CAPE BEETON ISLAND, ITOVA SCOTIA. 523 



200 feet in thickness. Beds of red and grey sandstone, usually 

 laminated, often micaceous and ripple-marked, are frequently met 

 with. The limestones generally contain the fossils characterizing this 

 horizon, and are frequently charged with galena and copper pyrites, 

 celestine and manganese ores. 



The following section, from the ' Geological Survey Report,' 

 1875-7(3, p. 407, gives a good idea of the conditions under which 

 the gypsum and limestone are usually presented : — 



ft. in. 



Bluish-grey columnar limestone 136 



Green marl 9 



Black bituminous nodular limestone, mottled greenish and 



red compact limestone 55 



Gray, compact, green, and mottled limestone 40 



White crumbling gypsum 15 



Green gypseous marl 7 



Pink gypsum 0|- 



Greenish gypseous marl 10 



Pink gypsum and greenish marl 6 



Red micaceous marl with gypsum 7 



White gj'psum 1 



White gypsum and marl, with veins of gypsum 1 6 



Nodular gypsum, marl, and limestone 4 



The gypsum varies greatly, and the following description of an 

 immense cliff, over one hundred feet in height, on the Bras d'Or 

 Lake, will serve to show its characteristic features. It is essentially 

 white, but spotted and tinted with many colours. It lies in beds 

 often massive, but frequently pointed in every direction. It is 

 usually compact, but often granular, minutely crystalline, or fibrous 

 and radiating. Crystals of selenite, of a brownish colour, frequently 

 occur in it ; they are isolated or arranged in radiating groups, and 

 sometimes give the rock a porphyritic appearance. The rock is fre- 

 quently traversed by veins filled with fibrous gypsum of various 

 colours, or with large plates of transparent selenite. Layers and 

 nodules of anhydrite and of limestone frequently occur in the beds 

 or divide them. Long-continued weathering roughens the surface 

 of the gypsum, owing to the presence of silica as sand. Glauber's 

 salt, common salt, and carbonates of magnesia and calcium, sulphur, 

 and several varieties of silico-borate minerals are not uncommon. 



Lower Coal-Measures. 

 (^Lower Carboniferous Conglomerate.) 



This, the lowest meml)er of the Carboniferous division, cor- 

 responding with the Bonaventure formation of Gaspe, and the basal 

 conglomerate of 'New Brunswick and Newfoundland, is of variable 

 voluine, and cannot in this district be separated by any strict line 

 from the overlying limestone formation ; and it is the opinion of 

 Mr. Fletcher that, in the districts surrounding the Bras d'Or Lake, 

 much of it may be considered contemporaneous with the Limestone 

 series. 



In the Sydney district, near the Coxheath Hills, it has a thick- 

 ness of 2525 feet, which rapidly diminishes as its strike is followed 



