No. 4.] CLAYPOLE — PRE-GLACIAL GEOGRAPHY. 199 



may be from the course of the present Richelieu, into the valley 

 of Lake Champlain and thence into the Hudson River, at that 

 time a tributary to the Mohawk. At the present day the dis- 

 tance between the Hudson and the Lake is only " 20 miles, with 

 a height of land between them only 120 feet above the sea." 

 Geology of Canada, 1863, p. 8. 



Without taking into account therefore the layer of superficial 

 deposits of which this height of land in part consists, it is easy 

 to see that the course here suggested was then a more probable 

 outlet for the Canadian waters from the north-east than that 

 which they now follow. Those to the west of Montreal may 

 have taken a course to the westward, and have entered the On- 

 tarian valley near its eastern end, and become tributary to the 

 Mohawk before it entered the Oswego chasm. 



In order to show that the phenomena of the adjoining lakes, 

 Michigan and Superior do not conflict with the results that we 

 have thus far obtained, it may be well to refer to them for a 

 moment. The bed of Lake Superior now lies about 200 feet 

 below the Atlantic. It must therefore at the time and with the 

 elevation in question have been more than 1300 feet above it. 

 Moreover the researches of the Michigan Geological Survey have 

 disclosed the existence of an old channel now filled with drift- 

 clay and sand reaching southward from the south shore of the 

 lake. The facts connected with the discovery are thus given by 

 Mr. N. H. Winchell in a paper on the glacial features of Green 

 Bay in the Am. Journal of Science and Arts for July, 1871 : 



" If we examine the south shore of Lake Superior we find 

 that in a line directly north of little Bay de Noc occurs the only 

 break in the otherwise continuous rocky barrier." 



" From the mouth of the Chocolate River, six or eight miles 

 east of Marquette to a point one mile and a half east of the 

 mouth of the Train River, the shore is low and occupied by drift 

 deposits, the usual rocky barrier of sandstone being interrupted 

 or entirely wanting. Both to the east and to the west from this 

 interval the shore of the lake is formed by the rocky ramparts 

 either of the Lake Superior sandstone on the east or of the 

 Hurouian and other Eozoic rocks upon the west." 



" In relation to the country between the head of little Bay de 

 Noc and the shore of Lake Superior, we may infer that a valley 

 exists or did exist connecting Lake Superior with Lake Michi- 

 gan through little Bay de Noc, and that the present outlet of 



