•>'). 



JONES GEOLOGICAL FEATURES OF THE BERMUDAS. 



these islands have become raised to their present height, Look at 

 a cutting side. Above all you see some few inches of red soil on 

 which trees and shrubs are groAving, then two feet of loose sand, 

 gradually hardening as it descends, the whole filled more or less 

 with semi-fossil shells of Helix Bermudensis and other land shells. 

 Thirdly we perceive a large cavern partly filled with red earth, an 

 undoubted cavern deposit, then a smaller deposit, and then a regular 

 bed of red earth again — the whole intervening space filled with 

 hardened calcareous rock. 



The lowest layer of red earth was once the surface soil, then 

 drift sand came over it, cavernous holes occurred in the drifting 

 sand, perhaps where a dense vegetation grew, the decomposition of 

 which left the small mass of red earth at the bottom. A second 

 drift again takes place, and then we have red soil and vegetation 

 growing again — and so the land rises ; but having attained a particu- 

 lar height, and becoming well clothed with a dense vegetation, it is a 

 question whether under existing circumstances a higher elevation 

 will be attained, unless some change should take place in the current 

 of the Gulf Stream, when the Bermudas would most assuredly 

 suffer in no slight degree, and the sand of the shore would make 

 similar encroachments to those taking place in Paget's Parish at 

 the present day. 



To show the gradual formation of the Bermuda shores, we have 

 only to take a walk along the sandy beaches, where we see large 

 masses of sand, intermixed with gulf weed and debris of all kinds, 

 in the form of a low wall above high water mark. These masses 

 have been placed there by the action of the waves during 

 storms. They are gradually hardening, and in process of time 

 will become sandstone rock. On these masses again at intervals 

 are thrown drift matter and tree trunks, some of large size, as I 

 have seen myself. Among the roots of these trees are fre- 

 quently seen pieces of stone of far different composition to any 

 found on the Islands. These stones have undoubtedly been carried 

 within the entwined roots of those drift trees from the continent of 

 America. They are generally pieces of hard trap, at least all those 

 I have been able to procure are so according to Professor Dawson. 



I was not aware of the real origin of these foreign fragments 

 when I hammered them out of the shore rock, about hi""h water 



