No. 2.] SPENCER — PREGLACIAL OUTLET OP L. ERIE. 73 



From the topography, it is be seen that the apparent length of 

 the rock-bound valley is six miles, with a width of over two 

 miles ; then it widens suddenly to four miles (with concave curves 

 on both sides), after which it gradually increases in width as it 

 opens into Lake Ontario. The direction of the axis of the valley is 

 about N. 70*^ E. The summit edges of the rock walls are sharply 

 angular and not rounded or truncated. This angularity is not 

 due to frost action since the Ice Age, to any extent, as is shown 

 by the character of the talus. Tlie rocks of the summit are fre- 

 quently covered with ice markings, but I am not aware of any 

 locality where they have been observed as being parallel with the 

 true direction of the valley, but on all sides one can observe them 

 (sometimes at only small angles of less than 30 degrees) making 

 conspicuous ungles with its axis. One exception may be made 

 to this statement. On a projecting ledge of Clinton limestone, at 

 Russefs quarry, near Hamilton, at a height of 254 feet above the 

 lake, and 134 feet below the summit of the "mountain," after 

 the removal of &ome talus, I observed that the surface was polished 

 but with scratches so faint that they could scarcely be compared 

 with those of fine sand-paper on wood ; and the direction if 

 determinable, was parallel with the overhanging escarpment. 

 There are many tributary canons, which are evidently of greater 

 antiquity than the Ice Age, which could not have been excavated 

 by the present streams, and are at all sorts of direction compared 

 with the striated surface of the country. 



The topography of the lower lake regions precludes the idea of 

 a glacier flowing down the valley to the north-eastward. Again, 

 us the direction of the ice was towards the south-west, the waters 

 from the melting glaciers could scarcely flow up an escarpment 

 many hundreds of feet in height. Even if the Niagara escarp- 

 ment did not exist elsewhere, the non-parallelism of the stria?, 

 and edges of the escarpment with their angular summits, is 

 sufficient to prove the non-glacial origin of the valley in the hard 

 limestone rocks. Moreover, ut the eastern end of the narrower 

 portion oi' the valley, there are two concave curves facing the lake, 

 which of necessity would have been removed if such a gigantic 

 grinding agent had been moving up the valley. 



The glacier-origin of the valley being an absolutely untenable 

 hypothesis, I sought for some fluviatile agent capable of efi'ecting 

 the present configuration of the region. At the time, no idea 

 occurred that even the great valley of the present is only a miser- 

 VoL. X. e2 No. 2. 



