THE GEOLOGY OF THE SYRACUSE QUADRANGLE 7 1 



settled parts of the western world; the carnage of beasts was 

 everywhere the same. I met with a man who had killed two 

 thousand buffaloes with his own hand; and others, no doubt, have 

 done the same. In consequence of such proceedings, not one buffalo 

 is at this time to be found east of the Mississippi; except a few 

 domesticated by the curious, or carried through the country as a 

 public shew. . . . 



The salt lakes and springs are also frequented by all the other 

 kinds of beasts, and even by birds; and from the most minute in- 

 quiries, I am justified in asserting that their visitations were period- 

 ical ; except doves, which appear to delight in the neighborhood of 

 impregnated springs, and to make them their constant abode. In 

 such situations they are seen in immense numbers, as tame as 

 domestic pigeons, but rendered more interesting by their solitary 

 notes and plaintive melody. 



CORRELATION AND SUMMARY 



It has already been pointed out that ordinary stratigraphic methods 

 can not be employed with the series of deposits whose mammalian 

 remains have formed the subject of this paper. The series lies 

 stratigraphically above glacial deposits, but beyond that, our most 

 'valuable 'criterion — geological superposition — fails us. It is there- 

 fore necessary to fall back upon geographic methods, correlating 

 by contours and their relation to existing water bodies. 



The highest altitude at which excavations in these deposits have 

 yielded fossils is a little over 400 feet. This lies well below the 

 present altitude of the Mohawk glacial drainage outlet at Rome. 

 This outlet is believed to have been that of an ice-dammed lake 

 whose level was controlled by a glacial lobe in the St Lawrence 

 valley and which is generally regarded as the last of the succession 

 of water surfaces to be maintained by the retreating margin of the 

 Labradorian ice sheet. 1 



The deposits inclosing the mammalian remains under discussion 

 lie therefore below the last ice-controlled water level and were con- 

 sequently laid down in and about water bodies which were in no 

 way affected, even remotely, by a glacial dam. On this account 

 these accumulations must be regarded as strictly postglacial. It 

 should also be noted in this connection that the layers yielding 

 fossils are superficial, being, as far as ascertained, less than 20 feet 

 below the present land surface. 



Onondaga and Oneida, as well as several other lakes in the low- 

 lands of central New York, probably represent all that is left of 



1 See N. Y. State Mus. Bui. 127, pi. 42, page 10. 



