GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE ACADIAN PROVINCES. 17 



belt of ancient and partially altered rocks, forming a somewhat broken 

 and hilly country. At the south-western extremity of the province 

 this belt is joined by another still more extensive, stretching south-west- 

 ward from the Bay de Chaleur, and forming, with the other, a gigantic 

 letter V, between the arms of which lies the wide triangular area 

 of the New Brunswick coal field ; while beyond the northern arm 

 of metamorphic and igneous rocks a plain of unaltered Silurian beds 

 extends to the highlands, along the south side of the St Lawrence. 

 The carboniferous plain of New Brunswick corresponds to, and, at 

 its eastern extremity, is connected w^ith that of Nova Scotia ; and its 

 hilly ranges of altered and igneous rocks form, with those of Nova 

 Scotia, outlying ridges rudely parallel to the great Appalachian breast- 

 bone of America, and, like it, descending under the level of newer 

 deposits and of the sea at their north-eastern extremities. Wliere they 

 thus die out and leave the beautifully arched southern bay of the 

 Gulf of St Lawrence, bordered, from Gaspe to Cape Breton, with the 

 coal-bearing rocks. Prince Edward Island bends like a crescent across 

 their extremities, and displays its bright red shores of later age than 

 the carboniferous period, its low but beautifully undulating surface, 

 and its fertile soil unsurpassed in Eastern America. 



The whole of this Acadian region is characterized, like other parts 

 of the Atlantic slope of North America, as distinguished from its 

 interior plains, by a varied and uneven surface, and by great variety 

 of soil and mineral products. In the latter, the Acadian provinces 

 are especially rich ; and in these and their maritime situation, they 

 bear to the inland regions of Canada much the same relation with 

 that which the British Islands bear to the plains of Central Europe. 

 Nova Scotia, more particularly, is most richly endowed with coal, iron, 

 and gold ; and these, with its other resources, its admirable har- 

 bours and the hardy and intelligent population, which it possesses in 

 common with the other Acadian provinces, must in time make it the 

 England of North-Eastern America, and must give it an eminence in 

 wealth and influence altogether disproportioned to its limited area. 



It is, however, of the nature of mineral wealth such as that of 

 the Acadian provinces, to be more slowly developed than the merely 

 superficial richness of the soil and forests of the great interior plains ; 

 and consequently this region has appeared to linger behind Western 

 Canada in its improvement. Its progress, however, is now very rapid, 

 and must proceed at an accelerated rate. 



Such being the general 2)hysical features of Acadia, it belongs 

 to us, as geologists, to inquire into the structure of its different rock 

 formations, the various materials of which they are composed, the 



B 



