No. 5.] HIND — NORTH-EASTERN LABRADOR. 277 



I have shown elsewhere that land slides, in valleys cut through 

 this series, (Explorations in the interior of the Labrador Pen- 

 insula ; 1862) are numerous, and that the felspathic strata are 

 those which first yield to frost, arising probably from cleavage, 

 coupled with mechanical texture. 



It may be mentioned here that on an Island about seven 

 miles from Hopedale, and also in the vicinity of Hopedale, I 

 found rocks which may belong to a formation separate from 

 either the Upper or Lower Laureutian. Sufficient information 

 regarding these beds has not yet been obtained on which to base 

 an opinion. During the present summer opportunities may occur 

 for securing more facts. 



The existence of the Labrador series over a very wide extent 

 of country between the St. Lawrence and the Northern Labrador, 

 in the form of Outliers or detached areas surrounded by the 

 Lower Laurentian rocks, and the presence of innumerable 

 boulders show that it has been subjected to great but irregular 

 wear. The thickness of the series is estimated at 10.000 feet. 

 One may suppose that the process of denuding the Lower Lau- 

 rentian of the Labrador series over a considerable part of the 

 Labrador Peninsula, has been to a considerable extent effected 

 through the instrumentality of Snow Drifts, which appear to 

 have done very important work as a geological agent on the 

 coast, and in earlier times in far lower latitudes, where the ex- 

 cavating work has been solely attributed to glaciers. 



It will be seen that the argument here presented rests in the 

 main upon the presence of an Arctic current. In all attempts 

 to describe the origin of boulder-clays, the transportation of 

 boulders, the scratchings on rocks in certain directions, apart 

 from strictly glacial scratches, and the heaping up of vast accu- 

 mulations of gravels, the presence of an Arctic current is always 

 presupposed. Indeed, without such a cold current coming from 

 the north or the south, drift work as we see it in very many in- 

 stances, could scarcely be explained in the present state of our 

 knowledge. We know that the slow subsidence of the continent 

 would bring an enormous area under the prolonged influence of 

 this current, which would be pressed to the westward by the 

 rotation of the earth. The gradual rise of the land for a second 

 time brings the successively rising surfaces under the influence 

 not only of pau ice, but of snow drifts acting in the manner de- 

 scribed, and like glaciers, continually retreating with the rise of 



