December 15, 1905.] 



SCIENCE. 



795 



* blazing beach.' On the evening of Friday, 

 September 1, the guests at the Hotel Park- 

 field were startled by the appearance of flames 

 rising from the beach and from the surface 

 of the water, an event of so remarkable and 

 unusual a character as to excite great curi- 

 osity and some alarm. The conflagration oc- 

 ■curred between seven and eight o'clock in the 

 evening, and lasted for upwards of forty-five 

 minutes. The flames were about one foot in 

 height. They were accompanied by a loud 

 and continuous crackling noise which could 

 be cHstinctly heard one hundred yards away, 

 while at the same time there was a very strong 

 liberation of sulphurous acid fumes which 

 penetrated the hotel, drove the proprietor and 

 his staff from the ofiice and filled the other 

 rooms to such an extent as to cause great in- 

 convenience to the guests. One guest of an 

 investigating turn of mind secured some of 

 the sand in his hand, but was obliged to drop 

 it on account of the heat. When some of the 

 sand was taken into the hotel and stirred in 

 water, bubbles of gas were liberated and pro- 

 duced flame as they broke at the surface in 

 contact with the air. 



Some of the attempts at explanation were 

 of a remarkable character and illustrate how 

 far one may be carried when the imagination 

 is not controlled by an adequate knowledge 

 of facts. One observer stated that some ves- 

 sel in the harbor had thrown overboard a 

 quantity of calcium carbide which had washed 

 ashore and caught fire. The most popular 

 •explanations referred the phenomenon to the 

 effects of the blast at Henderson's Point, some 

 six weeks before, the theory being that the 

 explosion of fifty tons of dynamite had opened 

 up rock fissures to such an extent as to lib- 

 erate volcanic gases ; while a somewhat similar 

 theory attributed it to the earthquake of the 

 day before, and the consequent opening up of 

 rock fissures. With respect to the latter it 

 may suffice to state that the earthquake may 

 have been a contributary factor in so far as 

 it served to give just that shaking at a critical 

 moment which would suffice to liberate gases 

 stored under slight pressure. The most sen- 

 sational explanation was that of a resident of 



the town who refused to accept the explana- 

 tion I offered as altogether too commonplace, 

 and who had ' always told the people of Kit- 

 tery Point that the town was built on the edge 

 of hell, the proof of which had now been 

 given.' 



Divesting the phenomenon of its sensational 

 aspects, it was not difficult to reach a satis- 

 factory explanation of all the features pre- 

 sented, and to eliminate explanations which 

 had some semblance of reasonableness. The 

 beach at the point where the fire occurred is 

 composed of a beach ridge at its upper margin, 

 made up of pebbles of varying size. From 

 this ridge, a somewhat sharp slope continues 

 the same formation outward and downward 

 for perhaps seventy-five feet, where the peb- 

 bles are replaced by sand. This latter begins 

 at about the half -tide mark and extends out- 

 ward with a very gentle slope beyond low- 

 water mark, so that during even the lowest 

 tides a portion is covered by very shallow 

 water. This sand beach extends laterally for 

 a distance of about 175 to 200 feet, being 

 limited in each direction by solid ledge, which 

 forms the general construction of the shore all 

 along the river. Over the outer portion of 

 the sand, as also for great distances beyond, 

 wherever there is a muddy bottom, there is an 

 abundant growth of eel grass (Zostera marina) 

 which, together with other debris of a similar 

 nature, is continually washed upon the beach, 

 broken up by the action of the waves and 

 gradually buried, so that each year the deposit 

 is increased by definite though rather slight 

 increments. One of the well-defined features 

 of the fire was, that it was limited to that area 

 which is occupied by the sand. It occurred 

 over that portion of the sand which was ex- 

 posed by the falling tide, but it was also ob- 

 served to extend out over the water for a dis- 

 tance of thirty or f6rty feet. Gas was found 

 to be liberated from the exposed .sand when 

 stirred in water, and similarly gas was seen 

 to rise from that portion of the sand covered 

 with water. Such facts showed conclusively 

 that the evolution of the gas was immediately 

 connected with the sand itself and not with 

 the adjacent rock formation, hence the theory 



