discoveries of Crold in Nova Scotia, 419 



In passing from S.W. to N.E., and nearly in the strike of 

 the beds, the following distribution appears. In the county 

 of Yarmouth, quartz rock and slate alternate; the former 

 constituting rocky ridges, the latter occurring in the valleys, and 

 occasionally exhibiting beds of chloritic and hornblendic slate. 

 Quartz veins abound in the slates. Along the coast of Shelburne 

 and Queen's counties, granite, gneiss, hard quartzite, and mica 

 slate, prevail ; but inland the clay slates occur and occupy a con- 

 siderable breadth of country. In Lunenburgh and Halifax coun- 

 ties, with the exception of the granitic bands of Aspatogen, Cape 

 Sambro, and Musquodoboit Harbour, the clay slate and quartzite 

 prevail, threaded as usual with small quartz veins, which in some 

 parts of Lunenburgh, and in the country between Halifax and 

 Musquodoboit Harbour, are very numerous and have proved au- 

 riferous. Eastward of the granite mass of Musquodoboit and 

 Ship Harbour, the slates and quartzite reappear, and are auri- 

 ferous, the former, however, being often micaceous, and between 

 Country Harbour and Cape Canseau, presenting many beautiful 

 varieties of perfect mica slates, for specimens of which, I was in- 

 debted many years ago to Mr. Whiteman, civil engineer, who visited 

 this coast in connection with the railroad surveys. In the 

 peninsula of Cape Canseau, gneiss appears to prevail, but there 

 are also thick beds of slate, abounding in crystals of chiastolite. 



The long range of outcrop above shortly sketched, and ex- 

 tending N.E. and S.W. along the coast, about 250 miles, and 

 inland in some places from 20 to 30 miles, appears to belong to 

 one geological system, and this probably the lower part of the 

 Lower Silurian. It is thus on the geological horizon of the auri- 

 ferous and cupriferous rocks of Lower Canada, as the age of these 

 rocks has been recently settled by Sir W. E. Logan. These rocks in 

 Canada were until lately referred to the Hudson River group ; 

 and on consulting my paper above quoted, and my "supplemen- 

 tary chapter," p. 53, it will be found that I was aware of the 

 similarity in mineral character to these Canadian deposits, though 

 I could not regard the Nova Scotia coast series as of so modern 

 date as that assigned at that time, to what are now regarded as 

 their Canadian equivalents. 



No geological survey of Nova Scotia having as yet been made,and 

 the Atlantic coast series, owing to its absence of fossils, and of in- 

 teresting minerals, being on the whole uninviting to amateurs, 

 little detailed information exists as to the precise order of its de- 



