In preglacial times this region was probably forested, but now the forest is buried beneath the drift of the glacier which deposited fragments of Palisade and Orange Mountain trap rock on Staten Island. During the depression of the land which occurred as the ice gradually receded, the waters of the sea doubtless passed up here and the meadow was a larger “Newark Bay.” Then commenced their slow filling up by the silt brought down by the Hackensack River. The river has preserved a right of way, but the bay has given place to a sea of reeds and grasses. [Illustration: 45. Hackensack marshes in August.] On a bright August morning I mount a spur of trap rock which reaches out from the western base of the Palisades, and from this elevation have an uninterrupted view over the meadows. The cool, invigorating air foretells the approach of autumn; it is brilliantly clear. The Orange hills stand out with the distinctness of Western mountains. The sun is at my back, and the light shows the meadows to the best advantage. At this distance I get the effect of only the masses of color; tracts of yellowish green meadow grass tinged with copper, and in places thickly sprinkled with the white flowers of the water hemlock and water parsnip; streaks of light green wild rice, and sharply defined areas of dark green cat-tail flags. The grass grows on the drier land, the wild rice in the small sloughs and creeks which are bordered by the flags. In the spring the wind blows the pollen from the cat-tail blossoms, and a shifting greenish vapor floats over the marsh; in the autumn a heavy westerly wind raises the seed-bearing down high in the air, carries it over the Palisades, across the Hudson, and it descends like a fall of fleecy snow on wondering New York. The marsh is a vast arena inclosed by the Palisades and Passaic hills; it is a great plain, with blue stretches of the winding river appearing here and there, and the haystacks are the huts of aborigines. I half close my eyes, and it is a copper-yellow sea. The grasses roll in undulating waves, capped by a white crest of parsnip and hemlock blossoms; the dark irregular patches of flags are the shadows of clouds, the light streaks of wild rice are shoals, a hovering Marsh Hawk is a Gull. A stately white-winged schooner^{45} comes up the river; her hull is hidden by the meadow grasses; she is sailing through the sea of my fancy.