20 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



1863 Sir William issued the Geology of Canada which embodied in continuous 

 discussion the results achieved by himself and his assistants. To a student 

 of Gaspe. geology this is the compendium and guide. There is left for future 

 workers in this field only the elaboration of structural and physiographic 

 details and the refined exploitation of the stratigraphy and paleontology. 



A reexamination of the stratigraphy of the country was made by Dr 

 R. W. Ells and Mr (now Director) A. P. Low for the Survey and reported 

 in 1883-4. To this later work we also owe much; it recorded new locali- 

 ties of interest, it followed new traverses across the interior and determined 

 with still more accuracy the direction of the fundamental folds and troughs ; 

 it analyzed with care and keenness the composition of the deposits lying 

 over the folded rocks, and finally resulted in the production of a very help- 

 ful and trustworthy map of the entire peninsula. 



The invertebrate fauna of these ancient rocks so far as it has been 

 made known till today, was chiefly described by Elkanah Billings, Paleon- 

 tologist to the Canadian Survey. Here, as in all the work of this keen inves- 

 tigator, there is the evidence of unrelaxed exactitude which has given to his 

 determinations perpetual value. It is our good fortune to be able to cite 

 his work so frequently that our pages may almost seem its memorial. 



Sir William Dawson also contributed most importantly to the paleon- 

 tology of the region, but confined his descriptions mainly to the terrestrial 

 plant remains of the Gaspe sandstone ; Prof. E. R. Lankester described 

 some fish remains and Dr Henry Woodward a crustacean submitted by 

 Dawson, from the plant beds of the same formation. To Dr H. M. Ami we 

 owe observations on the invertebrate fauna and stratigraphy of the region. 



On entering this field, rem.ote from New York but geologically a part 

 of it, it was with the expressed approval of the lamented Dr George M. 

 Dawson, then director of the Geological Survey of Canada. It was a 

 source of much gratification to the writer that this effort to acquire new light 

 for his own State should not be regarded an invasion but rather applauded 

 and encouraged. And in the same generous spirit of approval and helpful- 

 ness has this work been recognized by the present chief geologist, Dr Bell, 



