New Jerfcy, Raccoon. 277 



. 



yard : at the depth of forty feet, they found a 

 quantity of {hells of oyilers and mufcles, and 

 likewife a great quantity of reed, and pieces of 

 broken branches. I afked, to what caufes they 

 afcribed what they had difcovered ; aad I was an- 

 fwered, that fome people believed thefe things 

 had lain there ever fmce the deluge, and others, 

 that the ground increafed. 



PETER RAMBO, a man who was near fixty 

 years of age, aflured me, that in feveral places at 

 Raccoon, where wells had been dug, or any other 

 work carried deep into the ground, he had feen 

 great quantities of mufcle ihells and other marine 

 animals. On digging wells, the people have 

 fometimes met with logs of wood at the depth of 

 twenty feet, fome of which were putrified, and 

 others as it were burnt. They once found a great 

 fpoon in the ground at this depth. Query, Is it 

 not probable, that the burnt wood which has 

 been thus dug up, was only blackened by a fub- 

 terraneous mineral vapour ? People however have 

 concluded from this, that America has had inha- 

 bitants before the deluge. This man (Peter 

 RamboJ further told me, that bricks had been 

 found deep in the ground ; but may not the brick- 

 coloured clay (of which the ground here chiefly 

 confifts, and which is a mixture of clay and fand) 

 in a hard ftate have had the appearance of bricks? 

 I have feen fuch hardened clay, which at firft 

 fight is eafily miftaken for brick. He likewife 

 aflerted, that the water in rivers was ftill as high 

 as it ufed to be, as far back as memory could 

 reach ; but little lakes, ponds, and waters in 



T3 marfhes 



