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Eighth and Ninth streets. In digging his front well in Cherry street, at thirty feet, they came to marsh mud, and found acorns and oak leaves in abundance, and a little below them they came to fine polished coarse gravel, from the size of peas to filberts. Afterwards he dug two wells back, one hundred and forty feet southward on said ground, and at same depth came to precisely the same discoveries of acorns, leaves, and gravel. All the earth, save the first four to four and a half feet of made ground, appeared to be the natural strata of loam and sand. When he was building Mr. Girard's stores in north Water street, about thirty-five years ago, they dug out of the cellar ground, wine and beer, about one dozen bottles each, which still retained strength, supposed to have been buried there one hundred years.

Mr. Graff, the city agent for the water pipes, informed me of his having found, in digging to lay them, " near the Bank of Pennsylvania," in Second street, as I understood him, at twelve feet below the present surface, a regular pebble pavement. I should expect this to be the case in Walnut street, westward of Second street.

The late aged Timothy Matlack, Esq., told me of his having seen spatterdocks, fresh and green, dug up at eighteen feet depth, at the place called Clarke & Moore's brewhouse, on Sixth street a little below Arch street. This occurred in the year 1760, and the specimens were used by Dr. Kinnersly, in the College before his class.

At the corner of Fourth and Greenleaf alley he saw, at four feet beneath the present surface, the top of a white oak rail post, and they had to dig ten feet more for a fast foundation for a house.

Colonel James Morris, when ninety years of age, told me of his seeing turf dug up at the time of sinking the foundation of Second street bridge over Dock creek. It was a congeries of black fibrous roots. Turf also was seen in digging seventeen feet for a gravel foundation to Francis West's store in Dock street. The turf was found at twelve feet depth.

The late Jacob Shoemaker said he saw coal taken from a vein found in digging a well at a place in Turner's lane, about a quarter of a mile eastward of the Ridge road. It was, however, more probable it was such charred wood as is now found in the river bank at Bordentown.

Kensington has its foundation on quick sand, so that none of their wells will hold any depth of water.

Governor Dennie's daughter was buried in the Friend's burying ground near the corner of Third and Arch streets. What is curious

is, that after she had been buried thirty years, she was dug up and found entire, but perished when exposed to the air. Her hair had grown as long as the grave-digger could extend his hands. Her broad riband was entire and was worn afterwards by the digger's daughter! Her nails were grown too. This relation is well established, and fully agrees with some other facts of the enduring quality of silk-for instance, an disinterring the leaden coffins of

Lord and Lady Bellemont at New York, in 1787, the lead was found corroded, but the silk velvet on the lid was entire. At Boston, in 1824, they disinterred a British officer; the body and clothes were perished, but the silk military sash was sound in material and colour.

Thomas Dixey, a pump-maker and well-digger, a man of seventy years of age; intelligent and respectable, a chief undertaker, in his way, for forty years in the city, having been requested to tell me all he had ever met with as curious under ground, told me, that he has often, in several places, at considerable depths, come across acorns, oyster shells, &c. He told me that in the neighbourhood of Carter's alley and Go-Forth alley he dug twenty feet, and came to oyster shells and acorns. He found a great and excellent spring at twentyeight feet depth, at the corner of Go-Forth alley and Dock creek.

When the house, No. 72, South Fourth street, a little above Walnut street, west side, was built, they dug nine feet for their cellar, and there came to an old post and rail fence.

Mr. Dixey, in digging for a well on the north side of South street, near Third street, on the premises of Mr Reed, silk dyer, came, at the depth of twenty-five feet, across a pine limb of three inches in thickness, having its bark on it. It had petrified, and he actually ground it into a good hone, and gave it to the said Mr. Reed.

At No. 13, Dock street, the house of Thomas Shields, was found, in digging his cellar, a regular fire hearth, one a half feet below the present spring-tide mark.

