1875.] 419 [State Survey 



how far boulders were carried entire from their original position. 

 At any given point, the soils seem to consist, for the most part, of 

 comminuted fragments of the underlying solid rocks. But large 

 masses are frequently found at considerable distances from their 

 source. In this vicinity the glacial stream ran across the parallel 

 bands of rock ; so that, although boulders can be traced but a short 

 distance, they can be referred with certainty to their origin. Thus a 

 boulder of gneiss on the beach at Weymouth clearly came from the 

 neighborhood of Billerica or Bedford, twenty to twenty-five miles 

 away, the nearest point where similar rocks occur in place. Another 

 precisely similar in Cambridge has travelled half that distance. 

 Again, in Newton, two boulders of gneiss, one dark and micaceous, 

 the other brown, granular and granitic, resemble no rock nearer than 

 Concord, where (and farther west) such may be found. The light 

 red porphyry of Essex County may be found on Nahant abundantly, 

 and occasionally also on the beaches of the harbor islands. It is 

 curious to notice that pebbles of the crystallines are # as characteristic 

 of the conglomerate in Brighton and Newton, as slate fragments 

 from Somerville are of the Cambridge drift. 



The Committee appointed to prepare a Memorial urging 

 upon the Legislature of Massachusetts the importance of the 

 proposed new Survey of the State presented their report, 

 which was accepted, adopted, and ordered to be respectfully 

 submitted to the Legislature, as follows : — 



To the Honorable the General Court of Massachusetts : 



The Boston Society of Natural History, feeling the great impor- 

 tance of such a survey of the State as has been urged upon the 

 attention of your honorable body by the memorial of the American 

 Academy, respectfully represents, that in its view the time has fully 

 come when the interests of the people of the State, material and 

 otherwise, call for a new and thorough survey, topograpical, geologi- 

 cal and biological; one that shall be of the most comprehensive 

 character, meeting alike the requirements of such as seek directly 

 the development of material wealth, through better knowledge of 

 the mineral resources, of the water-sheds, of the areas and capaci- 

 ties of ponds and rivers to supply water for economical purposes, 

 etc., etc., and of such as have at heart more particularly the advance 

 of science and higher culture, which such a survey will surely foster 



