CHAP. XXV.] BLUFF OF ST. STEPHEN S. 91 



vitrified interior, and bodies of similar form and 

 structure were first supposed by Saussure to have 

 been due to the passage of lightning through sand, 

 a theory now generally adopted. 



If any geologist retains to this day the doctrine 

 once so popular, that at remote periods marine de 

 posits of contemporaneous origin were formed every 

 where throughout the globe with the same mineral 

 characters, he would do well to compare the succes 

 sion of rocks on the Alabama river with those of the 

 same date in England. If there were no fossils, he 

 might suppose the Lower cretaceous beds of loose 

 gravel to be the newest tertiary, the main body of 

 the chalk to be lias, and the soft limestone of St. 

 Stephen s, which is tertiary, to be the representative 

 of chalk. When I arrived at the last-mentioned 

 rock, or the white calcareous bluff of St. Stephen s, 

 it was quite dark, but Captain Lavargy, who com 

 manded the vessel, was determined I should not be 

 disappointed. He therefore said he would stop and 

 take in a supply of wood at the place, and gave 

 me a boat, with two negroes amply provided with 

 torches of pine-wood, which gave so much light that 

 I was able to explore the cliff from one end to the 

 other, and to collect many fossils. The bluff was 

 more than 100 feet high, and in parts formed of an 

 aggregate of corals resembling nummulites, but 

 called, by A. D Orbigny, orbitoides. 



I had seen the same &quot; orbitoidal &quot; limestone in the 

 interior of Clarke county, forming knolls, on which 

 many cedars or junipers were growing, reminding 

 me greatly of parts of the English South Downs, 



