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to shore about its middle, but the channel occupies only one 
and a quarter miles of this space. 
The change of depth is gradual, except between W atts’ and 
Beach Islands, near the southern extremity of the Sound, where 
the change from deep to shoal water is sudden. About the 
upper and northeastern portion the depth is more uniform, 
the deep channel shoaling to about twelve feet, and that water 
being but slightly diminished close to the shores. 
The beds do not as in Tangier Sound, cover the shoals on 
each side of the channel, the majority being found on the 
eastern side. Only two beds are to the westward of that part 
of the channel, where the water is deeper than three or four 
fathoms. 
The total area covered by oysters to a greater or less extent 
in this Sound, is 34.118 square nautical miles. This area is 
that enclosed on the chart by the boundaries of scattered oys- 
ters, and is but approximate, as previously explained, 
The solid beds, comprising all parts of the Sound where 
oysters were found in a greater proportion than 0.1 to the 
square yard, or where the bed was found to be to all intents, 
solid “ oyster-rock,” or comparatively unbroken, contains a 
total area of 4.519 square nautical miles. 
The groups or rocks are not always contiguous, being sepa- 
rated by the channels into the different creeks and rivers and 
by mud-sloughs and spaces. 
In only one case have the beds extended across the channel, 
and peculiar circumstances account for that exception. 
Generally speaking the beds will be found to lie on each 
side of the main channel in the Sound and on each side of the 
channels into the rivers. Taking them in order from the 
mouth of the Pocomoke River to the entrance to the Sound, 
there are seventeen of a sufficient size to justify a separate 
consideration and name. 
I have called them by the names given by the local oyster- 
men to the solid “ oyster-rock,” which was probably the origin 
of the bed. 
They are: The Old Rocks and Rew Plantation Rocks, 
Buoy Rock, Potter’s Rock, Slatestone Flat Rock, Dog-Fish 
