﻿38 JV. S. Shaler — Geology of Cobscook Bay District, Me. 



Cobscook Bay, which is a branch of Passamaquoddy Bay 

 lying north of Quoddy Head, differs from all the other 

 fjord systems of the United States coast in certain import- 

 ant features. As will be seen from the sketch map the sys- 

 tem of fjords known by the general name of Cobscook Bay 

 have a curiously embayed nature ; all the other similarly ex- 

 tensive fjords of this coast communicate directly with the sea 

 by their southern extremities, but in Cobscook Bay there are 

 many inlets of considerable length which discharge their waters 

 through east and west channels into each other and into the 

 waters of Passamaquoddy Bay. It will be seen that this sys- 

 tem of bays has three main divisions to which I have given 

 the provisional names of Moose Bay, Center Bay and Orange 

 Bay. This innovation in the way of names is made necessary 

 by the fact that there are no accepted designations for these 

 divisions though they have great topographical importance. 



The general trend of these bays differs considerably from 

 that of the other inlets of the coast. The Cobscook bays have 

 a general northwest and southeast axis, while the other bays of 

 this region are usually inclined a little to the east of north and 

 west of south. In fact the Cobscook system of bays is the 

 only system of inlets on this coast where the major axes of the 

 basins so closely coincide with the direction of the glacial 

 movement. 



The system of bays has the further peculiarity that their 

 borders are remarkably intersected by smaller indentations ; the 

 whole forming one of the most complicated shore lines in the 

 world. 



These peculiarities of outline indicate local differences in the 

 bed rocks on which the glacial sheet has acted. They are 

 sufficiently accented to make it clear to anyone who has had a 

 little training in the interpretation of topography, that this dis- 

 trict is occupied by rocks having a different character from 

 those that form the other portions of the New England coast. 

 It was indeed these peculiarities of outline that led me to be- 

 gin my detailed study of the New England coast at this point. 

 It seemed clear that there must be some important geological 

 causes for the abnormal geography. As will be seen in the 

 sequel this opinion has been amply justified by the results 

 obtained. 



Geology of the bed rocks of the Cobscook district. 



The geology of the bed rocks of this district presents certain 

 remarkable peculiarities. Those rocks consist of a very thick 

 series of stratified deposits of Paleozoic and perhaps Azoic age 

 intermingled with numerous sheets of igneous rocks which are 

 partly intruded and partly interbedded deposits, the latter in 



