IN KINGS COUNTY, N. S. 301 



least the same magnitude. It is probable that during the 

 deposition of these beds the waters of Minas Basin, Digby Basin 

 and St. Mary's Bay were connected and that the present flat 

 and fertile valley stretching from the base of the North Moun- 

 tain to the low Palaeozoic hills on the south was a shallow strait 

 through which twice a day the ebb and flood swept swiftly 

 planing down the valley to a uniform level but sweeping up 

 here and there long bars of shifting sands. These still remain 

 but form minor features in the topography of the valley. 



This shallow strait was sheltered from the rougher waters of 

 the Bay of Fundy by the protecting barrier of the North 

 Mountain and the deposits in the valley are much finer than 

 those of the same age on the Bay of Fundy coast. The North 

 Mountain itself was cut up into a line of nairow islands by the 

 submergence which brought the bottoms of several of the deeper 

 gorges below sea level, and the old shore lines in some of these 

 may still be seen. The length of the chain was practically the 

 same as at present since Briar Island the westermost extension 

 of the trap ridge then formed two small islands rising some fifty 

 feet above the sea as shown by the old shore line about eighty 

 feet above the present sea level. 



When the land again arose, the waters left the valley, the 

 rivers extended seaward removing the sand and gravel from 

 their old channels, wearing them deeper, and the now submerged 

 forests grew. 



But again a gradual subsidence followed. The sea slowly 

 advanced up the river channels. The fine sediment brought 

 down by the rivers was arrested by the tidal currents and 

 deposited in their shallow estuaries, and the marine marshes 

 were formed. 



This is as we find it at the present day. The changes are 

 still in progress. The history of this region which we have 

 followed from early Mesozoic times to the present, or as much 

 of it as the records known to us reveal, is still being written in 

 the changing surface features of the land, the retreating coast 

 line, and the strata now forming off our shores. Every change, 



