Apeil 16, 1897.] 



SCIENCE. 



621 



slit formed by that portion of the pencil which 

 at every incident angle undergoes reilection is 

 tinted by the rays so sent back. 



As in all such work, the sharper the beam 

 the better the results, but I find the experiment 

 succeeds very well indeed with the beam ob- 

 tained by projecting with the ordinary optical 

 front a narrow slit in the stage of my electric 

 lantern. 



F. W. McNaie. 



Michigan Mining School. 



SCIENTIFIC LITER A TUBE. 

 Annual JReport of the Geological Survey of Canada 



for the Calendar Year 1894.. G. M. Dawson, 



C. M. G., LL. D., F. R. S., Director. 



This volume is No. 7 of the New Series of 

 Eeports of the Canadian Survey, and comprises 

 1,206 pages, accompanied by eleven maps, fif- 

 teen plates and diagrams, besides figures in the 

 text. It is a storehouse of facts relating to the 

 geology of all parts of the Dominion, and is the 

 first of the reports prepared by the guiding 

 hand of the new Director. 



The staff of this organization, including all 

 employees, professional and ordinary, numbers 

 fifty-one persons, and the total amount, ex- 

 pended sum up $110,000 for the fiscal year end- 

 ing June 30, 1894. The several reports are, first 

 a summary of all the operations by the Director ; 

 then an account of the geology of the Kamloops 

 map-sheet in British Columbia, by Dr. Dawson ; 

 an exploration of the Finlay and American 

 rivers in the north part of the same province, 

 by R. S. McConnell ; preliminary report upon 

 the south part of the district of Keewatin, by 

 D. B. Dowling ; the geology of the southwest 

 sheet of the eastern townships, by R. W. Ells 

 and F. D. Adams ; the surface geology of 

 eastern New Bruswick, northwestern Nova 

 Scotia and a portion of Prince Edwards Island, 

 by R. Chalmers ; upon the chemistry and min- 

 eralogy, by G. C. Hoffmann ; upon mineral 

 statistics and mines for 1893 and 1894, by E. 

 D. Ingall and H. P. H. Brumell, and many 

 paleontological notes interspersed here and 

 there by J, F. Whiteaves and H. M. Ami. 



Out of such a mass of information one can 

 only refer to matters in which he is most inter- 

 ested. 



At Athabasca landing, near the Canadian 

 Pacific Railway, a trial boring has been effected 

 to the depth of over 1,000 feet for petroleum. 

 Beds of soft Cretaceous sandstones from 140 to 

 225 feet in thickness, for a distance of ninety 

 miles along Athabasca river, are more or less 

 saturated with bitumen. It is believed that the 

 petroleum occurs in Devonian strata, which in 

 the neighborhood underlie the Cretaceous. As 

 the tar sands proved to be somewhat thicker 

 than was expected, and various difiiculties 

 arose, partly in connection with the large sup- 

 plies of gas exhaled, operations had not been 

 completed at the time the report was made ; 

 and it was thought it would be necessary to con- 

 tinue this boring five hundred feet further before 

 abandoning the location. The probabilities 

 seemed ample for expecting the development 

 of another oil field in this district. 



The statistics of production of valuable min- 

 erals give a total value of $20,950,000 for the 

 year 1894, which is a slight falling off from the 

 yield of the previous year. The more valuable 

 products in the order of their importance are 

 coal, nickel, bricks, building stone and gold, the 

 last having the value of $1 , 042, 055. British Co- 

 lumbia produced the most, $456,066, followed 

 closely by Nova Scotia. The Columbian mines 

 are almost entirely worked in placers of Plio- 

 cene age, derived from auriferous veins in the 

 Carboniferous and Triassic rocks. Dr. Dawson 

 states that "British Columbia has now fairly 

 entered on a period of rapid and thorough de- 

 velopment of its mineral resources." 



Perhaps with the idea of promoting this de- 

 velopment, large space is given to the descrip- 

 tion of the geology of the Kamloops sheet, 

 with a map descriptive of an area about 

 eighty miles square, just above the latitude of 

 50° and comprised between longitudes 120° 

 and 122°, through which the Canadian Pacific 

 Railway takes its course. The aggregate thick- 

 ness of the formations in this field is 79,500 

 feet. The Archean is wanting, though present 

 just to the east of longitude 120°. The Cam- 

 brian consists of two parts: the lower, or Nis- 

 conliih series — dark argillites ; and the upper, 

 or Adam''s Lake series — volcanic beds with ar- 

 kose conglomerates ; both amounting to 11,500 

 feet. The Silurian and Devonian have not 



