president's address. xxi 



iiicap of 1884. The rush for areas did not stop in Cumberland County, 

 but passed into Colchester and Pictou, and along tlie shore of Minas 

 Basin, where small coal seams have been discovered for half a century 

 or more. To some of these localities no countenance has been given 

 by the survey, but encoui-agement by the prospector is taken on the 

 ground that the first Pictou Coal Field map was at fault east of the 

 Drummond Mine, and cut the coal field off" too soon. This, it may be 

 explained, arose from credit for accuracy being given to maps of early 

 explorations made on behalf of the Drunniiond Mine, which late mining 

 operations have failed to confirm. Speculation once awakened on these 

 lines, hope, eternal hope, has underlaid the greater part of the Permian 

 series in the latter counties with concealed coal wealth, and this view 

 has been given official sanction in the catalogue of the minerals at the 

 late Provincial Exhibition. It will, however, be well to remember, that 

 that the Permian is known to rest in places directly on Millstone 

 Grit rocks, and that further study of the sub-Permian structure and 

 faulting is advisable before extensive explorations bv bore-holes are 

 conducted. Ideas of what this structure may be in parts, have been 

 suggested by the work already done in the field, but any reference 

 would be altogether premature at the present time, and before full 

 counsel has been taken with men who have made a special studv of 

 great continental movements. 



In the mining of gold, a marked degree of confidence has" of late 

 grown round certain theoretical deductions. It may even be said that 

 the conclusions reached by Mr. E. R. Faribault, working in our gold 

 districts on behalf of the Geological Survey, have been accepted by 

 the rank and file of the miners as proven. 



It was not. very long after the public recognition, in 1860, of the 

 presence of gold in piying quantities, that ^Ir. John Campbell, a local 

 geologist, noted a regularity in the foldings of the strata, and that 

 many of the leads, which on account of their richness had attracted 

 the gold seekers, centred about anticlinal folds. Professor H. Y 

 Hind, about 1872, on behalf of the provincial government, extended 

 these ideas, but the ordinary prospector, for a time, preferred to let 

 chance govern his movements, and let those who chose to theorize 

 come after him. In early days the theorist had no following, and if 

 he failed to make a strike it was his fault and not his misfortune, 



