74 



foot of the cliff formed by the escarpment across the mouth 

 of the Dundas bay while the water of Lake Iroquois 

 stood perhaps ioo feet (30 m.) lower than its final stage. 

 As the northeast end of the lake warped upwards the 

 water rose toward the west end and the bar grew in height 

 to correspond, till it reached its present wall like form. 



To the west of the bar a plain 36 feet (11 m.) lower 

 consists of stratified clay, sand and gravel deposited in 

 the bay, and extending to the town of Dundas. At 

 various places in the gravel bar and the beds to the west 

 fossils have been found including mammoth, wapiti and 

 beaver. The most common fossils are bones, ivory and 

 teeth of mammoth, which occur at various levels, from 

 33 feet (10 m.) to 70 or 80 feet (21 to 24 m.) above Lake 

 Ontario. An old soil with mammoth bones and remains 

 of trees was found 30 feet (9-1 m.) below the gravel bar 

 in the city, showing a decidedly lower stage of water before 

 the final beach level was attained. 



The rise of water at the west end of Lake Iroquois 

 corresponded in character to the later rise in Lake Ontario, 

 leading to the flooding of the lower portions of the rivers 

 and to the growth of Hamilton beach in water now 78 

 feet (23 • 8 m.) deep. It appears that there has been a 

 more or less continuous elevation toward the northeast 

 since the departure of the ice, probably with a gradual 

 slowing down until at present the change of level is very 

 slight or completely ended. 



The Grand Trunk railway from Hamilton to Toronto 

 follows the Burlington gravel bar to the north shore of 

 the old bay, where red shales begin to show themselves 

 under a shallow deposit of drift. At Waterdown, four 

 miles (6-4 km.) east of Hamilton, another gravel bar 

 of Iroquois age projects two or three miles toward Hamilton 

 bay, to some extent overlapping the great bar just des- 

 cribed. The channel of the stream which flowed from the 

 Dundas valley before the cutting of the Desjardins canal 

 seems to have been an entrenched meander dating from 

 Iroquois times. 



The railway runs for about 15 miles (24 km.) a little 

 to the south of the Iroquois shore, which can be seen 

 rising as a low cliff from the plain which slopes gently 

 towards Lake Ontario. The rest of the railway journey 

 to Toronto is near the present lake shore and out of sight 

 of the old beach. 



