40 



BUEEAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 



[bull. 66 



enough to furnish the writer with copies of the originiil surveys 

 (figs. 1, 6, 7), which show these conditions. 



Beh)w the muck betl of the southern branch, along the southern 

 hank of the canal down to and beyond the railroad bridge, and along- 

 most of the bank oi)posite, are seen marine and alluvial-aeolian 

 deposits, which can be separated into three or possibly four strata. 

 The lowest, beginning on the average about 5 feet from the surface 

 and of unknown depth, is an old marine deposit, consisting of tri- 

 turated shell with some marl and Avhitish sand. This layer is not yet 

 consolidated and yields numerous fossil shells, but no vertebrates. It 

 is laver No. 1 of Sella rds. 



Fig. 7. — The Vero Canal, between the spillway and the railroad l>ridge. The solid black 

 squares indicate the location of the human remains. (From topographical survey 

 furnished the Smithsonian Institution by William H. Kimball, chief engineer in charge 

 of the construction of the canal.) 



Upon layer No. 1 rests unconformably, and in many places with- 

 out any definite boundary line, Sellards's stratum No. 2, a thick, com- 

 pact layer of brownish sand, the upper darkest portions of which 

 show more or less " toughening " or induration, though not enough 

 to preA'ent slicing with a good hoe (see pi. 2.) This indurated 

 portion is called a "rather hard rock" by Sellards (p. 128), a 

 characterization which it does not seem to deserve. The layer yields 

 numerous and generally isolated or fragmentary bones of fossil 

 vertebrates of Pleistocene age. If we accept its darkest and most 

 compact portion as the upper limit of the layer, as suggested by its 

 color, induration, and absence of roots, then the upper line of demar- 

 cation is quite uniform along the banks of the canal, but laterally, 

 as seen in the wall of the southern lateral drain, it shows much 



