86 SCIENTIFIC AND LITERARY NOTES. 
running between the village of Lakefield, in the Township of Douro, and the 
Town of Peterboro, at a spot situated but six miles from the latter place. 
It may not be uninteresting to those Members of the Institute who make the 
Fauna of Canada their study, to learn that another individual of the same 
species was trapped, a few weeks since, in the Township of Monaghan, in a 
creek within three miles of thistown. The Beaver weighed, when killed, forty-six 
pounds, and measured four feet eight inches in length, 
It is well known to Naturalists that the nail of the second toe of each hind 
foot of the Beaver is invariably split; it is, in fact, a double nail. Cui Bono? 
I should esteem it a favour if any of your correspondents will adduce a reason: 
for this peculiarity ; for that some sufficient reason can be assigned I entertain 
not the shadow of a doubt. 
Beavers are more abundant than usual in our County this season, and I have 
recently seen some very fine cuttings in the neighbourhood of Stony Lake; one, 
of poplar, eighteen inches in diameter. It is said that a single Beaver will 
“fall” a tree of that size in the space of half-an-hour. 
I am, dear Sir, yours faithfully, 
Vincent CLEMENTI. 
GEOLOGY AND MINERALOGY. 
ORIGIN OF LAKE BASINS. 
In an interesting paper on the lakes of Switzerland, etc., published in a recent 
number of the Journal of the Geological Society, Professor Ramsay maintains 
the glacial origin of the basins of these lakes, and he attributes a similar origin 
or mode of formation to the great lake basins of this continent. In this view, 
Prof. Ramsay states that he is supported by the opinion of Sir William Logan, 
who points out that our northern lakes are in true rock-basins, in areas occupied 
by comparatively soft deposits surrounded by harder rocks; the arrangement of 
the strata proving, moreover, that these lakes do not lie in areas of special sub- 
sidence. After a detailed review of the leading characteristics of the Alpine 
lakes, Prof. Ramsay condenses the evidence in support of his conclusions into 
the following summary. He remarks: 
Ist. That each of the great lakes lies in an area once covered by a vast 
glacier. There is, therefore, a connexion between them which can scarcely 
be accidental. 
2nd. I think the theory of an area of special subsidence for each lake unten~ 
able, seeing no more proof for it in the case of the larger lakes than for the 
hundreds of tarns in perfect rock-basins common to all glacier-countries, 
present or past, and the connexion of which with diminished or vanished gla- 
ciers I proved originally in “The Old Glaciers of North Wales.” In the Alps 
there is a gradation in size between the small mountain-tarns and the larger 
lakes. 
3rd. None of them lie in lines of gaping fracture. If old fractures ran in the 
lines of the lakes or of other valleys, and gave a tendency to lines of drainage, 
