 

 lowing interesting summary of scientific news : 



The Vowel Elements in Speech. 

 Mr. Samuel Porter, of Hartford, Conn., has a commuuicalion on 



