[TYRRELL] PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS 13 
the banks on the east side are at first low, with a well defined gravel 
beach just within the limit of the trees, while on the west side from 
Root Creek northward is a wooded plain six feet above high tide. 
A short distance west of the mouth of Root Creek is an escarpment 
25 feet high, rising to a second wooded plain. A mile southwest 
of Root Creek this second plain reaches the bank of the river where 
it presents a naked cliff to a height of 31 feet above high tide mark. 
This cliff is composed entirely of unstratified light grey till, studded 
with glaciated pebbles, and with a few boulders showing themselves 
here and there on its face. 
The cliff continues from this point up the northwest bank of 
the river, rising somewhat gradually, until at Flamborough Head, 
nine miles above Root Creek, it has reached a height of 90 feet. 
Throughout the distance it is chiefly composed of a homogeneous 
mass of till, but at Flamboro’ Head itself the upper twenty feet consist 
of stratified marine sands with many well preserved shells. 
Above Flamboro’ Head the bank maintains the same general 
character, and at the mouth of a small brook opposite Gillam Island, 
where it is 85 feet high, is composed of 70 feet of brownish unstratified 
till, overlain by 15 feet of marine sands and clays with many shells. 
The section on the southeast side of the Nelson river is very 
similar to that on the northwest side, though near the mouth it is 
not so well exposed, for the stream is not now striking against it and 
cutting it down. Opposite Flamboro’ Head, and thence up to Seal 
Creek, the cliff, which has a height of 80 feet, is steep and bare, and 
consists of unstratified till, overlain by a few feet of moss or peat. 
The river fills the whole channel between the steep cliffs on either 
side, and from the summits of these cliffs the land extends back 
from the valley in both directions as a level moss-covered plain. 
Gillam and Seal Islands, which lie in the middle ef the river four 
miles above Flamboro’ Head, are, like the banks on both sides, about 
80 feet high, with level summits covered with an even blanket of moss, 
showing clearly that they have been recently cut off from the shore, 
in fact so recently that the general covering of moss was formed over 
the plain before they were separated from it. These islands are 
composed throughout of till, like the bank to the south, and the 
marine sands so well exposed on the north bank are absent. Above 
Gillam Island cliffs of till form both banks of the river as far as I 
could see. 
At the mouth of Seal Creek, and at the north end of Gillam 
Island, are terraces 25 feet above the river whose significance will be 
discussed on a later page. 
