Doubtless the locality in North Carolina, the most important to the student of Pleistocene vertebrate palæontology, is that reported long ago on the northern shore of Neuse River, 16 miles below Newbern. As stated on page [117], in a mention of the mastodon bones discovered, H. B. Croom seems first to publish a statement concerning the animal remains found there. Some of his identifications were certainly wrong. According to Harlan (Amer. Jour. Sci., vol. XLIII, 1842, p. 143), there were secured remains of elephant, mastodon, hog, elk, deer, horse, seal, cetaceans, a tortoise, snake, fish, shark, and skate. As in another case, Harlan may have mistaken worn teeth of Bison for teeth of the hog (Sus). For our purpose the most important animals of the list are the elephant, the mastodon, and the horse. According to Croom, the animal remains were found in a marl pit. He was informed by the owner that in an upper layer there were found teeth of sharks and fragments of bones of marine fishes, mingled with sea-shells. In a deeper layer, 20 to 25 feet below the surface, there occurred the remains of land animals, together with sea-shells of great variety. Croom thought that some teeth belong to the hyena, and Foster reported the hippopotamus; but in both cases the identifications were wrong.
Conrad (Amer. Jour. Sci., vol. XXVIII, 1835, pp. 107–110; Proc. Nat. Inst. Prom. Sci., vol I, pp. 191–192) reported that the bones of animals found here were water-worn, black, and silicified. He concluded that they had been brought down the Neuse River and mingled with sea-shells. The fossiliferous stratum did not rise anywhere more than 10 feet above the river. In the first publication quoted, Conrad published a list of 66 mollusks in this stratum, of which 7 were not yet known as living species and 2 others are noted as new. According to this list, less than 90 per cent are recent. He referred the deposits to his newer Pliocene. In the second publication cited he concluded that the stratum belonged to the post-Pliocene. Stephenson (op. cit., p. 289) refers to the investigations made at this locality. It is not improbable that the deposit which furnished these fossils belongs to the earliest Pleistocene stage, the Nebraskan. The same may be said about the coquina rock mentioned by Stephenson which occurs at Old Fort Fisher, in New Hanover County (op. cit., p. 289, plate XXVIII).
On page 115 the writer refers to a lower jaw of a mastodon found by the geologist W. C. Kerr, near Goldsboro, and described by Joseph Leidy. The jaw was reported to have been found in gravel overlying Miocene marl. The writer believes that the mastodon belonged to the species Mammut progenium. Goldsboro, on Neuse River, is near the western border of the Sunderland formation, but the Wicomico is prolonged up the river far above Goldsboro. According to Stephenson and Johnson (op. cit., p. 475), Miocene sands and clays are found over a portion of the northern part of the county (Wayne). The geological age of this mastodon depends more on the age of the gravels in which it was found than on the age of the terrace, although the writer is willing to concede an early Pleistocene stage for the terrace.
A mastodon tooth has been found (see p. [117]) somewhere in Wilson County. The county is covered mostly by Pleistocene of Sunderland age, but a small part of the western end is occupied by the Coharie; while, according to Stephenson’s map, both the Chowan and the Wicomico follow up Contentnea Creek into Wilson County. The geological age of the mastodon is doubtful.
At Greenville, Pitt County, have been found remains of Equus complicatus, perhaps also of another species of horse (see p. [191]). While supposed to have been found in Miocene marls, the tooth belonged without doubt to the Pleistocene. Pitt County is occupied by four Pleistocene formations, Pamlico, Chowan, Wicomico, and Sunderland. The probability is that the horse-teeth were found in an early Pleistocene deposit.
As indicated on page [117], remains of Mammut americanum have been found in Pitt County, possibly at Greenville.
As noted on page [117], a tooth of Mammut americanum has been found at or near Tarboro. Nothing more is known about its origin. At this place are found deposits belonging to the Chowan, Wicomico, and Sunderland formations; it is impossible to say from which the tooth was derived.
Emmons (Geol. Surv. North Carolina, 1852, p. 56) reported finding mastodon bones in marl-pits on the farm of Mr. Knight, on the banks of Tar River, in Nash County, 3 miles west of Rocky Mount. The same Pleistocene deposits occur here as at Tarboro. The bones were supposed to have been buried in Miocene marl, and this may have been true. If so, they belonged to some other species of mastodon than Mammut americanum.
On page [191] is given an account of the discovery of teeth of Equus leidyi which were washed up on the beach at Plymouth. This town is on Roanoke River, several miles from Albemarle Sound, and on the border between the Pamlico and the Chowan formations. Our determination of the geological age of the teeth must be based on other evidence than that furnished by the discoverers.
Elsewhere in this work is given an account of finding a part of a skull of a walrus at Kitty Hawk. It was probably during the Wisconsin glacial stage that this animal lived along the coast as far south as Charleston.