NOTES OX GEOLOGY AND BOTANY OF DIGBY NECK BAILEY. 75 



Iron ores are both the most abundant and most interesting 

 of these minerals. They occupy veins traversing the trappean 

 rock, and with a tendency, apparently, to run in north and 

 south directions. They occur at many points, the most promi- 

 nent being along the road from Digby to Digby Light, Nicholl's 

 mine in Rossway, Johnson's mine in Waterford. and Morehouse's 

 mine on the St. Mary's Bay shore near Sandy Cove. At several 

 of these points attempts have been made to remove the ore, and 

 considerable money has been spent, but the small size of the 

 veins and the cost of removal have in all instances prevented 

 them from being remunerative. The ore is sometimes massive, 

 but more generally crystalline, being partly magnetite and 

 partly hematite. Fine crystals of martite or octahedral hematite, 

 probably a pseudomorph of magnetite, are especially abundant 

 at Johnson's mine and near Sandy Cove. The mining never 

 proceeded beyond the digging of shallow trenches in the side of 

 the hills, and these are now largely filled with rubbish ; but it is 

 among the latter that the most interesting specimens, both of the 

 iron ore and of the associated minerals, are to be had. 



Among these associated minerals quartz is by far the most 

 abundant, rock crystal being especially common and of great 

 variety and beauty. Amethysts are less common, and are now 

 hard to obtain, but very beautiful specimens were disclosed 

 during the opening of the trenches, and are occasionally met with 

 in boulders on the hillsides, or upon the beaches. With these 

 varieties of quartz, and others such as agate, chalcedony and 

 jasper, are often found one or more of the zeolites, and many 

 specimens have their beauty much enhanced by the curious way 

 in which the iron ore, rock crystal or amethyst, the zeolitic 

 minerals, and, it may be, white or yellow calcite, are commingled 

 or disposed in alternating layers. 



It is of little use to name definite localities for these minerals, 

 other than the mines alluded to above, for the finding of speci- 

 mens is largely a matter of chance and of diligent search. It 

 may, however, be mentioned that the rocks near the light house 

 in Tiverton (Petite Passage) are especially noticeable for the 



