38 THE MODERN PERIOD. 



The following facts, wliicli have a geological as well as a zoological 

 interest, are collected from an interesting lecture on Sable Island, by 

 Dr Gilpin of Halifax.* The walrus, or seahorse [Trichems rosmarus), 

 at one time inhabited the island, but is now extinct, probably in con- 

 sequence of the attacks of man, since as many as three hundred pairs 

 of teeth are mentioned as being collected on the island. This would 

 seem to have been the most southern range of the walrus, and it is an 

 interesting fact that this arctic creature should come as far south as 

 lat. 44°, on an island to which the Gulf Stream wafts many southern 

 marine forms, such as Spirula Peronii and others mentioned by Mr 

 Willis in his list of the shells of Sable Island. The explanation of 

 this curious fact is no doubt to be found in the circumstance that the 

 Sable Island banks form a meeting-place of the ice-laden Arctic 

 Current and the Gulf Stream. The former has brought the walrus 

 and the Greenland seal, which still lives on the island, and many 

 boreal niollusks ; the latter drifts to the shores of Sable Island many 

 of the products of more southern latitudes, which may have become 

 mixed in the same deposits with their arctic contemporaries. The 

 only land quadruped mentioned as native to the island is a " black 

 fox," but of what species is uncertain, as the creature seems to be 

 extinct. Horses have been introduced, at what time is uncertain, 

 and have produced the present wild ponies of the island. Their size 

 is small, and their colours " Isabella " and gray, while they have the 

 " large head, thick shaggy neck, low withers, and sloping quarters," 

 usual in wild horses. The rabbit is of recent introduction, and 

 appears to thrive, and to revert to the colour of the wild gray variety 

 of England. The white owl [Nyctea nivea) is said to have made its 

 first appearance in 1827, and to have visited the island periodically 

 ever since. 



Sand hills and beaches exist in many parts of Nova Scotia and 

 New Brunswick ; but nowhere to so great an extent as on the northern 

 side of Prince Edward Island, where the sand resulting from the 

 waste of the soft red sandstones of the island has been moved upward 

 by the waves, and blown by the wind until it forms long ranges of 

 sand-dunes, extending along the coast and crossing the bays, but 

 I believe in no place penetrating far inland ; though, since the forest 

 has been cleared, the sand is becoming troublesome on some parts of 

 the coast farms. Across Cascumpec and Richmond bays, and along 

 the intervening coast, a nearly continuous range of sand beaches 

 and- hills extends for more than twenty miles; and at New London, 

 Rustico, Covehead, Tracadie, and St Peter's Bays, there are similar 



* Halifax, 1858. 



