F. L. NASON — INTRUSIVE ORIGIN OF THE WATCHUNG Til A PS. 563 



deposits poured into a lake by streams from the Archean. They could very well have 

 been formed by wash from the Archean almost independent of streams. 



6. The appearance of angular limestone pebbles mingled with well rounded quartz- 

 ite and gneiss pebbles shows that the conglomerate was rapidly formed, else the lime- 

 stone pebbles would have been entirely worn away. This conglomerate might well 

 have been formed during the disturbance caused by the faulting of the rocks and the 

 outpour of the Triassic traps. 



The next paper was — 



ON THE PLEISTOCENE FLORA OF CANADA. 

 BY SIR WM, DAWSON AND D. P. PENHALLOW. 



It was read in abstract by Mr. F. D. Adams. The paper is published 

 among the memoirs, forming pages 311-334. 

 This was followed by — 



THE FIORDS AND GREAT LAKE BASINS OF NORTH AMERICA CONSIDERED 

 AS EVIDENCE OF PREGLACIAL CONTINENTAL ELEVATION AND OF DE- 

 PRESSION DURING THE GLACIAL PERIOD. 



BY WARREN UPHAM. 



From Norway, Denmark, and Iceland we receive the word fiord, meaning a deep, 

 narrow inlet of the sea, extending in a river-like course many miles into the land. 

 The continuation of the same valley is occupied by a stream, and there are often trib- 

 utary fiords and streams entering the main fiord on either side. All the topographic 

 and geologic characters of fiords prove, as first shown by Dana, that they are partly 

 submerged channels or valleys which were eroded by rivers when a greater elevation 

 of the land raised the bottoms of the fiords above the sea level. 



The northern Atlantic and arctic shores of North America and Greenland, not less 

 than the opposite shores of northwestern Europe and Iceland, are indented by very 

 remarkable and abundant fiords, from Maine and the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Lab- 

 rador, Hudson strait, the east and north parts of Hudson's bay, and to the most 

 northern latitudes explored on both coasts of Greenland and in the archipelago be- 

 tween Baffin bay and the mouth of the Mackenzie. Again, on the western side of our 

 continent the same evidence of formerly greater elevation of the land and present sub- 

 mergence is found on the coast of Washington, British Columbia, and Alaska to the 

 Yukon, in almost countless fiords, and in the channels, straits, and sounds, separated 

 from the open ocean by high islands, which shelter nearly the entire passage by steam- 

 boat from Victoria to Sitka. 



The fiord best known and most visited by tourists in eastern North America is the 

 impressively sublime gorge of the Saguenay. The depth of this fiord is stated by Sir 

 William Dawson to be from 50 to 140 fathoms — that is, 840 feet — below the sea level, 

 along an extent of about fifty miles from the St. Lawrence to lla-lla bay. while in 

 some places the bordering cliffs rise abruptly 1,500 feet above the water, making the 

 whole depth nearly 2,400 feet, with a width that varies from about a mile to one and 



