I860.] SPRATT BESSARABIA, ETC. 289 



deposits corresponding to No. 3. I found that even at Foksehan, as 

 at Galatz, the water of the town- wells was often so saline, owing to 

 its containing some mineral salt, as to prevent its being drunk by 

 the inhabitants. But I was informed such wells were not universal, 

 as some penetrated springs of good water. 



In no part of the intermediate district were there any evidences 

 of a late Tertiary deposit of marine origin. The freshwater marls 

 or the superficial drift cover Wallachia, as also Moldavia, Bessarabia, 

 and the Dobrutcha ; the latter with its earthy marls and gravels, 

 and without any contained fossils but those which indicate transport 

 by their fragmentary nature. 



Having sent to the Society a few fossils (with those from Moldavia) 

 that came from the borders of the Danube near Hassova, and com- 

 prise a peculiar striated bivalve (Cardium or Didacna) that seems to 

 associate the Rassova deposits as a portion of the freshwater series, 

 similar to the Bolgrod beds, I may here mention that I am indebted 

 for these to my friend M. Lefort, commanding the French gun-boat 

 stationed on the Danube, and who made an interesting trip in his 

 vessel as far as the Iron Gates. I gladly acknowledge this act of 

 courtesy on his part in thus so liberally sharing with me these speci- 

 mens which he had himself procured so high up the Danube, on my 

 pointing out the interest they possessed in connexion with my geo- 

 logical researches in other localities. 



I shall now briefly notice that the Black Sea seems to me, since 

 it has become purely a salt sea as at present, to have been limited 

 to the strait which separates the end of the Moldavian Steppe 

 at Latanof, from the Isaktcha Hills on the Dobrutcha side of the 

 river, as the distance is only about 11 mile between ; and when the 

 sea reached it, the distance was no doubt less; as it woidd now be, 

 if the delta and river there did not fill much of the intermediate 

 distance, at a level several feet above the Black Sea. It thus then. I 

 think, would present a sufficient contraction to form a barrier against 

 the sea, with the shallow embouchure of such a river as the Danube. 

 The river itself must have been the agent that opened the channel 

 which here divides, by only a little more than its breadth in many 

 parts, the superficial deposits of the Steppe i>n the Moldavian side 

 from the same deposits which cover the surface of the Isaktchn 

 ridges on the Turkish sid<- ; thus admitting it to the Black Sea: 

 the river's marine delta commencing at this point. 



These superficial deposits musl undoubtedly have at one time 

 been united there, and thus enclosed the upper basin within [saktoha, 

 as a true Danubian lake. Here the striated bivalves that we found 

 fossil in the freshwater d< posits of the Steppe, and now in part 

 apparently living in the present lakes, must have been preserved, 

 only alightrj varying in character under Borne influencing condition 

 is the lake approached the present time. 



1 think it probable even thai others of these bivalves (as the 

 Adaona) may still be found living; as l fount! the large Cardura- 



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