620 ALFRED W. G. WILSON 



typical cuestas with inner and outer lowlands. In the central 

 parts, in the vicinity of Montreal, the relation of the plain to the 

 oldland areas, which stand boldly above it on either side, sug- 

 gests that here the Paleozoic sediments may have been deposited 

 in a pre-Paleozoic depression of the graben type. The well- 

 known Monteregian hills, the stubs of post-Devonian volcanoes, 

 form prominent buttes rising to a considerable elevation above 

 the level of the St. Lawrence lowland. 



On the concave side of the oldland area we find traces of an 

 ancient belted coastal plain, convex southward, but for the most 

 part its features are buried beneath the deposits which form the 

 recent Hudson Bay coastal plain. 



EXPLORATION AND SURVEYS. 



The Laurentian Peneplain extends through about fifty-eight 

 degrees of longitude and about twenty-three degrees of latitude, 

 covering in all an area of over two million square miles. During 

 the ten centuries that have elapsed since the first daring Norse 

 mariner landed on its eastern shore, many explorers have 

 traveled along the margins of the area, and not a few have 

 traversed it in diverse directions. The early explorers, repelled 

 by the bold and forbidding coast formed by the eastern edge of 

 the uplifted peneplain, along the northwest shore of the Gulf and 

 River St. Lawrence, chose rather the easy route offered by the 

 free navigation of the great river, and penetrated to the heart of 

 the continent and to the more inviting areas lying to the south 

 of the great Archaean belt, long before traverses were made 

 across the peneplain itself. At a later period the active searches 

 instituted to discover a short route to China led to the discovery 

 of Hudson Bay. The continued search for the northwest passage 

 and the attractions offered by the profits of the fur trade resulted 

 in the exploration of portions of the coasts of this inland sea, 

 and in the establishment on its shores, more than two hundred 

 years ago, of trading posts, some of which are still in existence 

 at the present day. In the interests of the fur trade many 

 traverses of the district were made by the employees of the great 

 trading companies, both northward from the early French settle- 



