150 BULLETIN: MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 
for high water reaches only slightly above its base — indicates that the 
shore has been raised at this point to a height nearly equaling that of 
the cliff. What gives an increased interest to this locality is the pres- 
ence of a low kitchen-midden, only two or three feet thick, which over- 
lies the entire cliff. It is composed of a dark-colored, sandy earth, 
packed full of the shells of the edible mollusks of the bay, with a few 
scattered bones, and occasionally a human skeleton.” 
When I was at Bahia in August, 1899, Mr. Joseph Mawson directed 
my attention to important evidence of elevation north of Sao Thomé on 
the bay of Bahia, and on the trip to and from that place I was able to 
collect many other bits of evidence pointing to an elevation of the coast. 
The accompanying sketch-map of the region, made on’ the spot, will 
serve, in the absence of a better one, to show the topographic relations of 
the.points mentioned. It should be remembered, though, that both the 
orientation and the distances on this map are only approximately correct. 
With the exception of the late beds with which we are especially con- 
cerned, the rocks of the region are all folded, faulted, and sometimes 
decomposed Tertiary sediments. 
At the Ponta d’Areia, a point marked A on the northwest corner of the 
map, there is a flat bit of ground, not more than four acres in area, 
Half of this flat ground has a sloping sandy beach, and the remainder, 
in the northeast corner, has a low natural rock wall about 100 to 150 
metres long for a water front. This rock lies in horizontal beds, and is 
made up of shells, corals, and comminuted calcareous matter of various 
degrees of hardness. The total thickness of the beds could not be seen 
at the time the place was visited, on account of the tides, but they ex- 
tend from below high water to about one and a half to two metres above 
the highest spring tides. The uppermost metre of this is soft sand 
merging into hard rock below. The surface itself is very black soil to a 
depth of from fifteen to twenty centimetres, and I suspect it of having a 
human origin. The material of the lowest part of the beds is of very 
much ground-up shells and corals. 
It is possible that the shells on this point rise to a height of three 
metres above tide, but those seen on the highest grounds all belong to 
species that are used for food even to this day, and it is doubtful whether 
they ought to be included with the elevated beds. 
At the point marked B on the map marine shells are strung along 
1 Lam also under obligations to Mr. Richard Tiplady, Superintendent of the 
Estrada de Ferro da Bahia ao Sáo Francisco, and to Mr. Thomas Mawson, of the 
same road, for facilitating in every possible way my visit to this interesting region. 
