162 
THE GEOLOfilST. 
giving way to the action of the waves. From the same canse are to 
be seen detached peninsular masses in a tottering state, which now 
and then assume gi'otesque forms. There is something pecnliarly 
interesting in this singuhir group of islands, lying so isolated about 
the centre of the great Gulf of St. Lawrence ; and curiosity would 
be well repaid by a visit from one of the neighbouring ports. (See 
outline of Bryon Island, plate v.). 
2. — Caverns and Arched Rocks at Perce, Gaspe. 
On the eastern coast of Gaspe, in the Gulf of St. Lam-ence, there 
is a range of limestone cliffs, which commence on the south-west 
side of Mai Bay, at the perforated rock, called He Perce, and thence 
run in a north-north-west direction. Immediately south of these 
cliffs, which are six hundred and sixty-six feet in perpendicular 
height above the level of the sea. as described by Bayfield, are the 
Perce mountains, the highest of which. Mount Perce, is twelve thou- 
sand and thirty feet, and is visible forty miles out to sea. 
The town of " He Perce," as it was called in Charlevoix's time, 
occupies the shores of Perce Bay, running from Point Perce to White 
Head. This writer mentions in the second volume of his " Histoire 
de la Nouvelle France," p. 71, that Sir William Phipps, in his ex- 
pedition against Quebec, landed at He Perce, in Sept., 1690, pillaged 
the town and robbed the church, 
A reef connects the Perce Rock with Point Perce. This remark- 
able perforated rocky islet, which gives the name of Perce to tliis 
locality, is two hundred and ninety-nine feet in height, precipitous 
all round, and bold to seaward. This islet and the island of Bona- 
venture are considered outliers of the conglomerate rocks which 
enter into the formation of the main land at Perce, the former would 
seem especially to be a continuation of the range of cliffs on the 
south-west side of Mai Bay.* The Split Rock is an almost in- 
accessible mass of this strata, and stands up like a mall, in con- 
tinuation of the limestone-cliffs of Barry Cape (Point Perce). It is 
five hundred yards long, one hundred broad, and is remarkable for 
the presence at its western half of two large holes or arches, through 
one of which a sloop at full sail can pass at high water. There is a 
lateral arch at the north-east side, scarcely perceptible from the 
water. 
The perforations in this rock have been formed by the action of 
the waves of the sea, the same cause which has in the progress of 
time effected the disjunction of these outliers from one another and 
the main land. From the present position of the islet, which lies 
* Both islands are composed of the gi-eat mass of conglomerate, belonging to 
the lower carboniferous series, which here caps the Devonian rocks, and is made up 
of pebbles of all the rocks, from the old Laurentian of the north shore of the Gulf 
of St. Lawrence to the Devonian. — Professor Dawson's " Week in Gaspe." 
Canad. Nat. and Geol. Oct., 1858. 
