JEFFERSON COUNTY. 
411 
elevation south, ranging about two or two and a half miles southeast of Adams towards 
Loraine, and thence towards Mannsville. Some portion of this band of boulders lies along the 
common travelled road leading from Adams to Mannsville. 
The region which I have imperfectly defined, may strictly be called the Boulder region ; 
and all parts of the State where the surface and elevation resemble this, and analogous con¬ 
ditions exist, will furnish a region in which the same disposition will be found in regard to 
the arrangement of the boulders. It has been interesting, in noticing the kinds of boulders, 
to find among them the hypersthene rock, which, as the reader will have observed from 
remarks in other parts of the volume, is found in place principally in the western part of 
Essex. But those which occur upon the St. Lawrence and Lake Ontario cannot be traced 
to the Essex mass, but must be referred to the more northern regions of Canada or Labrador. 
Besides the distribution of drift and boulders, our attention is directed to another class of 
effects, the cause of which is perfectly well understood, but which is as surprising as to find 
the rocks of Labrador encircling our mountains and hills. I refer to the wearing out of deep 
holes in the rocks of some of the ridges of Jefferson, usually codded pot-holes, from their shape 
resembling a pot. The peculiar form which these holes always take when made by running 
water, is such that there is no possibility of error in assigning one and the same cause for 
their production wherever they may be found, whether in the present reach of running water 
or not. No cause whatever is capable of producing a deep hole in a solid rock, except a 
current of water moving with a sufficient power to carry around a quantity of stones. 
One of the most remarkable of these holes is in Antwerp, about three-fourths of a mile 
south of Oxbow. It is in a high cliff of granitic rocks, rising up on the west side of the 
road. This cliff is the western border of a valley one hundred rods Avide. The perpendi¬ 
cular face of the rocks in which the pot-hole is made, is thirty or thirty-five feet. Its appear¬ 
ance from the road is represented in the sketch at the head of this article. 
The hole is from twenty-four to thirty feet deep, and from twelve to fourteen feet in dia¬ 
meter ; about twelve feet in the neck of the passage, and fourteen in the largest part. A 
large mass of stones remains in the bottom, which were left by the water when it ceased to 
flow in this valley. The ledge of rock is about one hundred feet, and perhaps more, above 
the Oswegatchie. 
The effect observed in this instance, is one which I have already remarked may be traced 
to its cause. No doubt can exist in the mind of any person, who has once seen a pot-hole 
in a creek or river, but that this appertains to the same class of phenomena. It is impossible, 
however, to say when it was produced, or in what direction the river flowed, for there has 
been a change of the surface of the country. But there is one point which may be determined : 
it is in relation to the movement of the subjacent rocks, which without doubt have been ele¬ 
vated, and, in consequence of this elevation, have turned the channel of the waters in some 
other direction. 
Other pot-holes, I have been informed by Mr. Bailey of Hammond, exist three miles below 
this place, about fifty feet above the St. Lawrence river. These I have not seen; but from 
the accuracy of Mr. Bailey as an observer, there is no doubt of the fact as stated. 
