[bailey] presidential ADDRESS S 



In other words that portion of Acadia which now forms the southern 

 part of the Province of New Brunswick was then in the condition 

 of an archipelago, the currents traversing the latter being, as shown 

 by Matthew, at times from the south and therefore warm, while 

 at others they were from the opposite direction and therefore of lower 

 temperature. 



It will be in place to say here a few words further regarding the 

 great series of strata which in Nova Scotia occupy the whole southern 

 coast of that Province, and is well known for its auriferous contents. 

 The series in question embraces two divisions or groups, of which the 

 lower or Meguma Group consists mainly of grey quartzites with much 

 thinner alternating beds of grey slates, while the upper or Halifax 

 Group is made up almost wholly of black argillites, at times replaced 

 by similar beds which are greenish, purplish or conspicuously rib- 

 banded. The most noticeable features in connection with this for- 

 mation are four in number, viz., (1) the enormous thickness of the 

 deposits, estimated at 35,000 feet, (2) their uniformity over such 

 great areas, stretching from Yarmouth to Canso, (3) the absence, 

 except locally near Yarmouth of any conglomerates, and (4) the 

 apparently entire absence of recognizable fossils. The first feature 

 points to an equally enormous lapse of time and the depth to which the 

 subsidence took place, the second to the continuance through like 

 periods of conditions showing little change, i.e., the accumulation of 

 successive beds of sand and clay under waters which were at no time 

 very deep, the third to the absence of strictly littoral deposits or of 

 powerful currents, and partly the existence of conditions not suitable 

 for the development of life. A comparison has been suggested be- 

 tween this series and parts of the Huronian of New Brunswick, but 

 the two differ widely in most of their characteristics. The only 

 rocks with which they come into contact are batholithic granites and 

 these were of long subsequent origin. 



It has been said that the Pre-Cambrian rocks of the southern 

 Highlands in New Brunswick coincide, at least to a considerable 

 extent, with what is now the northwest side of the Bay of Fundy. 

 They thus evidently tended to fix what in all subsequent time was one 

 of the distinctive features of Acadian geography. Their general 

 northeasterly direction is in accordance with the system of trends 

 which throughout Palaeozoic time and later distinguished the orogenic 

 movements affecting the whole of northeastern America, and from 

 their hard and crystalline character, determining resistance to pressure, 

 made them a barrier against which that pressure, coming from the 

 Atlantic, was enabled to react. , 



