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CHAP. XI.
friable loam, almost totally devoid of any appearance ofstratification, and containing, here and there, land and am-phibious shells. It extends over large portions of Germany and Austria , wrapping over the inequalities of the groundand attaining an enormous thickness in the river valleys.It is extensively worked for brick-earth to the depth of abouteight feet. The bluffs before alluded to often consist of aterrace of gravel, from thirty to forty feet in thickness,covered by an older loess, which is continuous as we ascendthe valley to Liege . In the suburbs of that city, patchesof loess are seen at the height of two hundred feet abovethe level of the Meuse . The table-land in that region, com-posed of Carboniferous and Devonian rocks, is about fourhundred and fifty feet high, and is not overspread withloess.
A terrace of gravel covered with loess has been mentionedas existing on the right bank of the Meuse at Maes-tricht. Answering to it another is also seen on the left bankbelow that city, and a promontory of it projecting into thealluvial plain of the Meuse , and approaching to within ahundred yards of the river, was cut through during the ex-cavation of a canal running from Maestricht to Hocht,between the years 1815 and 1823. This section occurs atthe village of Smeermas, and is about .sixty feet deep, thelower forty feet consisting of stratified gravel, and the upperof twenty feet of loess. The number of molars, tusks, andbones (probably parts of entire skeletons) of elephants ob-tained during these diggings, was extraordinary. Not a fewof them are still preserved in the museums of Maestricht andLeyden, together with some horns of deer, bones of the ox-tribe, and other mammalia, and a human lower jaw, withteeth. According to Professor Crahay, who published anaccount of it at the time, this jaw, which is now preservedat Leyden, was found at the depth of nineteen feet from the