476 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [Apr. 27, 
first sight, but little of the aspect of stratified rocks, and might be 
mistaken for intrusive granites” *, 
Cape Breton.—In Cape Breton I saw, in 1866, the black corru- 
gated slates forming the summit of the gold-bearing series of Nova 
Scotia, about five miles north of Chetican Island, on the Gulf-coast ; 
and on the Mackenzie River, near Red Cape, I crossed part of a 
great gneissoid series }. 
In yarious parts of Cape Breton I have seen similar gneisses, as 
for instance, near the mouth of North River, St. Ann’s Bay, and on 
the peninsula opposite Baddeck. 
Dr. Honeyman informs me that he considers the gold-bearing 
rocks of Middle River, in Cape Breton, to be of the same age as 
those of Nova Scotia. Hence it becomes more than probable that a 
very large portion of the area coloured by Dr. Dawson to represent 
Upper Silurian in the northern part of the island is occupied by 
rocks of Huronian and Laurentian age t. 
Three Subordinate Laurentian Awes.—The sketch section of part 
of Canada, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia (fig. 3), showing the 
outcrop of the gneissoid rocks, points to three subordinate undula- 
tions which have brought up the gneissic rocks between the Atlantic 
coast of Nova Scotia and the great Laurentian axis of the American 
continent on the north side of the St. Lawrence. 
The first of these is the central belt of New Brunswick, which is 
parallel to the great axis north of the St. Lawrence. In the trough 
between the St. Lawrence and this belt the newest rock known is 
an outlier of Lower Carboniferous age. 
The second axis trends slightly to the eastward, and the rocks are 
exposed from the coast of Maine to a considerable distance beyond 
the city of St. John, enclosing a wedge-shaped trough in which the 
New-Brunswick coalfield is situated. 
The third axis is in Nova Scotia, and the newest rock in the 
intervening trough is the New Red Sandstone, 
On the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia, and on the south-east side 
of the Nova-Scotian axis the newest rocks consist of patches of the 
Lower Carboniferous, so that in each trough we find a recurrence of 
the same rock-series. 
From the horizontal attitude of the Carboniferous series in Nova 
Scotia and New Brunswick, sometimes resting on the gneiss, some- 
times on tilted Devonian or Silurian strata, it appears probable that 
these great undulations occurred at the close of the Devonian period. 
The three great axes just enumerated represent the main undu- 
lations; but they are themselves thrown into minor corrugations, 
* Geology of Canada, 1863, p. 587. 
t See page 11 of a ‘ Preliminary Report on a Gneissoid Series underlying the 
Gold-bearing Rocks of Nova Scotia, and supposed to be the equivalent of the 
Laurentian System, by the Author. 
¢ In the counties of Addington, Hastings, and Peterboro’, Ontario, there is 
a series of rocks provisionally placed by Sir W. E. Logan as Lower Laurentian, 
‘‘at the base of which there appears to be an auriferous band.” See page 5, Sum- 
mary Report of Progress in Geological Investigations, May, 1869 (Geological 
Survey of Canada), 
