Lesley.] 108 [Xovember. 



clinal and synclinal curves whicli issue from the lake and throw the 

 mountain dips to the north and to the south alternately, at angles 

 from 5° to 45°. Great rib-plates of flinty sand rock rise to the sum- 

 mits and form tablets with broken cliffs upon the outcrop side, fine 

 objects seen thus against the sky. The mountains at the head of the 

 east arm of the lake, and those on its northern side forming the pe- 

 ninsula, come down upon the shore in the same style, and belong to 

 the same system. On the south side of Mire Buy, in the ravines 

 east of the Gabarus road bridge, there is no mistaking the aspect of 

 masses of slates of No. VIII standing at 45° ; nor can one be con- 

 vinced that he is not riding through a forest grown on a soil of IX, 

 as he is whirled over the fine old road from IMire bridge to Louis- 

 burg, although the highest elevation of the plateau is but 350 feet. 



Whatever impression the Devonian and subcarboniferous sedi- 

 ments of Nova Scotia and Cape Breton may make upon a geologist 

 from the Middle States, certainly his wonder will be piqued by 

 striking analogies between the exhibitions of the workable coal-mea- 

 sures at two such distant places as Sydney and Pittsburg. The 

 resemblance is more than general ; it has special points. 



At Pittsburg there are about a thousand feet of coal-measures (to 

 the top coal), with a great bed 8 or 10 feet thick near the top, a 6 

 foot bed half way down, two small workable beds in the lower half 

 of the column, and a large bed (4 to 8 feet) at the bottom. 



At Sydney (Glace Bay), in like manner, there are about a thou- 

 sand feet of coal-measures, with an 8 or 9 foot bed towards the top, 

 a 6 foot bed half way down, two smaller beds in the lower half of the 

 column, and a 7 or 8 foot bed near the bottom. 



At Pittsburg, as at Glace Bay, the upper 18 inches or 2 foot of 

 the High Main coal is rejected. 



At Pittsburg, as at Glace Bay, the middle 6 foot coal (Upper 

 Freeport of the Alleghany River and Cook Vein of Six Mile Run) 

 is famous for its solid face and excellent quality. 



No one should admit that such coincidences furnish a demonstra- 

 tion of identity. But it must not be overlooked that the beds of the 

 Pittsburg area have been traced and identified from end to end of 

 areas with a diameter, in all, of over a thousand miles, even across 

 the denuded interval of Central Kentucky. The expectation may, 

 therefore, be pardoned, not as an amiable enthusiasm, but as a logi- 

 cal inference, that when the fossil groups of the individual beds of 

 Cape Breton shall have been thoroughly studied by Lesquereus and 

 other competent botanists, their identification with the beds of the 



