St. Lawrence Basin and the Great Lakes. va5 
constructed Niagara River, except, perhaps, a small lakelet 
southeast of Long Point. Subsequently, the northeastward 
warping (very much less in quantity than out farther 
northward at the Trent outlet) eventually lifted up the 
rocky ledge and formed Hrie into a lake in recent times; 
thus Erie is the youngest of all the lakes. The beaches 
about Cleveland are not those of separated Lake Hrie, but 
belong to the older and original Lake Warren. 
DIscoOVERY OF THE ANCIENT CoURSE OF THE St. LAWRENCE 
RIVER. 
Previous investigations by the author showed that there 
was a former river draining the Hrie basin and flowing into 
the extreme western end of Lake Ontario, and thence to the 
east of Oswego, but no further traceable, as the lake bottom 
rose to the northeast. Upon the southern side there was a 
series of escarpments (some now submerged) with vertical 
cliffs facing the old channel. By recent studies of the 
elevated beaches it is demonstrated that the disappearance 
of this valley is due to subsequent warpings of the earth’s 
erust, and that the valley of the St. Lawrence was one with 
that of Lake Ontario. Recent discoveries of a deep channel 
upon the northern side of Lake Ontario (a few miles east 
of Toronto) and of the absence of rocks to a great depth in 
the drift below the surface of Lake Huron, between Lake 
Ontario and the Georgian Bay, and in front of the Niagara 
escarpment between these lakes ; of the channel in Georgian 
Bay, at the footof the escarpment, and of the channel across 
Lake Huron, also at the foot of a high submerged escarp- 
ment across that lake, show that the ancient St, Lawrence, 
during a period of high continental elevation, rose in Lake 
Michigan, flowed across Lake Huron and down Georgian 
Bay, and as drift filled the channel to Lake Ontario, thence 
by the present water to the sea—receiving on its way the 
ancient drainage of the Hrie basin and other valleys. 
The paper awakened a warm discussion, in which Pro- 
fossors me Newberry, Wright, Winchell, McGee and 
1 
