GEOLOGY AND SCENERY OF NORTHEAST COAST 137 
The map of Figure 17 gives a synopsis of the observations 
so far made on the present altitudes of the highest shore- 
line. The figures represent the number of feet through 
which the coastal belt at individual points has risen since 
the Ice Period. The illustration indicates “that the uplift 
on the Labrador has been greatest near Hopedale. Hamil- 
ton Inlet owes in part its depth, and indeed its very exist- 
ence as an inlet (it is but 10 fathoms deep at the Narrows), 
to the fact that the part of the plateau in which it lies has 
not been elevated as much as the land to north and to south. 
The line rapidly rises as it crosses the Strait of Belle Isle, 
and seems to be about 500 feet in height along the whole 
eastern shore of Newfoundland.” 
It is further clear that the uplift is a real and independent 
upward movement of the land and not a mere withdrawal 
of the sea-water, lowered, it may be, in the filling of distant 
troughs or basins formed by the recent subsidence of other 
parts of the ocean-floor. On the contrary, the evidence is 
unmistakable that “there has been unequal positive uplift 
of the earth’s crust. The force responsible for this great 
piece of work has been applied locally and in varying degree. 
The result is that to-day the actual distance from the centre 
of the earth of every point on the highest shore-line is 
greater than it was at the close of the Glacial Period.” 
Why has the earth’s crust been thus hoisted? Some 
geologists believe that the crust iselastic andsensitive, even 
to the load of an ice-cap, and that the upheaval of the Labra- 
dor is due to the lightening of the load on the crust when the 
massive glacier disappeared. -It is certainly true that the 
recent uplift of the northern half of the continent has been 
most pronounced where the ice-load was presumably 
