86 The American Geologist. February, its99 
meaning at all. The term wash here used is simply intended 
to fill the gap until a better word is found. By ice-bound is 
meant, in the case of both till and wash, that condition of a 
deposit in which it is laid down at the ice edge in such a way 
as to retain, when the ice vanishes, some trace of the ice-con- 
tact which once existed. By ice-free is meant that group 
of deposits which, though of glacial origin, are deposited be- 
yond the influence of the ice. In the case of the till, the sole 
means of attaining this state is through the rafting of the 
debris. Where stratification in this case intervenes, on the 
dropping of the materials, the ice-laid distinction ceases to 
hold and the deposit passes into the water-laid group. Of 
the water-laid deposits, such accumulations as are laid down 
in river valleys at levels below the base of the ice may be said 
to be ice-free. Just as soon, however, as the construction of 
sand-plains or deltas reaches up to the ice edge and begins 
to bank and gravel against that edge, the deposits become 
ice-bound; they will show the ice-contact upon the liquefaction 
or retreat of the glacier A classification on this basis can- 
not supercede the admirable grouping presented by professor 
Chamberlin, to which reference has already been made: it is 
simply another way of pigeon-holing the same series of phe- 
nomena. 
ELEVENTH WINTER MEETING OF THE GEOLOG- 
ICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA. 
Reported by E. O. Hovey, New York. 
Although the first meeting of the Geological Society of 
America took place eleven years ago in Ithaca, it was merely 
one of organization, so that' the meeting which was held at 
Columbia University, from the 28th to the 30th of December. 
1898, really rounded out the first decade of active life and work 
of the society and marked an epoch in its history. The report 
of the council showed that the society had had a very prosper- 
ous year, and it reviewed in brief measure the history of the 
decade. In the words of the introduction to the report: The 
society has united the geologists of the continent, produced 
harmony of feeling, thought, and labor, created and cemented 
