IN MASSACHUSETTS AND VERMONT. 143 



New England for drift striee: and I should be glad to study the phenomena 

 further. 



There are a few other tributary streams on the eastern slope of Hoosac mount- 

 ain, which I should be glad to examine more carefully, with reference to this 

 question of ancient glaciers. I cannot but feel, however, that I have pointed out 

 facts enough to induce others to make further explorations ; enough, also, I trust, 

 to produce the belief that glaciers did once exist in these regions. 



Gladly would I have carried these researches into regions beyond Massachusetts, 

 where the probability is still stronger that traces of glaciers might be found. A 

 single excursion into Vermont, however, is all I have been able to make. I have 

 spent a little time upon the branches of the Queechy or Waterqueechee river, in 

 Windsor county, Vermont. The branches of that river, that pass through the 

 gold region of Vermont, run east and northeast, and I was anxious to determine if 

 marks of a glacier could be found descending those valleys, since the direction is 

 nearly 180° different from that of the strise on North Branch, just described. The 

 result of my examinations I have given at the top of the map, where I have added a 

 sketch of the Queechee region on a scale larger than that of the map below. The 

 intervening space in Vermont is well worthy of examination, though the direction 

 of the streams is almost coincident with that of the drift agency. 



The marks of ancient glaciers on the branches of the Queechee are not so 

 decided, I think, as upon the rivers already described in Massachusetts. Yet 

 taken together, they have produced the conviction in my mind that such a glacier 

 once descended that river as far as Woodstock at least. In ascending that stream 

 above that village, I found within a mile or so, accumulations of detritus on the 

 north bank, such as I have referred to moraines. Several miles further west, just 

 before entering the village of Bridgewater, I found a still more decided example. 

 The detritus here once extended across the entire valley, but has been worn away 

 by the river on one side, just as I have described in the vicinity of Chamouny, in 

 Savoy. Water has in this case considerably modified the materials at the surface 

 of the heap. 



Beyond Bridgewater I followed for several miles, a branch of the river that 

 comes in from Plymouth, in a northeast direction. The mountains along this 

 stream are high, and in several places it was obvious that the southwest side was 

 the stoss side : though the striae are mostly obliterated. I afterwards followed up 

 another branch of the river to the gold mine, in Bridgewater, and I thought I saw 

 evidence here, also, of glacial action on the west side of the ledges, but the 

 evidence was not very striking. 



The highest point which 1 reached on the road to Plymouth was 450 feet above 

 Woodstock, distant about 10 miles, and the gold mine is 820 feet above that place. 

 These heights would give a moderate slope, but great enough for a glacier. 



It would be desirable to follow the road beyond the gold mine to the top of the 

 Green mountains, as Killington Peak lies in that direction, one of the highest 

 points of these mountains, as much as 4000 feet above the sea. The highest point 

 which I have mentioned above, viz: the gold mine, is only 1580 feet above the 

 ocean. 



