208 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



the time Mr Lyell was here, he and his colleagues were struggling 

 for an interpretation of what were then commonly known as 

 " glacial " phenomena; but the glacier itself, as a factor in produc- 

 ing such phenomena, had not yet arrived. Both Lyell and Hall used 

 the word " glacial " in their writings with reference simply to the 

 action of ice, and in most every application thereof at this time, to 

 the action of moving berg or floe ice carried southward over the 

 surface of the continent. Mr Lyell was always searching the 

 beaches for an evidence of rock grooving caused by the movement 

 of such ice, and on this first trip it was not until he had practically 

 made his entire tour, that he happened to find what he sought on 

 the rock beds of the beach at Cape Blomidon, Nova Scotia. I quote 

 his memorandum regarding this occurrence 1 without reproducing 

 his illustrations and for the purpose of indicating here the effective- 

 ness of such a grinding by the ice, not only of such soft beaches as 

 we have been considering, but even on the rocky slopes of the 

 strand : 



As I was strolling along the beach at the base of these basaltic cliffs, 

 collecting minerals, and occasionally recent shells at low tide, I stopped short 

 at the sight of an unexpected phenomenon. The solitary inhabitant of a 

 desert island could scarcely have been more started by a human footprint 

 in the sand, than I was on beholding some recent furrows on a ledge of 

 sandstone under my feet, the exact counterpart of those grooves of ancient 

 date which I have so often described in this work, and attributed to glacial 

 action. After having searched in vain at Quebec for such indications of a 

 modern date, I had despaired of witnessing any in this part of the world. 

 I was now satisfied that, whatever might be their origin, those before me 

 were quite recent. 



The inferior beds of soft sandstone, which are exposed at low water at 

 the base of the cliff at Cape Blomidon, form a broad ledge of bare rock, to 

 the surface of which no sea weed or barnacles can attach themselves, as the 

 stone is always wearing away slowly by the continual passage of sand and 

 gravel, washed over it from the talus of fallen fragments, which lies at the 

 foot of the cliff on the beach above. The slow but constant undermining of 

 the perpendicular cliff forming this promontory, round which the powerful 

 currents caused by the tide sweep backwards and forwards with prodigious 

 velocity, must satisfy every geologist that the denudation by which the ledge 

 in question has been exposed to view is of modern date. Whether the rocks 

 forming the cliff extended so far as the points [indicated] 10, 50, or 100 

 years ago, I have no means of estimating; but the exact date and rate of 

 destruction are immaterial. On this recently formed ledge, I saw several 

 straight furrows half an inch broad, some of them very nearly parallel, 

 others diverging, the direction being N. 35° E., or corresponding to that of 

 the shore at this point. After walking about a quarter of a mile, I found 



'Charles Lyell. Travels in North America, 2: 144- i845- 



