220 G. M. Bauson — Geology of British Columbia. 



In other places they are still well-marked rough agglomerates, or 

 amygdaloids. 



No characteristic fossils have been obtained from these rocks, but 

 at the summit of this part of the series, and adhering closely to a 

 limestone which apparently forms its upper member, occurs a great 

 thickness of regularly-bedded blackish calcareous argillite, generally 

 quite hard and much fractured, but holding numerous well-preserved 

 fossils, including Monotis siibcircularis and other characteristic forms 

 of the so-called " Alpine Trias " of California and the 40th parallel 

 region, which represents the Hollstadt and St. Cassian beds of 

 Europe. The resemblance of the lower unfossiliferous rocks first 

 described to the probably Carboniferous beds of Vancouver, leads to 

 the belief that these may also be of the same age, while any slight 

 unconformity between these and the Triassic may be masked by 

 subsequent folding and disturbance. 



In the extreme north-western part of Vancouver Island Triassic 

 rocks like those of the Queen Charlotte Islands occupy extensive but 

 yet undefined areas, while the slaty auriferous rocks of Leach River, 

 near Victoria, may also represent the Triassic argillites in a more 

 altered state.^ 



As already mentioned, Mr. Selwyn, in his provisional classification, 

 unites under one title the older rocks of Vancouver Island, above 

 described, and those which form the greater part of the Cascade or 

 Coast Eanges. The progress in the investigation of the country 

 seems to favour the correctness of this view, and to show a blending 

 and interlocking of such characters of difference as the typical or 

 originally examined localities of the two series present. Tracing 

 the rocks eastward from the shores of Vancouver Island, we find 

 them becoming more disturbed and altered, the limestones always 

 in the condition of marbles, and seldom or never showing organic 

 traces, the other rocks represented chiefly by grey or green diorites, 

 gneisses — generally hornblendic — and various species of felspathic 

 rocks, such as may well be supposed to have resulted from the more 

 complete crystallization of the volcanic members of the series. 

 Eecurring in a number of places, and folded with these rocks, is a 

 zone of micaceous schists or argillites. 



The rocks classed as the Anderson Eiver and Boston Bar series ^ in 

 the provisional classification represent one fold of these schists, 

 which may be supposed to be more or less exactly equivalent to the 

 Triassic flaggy argillites of the first mountainous axis. 



The Coast Range constitutes an uplift on a much greater scale 

 than that of Vancouver and the Queen Charlotte Islands to the south- 

 west of it, a circumstance which appears to have resulted in a more 

 complete crystallization of its strata, and has also led to the intro- 

 duction of great masses of hornblendic granite. These may in many 

 places represent portions of the strata which have undergone 

 incipient or complete fusion, in place. There is every evidence that 

 in the Appalachian-like folding of this region the same rocks are 



1 Reports of Progress, Geol. Survey of Canada, 1878-9, p. 46 B ; 1876-7, p. 95. 



2 Eeport of Progress, Geol. Siu'vey of Canada, 1871-2, p. 62. 



