1012 Transactions of the American Institute. 



one-half to one pound of amber may be reckoned as about the 

 average. The pieces are of tarious sizes, those weighing as much 

 as a half pound being seldom found, and larger lumps of one or 

 more pounds are extremely rare. Their surfiices are dull and worn, 

 and their edges and angles are somewhat rounded, but not to a 

 sufficient extent to obliterate the various forms which they originally 

 received as the liquid resin of a tree, such as pins, drops, and plates, 

 whioji were formed between the bark and the wood, or between 

 yearly rings of growth of the stem. Frequently, also, fine impres- 

 sions of the parts of the plants which produced them can be 

 distinguished on their surfaces. It follows, therefore, that the pieces 

 of amber were for some time, but not very long, rolled about by 

 the water previous to their deposition. With the amber also occurs 

 fossil wood, but generally only in small pieces, which were probably 

 half-decayed when they were deposited. The complete system of 

 a tree has never yet been found in the amber earth, and solid pieces 

 of a foot or more in length are very rare. Such pieces of wood 

 as still have amber attached to them are of especial interest, and 

 there are even some so completely penetrated with amber-resin 

 that they appear to consist, not so much of wood-fibers as of amber- 

 filaments. In the " amber-earth " and in the lower part of the 

 " quick-sand" just above it there also occur pieces of compact clay 

 and marl which contain numerous fossils, the same as those which 

 are found in the overlying ferruginous sandstone. The amber-earth 

 by no means lies in its original bed — that is, not in the soil of the 

 old forest in which the amber-pines grew; the whole deposit of 

 the "glauconitic sand" is a marine formation, and the amber wa^ 

 washed into it by the sea in which crabs, sea-urchins, and oysters 

 lived. From the habits of these animals, and from the form of 

 the pieces of amber, it may be inferred that the deposition of the 

 latter occured not very far from the shore; and from the condition 

 of the amber, that its disposition took place in a proportionately 

 short time, and that considerable stores of it must have been col- 

 lected in neig-hborino: localities. In the beds al)ove and below 

 tlic "amber-earth" only a few isolated pieces of aml)er occur. 

 Through alternate upheavals and depressions the land has gradually 

 risen to the height it now possesses; but the' waves of the sea still 

 continue their work of destruction which they commenced thousands 

 of years ago, and yearly lessen the area of the country. If, however, 

 other countries can only complain of tlie damage which the sea 

 has inflicted on their coasts, it here amply rcp;u'.-i the loss it hiis 