Christian Witmeek, an old digger of wells in the Northern Liberties, mentioned some discoveries about Pegg's run. In Lowber's tanyard, at thirteen feet depth, cut across a small fallen tree-dug thirty-eight feet; at thirty-four feet they came to wood; full as much as twenty-four feet was of black mud. In digging a well near there for Thomas Steel, No. 81, St. John street, he came, at twenty-one feet depth, to real turf of ten feet thickness; at twentysix feet depth they came to a crotch of a pine tree.

The clay in the vicinity of the new prison in Arch street, by Centre square, is the deepest in the city, being twenty-eight feet deep. In digging twenty-eight feet on Singer's lot near there, Mr. Groves came to gravel, and dug up a limb of an oak tree of five inches thickness, and longer than the well across which it lay. Some oak leaves, and the impressions of several were marked on the clay. Mr. Grove found an Indian tomahawk at five feet depth in M'Crea's lot, in Chestnut street, vis-a-vis Dorsey's Gothic mansion.

In digging a well for Thatcher, in Front near to Noble street, they came, at the depth of twenty-eight feet, to an oak log of eighteen inches thickness, quite across the pit. The whole was alluvial deposit in that neighbourhood. Turf was dug out and burnt—in digging for the drain wells of twenty-eight feet depth under the present Sansom's row, in Second street north of Pegg's run.

In Race street, between Front and Second streets, in digging the VOL. II.-3 D

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foundation of the engine house now there, they dug up an Indian grave, and found the bones.

At the corner of Eighth and Cherry streets, in digging a well, at the depth of forty feet, says Joseph Sansom, they found a fallen log Other facts of subterrene discoveries will be found in other parts of this work, connected with certain localities spoken of severally.

In 1707-8, there was much expectation, through the suggestions of Governor Evans, of a great discovery of valuable minerals in Pennsylvania. William Penn, on hearing of it, begged an explanation, and hoped it might relieve him from his embarrassments! It proved, however, to be a deceit of one Mitchell, who had been a miner in England. He pretended he was led to the discovery by a Shawnese king. Some of the "black sand," &c., was sent to Penn to assay it.

In 1722, mine land is spoken of as having been taken up for Sir William Keith, at a place beyond Susquehanna.

In 1728, James Logan writes of there being then four furnaces in the colony in blast.

About the year 1790, John Nancarro, a Scotchman, had a furnace under ground for converting iron into steel. It stood at the northwest corner of Ninth and Walnut streets. There was also a furnace, above ground, at the north-west corner of Eighth and Walnut streets, having a large chimney, and tapering to the top. There a curious fact occurred, which, but for this record, might puzzle the cognoscenti and antiquaries at some future day;-such as whether the aborigines had not understood the art of fusing iron, &c. The fact was this:-The great mass of five tons of iron bars which were in the furnace, was suddenly converted into a great rock of steel, by reason of a fissure in the furnace which let in the air, and consumed the charcoal, whereby the whole ran into steel, equal to four or five tons. Some houses, of very shallow cellars, have been since erected over the place, and all are quite unconscious of the treasure which rests beneath them. It was an open lot when so used by Nancarro. There is a curious and unaccountable vault far under ground, in the back premises of Messrs. John and C. J. Wistar,-say, No. 139 High street, north side, and between Third and Fourth streets. At fourteen feet depth is a regular arched work of stone, sixteen feet long, and without any visible outlet. In breaking into its top to know its contents, they found nothing therein, save a log lying along the whole length. They sealed it up again, and the privy wall now rests upon it. There is no conjecture formed concerning what it may have been constructed for, nor at what time it may have been made. Dr. Franklin once lived in the adjoining house, No. 141; (both houses belonged to Wistar,) whether the vault could have had any connexion with his philosophy may be a question. In rebuilding those houses five wells were found under the foundations.

