262 A. S. PACKARD, Jr., ON THE RECENT 



The close of this period was signalized by a great amelioration of climate, by broad areas 

 of marine clays finely laminated, and having more sand and loam intermixed than in the 

 lowest and oldest beds. This was the transition from a period of broad estuaries, and, at 

 a late stage, of shallow seas, to the next epoch of a secular emergence. It ushered in 

 the — 



III. Period of raised Beaches (Saxicava Sands). This necessarily implies a great denuda- 

 tion of the glacial clays. The rolled, sea-worn boulders, shingle and sand, composing the 

 mass of the ancient osars and beach deposits, now found at all heights from the present 

 sea-level to 500 or 600 feet, are derived from the resorting of the moraines. We thus find 

 that the highest beaches are the oldest, and the most recent, those just above the ocean 

 level. The temperature of the sea did not differ greatly from that of the present day. 

 During this epoch the present distribution of the faunae now inhabiting the temperate and 

 arctic zones was established, and since then but little change has taken place. The fresh- 

 water shells found about the Niagara River and other deposits in Canada, were, so far as 

 we know, introduced at this time. Those shells found in beach deposits on the St. Law- 

 rence River, 4-500 feet above the present level of the river, show that but little change 

 has taken place in the climatic relations of the land or in the distribution of the animals 

 depending on such relations. It is evident that the Acadian fauna, once restricted to the 

 regions south of the Saco River, during this epoch crept up the coast of Maine, extended 

 itself along the western shores of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and prevailed in the St. Law- 

 rence River, and the broad estuary now represented by Lake Champlain. 



The close of this period witnessed the surface of New England covered by broad lakes 

 and ponds, with vast rivers and extensive estuaries, with deep fiords cutting up the coast- 

 line. Its scenic features must have resembled those of Labrador at the present day. 



IV. The Terrace Epoch. The estuaries and deep bays left beach deposits of sand and 

 shingle, resulting from the drainage of the slowly rising continent. All the terraces are 

 unconformable to the marine sands underlying them, though the highest terraces farthest 

 from the coast may have been forming while the more recent sea-beaches were being de- 

 posited by the action of the waves and tide. Thus the early part of the Lake period is 

 synchronous with the latter part of the Beach period. So also the lower strata of the Leda 

 clays were laid clown during the deposition of the oldest beaches, causing a constant inos- 

 culation of these unconformable deposits, and thus the beginning of one epoch overlaps 

 the close of the previous one. 



II. View of the recent Invertebrate Fauna of Labrador. 



The additional observations here recorded were taken from dredging notes made during 

 the summer of 1864, while coasting from the Little Mecatina Island in the Gulf of St. Law- 

 rence, to Hopedale, the lowest Moravian settlement. Many of the localities are known 

 only locally to the fishermen, but their positions relative to points more generally known 

 have been explained in the foregoing part of the article, and are indicated on the geolog- 

 ical map. 



Note. — I am indebted to Dr. A. A. Gould, Dr. William tide on the marine invertebrates found at Caribou Island, 



Stimpson, and Mr. E. S. Morse, for valuable aid in identify- Straits of Belle Isle, published in the " Canadian Naturalist 



ing the species mentioned below. The reader will, find nu- and Geologist" for December, 1863, and embodied in the 



merous corrections of typographical errors occurring in an ar- present article. 



