NOVA SCOTIA. 565 



nexion with the paper above referred to in the " Canadian Naturalist," 

 having examined all the specimens in my collection, with a consider- 

 able number of additional species kindly given to me by Dr Honey- 

 man. Next to this is the locality on the east branch of the East 

 River, referred to in the first edition of this work, and from which I 

 have lately obtained additional collections made by Mr D. Fraser of 

 Springhill. Another locality, to which attention was first directed by 

 Dr Gesner, and Dr Webster of Kentville, is that of New Canaan, in 

 King's County. I shall notice these in detail, and with them a few 

 other places where similar fossils have been detected. 



Arisaig. — Near this place, at the extreme northern limit of the 

 Silurian system on the eastern coast of Nova Scotia, is one of the 

 most instructive sections of tliese rocks in the province. At the 

 eastern end of the section, where they are unconformably overlaid by 

 Lower Carboniferous conglomerate and interstratified trap,* the 

 Silurian rocks consist of gray and reddish sandy shales and coarse 

 limestone bands dipping south at an angle of 44°. The direction of 

 the coast is nearly east and west, and in proceeding to the eastward, 

 the dip of the beds turns to south 30° west, dipping 45°, so that the 

 series, though with some faults and flexures, is on the whole descend- 

 ing, and exhibits, in succession to the rocks just mentioned, gray and 

 dark shale.s, with bands and lenticular patches of coarse limestone, 

 some of which appear to consist principally of brachiopodous shells 

 in situ, wliile others present a confused mass of drifted fossils. Below 

 these the beds become more argillaceous, and in places have assumed 

 a slaty structure, and occasionally a red colour. The thickness of 

 the whole series to this point was estimated at 500 feet. The dip 

 then returns to the south, and the beds run nearly In the strike of the 

 shore for some distance, when they become discoloured and ochraceous, 

 and then red and hardened ; and finally, at Arisaig Pier, are changed 

 into a coarse reddish banded jasper, where they come into contact 

 with a great dike of augitic trap of Carboniferous date. Beyond this 

 place they are much disturbed, and, so far as I could ascertain, desti- 

 tute of fossils ; but Dr Honeyman has detected fossils In their con- 

 tinuation at Doctor's Brook. The alteration of the beds extends to a 

 distance of 300 yards from the trap, and beyond this in some places 

 slaty cleavage and reddish colours have been produced ; the latter 

 change appearing to be connected with vertical fissures traversing the 

 beds. 



In the lower or shaly portion of the Arisaig series, the characteristic 

 fossils are Graptolithus not distinguishable from O. Clintonensis, Lepto- 

 * See my paper on Eastern Nova Seotia, J. Geol. Soc., 1844. Section ante. 



