American Association. 259 



the adjoining States. " Mr. Cook said tliat in the course of some 

 geological examinations near the coast of Southern New Jersey, 

 his attention was frequently called to various facts indicating a 

 change in the relative level of the land and water at some recent 

 period. An attentive examination of these facts led him to the 

 conclusion that a gradual subsidence of the land was now in pro- 

 gress throughout the whole length of New Jersey and of Long 

 Island ; and from information derived from others, he was induced 

 to think that this subsidence might extend along a considerable 

 portion of the Atlantic coast of the United States. The occur- 

 rence of timber in the marshes and water below tide-level was 

 common along their whole Atlantic shore. Almost every one fa- 

 miliar with shore-life had observed the remains of logs, stumps, 

 and roots in such places, although they had been looked upon 

 genei-ally as the remains of trees torn from their original place of 

 gfowth by torrents, or by the necessary moving of the shores, and 

 deposited in the places where they were found by the ordinary 

 action of the water. But close examination made it evident that 

 they grew iipon the spots where they are found. The stumps re- 

 main upright — their roots are still fast in the firm loamy ground 

 which underlies the marsh, and their bark and small roots remain 

 attached to them. The localities in which they are most abun- 

 dant are such as are least liable to be affected by the violent action 

 of the water or of storms. Thus they are by far the most abun- 

 dant on the low and gently sloping shores of Long Island, New- 

 Jersey, and all the States farther South which are protected from 

 the violent action of the surf by a line of sand beaches, at the 

 same time that the numerous inlets allow free access to the tides. 

 In these protected situations hundreds and even thousands of acres 

 can be found in which the bottom of the marshes and bays is as 

 thickly set with the stumps of trees as is the ground of any living 

 forest. His own observations were chiefly made upon the southern 

 part of New Jersey, following the shores of Delaware Bay from its 

 head down to Cape May, and the Atlantic shore from Cape May 

 north to Great Egg Harbor, and thence eastward at several points 

 along the south shore of Long Island. In the ditches in the 

 marshes, above Salem, great numbers of the stumps and trunks of 

 trees are met with at all depths, quite down to the solid ground. 

 At Elsinboro' Point, a little farther down on the Delaware Bay 

 shore, the cutting away of the marsh by the water has left great 

 numbers of stumps exposed-; where they can be seen at every low 