In the year 1836, when digging to lay down the hydrant pipe in

High street, opposite to Decatur street, they found, under ground, the floor of a store or stable, out in the middle of the street; the joists were still sound and heavy. I think it must have been the remains of the bridge which once ought to have run across the street at that place.

At that run, a drunken man, who had fallen into it, was found drowned, lying on his face.

In 1738, it is announced in the Gazette, that they have the pleasure to acquaint the world, that the famous Chinese plant, ginseng, is now discovered in the province, near Susquehanna. It appears from the specimens sent home, that it agrees with Du Halde's account, and with Chambers' Dictionary.

Our Gems.-We are little aware of the treasure we possess among ourselves in the way of gems. The reason that they are not sought and, known is, that they cost so high to prepare them for use; so that only imported ones are now used by our jewellers. We have the chrysoprase, of a pea-green, the amethyst, the topaz, in the yellow quartz. The white or rock crystal, also the brown crystal or smoky quartz, in splendid specimens, in Lancaster county. The garnet or carbuncle, of a rich red, is found abundantly near West Chester, and some near Germantown. The calcedony, in much variety, abounds in our state and New York. Jasper is found very good at Hoboken. The beryl, splendid and perfect, is found in Chester county, exceeding eight inches in diameter. Several of the above gems are to be gathered by the handful-picking one and two here and there at a time, on the sand beach of Cape May, by the summer bathers who may pad along the strand for that purpose; they being such as are washed up in storms from the bosom of the ocean, where they may have been cast, in the whirl of waters at the first rotary impulse of the earth, when the fiat went forth"Let the dry land appear." When we shall have lapidaries working as cheaply as in Europe, these stones may find demand-and withal, lower their market price.

The chalybeate spring, at Harrowgate, is first announced as a discovery by George Esterly, in July, 1784. After that, it became a place of public resort, as a beautiful garden, &c., and was so sustained for many years.

WHALES AND WHALERY.

"The huge potentate of the scaly train."

Ir will surprise a modern Philadelphian to learn how very much the public attention was once engaged in the fishery of whales along our coast, and to learn withal, that they disdained not occasionally to leave their briny deeps to explore and taste the gustful fresh waters of our Delaware-even there

"Enormous sails incumbent, an animated isle,

And in his way dashes to heaven's blue arch the foaming wave."

"The Free Society of Traders" had it as a part of their original scheme of profit, to prosecute extensively the catching of whales. To this purpose they instituted a whalery near Lewistown, and, as I am inclined to think, there was once in some way connected with the whalery a place of sale or deposit, at the junction of "Whalebone alley" and Chestnut street, on the same premises now Pritchet's. The old house which formerly stood there had a large whalebone affixed to the wall of the house, and when lately digging through the made earth in the yard, they dug up several fragments of whales, such as tails, fins, &c. Its location there originally was by the tidewater ranging in Dock creek. Be this as it may, we are certain of the whales and whaleries, from facts like the following, to wit:

In 1683, William Penn, in writing to the above society, says, "The whalery hath a sound and fruitful bank, and the town of Lewis by it, to help your people."

In another letter of the same year he says, "Mighty whales roll upon the coast, near the mouth of the bay of the Delaware; eleven caught and worked into oil in one season. We justly hope a considerable profit by whalery, they being so numerous, and the shore so suitable."

In another letter of 1683, William Penn again says, "Whales are in great plenty for oil, and two companies of whalers, and hopes of finding plenty of good cod in the bay."

In 1688, Phineas Pemberton, of Pennsbury, records a singular visiter, saying, "a whale was seen in the Delaware as high as the falls!"

In 1696, Gov. Andrew Hamilton, of Burlington, New Jersey, authorizes George Taylor, of Cape May, to be his deputy, and to take into his possession wrecks, or drift whales, or other royal fish, that shall be driven on shore along the coast, or in the Delaware.

In 1722, deficiency of whales is intimated, saying in the Gazette, that there are but four whales killed on Long Island, and but little oil is expected from thence.

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