THE PLEISTOCENE. 



I. THE PLEISTOCENE. 



Since the publication of the last edition of this work a vast mass of 

 material has been added to the discussion of the so-called Glacial 

 Period. In so far as the Maritime Provinces are concerned, I see 

 little reason to modify the general conclusions stated in the Supple- 

 ment of 1878. These conclusions have, indeed, in my judgment 

 been confirmed and their bearing extended, more especially by the 

 researches of ISIr Chalmers, who has shown in the most convincing 

 way that glaciers proceeding from local centres along with sea-borne 

 ice may have been the agents in glaciating surfaces and transporting 

 boulders in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Taken in connexion 

 with the observations of Dr Dawson and Mr M'Connell in the Cordil- 

 lera region of the West, and those of Dr Bell, Dr Ells, Mr Loav, and 

 others in the Laurentian country north of the St Lawrence and in the 

 Province of Quebec, we may now be said to know that there was not, 

 even at the height of the glacial refrigeration of America, a continental 

 ice-sheet, but rather several distinct centres of ice-action, — one in the 

 Cordillera of the AVest, one on the Laurentian V-shaped axis, and one 

 on the Appalachians, with subordinate centres on isolated masses like 

 the Adirondacks, and at certain periods even on minor hills like 

 those of Nova Scotia. It would also seem that, in the West at least, 

 elevation of the mountain ridges coincided with depression of the 

 plains. In Newfoundland also, it would appear from the observations 

 of Captain Kerr, with which those of Mr Murray are in harmony,* 

 though they have been differently interpreted, that the gathering- 

 ground of ice was in the interior of the island, and that glaciers 

 moved thence to the coasts, but principally to the East coast, as was 

 natural from the conformation of the land and the greater supply of 

 moisture from the Atlantic. 



The labours of Murray in Newfoundland, of Matthew, Chalmers, 

 Bailey, and others in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, have considei'- 

 ably enlarged our knowledge of Pleistocene fossils, showing, however, 

 that the marine fauna is the same with that of the beds of like age in 

 the St Lawrence valley, and with the existing fauna of the Labrador 

 coast and colder portions of the Gulf and River St Lawrence, as ascer- 

 tained by Prickard, Whiteaves, and the writer. It would seem that 

 throughout this region, the 60 feet and the 600 feet terraces were the 

 most important with refei'ence to these marine remains, and that their 

 chief repository is in the Upper Leda clay, intermediate betAveen the 



* Trans. Royal Society of Canada, vol. i. 



