LXXXVI ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



Every geologist admits the absolute necessity of such a pi'imary 

 rock-foundation or solid crust, but none, or very few, seem yet willing to 

 admit the possibility of the crystalline granitoid, granitic and schistose 

 rocks, which we call Laurentian and Huronian, being veritable portions 

 ot that ancient crust. That it has been raoditied by the additional mat- 

 ter which, during the millions of years of its cooling and evolution, it has 

 been able to absorb from the atmosphere by slowly coming into contact 

 with the substances which were then being liberated, or condensed to 

 form that hydrosphere which we call ocean, may well be supposed and 

 admitted. But 1 must reiterate my firm belief that, apart from ingenious 

 theories and plausible suppositions of what may have been in the past, — 

 all of which are ably and exhaustively referred to in Books I. and 11. of 

 Geike's "Text-book," 1895, and also in Dana's "Manual," 1874, — there is 

 nothing Avhatever to be found in the rocks themselves to warrant the 

 assumption or necessitate the belief that the}' are not the rocks of the 

 original Archaean foundation. 



Divisional planes or j^ai-allel structures called bedding, stratification, 

 lamination or cleavage, the occurrence of associated layers of calcite, 

 graphite, lime-phosphate and many other minerals, or the fact that 

 similar granitic or granitoid compounds were formed in later ages, can- 

 not be taken to disprove this ; while their universal distribution and 

 uniform mineral characters, already referred to, indicating, as they 

 almost certainly do, a thermal or igneo-crystalline and not an aqueous 

 sedimentary origin, are wholly and all in favour of the contention 1 am 

 advocating respecting the Archa3an rocks. 



It seems remarkable that neither by Dana in his '' Manual," nor by 

 Geike in his "Text-book," are the views of either Naumann or Sheerer 

 in relation to Arcluean or '■ primitive ' rocks referred to. They are, 

 however, I hold, thoroughly philosophic, consistent and progi-essive views 

 of the subject, and are in every respect in accordance with the teachings 

 of the rocks themselves. 



Elie de Beaumont considers the Ibllowing minerals to be found in 

 granite: Potassium, lithium, sodium, calcinum, magnesium, yttrium, glu- 

 cinum, aluminium, zirconium, thorium, cerium, lanthanum, didymium, 

 uranium, manganese, iron, cobalt, zinc, tin, lead, bismuth, eo])])er, silver, 

 paladium, osmium, hydrogen, silicon, carbon, boron, titanium, tantalum, 

 mobium. pelopium, tungsten, molybdenum, chromium, arsenic, ])hos- 

 phorus. sulphur, oxygen, chlorine, and fluorine.' 



Substances enough to form, when ' in due proportion duly mixed," as 

 Nature, in her chemical and physical laboratories, clearly knew how, 

 with the ample time at her command, to foi-m all and every kind of rock 

 and mineral for the use and develo])ment of her animal and vegetable 

 kingdoms. 



' Bull, de la Soc. Geo. de France, 2™* ser., tome IV. 



