NOTES ON GEOLOGY AND BOTANY OF DIGBY NECK—BAILEY. 69 
PHYSICAL FEATURES. 
Under the designation of “ Digby Neck” will be included, for 
the purposes of this paper, not only the long narrow ridge 
properly so called, together with the isthmus by which this is 
connected with the mainland of Nova Scotia, but also what is 
clearl y but a former extension of this ridge through Long and 
Briar Islands. 
As thus regarded, the area naturally becomes divided phy- 
sically, as it is also geologically, into two portions, of which the 
one, comprising the isthmus referred to, is comparatively low, 
while the other, more by the abruptness of the contrast than by 
the possession of any considerable altitude, may almost be termed 
mountainous. ‘This latter is indeed the extension, westward of 
Digby Gut, of what, eastward of the latter, is commonly known 
as the North Mountain range. 
The total length of this belt of high land, from the Gut to the 
extremity of Briar Island, is 44 miles; and for much of the dis- 
tance the breadth varies but little from a mile and three quar- 
ters. There are, however, places, as at Sandy Cove, where inden- 
tations on opposite sides of the peninsuia considerably reduce 
the actual distance from water to water, while at Petite Passage, 
and again at Grand Passage, transverse gorges, excavated com- 
pletely through the peninsula and of great depth, give free 
movement to those waters as well as to navigation, from side to 
side. On the other hand, the breadth of the isthmus connecting 
the mountains with the mainland is, between the one and the 
other, only about three miles, while between Annapolis Basin 
and the head of St. Mary’s Bay it is about five miles. Near the 
town of Digby the connecting isthmus includes some rather high 
and no very low land, but the elevation declines both in the 
direction of the foot of the higher hills and again towards the 
head of St. Mary’s Bay, where, upon the ebb of the tide, the low 
shores are prolonged outward into extensive mud-flats. 
The maximum elevation of the hilly range is about 350 feet. 
It would be very incorrect, however, to regard this as a simple 
ridge extending through the peninsula and sloping from a 
