CHAP. m. RECENT DEPOSITS OF SEAS AND LAKES. 45 



fossil human remains were found by Count Pourtalis. They 

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



Recent Deposits of Seas and Lakes. 



1 have shown, in the Principles of Geology, 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 op- 

 portunities 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 raj)idly, 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 hu- 

 man observation, I have adduced the strata near Naples in 

 which the Temple of Serapis at Pozzuoli was entombed.* 

 These upraised sti'ata, 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 Baia>. They consist partly 

 of clay, partly of volcanic matter, and contain fragments of 

 sculpture, pottery, and the remains of buildings, together with 

 gi'eat numbers of shells, retaining in part their colour, and 

 of the same species as those now inhabiting the neighboring 

 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." 



