of Western Canada. 429 
in places. This deposit is often laminated horizontally, and is 
generally very calcareous. It appears also to be free from north- 
ern or large crystalline boulders. Pebbles of limestone and other 
fossiliferous rock, mixed with some small pebbles of water-worn 
gneiss, occur abundantly in it in many localities; but northern 
boulders, properly so called, are either absent or exceedingly rare. 
Amongst the localities in which these lower and boulder-free clay 
deposits are of marked occurrence, the district around Toronto 
and many parts of the valley of the Saugeen and western shores 
of Lake Huron may be especially mentioned ; but wherever our 
Drift deposits are found to consist of clay and other materials, 
the clay-beds are almost invariably seen to occupy the lower 
place. At the same time, as described more fully in the sequel, 
beds of yellow and other-coloured clay, it should be observed, 
are occasionally found with northern boulders in a higher part of 
the series; but these are quite distinct from the lower clays now 
referred to. They are, moreover, of no great thickness, but 
alternate with, and are subordinate to, thick deposits of gravel 
and sand ; whereas the lower clays attain in places to a thickness 
of over 100 feet, and present a general uniformity throughout. 
In these latter beds no traces of contemporaneous fossils have as 
yet been found. 
3. It is generally assumed as an established fact, that the 
harder rocks beneath the Drift exhibit everywhere the marks of 
glacial action. Although we have numerous examples, through- 
out this section of the province, of polished and striated rock, I 
believe it to be still an open question as to whether the rocks 
which underlie these lower clays have been thus affected. I have 
not been able to discover any imstances of it, nor can I find any 
recorded cases in our Geological Reports, or in other trustworthy 
sources. The question hitherto does riot seem to have been 
mooted, the Drift accumulations generally being classed together 
by most observers under one common term. As the point is of 
much interest, however, it should be kept in view. 
4. Above the lower clay deposits, or resting immediately (where 
these are absent) on the foundation rock of the country, we meet 
with a series of sands and gravels of evidently northern origin, 
containing boulders of gneissoid and other rock, and alternating 
occasionally with beds of clay, in which northern boulders are 
also frequently found. ‘This clay, with scarcely an exception, is 
remarkably free from calcareous matter, the cause of which will 
be alluded to further on. In some places the clay and gravel 
are mixed up together, and present no signs of stratification ; but 
more usually they are distinctly stratified, and the boulders are 
mostly accumulated towards the upper part of the series Asa 
general rule, indeed, the boulders occur in by far the greatest 
