70 



the station south of St. Catherines the railway descends 

 to the lower side of a low bluff , the shore cliff of the Iroquois 

 beach, which continues most of the way from Queenston 

 to Hamilton. From the village of Homer, about three 

 miles (4-8 km.) east of St. Catherines, the shore cliff 

 gives place to a strong gravelly beach ridge which runs 

 westward into St. Catherines where it divides into several 

 spits. The shore again becomes a strong gravel ridge in 

 crossing the embayment between Stoney creek and Barton- 

 ville. 



The route of the railway westward from St. Catherines 

 is over a flat plain which descends gently toward Lake 

 Ontario but is deeply trenched by many small streams. 

 The subsoil is of clay, but the surface is generally gravelly 

 or sandy loam, excellent for agriculture purposes and 

 especially for fruit growing. The climatic influence of 

 Lake Ontario favours the same industry and a little farther 

 west near Grimsby almost all the land is given to the 

 raising of peaches, pears, apples and grapes, forming 

 one of the best fruit growing districts in Canada. 



Just west of Jordan station about seven miles (11 2 

 km.) west of St. Catherines, the railway crosses the 

 drowned valley of Twenty Mile creek. North of the rail- 

 way the valley of this creek is occupied by one of those 

 landlocked lakes which arise from the backing up of the 

 water into the valley after it had been cut down to a 

 level lower than the present level of Lake Ontario. 



Five or six miles (8 or 9-6 km.) west of Jordan, and 

 at two or three places farther on, the railway passes through 

 a bouldery or stony belt, sometimes with low small knolls 

 of bouldery till. In places these appear to be the remains 

 of a moraine which has been mostly washed away, corres- 

 ponding probably to the Carlton moraine in New York; 

 in others they mark the site of a beach ridge which was 

 washed away when the lake rose to a higher level. At 

 Queenston the Ontario lowland is eight or nine miles 

 (13 or 14 km.) wide. At Jordan it narrows to three, 

 and at Grimsby it is only one mile wide, but thence west- 

 ward to Hamilton it is generally two to three miles wide. 



