GLACIAt, LAKES. 19 



and Hamilton Inlet were formed by the denudation of 

 the Domino gneiss. Despair Harhor is a deep fiord oc- 

 curring at the juncture of the " Aulezavik gneiss" of 

 Lieber, with syenitic rocks forming the coast-line between 

 this point and Hopedale. The irregular overflows of 

 ■♦•■.lap and syenitic rocks which enclose the gneiss rocks, 

 produce an immense number of cross fiords and channels, 

 from the presence of innumerable islands which line the 

 ■coast, and are composed of these eruptive rocks. 



These original fissures and depressions have been 

 modified by glaciers, by frost and shore-ice and icebergs, 

 and by the waves of the sea. 



The shallow lakes, formed most probably by glaciers, 

 He in shallow troughs, upon a thin bed of gravel and 

 boulders. We only learn in some regions, especially in 

 Southern Labrador, that the country has been covered 

 with boulders by their presence on the banks and in the 

 •centre of these pools. Clear examples of lakes partially 

 surrounded by walls of rock, with the banks at one end 

 completed by a barrier of sand and gravel, are frequent. 

 Such barriers of drift have lost entirely their resemblance 

 to glacial moraines, to which they undoubtedly owe their 

 origin, since the drift deposits have been remodelled 

 into sea beaches composed of very coarse gravel and 

 boulders, while the finer materials have been swept away 

 by the powerful " Labrador current," with its burden of 

 icebergs and fioe-ice that has so effectually removed 

 traces of the former presence of what we must believe 

 to have been extensive glaciers. 



From all that has been published, it would seem that 

 the entire interior of the Labrador peninsula is strewn 

 w^ith boulders, having once been covered with land-ice, 



