Herzberg Principle — PALMER 
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same. Between the underlying salt water and the 
fresh water on top of it there is an intermediate 
zone of varying width in which the two mingle 
to form brackish water. The fresh water, always 
receiving additions from above, is slowly but 
steadily moving to the only outlet it can find 
—that is, to springs located along the sea shore, 
just above or a little below sea level. 
The surface of the salt water "is . . . about 
160 feet below the surface of the ground 
[near the south shore]. Inland this level sinks. 
. . . The permanent surface of fresh water rises 
inland very slowly, so that a mile or more 
inland the water in wells may stand only a 
foot or two above sea level.” 
Attention is called to Dr. Lindgren’s refer- 
ence to the "counter pressure of sea water,” 
and to his observation that the water table 
rose inland and that the salt-fresh boundary 
dropped inland. He was very close to develop- 
ing the idea of the fresh water lens. 
In the following years a number of studies 
were made by members of the U. S. Geologi- 
cal Survey in states bordering the Atlantic 
and Gulf Coasts. 
Harris in 1904 held that fluctuations of 
water levels in wells in Louisiana were re- 
sponses to loading and unloading of imper- 
meable strata over the water-bearing strata by 
tides and by strong onshore winds. Also, that 
the fluctuations did not depend on any direct 
connection between the water of the Gulf and 
the water in the artesian aquifers. 
Pennink in 1904 discussed before the In- 
ternational Engineering Congress in St. Louis 
some of the features of the relationship be- 
tween fresh and salt water under coasts and 
islands, based on his work in the Netherlands. 
Unfortunately the title of the paper (1905) 
did not reveal this topic, so that it did not 
come to the attention of geologists. It is not 
nearly as forthright a presentation of the 
Herzberg principle as one would wish. 
Veatch and others (1906), in a big report 
on the ground waters of Long Island, N. Y., 
made no reference to any possible relationship 
between fresh and salt water. Twelve north- 
south profiles of the island and its water table 
have as their bases the line 20 feet below sea 
level. Curiously these profiles have the pattern 
for the saturated zone extend out under both 
the north and south shores, as if fresh water 
extended under the waters of the bays at the 
south and those of Long Island Sound on the 
north. It would seem, therefore, that they 
gave no consideration to the effect of salt 
water. 
Veatch in 1906, in a smaller paper, wrote 
that the water level under Long Island coin- 
cided with sea level at the shores and became 
higher inland, but said nothing about any 
underlying salt water. 
Taylor, writing in 1907 of the salinity of 
some wells in the Texas Coastal Plain, offered 
no explanation of the salinity. 
We now come back to Hawaii again, for in 
1908 W. D. Alexander discussed the ideas 
ascribed to McCully and wrote that McCully 
(really some unnamed person) held that "it 
seems evident that the great central stratum 
of water-bearing rock must be completely sur- 
rounded by impervious strata from the sur- 
rounding ocean. Were it not so, the water it 
contains would escape into the sea instead of 
standing at forty-two feet above it.” Alexan- 
der agreed with most of these ideas, but not 
entirely, for he wrote, "On the whole the 
theory . . . seems ... to be the most probable 
one, although it may not be necessary to as- 
sume that the 'water-bearing rock must be 
completely separated by impervious strata 
from the ocean,’ in view of the slowness with 
which water percolates through rock and 
gravel, and also of the pressure of the sea 
water.” Unfortunately Alexander did not de- 
velop the germ of the idea further, perhaps 
because not more than 23 well logs could 
have been available to him then. 
It remained for Andrews, in 1909, to make 
a tremendous advance in the understanding 
of the artesian system at Honolulu. Like Mc- 
Cully’s ghost writer and Alexander, he thought 
the barrier of "clay” played an important role, 
but he developed the all-important part played 
