552 



CENOZOIC TIME. 



often contain marine fossils. The seashore terrace or " bench " is 

 often the termination of a river-border terrace, one graduating into 

 the other, the river level and sea level being the same at the mouth of 

 a stream. They are commonly called elevated beaches, though not 

 always of beach origin. Like lake-border formations, they are, in 

 many cases, combinations of Diluvian and Alluvian depositions ; but, 

 besides beds made in shallow waters, containing shallow water fossils, 

 there are often others of deeper-water formation, different in most of 

 their marine fossils. They vary also according as they were made on 

 an open coast or in an estuary. 



The height of the sea-border formations increases with the latitude. 

 On the southern shores of New England, the height above the sea is 

 10 to 25 feet; on Nantucket, 85 feet; at Point Shirley, near Boston, 

 75 to 100 feet; on the coast of Maine, in some places, 217 feet; on 

 the shores of Lake Champlain, at different heights, up to 393 feet 

 above tide-level, and containing marine shells to a height of 325 feet ; 

 on the borders of the St. Lawrence, with abundant marine fossils, near 

 Montreal, to a height of 470 feet ; from which point, the same forma- 

 tions continue on, and border Lake Ontario ; but they are destitute of 

 marine remains, — the now of fresh waters in the river St. Lawrence 

 beyond having apparently prevented the farther ingress of the ocean 

 and of marine life. On the coast of Labrador, the beds are 400 to 

 500 feet above the sea. They occur also in the Arctic regions in 

 many places, as on Cornwallis and Beechy Islands in Barrow Straits, 

 where they are at different heights to more than 1,000 feet. 



The seashore deposits on Nantucket occur at Sancati Head. In Maine, the beds occur 

 at many places near the coast, as Portland, Cumberland, Brunswick, Thomaston, Cher- 

 ryfield, Lubec, Perry, etc., at different elevations, not exceeding 217 feet, so far as yet 

 reported; also distant from the coast, at Gardiner, Hallowell, Lewiston, Skowhegan, 

 Clinton Falls, and Bangor. At Lewiston, a starfish and various shells were found in a 

 bed 200 feet above the ocean and 100 above the Androscoggin River; at Skowhegan, 

 the beds are 150 feet above the ocean, and 100 feet at Bangor; near Mt. Desert (a sea- 

 bottom deposit, on North Haven Island), 217 feet. 



There are shell-beds at several levels and many localities, along the St. Lawrence, 

 observed by Logan; and part, as Dawson has shown, are sea-beaches, and others off- 

 shore deposits. At Montreal, at heights of 470, 420, 366, 200, 100, above the river, or 

 20 feet more for each above Lake St. Peter; west of Montreal, near Kemptville, at a 

 height of 250 feet; on the Upper Ottawa, 65 miles northwest of Ogdensburg, 360 feet; 

 in Winchester, 300; in Kenyon, 270; in Lochiel, 264 and 290; at Hobbes Falls in Fitz- 

 roy, 350; at Dulham Mills, 289; in the counties of Renfrew, Lanark, Carlton, and 

 Leeds, 425; east of Montreal, near Upton Station, 257; farther east, on the river Gouf- 

 fre, near Murray Bay, 130 and 360 feet. At the Straits of Belle Isle, Labrador, the 

 terraces, on either side, are about 400 feet above the sea; at Chateau Bay, 500 feet, prob- 

 ably 800 feet in some parts (Packard). 



The 100-foot level near Montreal was apparently beneath the sea at the time, as the 

 shells in which it abounds are not littoral species, neither are the specimens water-worn. 

 At Beauport, near Quebec, there are thick beds of this kind, mostly made of shells, 

 partly littoral, and situated at heights of 200 to 400 feet above the sea. The depth of 



