o. 



No. 1.] ANNUAL ADDRESS. if 



nearly to tlie domain of ordinary existing causes. "Wliympcr, 

 Bonney, and other Alpine explorers, have ably supported in Eng- 

 land, the conclusion which after a visit to Switzerland in 1865, 

 I ventured to affirm here, that the erosive power of glaciers is 

 very inconsiderable. The recent German expeditions have done 

 much to remove the prevailing belief that Greenland is a modern 

 example of a continent covered with a universal glacier. Mr.. 

 Milne Home, Mr. Mcintosh, and others, have ably combated the 

 jDrevalent notions of a general glacier in England and Scotland: 

 Mr. James Geikie, a leading advocate of land glaciers, has been 

 compelled to admit that marine beds are interstratified with the 

 true boulder clay of Scotland, and consequently to demand a 

 succession of elevations and depressions in order to give any 

 colour to the theory of a general glacier. The idea of glacial 

 action as means of accounting for the drifts of central P^urope 

 and of Brazil seems to be generally abandoned. Lastly, in a 

 recent number of Silliman, Prof. Dana has admitted the neces- 

 sity, in order to account for land glaciation of the hills of New 

 England, of supposing a mountain range or table land of at least 

 6,000 feet in height, to have existed between the St. Lawrence 

 and Hudson's Bay, while in addition to the imaginary N. AV. & 

 S. E. glacier, flowing from this immense and improbable mass, 

 there must have been a transverse glacier running beneith it up-, 

 the valley of the St. Lawrence. Such demands amount, in my 

 judgment, to a virtual abandonment of the theory of even very 

 large local glaciers in America in the Post-pliocene period. . 

 Thus there are cheering indications that the world-enveloping 

 glacier, which has so long spread its icy pall over the geology of 

 the later Tertiary periods, is fast melting away before the sun- 

 shine of truth. 



With the exception of that which relates to the Post-pliocene, 

 the geology of Canada has hitherto had to deal only with the 

 more ancient formations. Now, however, there opens up to us a 

 vast field of mesozoic geology in the far west. Already the ex- 

 ploring parties of the Geological Survey are bringing the first 

 fruits of this harvest. The first report of the survey on British 

 Columbia and Vancouver Island is not yet published, but Mr. . 

 Selwyn has given us a sketch of his work and that of his inde- 

 fatis-able assistant, Mr. Richardson, in a most interestinc: and 

 important communication to this Society, a conimunicatiorr 

 which we hail as an earnest of the great things to be expected' 



