﻿222 NARROWS. July, 



which is probably the stream mentioned by Sir 

 Alexander Mackenzie as one on whose banks 

 Indians and Eskimos collect flints. These flints 

 are doubtless either chert from the limestone beds, 

 or flinty slate, which exists plentifully in some 

 parts of the shale formation. 



Early in the morning of the 31st, we ran through 

 the " Narrows," a defile similar to that of the 

 Ramparts, and in passing which the river makes a 

 similar sharp elbow. The cliffs are composed of 

 sandstone, in some places horizontal, in others 

 dipping to the south by east at a small angle. 

 The stone is of various textures : some of it having; 

 a conchoidal fracture, and containing much cal- 

 careous matter. The basis is earthy, and the 

 coarsest stone is composed of small, rounded, and 

 also sharply angular grains of opake, white, green, 

 or blue quartz, with grains of Lydian-stone and 

 coal ; the basis being also tinged with coaly matter. 

 Other beds pass into a kind of wacke, or shale, 

 which breaks down quickly into very small angular 

 fragments. This shale is often encrusted with alum 

 in powder, and it is sometimes stained with iron, 

 and contains spheroidal nodules of clay-ironstone. 

 The cliffs vary in height from fifty to one hundred 

 and fifty feet, and the capping of clay and loam 

 with boulders is thin. The shale formation ex- 

 tends along the banks of Peel's River; and Mr. 



