186 GEOLOGY OF THE SECOND DISTRICT. 



Peat has been employed by several farmers in Warren county, with success, for increasing 

 the fertility of their lands. It requires to be exposed to the atmosphere and frost, before it is 

 used for manure. An improved method of preparing it, is to expose it in heaps with barn- 

 yard manure, or to mix with it a quantity of lime before using it, giving it an opportunity to 

 pass into a soluble condition. As it regards this substance, I have not been particular to enter 

 upon any estimates of its quantity or value. Such is the state of knowledge in community at 

 the present time upon the uses of this substance, and the tests by which it may be distin- 

 guished, that I deem it unnecessary to occupy space and time in those details. 



Superficial Deposits. 



The section of country of which Warren county is a part, furnishes many interesting facts 

 in relation to the currents which have swept over it. This is indicated at least by the immense 

 number of rounded gravelly and sandy hills situated at every point where an opposing obstacle 

 presented itself, or which could shelter it from the main power of the current, or wherever 

 counter or eddying currents were formed. 



It is unnecessary to particularize parts of the county which furnish sand and gravel hills. 

 I may, however, remark, that in all the level parts, as tlie plains of Queensbury and War- 

 rensburgh, the sand is spread out evenly ; while in all the parts of the county where water- 

 courses would be obstructed by hills or mountains, these materials are always heaped up into 

 conical hills, unless they repose against their sides. These sand and gravel beds are not 

 confined to the lower portion of the county, but may be found eight hundred or one thousand 

 feet above the river at Glen's-Falls. Thus, in passing over the Luzerne mountains, they are 

 met with upon the highest portions of the ridge. 



We may divide the sand and gravel hills into three kinds, each of which is produced by a 

 distinct cause, or by a different operation of the same cause : 



The^^rs^, or those already spoken of, can be formed by no other agency than that of water 

 in a large body moving with some degree of momentum. 



The second are in the form of long ridges, composed of sand, gravel, and small rounded 

 stones intermixed. This variety, I am satisfied, is always formed by the agency of waves. 

 They lie along a flat section of land, which is still swampy on one or both sides, thouo-h I 

 conceive that all vestiges of the former existence of a lake or pond may have been lost. These 

 are produced, as I remarked, by waves, which continually wash up those materials and 

 arrange them in a line. It is necessary to this result, that the surface should be level beyond 

 the line where the waves cease to affect or carry up these materials, so that they may fall 

 over on the opposite side. Under these circumstances, the waves, continually beating up the 

 loose sand upon a stony shore, will form a ridge, sloping gradually to the water, but steep 

 on the opposite side. These lines of gravel and sand are formed in almost every lake or pond, 

 but generally upon that side where the waves are more constantly beating. They would 

 appear more frequent than they do, were it not that the banks ascend too much, and rise 



