DALY: PHYSIOGRAPHY OF ACADIA. 77 



the narrow portion of the plateau south of the Truro lowland, as well 

 as the slightly more broken northeastern third of the plateau which 

 gradually descends from the 600-1000 foot hills on the north to the 

 200-300 foot hills west of Cape Canso. 



The granitic " axis " of Digby and Annapolis counties rises not more 

 than one or two hundred feet above the general surface of the broad 

 upland, an amount insufficient to interfere seriously with the general 

 law of a gentle southward slant for the whole plateau. But few individ- 

 ual hills break the even sky-line. Among these Mt. Ardoise (738 feet), 

 southeast of Windsor, and Aspatagoen (480 feet) at Mahone's Bay, 

 are the most prominent west of Halifax, while an unnamed summit 

 725 feet high lies south of Chedabucto Bay. The two last mentioned 

 are granitic and presumably project above the plateau surface because 

 of their comparatively great power of resistance to erosion ; Mt. 

 Ardoise also bears unmistakable evidence of having been, like the 

 neighboring low swells of quartzite, worn out of a larger mass, although 

 there is no direct evidence of differential hardness. 



Thus the plateau is to be regarded as a single great topographic facet 

 above which rise local cameo-like reliefs in the form of a few residual 

 hills. It also presents the appearance of having been carved in intaglio. 

 Sunk beneath the facet are many deep, narrow, and steep-sided valleys 

 in the north, typified by the gorges of Bear River, Gaspereau River 

 (Plate 3), the upper Shubenacadie, and the East River; in the south 

 the bed-rock valleys are shallower and have been in large part filled by 

 drift, with the result of obscuring greatly their pre-glacial form. Bailey 

 ('98, pp. 10, 11) notes the fact that they are commonly longitudinal, 

 lying on the softer slates between the quartzite ridges. All these 

 valleys are separated by broad interstream upland spaces and do not 

 furnish other than quite subordinate interruptions in the relatively 

 even plateau-top. 



Is it expedient to leave, without decided emphasis in a description 

 of Nova Scotian physiography, this remarkable, and, in view of the 

 geological history, astonishing, flatness of the main body of the penin- 

 sula? Yet in the works already written on the subject, we read more 

 of the inequality in the land-surface than of its essential character of 

 low relief. " South Mountain " is spoken of as one of the two " ranges" 

 walling in the Annapolis Valley (S. E. Dawson, '97, p. 155) : surely a far 

 from satisfactory designation of the escarpment of an even-topped up- 

 land. The " dominant features " of Nova Scotia " consist of ridges run- 

 ning parallel to the length of the peninsula " (G. M. Dawson and A. 



