80 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIV. No. 864 



cerned, I am not sure that the meaning pre- 

 ferred by Professor Jennings is the most 

 widely accepted one. Eisler, for example, in 

 the last edition of his " Worterbuch der phi- 

 losophischen Begriffe " defines " Neo-Vital- 

 ismus " primarily as the doctrine which 

 " betont die Autonomie und AMivitdt der 

 Lebensprozesse, die Unmoglichkeit diese 

 restlos aus mechanisch-chemischen Gesetzen 

 abzuleiten"; and though he adds to this for- 

 mula (which he ascribes in common to 

 Bunge, Wolff, Eeinke, Hartmann, v. Uexkiill, 

 K. 0. Schneider and Driesch) some peculiarly 

 Drieschian details, these do not amount to a 

 theory of "biological indeterminism." 



Usage, however, is still too various and con- 

 fused to settle the matter ; and none of us has 

 authority to legislate upon the subject. The 

 term vitalism might, with real advantage to 

 both biology and philosophy, be retired from 

 service. Even if that desirable consumma- 

 tion be past hoping for, it should still be 

 possible to persuade contributors to the dis- 

 cussion to bear in mind the ambiguity of the 

 term and of the antithetic " mechanism," and 

 to recognize and keep separate the several dis- 

 tinct issues which in much current use of 

 those terms tend to become blurred and con- 

 fused. 



a. o. lovejoy 



The Johns Hopkins University, 

 June 19, 1911 



SUBSIDENCE OF ATLANTIC SHORELINE 



On page 906, of Science, No. 858, I observe 

 certain statements of D. W. Johnson, of Har- 

 vard, maintaining that there is no decisive 

 evidence of recent subsidence of the Atlantic 

 coast regions, but, on the contrary, some 

 beach-formations which would seem to pro- 

 hibit such conclusion. This is all very start- 

 ling, not to say iconoclastic. 



The great shallow bays of our more south- 

 ern coasts, such as Delaware, Chesapeake, 

 Albemarle and Pamlico, having long estuary- 

 like arms, which suddenly and bluntly termi- 

 nate at their upper ends and there receive in 

 every instance a stream of comparatively 

 small size, might at first seem to be a some- 



what puzzling geographic condition; but it 

 can readily be accounted for through subsi- 

 dence and in my opinion in no other way. 



At the maximum of the last elevation of 

 the coast, the Susquehanna River flowed 

 southward, with sensibly more than its pres- 

 ent volume, and emptied into the Atlantic 

 near the present Cape Henry. A few miles 

 above this point it received from the 

 west a moderate stream following the di- 

 rection of the present James Eiver. Higher 

 up another moderate stream, following the 

 line of the present Potomac, joined the Sus- 

 quehanna near the present Smith Point. 



For some thousands of years, perhaps, con- 

 stant denudation lowered and flattened out 

 the land along these streams. A subsidence 

 of the coast then began. The sea, entering 

 the Susquehanna, formed at first a small bay 

 which received both the curtailed Susque- 

 hanna and the James. With still further sub- 

 sidence the ocean filled more and more of the 

 river valley and those of its branches, until, 

 after a subsidence which need only amount to 

 some 75 feet, we find the long shallow Chesa- 

 peake and its lateral arms formed by the in- 

 truding ocean as we know them to-day. The 

 same reasoning applies to the other bays men- 

 tioned. Further north these results are less 

 manifest because of the more precipitous na- 

 ture of the coast; but the great terminal 

 moraine constituting the backbone of Long 

 Island became separated from the mainland 

 by the waters of Long Island Sound, and it 

 is probable that Narragansett Bay was largely 

 formed in the same way. 



If the nature of these shallow bays and 

 their long, wide, abruptly ending lateral arms, 

 receiving in every case at the upper end a 

 flowing stream, is not positive evidence of 

 progressive subsidence of the coast in recent 

 times, it would be difficult to imagine any 

 satisfactory reason for the observed facts. 

 The evidence seems, in fact, as plain as 

 though written in bold characters for us to 

 read. 



Other evidence of subsidence is shown by 

 the salt marshes, with perfectly level sur- 

 faces built up by vegetable debris at high-tide 



