55 



of till now being abandoned and has wide, reedy shallows 

 all along its base. 



The old Drift Banks of Niagara River.— When the 

 falls first began at the escarpment south of Queenston, 

 there was no gorge and the river flowed across the country 

 on the line of lowest level. Although it had no bed at 

 first, it very soon made one for itself in the drift. In 

 consequence of its greater width, fragments of the old 

 drift banks are found at intervals nearly to the mouth of 

 the gorge. Anyone who would doubt the making of the 

 rock gorge by the present post-glacial river will have 

 to explain how the old river banks in the drift could have 

 originated, for evidently the river could have flowed in 

 its old drift bed at any given place only before the gorge had 

 been cut back to that place. 



The most remarkable parts are the three embayments 

 on the west side near the falls. The earliest embayment 

 extends southward from a point about 1,000 feet (300 m.) 

 south of Hubbard point nearly to Table Rock house. This 

 appears to have been cut partly during the earlier history 

 of the river, when the falls were somewhere north of Hub- 

 bard point, and partly, especially the southern part, while 

 the falls were receding down the southward slope of the 

 old valley mentioned below. This part extends from a 

 point one-fourth of a mile (-4 km.) north of the park 

 bridge to the western end of Goat island. The large em- 

 bayment south of Table Rock house had not then been 

 made and the western bluff of that time probably extended 

 south and southeast from near Table Rock house out over 

 the present site of the Horseshoe falls and the rapids above, 

 in all probability along a line several hundred feet out from 

 the shore. 



At this time the river began to cut the bank at a new 

 place on the west side, where the rapids are now, and soon 

 formed the strongly marked embayment which curves 

 around west of the present rapids. The cutting of this em- 

 bayment was apparently due to the momentum of the water 

 as it descended the sloping rock floor of the rapids toward 

 the west. The rushing water was turned to the east, but 

 not until it had cut heavily into the drift, and before tht, 

 process ceased it had carved out the great embayment 

 now seen. This work was probably completed in a rela- 



