424 SMITHSONIAX MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 53 



covered debris slope without rock outcrops. Knowing that there 

 were shales and sandstones in the Bow Valley to the northwest, I 

 went up on the slopes of Mount Saint Piran, and from there exam- 

 ined with a strong field-glass the valley and mountains to the north- 

 east. I could see that the Fairview sandstone formed a clifif on 

 Mount Hector and Fort Mountain above slopes that were evidently 

 clear of debris, and that there was a marked change in the character 

 of the rock where the cliff and slope met. A week was next spent 

 at Fort Mountain and vicinity, and, with the information secured 

 there as to the presence of a massive bedded conglomerate at the 

 base of the Fairview formation, a trip was made along the southwest 

 side of Bow Valley in search of contacts between the basal con- 

 glomerate and the shales beneath. It was found that the lower 

 slopes and bottom of Bow Valley from Hector Lake to the vicinity 

 of Cascade Station, on the Canadian Pacific Railway, were under- 

 lain by pre-Cambrian shales and sandstone formations, to which the 

 names Hector and Corral Creek are applied in this paper. These 

 rocks were formerly referred to the Bow River group of the Cam- 

 brian by Mr. R. G. McConnell- 



TOPOGRAPHY OF BOW VALLEY 



The Bow Valley heads at Bow Pass, and for the first lo miles 

 of its course it appears to be deeply excavated in the limestones and 

 sandstones of the Cambrian formations. Southeast of Bow Peak 

 the floor of the valley attains a width of two miles ; it is joined from 

 the west by the flat of Hector Lake, and from this point the valley 

 is broadly U-shaped in profile, with high mountain fronts on either 

 side. This is illustrated by figure i, plate 45. This profile is con- 

 tinued to the southeast for about 35 miles to where the ridges of 

 the Sawback Range and the mass of Pilot Mountain on the north, 

 and of Mount Bourgeau on the south, crowd the sides of the valley 

 toward the river; from here to Banff it is deep and narrow. The 

 valley is evidently one of pre-glacial origin that has been widened 

 and shaped by the passage of a great glacier into which lateral 

 glaciers flowed from the side canyons. Rounded hills and ridges of 

 gravel and clav record glacial deposits and subsequent stream ero- 

 sion. 



I find in mv field note-book the following: "The view from Fair- 

 view Mountain, 3,000 feet above Lake Louise, is a most extended 



'Annual Rept., Geol. and Nat. Hist. Survey Canada, for 1886, Part D, 

 p. 15 D, 1887. 



