FINDING OF PETRIFIED BONES 77 



water, and at flood times were buried in the river deposits. 

 In time the whole area sank; for near the top of the hill 

 was the oyster layer, with all the indications of inundation, 

 irregular contact, disturbed beds, all sorts of shallow water 

 shells, bones with borings of teredoes, etc. The sinking 

 continued until after over 500 feet of marine sands were 

 deposited on top of the river-beds, then the land rose again 

 until it now stands 800 feet above the sea level. The 

 Chico River has carved out the hill, reexposing the bones 

 buried so long before. 



The afternoon waned and we hurried back to the boys 

 who had begun to wonder if we were lost. The nearest 

 water was close by the house, and Mr. Booysen allowed us 

 to camp in his dooryard. Next morning we all went over 

 on foot and began real prospecting. Inside of an hour every 

 man had a prospect to work on, and before the day was 

 done he had enough work in sight to last him a week. 



For three days we worked from this camp, but as we 

 were going over the third morning Billy spied a bare spot 

 where the ground was damp and covered with a rime of salt. 

 It looked as if water might be underneath, so we got the 

 pick and shovel, and a couple of hours digging cleared out 

 what proved to be as good a spring as we encountered in 

 the country; so the next morning we packed up again and 

 moved over to our spring where we could camp within half 

 a mile of our hill. 



