November i8. 1897] 



NA TURE 



sion of mountainous ridges had been carved, all with precipitous 

 faces to the east, and long dip-slopes to the west. Near the 

 summit, about 8000 feet above sea-level, there were distinct 

 traces of glaciation, apparently transverse to the ridge. 



A hurried descent put us into fit state to appreciate the luxury 

 of a bath from one of the hot sulphur springs, already cele- 

 brated for their restorative properties, which well up along a 

 line of fault at the foot of the mountains. Then after a reunion 

 at the hotel we retired once more to the "Chaudiere," which 

 had begun to assume quite a home-like aspect. 



Early on the following morning, September 3, the west-bound 

 train took us again in tow, our course for some time following 

 up the Bow River amid scenery of increasing splendour, with 

 glaciers showing here and there in the mountains ahead. Then, 

 turning westward up a small tributary, the train entered the 

 Kicking Horse Pass ; and soon a painted signboard announced 

 the Continental Divide ; and we breakfasted at Field Station on 

 the Pacific slope, with the shapely Mount Stephen just above us. 

 From this point onward the geological structure became more 

 complex, the foldings more acute, and the outline of the moun- 

 tain peaks less and less dependent upon the bedding, and in 

 running down the beautiful valley of the Wapta or Kicking 

 Horse to the Upper Columbia depression we passed into the 

 region of complication and alteration which 

 forms the core of the mountain ranges. 

 Thenceforward to the Pacific coast the 

 task of the travelling geologist is difficult, 

 and but for the work which has already 

 been published on the Selkiiks and Coast 

 Ranges, and the presence among us of the 

 man who had done it, we should have 

 been at a loss to understand what we saw. 



The Columbia River was reached at 

 Golden, and was followed thence north- 

 westward to Beaver Mouth. The great 

 terraces of stratified material which line 

 its valley up to high levels attracted atten- 

 tion both here and at Revelstoke, where 

 the railway again crosses the river below 

 its great north bend. Leaving the Colum- 

 bia, our track turned south-westward, up 

 Beaver Creek and Bear Creek, to make 

 its difficult traverse of Selkirk Range. 

 The Palaeozoic rocks had now undergone 

 a great change of character, and instead 

 of the flaggy limestones of the Eastern 

 Rockies, we found ourselves among unfos- 

 siliferous argillite schists and quartzites, 

 everywhere highly disturbed and sheared. 

 The denser timber and the many long 

 snow-sheds lent additional obscurity to our 

 geological impressions. 



Around Rogers' Pass, 4300 feet above 

 sea- level, lies the finest mountain scenery 

 of the whole route, but on this day the 

 highest tops were hidden in clouds. A 

 short run from the summit brought us, 



at 2 p.m. or 14 o'clock railway time, to our next halting-place, 

 the C.P.R. Hotel at Glacier. 



At this place our first objective was, of course, the grand 

 Illicilliwaet Glacier, the snout of which lies two miles back in 

 the forest. Around the glacier a busy afternoon was spent — one 

 of our party, expert in such work, fixing points for measuring 

 its future recession; others scaling the lateral moraines of blocks 

 of sheared quartzite in which blue quartz grains were conspicuous ; 

 others attacking the glacier itself, and studying the fine dis- 

 play of structures which the body of the ice reveals. But the 

 time was, of course, too short for more than a mere skirmish 

 around its lowermost portion, and the great icefields above 

 remained unseen. 



It had been proposed on the following morning to climb one 

 of the ridges overlooking these icefields ; but here for the first 

 and only time the weather failed us, and though after breakfast 

 Prof. Coleman, who made light of all obstacles, led the way 

 towards the Asulkan, another of the many glaciers of this region, 

 he found but few followers to face the discomfort of the saturated 

 forest. 



Some curious feats in engineering have been performed in 

 carrying the railway down the western slope of the Selkirks, but 

 none are more remarkable than the great " loops" by which the 



NO. 1464, VOL. 57] 



descent is made from Glacier into the cafion of the Illicilliwaet. 

 After leaving this place we had all around us the heavy timber 

 of the Pacific region, making, where unburnt, a fine foreground 

 to the peaks and glaciers behind. But the wholesale devastation 

 which has been wrought by forest fires throughout this region is 

 distressing to any eyes but those of the Western man who has 

 come to regard timber as the chief hindrance to the rapid 

 development of his country. 



At Albert Caiion the train stopped long enough to allow our 

 photographers to spoil their plates in attempting views of a 

 sombre river-gorge. At this point the dark schists with a band 

 of crystalline limestone (part of the " Nisconlith Series" of 

 Dawson) are believed to lie very near the base of the sedimentary 

 rocks of the Selkirks. At any rate, a short distance further 

 west we entered upon the region of gneiss, mica-schist and 

 granite, which the Canadian geologists recognise as a portion of 

 the Archaean nucleus or axis Out of such rocks the western 

 part of the Selkirks and much of the Gold Range have been 

 carved. We found opportunities to examine them, during the 

 return journey, at a few points around Revelstoke and Arrow- 

 head, and from their intricate structures one might judge that 

 several different stages of movement and several distinct periods 

 of eruption were represented- Unlike the conditions in Eastern 



[From a photograph ty Prof. II. E. Armstrong. 

 Fig. 2. — The eastern face of Mount Rundle, Banff. 



Canada, in British Columbia westward of the Selkirks the 

 Palaeozoic and even Mesozoic rocks are so involved and altered 

 among eruptive and intrusive masses, and so implicated with 

 each other by the earth-forces which have built up the mountain - 

 ranges, that the evidence for age is rarely at hand, and one would 

 need to be thoroughly well acquainted with the country to pro- 

 nounce upon any part of it. But one could see that these 

 schists and gneisses form the Central Complex of the ranges ; 

 and they seem of high antiquity. In travelling from east to 

 west across the mountains we had seen the effects of crustal 

 forces of gradually increasing intensity, acting usually from west 

 to east. We were now upon the focus of these forces, where 

 their intensity had obscured the evidence. 



At Revelstoke, the same evening, the Columbia was crossed 

 for the second time, the great river flowing south-easterly here, 

 instead of north-westerly as where we had crossed it on the 

 previous day, on nearly the same latitude, but about 150 miles 

 nearer its source. The valley systems of this part of the continent 

 are peculiarly interesting for the physiographer, and present 

 some curious problems which are yet unsolved. In this instance 

 the Columbia and its great tributary, the Kootenay, have their 

 sources close together in the same great valley : the one flows 

 north, and then swings round sharply southward ; the other 



