

DALY: GEOLOGY OF THE NORTHEAST COAST OF LABRADOR. 267 



The Need of Further Exploration. 



One cannot leave the consideration of this huge field of research, the 

 northeast coast of Labrador, without indicating some of the directions in 

 which repaying investigation might be carried on. Packard said in 1891 

 that " the Labrador Peninsula is less known than the interior of Africa 

 or the wastes of Siberia." : Since that time a harvest of new facts has 

 been reaped by Low in connection with the Canadian Geological Sur- 

 vey, and the secrets have to some extent been told. Packard has him- 

 self done much to remove this stain on the banner of American geological 

 and geographical enterprise, in the publication of his book, embodying 

 as it does many original observations. Yet, in his account of the coast, 

 he was forced to sketch in but the briefest fashion, that part of it which 

 is by long odds the most interesting, the region north of Hopedale. It 

 is probable that for many years it will be impossible for government 

 surveyors to be called away from economically more important fields to 

 make thorough exploration of the coast. That work seems marked out 

 by nature for private ventures. 



Escaping from the heat of an American or Canadian summer, the 

 explorer of northern Labrador will find a bracing, health-giving climate 

 calling forth strenuous and welcome exercise of body and mind. If he 

 be particularly interested in geological structures and processes, he will 

 find, in the lack of soil and forest-cover, most fortunate conditions for 

 rapid observation. Using a steamer sheathed for ice-navigation, an 

 exploring party might be on the ground in early July and, from one end 

 of the coast to the other, rarely fail to find a snug harbor close to the 

 important points of attack. 



The Kiglapait is unmeasured, unmapped and absolutely unknown as 

 to composition. The Kaumajet sediments, covering several hundreds of 

 square miles, present important structural and stratigraphic problems. 

 Their age is quite undetermined, like that of the stratified rocks at Aillik 

 Bay, at Pomiadluk Point and at Ramah. The Torngats afford a field of 

 operations which it will take many seasons even to reconnoitre. In the 

 last mentioned range are the highest mountains on the Atlantic sea- 

 board of America, unmeasured and almost entirely unnamed. It would 

 be of much importance to fix the elevation of the highest postglacial 

 shore-line in the interior of the peninsula as well as on the south coast, 

 in Newfoundland, Cape Breton and across Hudson's Strait, where isolated 



1 The Labrador Coast, Preface, p. 5. 

 vol. xxxvm. — no. 5. 5 



