о 
AGASSIZ: THE FLORIDA ELEVATED КЕБЕ. Ə 
Mr. Peter A, Williams, of Key West, was kind enough to have col- 
lected for me samples from the Artesian well bored at Key West in 
1895. This well was carried to a depth of 2,000 feet. Samples were 
taken every twenty-five feet. The specimens I sent to Mr. E. O. Hovey 
for preliminary examination, and his report will follow this Bulletin. 
The most interesting result obtained is that the thickness of the coral 
reef formed since Pliocene times is probably about fifty feet. 
Dr. Hovey places the upper limit of the Vicksburg beds at 700 feet 
from the surface, but he has been unable to determine the lower limits 
of the Miocene and Pliocene. As will be seen by his report, many of 
the samples indicate beach deposits, or deposits formed in comparatively 
shallow water. The Foraminifera are now under examination, and it is 
hoped that some light may be thrown on the subject from these results, 
as well as from the comparativo examination of the borings of other 
Florida wells undertaken by the geologists of the United States Geo- 
logical Survey. I have also added to Mr. Hovey’s report the chem- 
ical analysis of the samples kindly made for me by direction of the 
Hon. C. D. Walcott, Director of the United States Geological Survey. 
On the smaller island to the southwest of Bahia Honda there isa 
fine exposure of a portion of the elevated reef. The rock is full of heads 
of Colpophyllia, Mæandrina, and Orbicella. The highest point of the 
elevated reef is not more than a couple of feet above high-water mark, 
The leo side of the small island is in part covered with æolian sand 
derived from the breaking up of the weather side of the elevated reef 
patch. In addition to the жоПап sand which covers the eastern part 
of this small island we find sand composed of coralline and broken shells 
and coral material, forming at some points a dike fully two feet high, 
which has been thrown up by the sem. This small island is interesting 
as showing how the underlying reef rock of the larger keys has gradu- 
ally been covered over with solian sand blown from the disintegrated 
elevated reef itself, or how the sand has been piled up on the top of the 
reef to leeward, and formed bars or flats which have gradually increased 
until they have built up a great part of the land of some of the promi- 
nent keys of the western extension of tho Florida Keys. Or this sand 
may have taken tho place of tho land eroded from the mainland by 
the action of the sea after the elevation of the reef which edged the 
former shore line of. Southern Florida took place. 
The sand on Bahia Honda itself consists of the same material as that 
described above, but it is more finely comminuted. At this point the 
elevated reof must have been of considerable width, for its northern 
