Lieut. Nelson on the Geology of the Bermudas. 



115 



The surface of the calcareous sandstones, is, in some places, coated by compact stalagmite, and 

 I believe a strong resemblance, if not identity, will be found between its nature and the hard 

 chalk near the basaltic districts of Antrim, the solidifying of which has been attributed to fire. 

 This inference may be true ; but here is a clear fact, that such limestone can be otherwise pro- 

 duced. Not that the conclusions from Sir J. Hall's most interesting experiments are the less 

 valid, countenanced as they are by the results of the action of Trap and Whin on the immediately 

 contiguous strata. Sucli a mode of consolidation, however, is not perhaps so likely to occur on 

 an extended scale, or to produce such regular strata, as that which has formed the Bermuda stone. 

 It is, moreover, an additional means of arriving at certainty, to allow every known force its fair 

 consideration. 



Fig. 10. 



Fig. 



Vegetable Organics. — These are doubtful. Fig. 9 is however a sketch 

 and section of certain rudely-shaped cylindrical blocks which are to be found 

 on every part of the surface of Bermuda, though I never heard of their being 

 discovered below it. They are very frequently arranged in groups of from 

 twenty to fifty, as if they had once been the roots of as many trees. Fig. 10, 

 c, df are plan and section of the recent Palmetto root, which has, in common 

 with the subject under consideration, a very marked socket, or deep cup*. 

 When this tree dies, it generally falls out of the cup, of which excellent 

 examples may be seen at low water in Shelly Bay, north of Harrington Sound, 

 Bermuda. It is the general surmise that these curious cylinders (fig. 8) are 

 the remains of the Palmetto. I think it very likely that they belong to a mem- 

 ber of the family of Palms; though I have my doubts as to the Palmetto being 

 the individual, as the internal surface of its root socket is entirely composed of 



* Sometimes only casts of these roots are left as pits in the rock; but in the compacter 

 limestones, I have more than once met with cylindrical excavations, evidently the work of water. 

 They vary from two to three feet in diameter, and may be about eight or twelve inches deep. 

 These are mentioned merely from their singular resemblance to the ' Rock Basons,' on the crags of 

 Dartmoor, supposed to be Druidical. That which I have more particularly in mind is on the 

 apex of Heytor. The flat bottom of the latter showing its broad streaks of felspar, had evidently 

 a different origin from the equally flat ones of the Bermuda pits, which seem to be a natural 

 deposit and mixture of sea salt and sand. 



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