134 G. H. Stone — Wind Action in Maine. 



stream of New England. The valley of the Androscoggin is 

 preeminent for its sand dunes. One can travel in a carriage 

 along this river from Brunswick to the New Hampshire line at 

 Gilead and hardly be out of sight of drifted sand for an hour 

 at a time. In Wayne, within the last forty years, the sand has 

 drifted eastward from one half a mile to nearly one mile, and 

 up the western slope of a hill 250 feet high, and now is descend- 

 ing the eastern slope. In places the dunes must have traveled 

 two miles or more away from the river valley where they were 

 originally deposited as valley-drift. Often on hill-sides a pine 

 growth is found where one would naturally expect the hard 

 deciduous trees. Investigation shows that drifting dunes have 

 passed over the hill, and have left more or less sand as a cover- 

 ing of the till. The explorer of the drift of Maine soon comes 

 to regard this blown sand as perhaps his most protean adver- 

 sary, especially when trying to locate the shore line of the 

 Champlain sea. It is not, however, the purpose of the present 

 writing to treat in detail of the ordinary dunes, but to describe 

 two less common phases of wind action. 



I. Till Burrowing. — Not rarely spots bare of vegetation can 

 be found on hill-sides exposed to high winds. Here during dry 

 days the wind removes the finer parts of the till and drives the 

 gravel back and forth just as happens in Colorado during the 

 dry winter weather. But the rains fall so frequently in Maine, 

 and the ground during the winter is so generally covered with 

 snow, that under ordinary conditions the wind is never able to 

 blow away much of the till in this manner. A few inches is 

 all that I have ever seen thus removed. But along the borders 

 of the drifting sands the case is different, especially near the 

 tops of hills where the till is not kept moist by springs. Here 

 the protecting vegetation has often been destroyed over large 

 areas by the drifting sand, and the rapid evaporation from the 

 sand seems to keep the till dryer than elsewhere. As a result 

 the till is here blown away much more rapidly than usual. 

 Small bluffs are formed, partly owing to the direct effect of the 

 wind in blowing away the finer parts of the till, and partly from 

 the impact of the blowing sand which is near by. A talus com- 

 posed of the coarser gravel and bowlders of the till is thus left 

 at the base of the cliff and scattered promiscuously over the de- 

 nuded surface. In this way considerable areas of the till have 

 in some cases been denuded as the drifting sand traveled from 

 place to place. A fine instance of this kind of till-burrowing 

 is found on the top of a hill about one mile northwest of 

 Wayne village. Here, in 1879, the wind had excavated the till 

 to a depth of nearly three feet and the glaciated ledges had 

 been laid bare for a distance of several rods. The glaciated 

 stones of the till retained their scratches in perfect condition, 



