USEFUL MINERALS.— GOLD. 633 



and in a recent paper by Mr P. S. Hamilton, I find the statement 

 that it has been found near the head waters of the Musquodoboit 

 and Stewiacke Rivers, and also near Five Islands, The same 

 authority also states that gold has been found in quartz occur- 

 ring in the Triassic Trap of Partridge Island and Cape D'Or. 

 In this last case the metal has possibly been brought up by means 

 of the Trap from its original repositories in the Silurian rocks 

 below. These facts indicate that though the coast series is at 

 present much more productive, impoiiant discoveries may yet be 

 made in those rocks of Upper Silurian age which constitute the 

 inland metamorphic hills extending from Annapolis County to the 

 North of Cape Breton, and also constituting the Cobequid range. 

 On the view of the origin of the veins given above, there is no reason 

 why the Upper Silurian series should not be auriferous as well as 

 the Lower ; and it is known that gold occurs in both series in the 

 gold district of the province of Quebec, and perhaps more abundantly 

 in the Lower Silurian. 



The large areas of altered Lower and Upper Silurian rocks, indi- 

 cated in the map as occurring in New Brunswick, are also likely to 

 afford gold, more especially as a portion of this area in Northern New 

 Brunswick may be regarded as a continuation of the gold district of 

 Lower Canada. Nor are the metamorphic rocks of the southern part 

 of New Brunswick unlikely to afford the precious metal, more 

 especially those of Lower Silurian age ; and recent discoveries in 

 Canada show that this probability may extend even to the still older 

 Laurentian series. 



It has been remarked, that it is wonderful that in a district so 

 thickly settled, and so much subjected to the operations of the surveyor, 

 road-maker, and agriculturist, as the south coast of Nova Scotia, so 

 numerous deposits of gold should so long have escaped observation. 

 Geologists also and mineral explorers have repeatedly visited and 

 passed through the district. Still, when it is considered that the 

 country is netted with quartz veins, and that perhaps not more than 

 one in a million of these is appreciably auriferous, the wonder ceases. 

 Ordinary observers do not notice such things. A geologist, not 

 specially looking for useful minerals, soon becomes wearied of break- 

 ing up and examining barren veins of white quartz, and certainly 

 cannot spend two years in " prospecting," as the discoverer of 

 the Wine Harbour deposit is said to have done. My own field 

 notes contain the record of many days of hard work among these 

 unpromising rocks, and countless quartz veins have suffered from my 

 hammer without yielding a speck of gold. I believe I have visited 



