3. Farmington, Hartford County.—In 1914 (Amer. Jour. Sci., vol. XXXVII, pp. 321–330), Schuchert and Lull described the exhumation of a mastodon near the town named. All of the principal bones of the skeleton were secured. One tusk and most of the foot-bones were missing. The account ought to be taken by collectors as a model for their reports. The exact position of the skeleton is given. A topographic map of the surrounding region is furnished, as well as the details concerning the materials occurring above and below the bones. These lay on boulder clay of Wisconsin age and were covered by materials washed in from the surrounding higher grounds. No mollusks were found in the excavation, and little vegetation. The bones, as shown by Lull’s map, were remarkably little disturbed, not more than one might expect from the activities of wolves. One of the tusks was, however, removed from the skull a distance of 23 feet and left on ground 2 feet higher. Schuchert regarded this as being hard to explain. The other tusk was not found at all.
4. Bristol, Hartford County.—In 1885 (Trans. N. Y. Acad. Sci., vol. V, p. 14), O. P. Hubbard stated that the remains of a mastodon had been found at Bristol, but no further information was furnished.
5. Sharon, Litchfield County.—In 1828 (Amer. Jour. Sci., vol. XIV, p. 187), in a footnote, it was reported that, a good many years before that time, some remains of mastodon had been found near Sharon. In 1835 (ibid., vol. XXVII, p. 166) it was stated that a mastodon bone, found probably at Sharon, had been presented to the museum of Yale College. There seems to be no certainty that the bone was correctly identified.
NEW YORK.
1. New Dorp, Richmond County.—In 1901 (Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci., vol. XIV, p. 67), Dr. Arthur Hollick reported the discovery of some fragments of a molar of a mastodon in a swamp deposit in the Moravian cemetery immediately north of New Dorp, Staten Island. The molar was found at a depth of 23 feet. The swamp, now drained, was located immediately on the moraine of the Wisconsin ice-sheet (Folio 157, U. S. Geol. Sur.). It had evidently at first been a pond about 25 feet deep; later it had become filled up with sandy silt, muck, and vegetable débris. At a depth of about 8 feet Hollick found a stratum approximately 2 feet thick, in which were cones of white spruce (Picea canadensis), a tree now found not farther south than northern New England and the Adirondacks. Evidently the mastodon had lived there not long after the retirement of the ice, for the tooth appears to have been only about 2 feet above the bottom of the old pond. The spot is probably at an altitude above the submergence described by Fairchild (Bull. Geol. Soc. Amer., vol. XXVIII, p. 279).
2. Ridgewood, Kings County.—In 1885 (Trans. N. Y. Acad. Sci., vol. V, p. 15), Mr. D. S. Martin stated that some 15 or 20 years before that time a mastodon skeleton had been exhumed in excavating for the Ridgewood, Long Island, reservoirs. No details were furnished.
3. Jamaica, Queens County.—In 1859 (Proc. Amer. Assoc. Adv. Sci., 12th meeting, 1858, p. 232), J. C. Brevoort reported the finding of 5 molar teeth and fragments of bones in removing pond-muck in the valley of a small stream which flowed into Baisley’s pond, near Jamaica. In the pond itself was a deposit of mud, in some places 6 feet deep, which rested on gravel. This deposit of mud, mixed with vegetable matter, is continued up the valley mentioned. The bones and teeth were found about 20 yards from the channel of the stream, resting on the gravel and covered by about 4 feet of the muck.
According to Folio 83, of the U. S. Geological Survey, Jamaica and vicinity is situated on stratified drift which was laid down while the foot of the glacial ice was immediately north of the town. The mastodon must have lived there after the retreat of the ice from the island; it may have been a long time afterward. According to Fairchild, as above cited, this locality was submerged by the sea while the stratified materials were being laid down.
4. Inwood, Nassau County.—In 1891 (Science, vol. XVIII, p. 342), Professor R. P. Whitfield noted the finding near Inwood of a fragment of what he regarded as a mastodon tusk. It was met in cutting a ditch in a peat-swamp. While the probability is that the tusk was that of a mastodon, it might have been that of one of the elephants.