INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE, PHILADELPHIA. 15 



the sea, and but barely elevated above it ; the condition of its exposure 

 was, doubtless, the result of recent sea-wash. I was much surprised to 

 find actually embedded in this rock, and more or less firmly united with 

 it, the skeletal remains of a mammalian, which I had little difficulty in 

 determining to be the genus Homo. Most of the parts, including the 

 entire head, had at various times been removed by the curiosity-seekers 

 of the neighborhood, but enough remained to indicate the position occu- 

 pied by the body in the matrix. The depression which received the 

 head was still very plainly marked, but unfortunately the outline had 

 been too much disturbed to permit of any satisfactory impression being 

 taken from it. I was able to disengage from a confused mass of stone 

 and skeleton two of the vertebra;, which Dr. Leidy has kindly determined 

 for me to be in all probability the last dorsal and first lumbar. The dis- 

 tinctive cancellated structure of bone is still plainly visible, but the bone 

 itself has been completely replaced by limonite. 



How great an antiquity these human remains of iron indicate, I am 

 not prepared to say. That they are very ancient there can be no ques- 

 tion, considering the nature of their fossilization, and the position which 

 they occupy ; but to which exact horizon in the geological scale they are 

 to be referred, still remains an open question. I in vain searched the 

 region for geological landmarks by which the special bed containing the 

 remains could be correlated, but in vain. I could find no trace of any 

 other fossil in the deposit, nor, owing to the low position of the bed, and 

 the absence of overlying deposits of any magnitude, could its homotaxis 

 with reference to the fossiliferous deposits occurring elsewhere on the 

 bay be ascertained. The probability naturally lies with the Post-Pliocene 

 age of the deposit, but for aught we know to the contrary, the age rep- 

 resented might in fact be Tertiary. At all events, as has already been 

 stated, the remains are very ancient, and not impossibly they represent a 

 period as far (if not further) removed from the present one as is indicated 

 by any other human remains that have thus far been discovered. 



About three-quarters of a mile below Mrs. Hanson's a compact ter- 

 restrial sand-rock, containing numerous individuals of several common 

 forms of recent snail (Polygyra volvoxis, etc.), and evidently represent- 

 ing a modern formation, is exposed at water-level, extending for some 

 little distance up the channels that have been left by the retreating waters. 

 The presence of this hard rock of terrestrial origin on the immediate 

 ocean front, and in the very path of existing waters, coupled with the 

 circumstance of the complete absence of associated marine forms of 

 life, renders it more than probable that this portion of the coast has 

 quite recently been undergoing subsidence. It is true that the encroaches 

 of the sea might be attributed to a simple washing away of the coast line, 

 but this hardly appears probable in view of the resisting nature of the 



