1872.] BLEASDELL MODERN GLACIAL ACTION IN CANADA, 395 



one, named Salmon Island. Judge Fairfield, who was brought up 

 from childhood in this locality, tells me that when a boy, some fifty 

 years ago, he was on it, and it was then, he supposes, over an acre 

 in extent. Within the last twenty years I remember this island, 

 having seen it in the distance from the bay and main shore opposite ; 

 and it was then conspicuous by a large elm tree growing upon it. 

 Now Salmon Island has entirely disappeared, and a shoal, with four 

 feet of water over it, alone marks its former site. North of this, 

 and near the main shore of the Bay of Quinte, separated by narrow 

 channels, are three small islands, side by side, and hence named 

 the Brothers. These islands also are under a process of disintegra- 

 tion ; and the western one has almost disappeared. On one of 

 these a recluse formerly resided, and supported himself by fishing 

 &c. ; but he left the locality some time ago. 



The cause of these changes is confessedly of a glacial character. 

 These islands are low, and little above the level of the waters of 

 Lake Ontario and the Bay of Quinte. They are so situated, in 

 a range with the Lower Gap (the lower outlet of the bay to the 

 lake), that the prevailing south or S.S.E. wind blows the drift- 

 ice, which is apt to pile up on such spots, to a great height ; and 

 loading itself with a cargo of earthy material, gravel, stones or boul- 

 ders, it acts upon such exposed spots and carries them away piece- 

 meal. As an evidence of this disintegrating action, I may mention 

 that last winter, on a low rocky limestone point about 4| feet above 

 the level of the water, in the range of the Lower Gap and on the 

 opposite shore of the mainland, a large mass of drift ice was piled to 

 such a height, on a spot between Perrot's Bay and Collins Bay, 

 as to obstruct the high road that passed by it. This spring there 

 were left on the point some large heavy boulders and other debris, 

 which were not there previously, and which had evidently been 

 brought by this glacial agency from the direction of the lake and the 

 islands already named ; and this may be deemed the chief cause of 

 the disappearance of Salmon Island and the disintegration of the 

 group of the Brothers. Further eastward, and opposite the village 

 of Bath, tradition states that in the days of the early settlers, 

 about A.D. 1786, there was a small island a short distance from the 

 shore ; and a shoal now marks the spot. Drift-ice from the direction 

 of the Upper Gap may similarly have efifected this. 



Two or three typographical errors have crept into my former 

 article as printed in No. 105, for November 1870, which I here 

 correct. For " Barnhast's Island," &c., read " Bamhart's Island ; " 

 for " immature ice-bergs," read " miniature ice-bergs ; " for Saxi- 

 cava vagosa, read rugosa ; and for " chalky sandstone," read " gritty 

 limestone." 



Discussion. 



Prof. Ramsay mentioned that Sir William Logan had informed 

 him that shore -ice in Canada, charged with boulders, had been 



VOL. XXVIII. PART I. 2 F 



