1 1 8 SUPERFICIAL GEOLOGY OF DUNDAS VALLEY. 



Sir Charles Lyell says : " With the exception of the parallel 

 roads or slopes in Glen Roy and some of the neighboring glens in 

 the Western Highlands of Scotland, I never saw so remarkable an 

 example of banks, terraces and accumulations of stratified gravel, 

 sand and clay maintaining over wide areas so perfect a horizontality 

 as in this district of Ontario." * 



Sir Charles Lyell regards them as referable to some ancient 

 beaches and lines of cliff formed on the margins of channels of the 

 sea ; others, including some of the loftiest of the ridges, as having 

 originated in banks and bars of sand, formed not at the extreme edge 

 of a body of water, but at some distance from the shore, in propor- 

 tion as the water attained a certain degree of shallowness from the 

 upheavel of the land." 



The height of these ridges above the sea have been given by 

 Mr. Roy, in a paper presented to the Geological Society of London, 

 in 1837, as: J 



A 342 feet. 



B 44r " 



c 514 " 



D 542 " 



e : 576 " 



F 634 " 



G 654 " 



H 734 " 



I 79o " 



J ■■■■• 858 " 



K 914 " 



O 996 " 



To these Dr. Chambers adds two others at § 



242-7 " 



39 2 " 



Between Lake Ontario and the head of Dundas valley proper, 

 there are indications of at least five of these ancient sea beaches. 

 Two of these, Burlington Beach and Burlington Heights are clearly 

 defined. The one at the head of the valley, although the evidence 



* Ancient Sea Margins. 



t Geology of Canada, page 915. 



§ Ancient Sea Margin,, Appendix, Table I. 



