Mineralogy and Geology of Nova Scotia. 233 
for mining. This remark will apply to all the veins of iron ore 
which we discovered on Digby Neck; for although the ore is 
very rich, yielding as much as sixty per cent. of iron, it is so scat- 
tered in narrow, unprofitable veins, that it can never do more than 
supply the mineralogist with specimens of the objects of his 
science. 
Proceeding in our researches eastwardly along the opposite 
shore, nothing of peculiar interest presents itself, until we reach 
nearly the extremity of St. Mary’s Bay. This bay is separated 
from Annapolis Basin, by a narrow isthmus on which the town of 
Digby is situated, and which connects Digby Neck with a moder- 
ately elevated range of hills, to be mentioned more particularly 
when we treat of that formation. This isthmus, which no where 
attains an elevation of more than one hundred feet, is composed 
almost entirely of sandstone without presenting, so far as our 
examination has gone, any traces of marine or other. organic 
relics. It undoubtedly underlies the neighbouring trap rocks of 
the North mountains, and supports them through their whole 
extent ; but its junction with the trap was not observed at this 
place, though in a distant section of the North mountains it is 
seen rising up from beneath it, and forming the coast for a consid- 
erable distance. On the shore of St. Mary’s Bay, a vertical sec- 
tion of this sandstone is presented, of about one hundred and 
fifty feet in height; spreading its broad face to the sea, and being 
the natural barrier against its violence, it has received the 
appropriate appellation of “the sea-wall.” It consists of the red 
and grey varieties, alternating with each other in long parallel 
strata, running nearly north and south, and gradually inclining 
away at an angle of about ten degrees, till it disappears beneath 
the surface. The strata vary much in thickness, but from four 
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