GUILDHALL. 117 



3d. This supposed bed is on the route of the proposed railroad from Littleton, N. H., to Lancaster, N. H. 

 Its summit level is 650 * feet above Connecticut River, and if this measurement was taken from the mouth 

 of Wells Kiver, as we should suppose, it will be only 230 feet above the same river at Lunenburg, and 197 

 feet above Lancaster, N. H. This would not make this bed so high above the present level of the river as 

 others which we consider as well established cases. All that remains to settle the point is to visit the 

 ground, and see whether there are any special evidences of water action along the highest part of the route. 

 Had we suspected such a thing when in that district, we should certainly have examined it. If this ancient 

 bed was once occupied by the Connecticut, then may we say that geology throws light upon ancient bound- 

 aries of States. For the Connecticut is the established boundary between Vermont and New Hampshire. 

 When therefore the river occupied this old channel, Vermont encroached on New Hampshire, and owned 

 some forty or fifty square miles more of territory than at present. When we come to speak of old river 

 beds we think we can give an adequate reason for this change of location. 



As already stated, we have little to say of the seventeenth basin, or between Waterford and the Cat Bow 

 in Lunenburg, except that the whole course is probably rocky. The next basin presents a marked contrast 

 to this. 



BASINS FEOM LUNENBUKG TO CONNECTICUT LAKE. 



There are at least five basins in this region, one of the most fertile for agricultural purposes in the State. 

 The first of them, or the eighteenth from the mouth of the Connecticut, extends to the north line of 

 Guildhall, a distance of seven miles. In South Guildhall, opposite Lancaster, N. H., the meadow is 

 remarkably wide so wide indeed is it that we could not see from the west side how many terraces there 

 were on the east side. This has not been so before since leaving Massachusetts. The terraces are devel- 

 oped in beautiful proportions in Guildhall, especially about two miles west of the court-house, where there 

 are seven terraces, the product of the joint action of the Connecticut and a small stream coming down from 

 Granby. These are in a kind of sub-basin, a valley running west among the mountains, so that the Con- 

 necticut must formerly have made quite a bend. The second terrace is the most extensive of them all, 

 forming a plain more than a mile wide. It is the meadow in Guildhall. In Northumberland, on the New 

 Hampshire side, a high ledge of granite comes close to the river, cutting off all deposits. And soon the 

 granite from the Vermont side approaches the river, and we see the barrier or limit of the basin. 



We were reminded very much of Bellows Falls in Guildhall. For in both places, the general featiires of 

 the geology as well as the topography are the same. The high hill of granite in Northumberland is shaped 

 like Kilburne Peak, opposite Bellows Falls ; and in lithological character the mountains agree, as well as the 

 adjacent rocks across the river. 



Passing into the nineteenth basin, in Maidstone, we find quite a wide valley, with well defined terraces, 

 and quite large accumulations of sand and loam. The number of terraces varies, especially upon the west 

 side, where the highest terraces are sometimes wanting. On the east side the fourth terrace is constant. 

 In this basin, opposite Maidstone and Brunswick, is the route of the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Eailroad, 

 which crosses the Connecticut into Vermont at the south part of Bloomfield, passing up the Nulhegan 

 Eiver to Island Pond. The latter river acted with the Connecticut in forming terraces, and the map shows 

 at this point a combination of lateral and delta terraces. Soon this basin narrows, and its limit is in North 

 Bloomfield, eighteen miles above the south line of Maidstone. 



We are now in a very romantic country. The traveler sees a constant succession of very high moun- 

 tains, whose tops, sometimes of great extent, or mere conical points, are either clothed with verdure or are 

 simply white granite, glistening in the sun. If it be not fair weather their tops are obscured by clouds, or 

 their summits appear above the clouds like islands in the ocean ; and in fact they then show us what was 

 their appearance before the formation of the terraces, when the waters of the ocean extended to where the 



* We are under great obligations to Mr. John T. Coffin, of Laconia, N. H., for sending us copies of a " Plan of a Survey for the White 

 Mountains Railroad." This map has been of great service to us in sustaining this conjecture of the former course of the Connecticut. 

 It is our authority for the heights specified. 



