158 Bibliographical Notices. 



Their labours, indeed, have been great and continuous since then ; 

 and not the least important portion of their work has consisted in 

 directing and helping younger labourers in the same field of research. 

 Among these Dr. J. W. Dawson, Principal of M'Gill University, 

 Montreal, is eminent. In 1842 Sir C. Lyell visited Nova Scotia, 

 giving and taking information on what he saw in the remarkable sec- 

 tions of coal-beds &c. in the Bay of Fundy and elsewhere, and putting 

 Mr. Dawson and others on the right track towards elucidating the 

 geology of their Province. Great results have followed. Year by 

 year new observations were made, authenticated, and published, 

 chiefly in the ' Journal of the Geological Society of London,' until, a 

 few years since. Dr. Dawson published his ^ Acadian Geology ;' and 

 now, with greatly increased material, collected and made known by 

 himself and others, he has brought out what is rather a new work 

 than a new edition, so much enlarged, enriched, and so much more 

 complete is the present thick volume of nearly 700 pages. 



Acadia or Acadie is the old and beautiful name, derived from a 

 Micmac (native Indian) word meaning the " place " or *' place of 

 abundance," applied by the early French colonists to what is now 

 known as Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and the neighbouring 

 islands ; and, distinct in its natural arrangement and produce from 

 Canada on the one hand, and from the United States on the other, 

 this water-cut region deserves its special and appropriate name. So 

 the author thinks, and he cordially hopes the name Acadia will live, 

 and that the region will in the end assert its natural preeminence. 

 A general account of the Acadian provinces is followed by a descrip- 

 tion of the deposits of the modern period, including submarine 

 forests, remains of prehistoric man, and other interesting matters — 

 showing how rapidly some of the changes of the surface, due to 

 alterations of drainage and burning of forests, may have taken place. 

 The Boulder-clay and other deposits of the Glacial period, with the 

 remains of Mastodon &c., are next noticed and illustrated. These 

 lie on the Triassic rocks, which, with their trap-rocks, useful mine- 

 rals, fossil plants, and reptilian remains, are fully treated of. After 

 noticing the Permian blank, Principal Dawson takes up the Carboni- 

 ferous period and its wondrous accumulation of fossil fuel and other 

 deposits, with its minerals, physical characters, and its fossils both 

 of animal and vegetable origin. Eleven chapters are not too much 

 for this rich subject, on which the author has devoted many years 

 of labour and acute research, and from which he has extracted a 

 vast store of information, both for palaeontologists in particular and 

 for geologists at large. He has reconstructed several of the strange 

 trees and plants of the period, and brought together the shattered 

 remnants of many reptiles, with two kinds of land- shells and a 

 centipede. But these are already known to reading geologists. 

 The Devonian rocks in this portion of the American continent are 

 richer in plants than those of Europe and Britain ; and several 

 insects, too, as well as plants, have been discovered in them by the 

 geologists of New Brunsmck. Dr. Dawson's remarkable plant, the 

 Psilophyton, is mainly of Devonian age, though some older fragments 



