136 BALDWIN COUNTY. 



vel, sand, and micaceous loam are found, evidently derived 

 from the waste of decomposed crystalline rocks. I am not 

 surprised, therefore, that some geologists should have con- 

 founded the ancient gneiss of this district, thus decomposed 

 in situ, with the tertiary deposits. Their close resemblance 

 confirms me in the opinion, that the arrangement of the gneiss 

 and mica schist in beds with subordinate layers, both hori- 

 zontal and oblique, was originally determined, in most cases 

 at least, by aqueous deposition, although often modified by 

 subsequent crystalline action. 



" The surprising depth of some of the modern ravines, in 

 the neighbourhood of Milledgeville, suggests matter of curious 

 speculation. At the distance of three miles and a half west of 

 the town, on the direct road to Macon, on the farm of Pomona, 

 is a ravine. Twenty years ago it had no existence ; but 

 when the trees of the forest were cut down, cracks three feet 

 deep were caused by the sun's heat in the clay ; and, during 

 the rains, a sudden rush of water through these cracks, caused 

 them to deepen at their lower extremities, from whence the 

 excavating power worked backward, till, in the course of twenty 

 years, a chasm, measuring no less than 55 feet in depth, 300 

 yards in length, and varying in width from 20 to 180 feet was 

 the result. The high road has been several times turned to 

 avoid this cavity, the enlargement of which is still proceeding, 

 and the old line of road may be seen to have held its course 

 directly over what is now the widest part of the ravine. In 

 the perpendicular walls of this great chasm appear beds of clay 

 and sand, red, white, yellow, and green, produced by the de- 

 composition in situ of hornblendic gneiss, with layers and veins 

 of quartz, as before-mentioned, and of a rock consisting of 

 quartz and felspar, which remain entire to prove that the whole 

 mass was once crystalline." 



Miscellaneous Remarks. — The first court was held in 

 Baldwin, July 21, 1806, Judge Tait presiding. 



Name. — The Hon. Abraham Baldwin was born in the 

 State of Connecticut, in 1754. He graduated at Yale, in 

 1772, with the reputation of one of the best classical and 

 mathematical scholars of his time. During the Revolutionary 

 war, he was several years a professor of that institution, and, 



