112 SUPERFICIAL GEOLOGY OF DUNDAS VALLEY. 



meets the lower escarpment near Mr. Leith's gate. The upper escarp- 

 ment is, in this vicinity, considerably broken. There is an old chan- 

 nel at the northern end of the village of considerable depth, but of no 

 great width or length. This break or channel is filled with clay and 

 sand drift with large flag shaped boulders of limestone and sand- 

 stone, tilted at high angles, some of them being set on edge. The 

 upper bed is of limestone, weathered into pits or honeycombed, and 

 corresponds to Number Six of the section given by Sir William 

 Logan, in his geology of Canada.* The head of this ravine behind 

 the village, is crossed by the honeycombed rock which the stream has 

 cut through, and is now passing over the underlying shales which the 

 water has worn off into small steps. This stream has worn a large 

 channel in the shales of the lower escarpment at the Red Mills, on 

 the road leading from Ancaster to Dundas. The head of this chan- 

 nel is five hundred and ten feet above Lake Ontario. Passing along 

 the northern end of the village this escarpment shows a bold face 

 looking north, a short distance, when it is again broken by a stream 

 having a channel of considerable width, but of no great depth. Here, 

 the upper beds of the escarpment are very much broken by fissures 

 of considerable width, and in many places present a series of steps. 

 At other places the drift completely covers the escarpment only 

 allowing the rock to appear here and there on the side of the stream. 

 After crossing this stream the upper escarpment passes into the sand- 

 hills of the neighborhood and disappears. The honeycomb bed can 

 be seen on the surface west of the village, and also on the farms of 

 of Messrs. George Farmer and A. Book, a distance of something, 

 like four miles to the south of the village of Ancaster. From these 

 exposures, we might be inclined to infer that the upper escarpment 

 turned south from Ancaster village, leaving a basin to the west 

 between it and the Onondago group. The beds of the upper escarp- 

 ment are made into lime by Messrs Guest, and also quarried for 

 building purposes, on both sides of the stream at Ancaster. The top 

 bed at Guest's lime-kiln runs out before reaching the quarry on the 

 adjoining farm. 



Between the top of the lower escarpment and the foot of the 

 upper, there is a considerable tract of level rocky floor covered with 



♦Geology of Canada, page 324. 



