1885.] Geology and Paleontology. 69 
Tue Eocene oF Nortu Carorina,—I have recently ascertained 
by the discovery of the unmistakable superposition of the small 
outlines of Eocene fossiliferous rocks (noted in the text and geo- 
logical map of the State, in the report of 1875), and of other 
similarly situated patches of the same beds, with upper Eocene 
shells, capping the highest hills of the so-called ‘drift or quater- 
nary, that nearly all of these beds of sand and gravels heretofore 
referred to the latter horizon are of Eocene age. The area of 
Tertiaries in this State must now be extended over a wide stretch 
of country, from the tops of Laurentian hills, near Raleigh, and 
the higher elevations of the Huronian slates, to from fifty to 
seventy-five miles south-eastward, along the course of the Deep 
river, and so onward to the South Carolina border, reaching at one 
point an elevation of 600 feet above tide. This leaves the quater- 
nary, like the Miocene, to be represented by a thin and broken 
covering of superficial deposits, of only a few feet to a few yards 
in thickness, and reaching from the coast only about 100 miles 
inland and an elevation but little above 100 feet.— W. C. Kerr, 
Raleigh, N. C. 
CHARACTER OF THE DEEP-SEA DEPOSITS OFF THE EASTERN 
Coast oF THE UNITED States.—At the Newport meeting of the 
National Academy of Sciences, Professor A. E. Verrill gave the 
results of explorations made last summer by the U. S. Fish Com- 
mission steamer Albatross, sixty-nine dredgings having been 
made during four trips between Wood’s Holl and a point off the 
Virginian coast. Of these dredgings, 5 were in depths between 
2000 and 2600 fathoms (4 successful); 20 were between 1000 an 
2000 fathoms ; 24 between 500 and 1000 fathoms ; 8 between 300 
and 500 fathoms; 12 between 75 and 300 fathoms. Another trip 
has since been made to explore more extensively the zone 
tween 40 and 100 fathoms. ; 
Some very interesting and important discoveries were made in 
regard to the nature of the materials composing the sea-bottom 
under the Gulf stream at great depths. These observations are 
_of great interest from a geological point of view, and some of 
them are contrary to the experience of other expeditions, and not 
in accordance with the generally accepted theories of the nature . 
of the deposits far from land. The bottom between 600 an 
