1847.| DAWSON ON THE NEW RED SANDSTONE OF NOVA SCOTIA. 57 
these dark shales and sandstones, with grey and reddish sandstones 
like those of Wolfville, and containing Lepidodendron, Flabellaria, 
and scales of fish, are well-exposed, and have been described by Mr. 
Lyell. Some additional facts respecting them will be found in the 
Appendix to this paper. At the north end of the section at Horton 
Bluff the dark shales dip to the southward. They are then concealed 
by boulder clay, which with a marsh occupies the shore for nearly a 
mile. Beyond this, in a small poimt named Oak Island, are seen a 
few beds of coarse red sandstone, with some finer red beds and grayish 
bands. These beds dip to the N.N.W., and form a continuation, 
and the eastern termination of the red sandstones of the Horton 
Islands and of Cornwallis. 
It appears from the facts above-stated, that the red sandstones of 
Cornwallis and Horton, though not seen in contact with the carbo- 
niferous rocks, extend parallel to their disturbed strata with uniform 
north-west dips, and passing beyond them with the same dip, rest un- 
conformably on the older slaty series. This arrangement I thmk, 
satisfactorily proves that these red sandstones and the overlying trap 
are really newer than the carboniferous shales of Horton, and un- 
conformable to them. 
Eastward of the estuary of the Avon, the country as far as the 
Shubenacadie River is occupied by a deposit of reddish, grey and 
purple sandstones and marls, with large beds of gypsum and. lime- 
stones abounding in marine shells. This gypsiferous series is much 
fractured and disturbed, and is in many places associated with dark 
shales containing fossil plants, like those of Horton Bluff, and thin 
seams of coal. This association of the gypsiferous series with dark 
fossiliferous shales, occurs at Halfway River, where coarse brown 
and grey sandstones, with imperfect casts of fossil trunks of trees, 
and a thick bed of anhydrite and common gypsum, rest conformably 
on the continuation of the dark beds of Horton Bluff. The carbo- 
niferous date of this gypsiferous series has been fully established by 
Mr. Lyell; and though it contams red sandstones with veins of 
gypsum lke those of Blomidon, these never extend to so great a 
thickness as that of the Cornwallis sandstones, without alternating 
with fossiliferous shales, or limestones, or with beds of gypsum. 
For this reason, in connection with the undisturbed condition of the 
Cornwallis sandstones, their apparent unconformability to the car- 
boniferous shales of Horton, and their identity in mineral character 
and association with trappean rocks, with the red sandstones of Swan 
Creek and Five Islands, I have no hesitation in separating them from 
the gypsiferous series and including them in the new red sandstone 
formation. 
I am not aware that any rocks equivalent in age to the new red 
sandstones which have been described, occur in any other part of 
Nova Scotia. Red sandstones not unlike those of Cornwallis and 
Truro, occur in some parts of the newer coal formation, as seen on 
the shores of the Gulf of St. Lawrence ; but they alternate with beds 
of shale and grey sandstone, containing fossil plants of carboniferous 
species. Prince Edward Island, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, is 
