CHAP. III. KECENT DEPOSITS OP SEAS AND LAKES. 45 



fossil human remains were found by Count PourtaKs. They 

 consisted of jaws and teeth, with some bones of the foot. 



Recent Deposits of Seas and Lakes. 



I have shown, in the Principles of Greology, where the 

 recent changes of the earth illustrative of geology are de 

 scribed at length, that the deposits accumulated at the 

 bottom of lakes and seas within the last 4000 or 5000 years 

 can neither be insignificant in volume or extent. They lie 

 hidden, for the most part, from our sight; but we have 

 opportunities of examining them at certain points where 

 newly-gained land in the deltas of rivers has been cut through 

 during floods, or where coral reefs are growing rapidly, or 

 where the bed of a sea or lake has been heaved up by sub 

 terranean movements and laid dry. 



As examples of such changes of level by which marine 

 deposits of the recent period have become accessible to human 

 observation, I have adduced the strata near Naples in which 

 the Temple of Serapis at Pozzuoli was entombed.* These 

 upraised strata, the highest of which are about twenty-five 

 feet above the level of the sea, form a terrace skirting the 

 eastern shore of the Bay of Baiae. They consist partly of 

 clay, partly of volcanic matter, and contain fragments of 

 sculpture, pottery, and the remains of buildings, together 

 with great numbers of shells, retaining in part their colour, 

 and of the same species as those now inhabiting the neigh 

 bouring sea. Their emergence can be proved to have taken 

 place since the beginning of the sixteenth century. 



In the same work, as an example of a fresh-water deposit 

 of the recent period, I have described certain strata in 

 Cashmere, a country where violent earthquakes, attended by 



* Principles of Geology, Index, ' Serapis.' 



