64 *The American Geologist. July, 1897 
nients arc always found in stratified deposits, but never in the unmodi- 
fied drift. One would naturally suppose that an ice sheet grinding and 
carrying with it the rock and other debris from the surface of the land 
over which it passed would have embosomed in it some of the wreck of 
the forest lands, but there is no such indication in the drift of Long 
Island. I mean, of course, the unmodified drift, for, as stated, the wood 
fragments have only been found in the overwash or beneath it. Lignite 
found at greater depths, nearly 400 feet below the surface, may be older 
and of different origin than the wood fragments referred to, although 
the late curator of the Long Island Historical Society, Mr. Lewis, says 
of it: "The lignite found threw no light on the age of the beds. It is 
brought to the surface in small pieces and that from the surface of the 
clay bed 353 feet was formed from small stems of exogenous structure. 
The same is true of that found at 70 feet. This deposit of clay 56 feet 
in thickness seems closely analogous to many clays now upon and at va- 
rious depths beneath the surface of the island. It is evidently a local 
deposit such as might occur in a depression of the surface. Two tube 
wells have been driven at no great distance from Barnum's island, one 
97 the other 194 feet, in which no similar layer of clay was detected." 
This was said in reference to the boring on Barnum's island, which may 
be said to form part of the Hempstead plains. The same is also true of 
the Woodhaven well near Jamaica bay where the rock in situ was 
reached at the depth of 550 feet. Fragments of wood and lignite were 
found at the depth of over 300 feet in a stratum of clay 10 feet in thick- 
ness. Nothing of a marine character was found. In fact, very little of 
an organic nature could be detected. 
Both of the deep wells were failures so far as a supply of water was 
concerned, which would seem to disapprove Mr. Darton's theory, that 
there is a substratum of water flowing from the main land underneath 
the sound and across Long Island sufficient to supply the whole of the 
city of Brooklyn. A few experiments have been made and a few flowing 
wells have been struck on the Hempstead plains, but their success has 
not seemed to warrant a greater expenditure of money. I have before 
me a copy of a letter written by Mr. Carmen, an experienced well digger 
of Hempstead, in relation to the well boring on Barnum's island in the 
Great South bay near the ocean. He says: "The first five feet was 
coarse sand and gravel, the water was fresh. The next fifty feet the 
soil was in layers of sand and clay. The water was salt, with creek 
mud and bilge water. We then passed through a very dense layer of 
blue clay for 70 feet with no water in it. We had to bore through it 
with augers and lift it out like putty. At one hundred and three feet 
we reached fresh water again, but in small quantity and very poor in 
quality. We continued to three hundred and sixty-five feet through 
layers of sand (beach) and clay and found no good water. We found 
quantities of 'sulphur stones' and particles of decayed wood or bark of 
trees, some of these an inch long and one-half inch thick. There have 
been wells put down near our village (Hempstead) about three hundred 
feet, some of them have been flowing wells. The water would be good 
