Crosby.] 44 [October 2, 
to which the summer and autumn of his later years were de- 
voted. 
His serene simplicity and loftiness as well as kindliness of 
spirit were portrayed; his entire devotion to what he deemed 
his duty —often exhibited in the extreme patience with 
which he attended to the applications of projectors and 
crotchety discoverers who sought his advice. And much of 
the prominent influence which he wielded at Washington 
was attributed to his transparent and spotless character, the 
complete subjection of all considerations of personal advan- 
tage or even of personal ambition, and the atmosphere of 
purity in which his official as well as private life ever moved, 
and upon which never fell even the shadow of a shade. 
The following paper was read : — 
NoTES ON THE PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY AND GEOLOGY OF 
TRINIDAD. By W. O. CrosBy. 
Trinidad is a typical example of a continental island. Its inti- 
mate relation to the continent of South America is shown not by its 
geographic contiguity alone, but also by its botany and zoology, and 
very strikingly by its topography and geologic structure. In all 
these respects, especially the last, it differs widely from all the other 
Caribee Islands, except Tobago. 
South America appears to be a partially submerged continent; 
the true continental edge being sometimes a hundred miles or more 
to the seaward of the actually existing coast line. Around the 
north-eastern corner of the continent, the almost cliff-like declivity 
that marks the real border of the ocean is distant fifty to one hun- 
dred and fifty miles from the nearest dry land of the Main, and 
inside this line the soundings do not exceed one hundred fathoms. 
Rising from this zone of shallow water are all the Leeward Islands, 
or Lesser Antilles, and Trinidad and Tobago. These islands, com- 
posed wholly of stratified rocks, are essentially a part of the conti- 
nent, and are strongly contrasted with the volcanic islands to the 
northward, which have their foundations in the abysses of the ocean. 
- Trinidad is usually described as a quadrangular plain of very 
moderate altitude, traversed by three parallel, east-west lines of 
