326 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERT. 



nation of the distribution of this metal in the eastern townships, and 

 particles of it were found in the valley of the St. Francis, at various inter- 

 vals. Though the weather was rather adverse to the examination, on 

 account of the cold and frost, yet the results were much the same as those 

 of similar previous explorations farther to the east. One of the positions 

 examined was on the Magog River, above Sherbrooke, where particles were 

 met with in an ancient hard-bound gravel, which probably has never been 

 disturbed since the time when the surface rose from beneath a Tertiary 

 sea. The position is about one hundred and fifty feet above the level of 

 Lake St. Francis at Sherbrooke, and would probably be over six hundred 

 feet above the St. Lawrence at Lake St. Peter. This fact seems to show 

 that the metal is not confined to the lowest parts of the valleys, but will 

 have a distribution coextensive with the original drift of the district. It 

 may be considered that the auriferous drift has now been shown to exist 

 into 10,000 square miles on the south side of the St. Lawrence, compre- 

 hending the prolongation of the Green Mountains into Canada and the 

 country on the south-east side of them. In following the range of this 

 drift north-westerly, the researches of the survey have not extended beyond 

 Etchmin Lake ; but the general similarity of the rocks beyond renders it 

 probable that little change will be found for a distance extending much 

 farther, perhaps to the extremity of Gaspe. It may be proper to remark 

 that, though the ascertained auriferous area is thus so much increased 

 beyond the measure given in the previous report, no fact has come to my 

 knowledge of sufficient importance to authorize any change in the opinion 

 that has been already expressed, that the deposit will not in general remu- 

 nerate tmsldUed labor, and that agriculturists, artisans and others engaged 

 in. the ordinary occupations of the country, would only lose their labor by 

 turning gold hunters. In the examination of the valley of St. Francis, 

 one of the spots tried was in the immediate vicinity of the quartz vein 

 * holding copper pyrites, mentioned in the report of 1847-8. In that report 

 it Avas stated that the copper pyrites were auriferous ; and in corroboration 

 of this fact, a small, uneven, but loose, octohedral crystal of gold was on 

 this occasion obtained from a crevice in a two-inch string of quartz, spotted 

 with copper pyrites, which appeared to be subordinate to the principal 

 vein. This vein occurs in a mass of talcose slate, supposed to belong to 

 the Lower Silurian series ; but from a vein on the river Du Loup, speci- 

 mens of quartz and iron pyrites have lately been shown to me, derived 

 from the clay slates of the Upper Silurian series, and in some of these traces 

 of gold have been met with. The metal thus appears to belong to the 

 veins of both the lower and upper series. If Sir H. G. Murchison's theory 

 be well founded, that the gold, when it was originally placed in vein, 

 occupied only that part of them which was towards the then existing 

 exterior of the earth's crust, the presence of it in the Upper Silurian veins 

 would lead to the conclusion that it should be more abundant in them 

 than the lower ; for it is probable that those parts of the lower rocks now 

 found exposed were once covered by the upper, which have been removed 



