280 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Vol. vii» 



that time the land has gradually been raised out of the waters, 

 and with this elevation the southern or Acadian fauna has crept 

 northward and established itself around Prince Edward Island, 

 as the Acadian Bay attained its present form and conditions. 

 But how is it that this fauna is now isolated, and that interven- 

 ing colder waters separate it from that of southern New England. 

 A'errill regards this colony of the Acadian Bay as indicating a 

 warmer climate intervening between the cold Post-pliocene period 

 and the present, and he seems to think that this may either have 

 been coincident witli a lower level of the land sufficient to estab- 

 lish a shallow water channel, connecting the Bay of Fuudy with 

 the Gulf, or with a higher level raising many of the banks on 

 the coast of Nova Scotia out of water. Geolooical facts, which 

 I have illustrated in my Acadian Geology, indicate the latter as 

 the probable cause. We know that the eastern coast of America 

 has in modern times been gradually subsiding. Further, the 

 remarkable submarine forests in the Bay of Fundy show that 

 within a time not sufficient to produce the decay of pine wood, 

 this depression has taken place to the extent of at least 40 feet, 

 and probably to 60 feet or more.^^ We have thus direct 

 geological evidence of a former higher condition of the land, 

 which may when at its maximum have greatly exceeded that 

 above indicated, since we cannot trace the submarine forests 

 as far below the sea level as they actually extend. The effect of 

 such an elevation of the land would be not only a general shal- 

 lowing of the water in the Bay of Fundy and the Acadian Bay, 

 and an elevation of its temperature both by this and by the 

 greater amount of neighbouring land, but as Prof. Yerrill well 

 states, it would also raise the banks off the Nova Scotia coast, 

 and extending south from Ntwfoundland, so as to throw the 

 Arctic current further from the shore and warm the water along 

 the coasts of Nova Scotia and Northern New England. In 

 these circumstances the marine animals of Southern New Eng- 

 land might readily extend themselves all around the coasts of 

 Nova Scotia and Cape Breton, and occupy the Acadian Bay. 

 The modern subsidence of the land would produce a relapse 

 toward the glacial age, the Arctic currents would be allowed to 

 cleave more closely to the coast, and the inhabitants of the 

 Acadian Bay would gradually become isolated, while the nor- 

 thern animals of Labrador would work their way southward. 



* Acadian Geology, p. 29. 



