242 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. viii. 



During the glacial period the country was submerged, but 

 into the history of this epoch, and evidence of the very great 

 extent of this submergence, I do not propose here to enter. In 

 my Report on the Geology and Resources of the 49th Parallel, I 

 have given the grounds which lead me to believe in a submergence 

 at this time of at least 4,400 feet, on the eastern slopes of the 

 Rocky Mountains. In the central portions of British Columbia, 

 ice-bearing water must have stood at a level of 5,270 feet. 

 I do not wish to insist that this must necessarily have been the 

 sea, though that appears best to account for the facts. 



Mr. George Gibbs stutes,* that the passages and inlets of 

 Puget Sovmd, in the northern part of Washington Territory, are 

 excavated in many places in drift deposits, which appear not only 

 to form their present banks, but to underlie their beds. If this 

 be correct, there is here pretty good evidence of a post-glacial 

 elevation of the land to a height somewhat greater than the pre- 

 sent ; for the long river-like inlets, referred to, bear all the appear- 

 ance of having been formed by river erosion and afterwards filled 

 and widened only by the action of the sea and tidal currents. 



No elevation or depression of the coast of the southern part of 

 Vancouver Island is known to have taken place very recently, 

 but the aspect of the shore is that of one gradually subsiding, 

 and I had arrived at this conclusion from its examination before 

 meeting with the statements of others, shortly to be mentioned. 

 Near Victoria the low rocky substructure of the country, is 

 partly enveloped in a somewhat irregular terrace, of which the 

 average height may be about 40 feet. It is composed of clays, 

 more or less arenaceous, holding boulders, and in some places also 

 marine shells indicating pretty deep water. Cliffs of this clay 

 are being rapidly wasted, along some parts of the shore, where 

 the water may be seen during the higher winter tides actually 

 removing this material from the polished and glaciated rock 

 surfaces, wave by wave. The rocks about high water nearly 

 all preserve very perfectly their glacial markings, which lower 

 down are not so distinct ; but in many places even where 

 they receive the full force of the sea at every tide, they 

 are much* better preserved than would be the case if they had 

 been for an indefinite number of years exposed to its action. 

 In shallow bays, where the sloping pebbly Leach is bordered land- 



* Am. Journ. Geo.;. Soc. 1874, p. 308. 



