From a moderate calculation, this bay receives the 

 waters that are collected from a superficies of about 

 sixty thousand square miles. 



To pretend to enter into an examination of the 

 probable changes produced in this bay, by alluvion 

 brought down and deposited in its bed by those nu- 

 merous rivers and smaller streams, would be extreme- 

 ly tedious, uninteresting, and unnecessary ; since a 

 reference to, at least, two of its principal streams, 

 (viz.) the Susquehanna and Potomac rivers, will be 

 quite sufficient to determine the probable result from 

 the whole ; and without entering into a minute exami- 

 nation of these two great rivers, it may suffice to say, 

 that there is no material difference between them and 

 the Connecticut, Hudson, and Delaware rivers. 



The currents of each and all of them are checked 

 by the reflux of the tides. Whenever that takes place, 

 the silicious matter, suspended by the currents, is at 

 once deposited. Hence, the sand banks and sand bars 

 at the mouths of rivers ; but the alluminous matter 

 which is brought down, and which predominates in 

 the soil, generally, of the state of Maryland, is held 

 much longer suspended, and is, doubtless, very gene- 

 rally diffused over the borders of the Chesapeake 

 bay. 



There are but few or no indications of alluvions 

 deposites or formations ; no islands of recent formation. 

 If there is some appearence of the land having en- 

 croached on the bay ; there are others where the wa- 

 ters of the bay have gained on the land. 



