286 Messrs. Jackson and Alger on the 
invariably found traversing one or more of the strata at right an- 
gles with its layers. Some, especially the larger, are cylindrical; 
others are flattened and are generally coated externally witha 
layer of coal; some are smooth, others striated longitudinally as 
represented in Parkinson’s “ Organic Remains,” (Pl. III. fig. 3.) 
Near the principal coal bed, Dr. Lincoln saw one segment of a trunk 
two feet long and twenty-five inches in diameter, and another about 
one foot long and eighteen or twenty inches in diameter. The 
external appearance of this petrifaction had led the grindstone-cut- 
ters to believe it to have been a hemlock tree (Pinus canadensis. ) 
They say that a few years ago a large part of the trunk was stand- 
ing erect in the cliff, with some of its branches attached to it. 
Lignites are very abundant. Some specimens appear to have 
been trunks of trees, or succulent plants, of an enormous size, 
and they are found, not traversing the strata of the rocks like the 
stony casts of the reeds, but lying between them. 
The Isthmus connecting Nova Scotia with New Brunswick, 
situated between Cumberland Basin and Bay Verte, is but twelve 
or fourteen miles wide, and, being composed of a friable de- 
composed sandstone, opposes a feeble resistance to the rush- 
ing waves of Cumberland Bay, where the tides rise to the 
height of sixty feet; while on the shores of Bay Verte they 
scarcely attain the elevation of eight or ten feet. One would 
suppose such frail barriers would give way before the pres- 
sure and violence of the conflicting tides. It is, however, a 
remarkable fact, that the same waves which cause so much de- 
vastation along the rock-bound coast of the Bay of Fundy, un- 
dermining and tumbling in confusion the lofty trap rocks, roll 
harmless against these shores, protected by the bold promontories 
of Cape Chignecto and Meringuin, depositing their spoils, taken 
