296 RECORDS OF POST-TRIASSIC CHANGES 



Ifc has been stated that these strata rest unconformably on a 

 surface of decomposed trap, and that the lower layers are made 

 up. in part, of the triturated fragments of the trap. This would 

 indicate that after the pouring out of these lava sheets their 

 surface was above water, was carved into valleys and hills, by 

 the streams of the time, and subjected to the decomposing action 

 of atmospheric agencies and vegetation, until the ancient surface 

 came to present the irregular and weathered aspect that we may 

 now see on portions that have been subjected to similar action 

 during recent geological time. This necessarily long exposure 

 preceded the subsidence and submergence during which the 

 stratified formation was deposited and would indicate, to my 

 mind, that at least a whole geological period had intervened 

 between the outpouring of the trap and the deposition of the 

 marine formation unconformably upon its weathered surface. 

 The trap is considered to be of Triassic age and I would place 

 that of the limestone as probably Cretaceous. Again, from Cape 

 Cod southwards marine deposits were laid down along the 

 Atlantic border during Cretaceous times. Altho' I have as yet 

 been unable to find any traces of foraminifera in the soft greenish 

 sandstone that occurs in one of the coves, yet the general aspect 

 of the fossils so far found is also suggestive of Cretaceous age. 



The hollows or depressions in which these remnants are 

 preserved are at present small valleys, occupied by brooks and 

 terminating on the shore in small coves which also owe their 

 existence to the erosion preceding the deposition of this forma- 

 tion. The Topography of this portion of the North Mountain is 

 thus shown to be much older than the Glacial period and not 

 only are the brooks flowing in Mesozoic channels but the Bay 

 of Fundy waves are again washing the shores of coves from 

 which they have been excluded since the Mesozoic period. 



The facts observed here are in accord with the conclusion 

 ariived at from a comparison of the present stream beds with 

 the streams that now occupy them. Some of the gorges in this 

 area are equal in magnitude to those of the secondary streams 

 of the South Mountain, although the volume of wa^er now flow- 



