from Guadaloupe. 119 
owes its existence to the same subterraneous energies, which 
still manifest themselves in the eruptions of the Soujfriere. 
M. Lavaisse, to whom I alluded above, as the only author 
who mentions the galibies, except General Ernouf, speaks of 
the bed of limestone which encloses them, as the most re- 
markable of the calcareous rocks in the Leeward islands ; I 
therefore expected to find in his work an exact statement of 
its mode of occurring ; but the only positive information I 
could collect from this author is, that the bed is a kilometre 
(nearly an English mile) in length, and that it is covered by the 
sea at high water. According to him, no trace of shells or 
organized bodies are discoverable in this rock; but in lieu of 
these he was fortunate enough to meet with mortars, pestles, 
hatchets, &c. of a basaltic or porphyritic rock, which, we are 
informed, were petrified [petrifies). From this very vague 
account, I should not be induced to lay much stress upon the 
circumstance that the position of the skeletons is east-west, 
and that the spot must, therefore, have been a cemetery, which 
time and circumstances have transformed into a hard calcare- 
ous rock. 
I have to apologize to you, my dear Sir, for this very long 
letter on a subject which may possibly turn out to be inte- 
resting only so far, as the human bones from Guadaloupe are 
unquestionably the only bones we are acquainted with that have 
ever been found imbedded in a hard stony mass, that does not 
appear to belong to common stalactical calcareous depositions. 
This circumstance admits of being easily ascertained by a close 
inspection of the locality; and I am perfectly of your opinion, 
that a comparison of the nature of the different varieties of 
shell sand with which the neighbourhood of the Caribee islands 
