IS THElil-: COAL UNDER P. K. isi.AND f -POOLE. 5 



genie movements proceeded through the highlands of Inverness 

 to join the great fault of the St. Lawrence Valley and the Gulf, 

 and give an easterly margin to the area in question. 



With the geological cj^cles that occurred prior to the Car- 

 boniferous era, we are not particular!}' concerned, bej'ond noting 

 the more and more marked persistance, as time rolled on, of tlie 

 dominant features, and the establishment then of systems of 

 drainage which have continued to the present day, e. g., that 

 through the Cabot Strait and between St Paul's Island and 

 Cape Nortli, wdiich must have been long continued for tlie 

 erosion to cut down rocks as hard as these Pre-Cambrian, to such 

 profound depths, 2000 feet or more below the level of the sea, 

 itself some 1400 feet below the eroded top of the mountain 

 plateau. Then, too, the Pre-Carboniferous erosion cut througli the 

 PreCambrian rim to the Gulf area, where the ancient break had 

 occurred at the deflection between Cape George and Cape 

 Mabou. In the w^aters between these capes, soundings show a 

 submerged ridge, a remnant of the mountain range. A similar 

 old time denudation, doubtless, gave direction to the rivers of 

 Pictou. Yet again we have another opportunity to measure the 

 work of Pre-Carboniferous erosive agents in these time-defying 

 rocks. The eastern end of the coastal range bordering the Bay 

 of Fundy has its present termination in Caledonia Mountain, 

 but when the land stood at a higher level, the range extended 

 further to the eastward and beyond the passage across it of the 

 existing rivers, the Petitcodiac and Memramcook. Of the 

 extension beyond these rivers, remnants of former peaks project 

 through later formations at Lutz Mountain, Colhoun's and 

 McManus's Mills. These modern rivers have their beds cut in 

 rocks of Millstone Grit, Carboniferous Limestone and Albert 

 Shales; deposits here occupying a broad valley previously eroded 

 across the range of old rocks by Pre-Devonian streams, the pre- 

 decessors draining the extensive country lying to the north of 

 tiie lange. 



To what depth this great Pre-Devonian valley w^as eroded 

 is not kno.vii, but bore-holes in search of oil in the Albert Shales 



