22 



RESUME. 



We may shortly generalize the foregoing facts and observations. 



Of the sixty four elementary substances at present known to 

 compose the material of our original globe, phosphorus is found to be 

 among the twenty more abundant elements, and is recognized to have 

 been widely disseminated in all the original and ancient rock masses. 

 With the exception of the segregations of crystallized Apatite in the 

 Laurentian rocks, we do not find any marked local accumulation of 

 phosphatic bases in any of the azoic formations, or intrusive rocks. 



The existence of the Eozoon Canadense is still debatable, and it is 

 problematical whether the apatite of these older metamorphosed strata 

 is not the mineralized product of organic remains, but passing from the 

 Laurentian epoch to the succeeding and less altered rocks we are 

 immediately in presence of abundant evidence of organized life, and 

 cannot fail to remark how much more frequent are the accumulations 

 of phosphatic beds. 



The function of organized life to assimilate and concentrate the 

 disseminated phosphoric element is strikingly apparent. The natural 

 forces which are ever restless and continual in building up the varied 

 geological strata of succeeding epochs (attrition, deposition, cementation, 

 ablation, etc.) may alter and vary the manner of presentation of the 

 phosphatic deposits which we have been considering, but the silently 

 working power of assimilation by the organized cell, would appear to 

 triumph over the mighty disruptive and more violent operations of 

 nature, for the latter forces fail to re-disseminate the work accomplished 

 by the former, but rather complete the task required to secure to man 

 the providential supplies of phosphatic deposits with which we may 

 satisfy our present demands, and therefore these economic supplies 

 are seen to be chiefly in the more recent geological formations, 



