638 REPORT— 1886. 



year ('witli the one exception of 1883), until ^ve find it in 1885 as low as 117,726 

 tons. 



The paper concluded with an account of the methods of mining coal at great 

 depths. 



MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6. 



The following Papers were read : — • 



1. On tlie Relations of the Geology of the Arctic and Atlantic Basins. 

 By Sir J. William Dawson, O.M.G., F.B.8. 



The paper was hased on examinations of Arctic collections in England, made 

 with reference to a paper now in preparation by Dr. G. M. Dawson. 



The conclusions stated were principally as follows: The older crystalline rocks 

 in the Arctic collections correspond with the Laurentian and Huronian of Canada, 

 and there are also specimens which seem to represent the Animike series and the 

 Cambrian coastal series of Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. There is a close 

 correspondence in the Ordovician, Silurian, and Devonian facies of the Arctic basin 

 with those of the eastern plateaus of North America, and the specimens are large and 

 well-developed. This would seem to apply also to the Carboniferous. There is a 

 deficiency in Permian and Triassic remains. The Jurassic seems to be represented, 

 and the Cretaceous flora is similar to that of the western territories of Canada. The 

 beds hitherto considered as Miocene in Greenland are apparently equivalent to the 

 Laramie Cretaceo-Eocene of Canada ; and the Miocene and Pliocene are absent, or 

 little represented, as is also the case in eastern Canada. The Pleistocene presents 

 features akin to that of Canada, more especially iu the occurrence of marine shells 

 of modern boreal species at great heights on the coast terraces. 



It appears that the elevations and subsidences corres])ond with those of the 

 American land to the southward; that there is remarkable evidence of temperate 

 climates from the Palaeozoic downwards, and an absence of glacial deposits except 

 in the Pleistocene and Modern. In the colder periods, however, the Arctic basin 

 may have been buried under permanent snow, or may have been an area of denuda- 

 tion rather than of deposition. 



2. 0)1 the Roclcy Mountains, ivith special reference to that part of the 

 Range between the 4:9th parallel and the headwaters of the Bed Deer 

 Biver. By George M. Dawson, D.Sc, F.O.S. 



The term ' Rocky Mountains ' is frequently applied in a loose way to the whole 

 mountainous belt which borders the west side of the North American continent. 

 This mountainous belt is, however, preferably called the Cordillera region, and 

 includes a great number of mountain systems or ranges, which on the 40th parallel 

 have a breadth of not less than 700 miles. Nearly coincident with the 49th parallel, 

 however, a change in the general character of the Cordillera region occurs. It be- 

 comes comparatively strait and narrow, and runs to the 56th parallel or beyond with an 

 average width of about 400 miles only. This portion of the western mountain region 

 comprises the greater part of the province of British Columbia. It consists of four 

 main ranges, or, more correctly, systems of mountains, each including a number of 

 component ranges. These mountain systems are, from east to west : — (1) The 

 Rocky Mountains proper. (2) Mountains which may be classed together as the 

 Gold Ranges. (3) The system of the Coast Ranges of British Columbia, sometimes 

 improperly named the Cascade Range. (4) A mountain system which in its unsub- 

 merged portions constitutes Vancouver and the Queen Charlotte Islands. 



The present paper refers to the Rocky Mountains proper. This system, between 

 the 49th and 53rd parallels, has an average width of about 60 miles, which, in the 

 vicinity of the Peace River, on the 56th parallel, decreases to about 40 miles. It is 



