oiO [Jan. 22, 



they have a tendency to concretionary structure, and sometimes 

 degenerate into beds of marly clay with large balls of limestone. 

 The limestones appearing at the four last mentioned places are, 

 perhaps, portions of one bed. 



The two small beds of coal are similar in appearance to those of 

 the older coal formation. One of them, with its under clay, is 

 included in coarse grey sandstones ; the other rests on limestone, 

 and is succeeded by some grey clay and dark shale. 



The conglomerates cannot be distinguished from those of the 

 lower carboniferous series. Both are of reddish-brown colours, 

 and composed of fragments of various hard rocks, usually united 

 by a calcareous' cement. 



It appears from the foregoing descriptions that, in lithological 

 character, the newer coal formation of Pictou strongly resembles 

 the lower carboniferous series ; the chief differences being that, in 

 the former, the beds of grey sandstone are of greater comparative 

 thickness, and that, in the latter, there are great beds of gypsum 

 and of limestone with marine shells. Our coal measures may thus,; 

 in one point of view, be regarded as a subordinate group, included* 

 in a great thickness of sandstones and shales, mostly of red colours. 



The sections which I have described are included in a district 

 extending about fifty miles along the shores of the Gulf of St. 

 Lawrence, from Merigomish to Wallace ; forming, I believe, the- 

 largest continuous tract of rocks of the newer coal formation in 

 Nova Scotia. Along the coast, between these extreme points, the 

 strata are arranged in an undulatory manner, so that the beds seen 

 at Little Harbour probably re-appear at Cariboo, Cape John, and 

 Tatmagouche. Notwithstanding these undulations, however, the 

 general strike of the formation nearly corresponds with the general 

 direction of the coast. This arrangement is due to the circum- 

 stance that the great anticlinal line of the Cobequid Hills, instead 

 of being continued to the shores of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, turns 

 to the southward, and appears to be continued by a group of hills 

 extending across the Pictou coal formation trough, and greatly 

 complicating its arrangement. This group, however, being com- 

 posed of stratified rocks of the older and newer coal formation, 

 must have owed its elevation to disturbances much more i-ecent 

 than those which determined the main direction of the Cobequid 

 Hills, and that of the great anticlinal line, southward of the Pictou 

 coal field. 



The greater part of the rocks composing the newer coal form- 

 ation of Pictou, were formerly confounded, under the name of New 

 Red Sandstone, with a part of the gypsiferous series, and with a deposit 

 of non-fossiliferous red sandstones skirting the shores of the Bay of 

 Funday, and miconformably superimposed on tlie older car- 

 boniferous strata. I have no doubt, however, that in other parts 

 of Nova Scotia the newer coal formation will be found to be a 

 Avell-marked cai'boniferous group. To facilitate comparison with 

 the equivalent rocks of this and other counti-ies, I annex the 

 following synopsis of our Carboniferous series. 



