G IS I'HEllE COAJ. UNDER ISLAND ? — POOLE. 



have ptoved it to be over 1000 feet below the tide, and thus^ 

 presumably comparable in character to the broad valley in Cabot 

 Strait that drained the St. Lawrence rei^ion when the continent 

 was elevated i'ar above its present level. That the continent 

 has stood vastl}^ higher than it now does, there can be no doul)!", 

 and to convert the piesent estuary of the great river and the 

 Gulf into a valley with a flowing stream capaV)!e of eroding its 

 bed, would recjuire a general elevation of not loss than 2,500 feet, 

 and possibly still more. 



The Pre-Carboniferous ero-^ion, which was of excession 

 magnitude, left for subsequent depositions a platform that,^ 

 through all after changes, has retained much of its original 

 liorizontality. Nor has it been broken, except locally, by 

 fractures of secondary importance, and then only to a VQ' y 

 limited extent. The cycles preceding the Carboniferous, supplied 

 the erosion that gave shape to Nova Scotia as a peninsula and 

 formed the great bays of the coast, of which some still show 

 above the present shoreline remains of the Lower Carboniferous 

 deposits that evidently encircled and covered much of this and 

 neighbom'ing lands. Remains of these deposits are to be found 

 in the bays of St. Margaret, Chedabucto, Fourchu, Gabarus, 

 Lorraine, Mira, the Bras d'Or, St. Ann, A.spy, St. Lawrenc*^, etc. 



Circumstance^* changing, and a new cycles entered on, there 

 must have followed a depression of corresponding magnitude 

 and comlitions favorable for the deposition of the bay and other 

 deposits, the massive limestones and gypsums beds which are 

 spread over an extent of country some four hundred miles in 

 length. 



After an epecyclical period and lessened disturbances which 

 left large districts of these later deposits still exposed to 

 denudation, a series of sedimentations set in, which in time 

 culminated in strata associated with the productive coal 

 measures. 



We have now reached the crux of the matter, and have ta 

 consider how wide-spread were the conditions favorable to the 

 deposition of coal seams, and in what districts did those con- 



