256 Prof. Milne and Alex. Murray — Rocks of Neivfoundland. 
diorites about 1000 feet in thickness. As these serpentines and 
diorites, which represent the Lauzon or middle division of tke 
Quebec group, are, from an economical point of view, perhaps the 
most important series in the island, I will consider tkem at greater 
length than I have the others. Their importance lies in the fact of 
their being repositories of metallic ores, a character which they bear 
not only in Newfoundland, but in all our transatlantic colonies and 
the United States. 
In Newfoundland tliis formation has a considerable development. 
On the eastern side of the island we see it occupying the valley of 
Gander Rivei - , a great portion of the shores and islands of Notre 
Dame Bay, and farther to the north in the vicinity of Hare Bay. 
On the west coast it crops out at many points, as at Cow Harbour, 
Bonne Bay, Bay of Islands, and Bluff Head. On the south we see 
it in Despair Bay, and extending northwards up Conne River towards 
the head waters of the above-mentioned Gander River. 
All these districts, with the exception of Gander Valley, I visited, 
and from various points collected several hundreds of rock and 
mineral specimens. In the fall of 1S7L Gander Valley was explored 
by my friend Mr. Murray, and to him I am indebted for a collection 
of rocks from that locality. 1 They consisted of many schists, most 
1 I made a very full repovt upon tbe Quebec Group iu 1874, the result of my own 
observations in 1873, and of my assistant’s survey by my direction in 1874 ; to which 
I heg to refer for my views of the structure. At page 52 of the said Report I have 
expressed myself thus : “ The facts ascertained, as already represented in the descrip- 
tion of the coast and river sections on the east side of Port-a-Port Bay, seem to point 
to the conclusion that the Silurian formations are arranged in a series of sharp 
anticlinal and synclinal folds, ranging generally about N. 22° E., S. 22° W. ; the 
whole mass of strata having, towards the close of the later deposits or subsequcntly, 
been affected by vast igneous intrusion, and become much dislocated by great parallel 
or nearly parallel faults, the. ground trend of which is N.E. and S.W. At the 
summit of the whole series is a great volume of igneous and magnesian rocks, consist- 
ing of various diorites, serpentines, and chlorites, which our evidenccs seem to 
indicate to he lapped over the inferior strata unconformably, and to come in contact 
with different members at different places.” In Sir William Logan’s investigations 
in Canada, the great mass of sandstone and conglomerate, displayed so largely at 
Sillery and other parts of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, were provisionally placed at the 
summit of the Quebec Group, aud as overlying the metamorphic and igneous rocks 
with serpentines and metallic ores, etc. ; but our evidences in Newfoundland seem to 
point to a somewliat different conclusion — unless, indeed, there may happen to 
be two great sandstone formations, one of which is absent in this island. The 
description of the rock of the St. Lawrence applies in nearly every particular to the 
rock here ; but while we find it to succeed the Levis formation with perfect regularity, 
although with numerous folds and twists, in every case it seems to pass bclow the 
serpentines, wherever a contact has been seen ; and moreover to pass below them 
unconformably. The Long Point of Port-a-Port Bay contains fossils recognized by the 
late Mr. Billings as not older than the Bird’s Eye and Black River, and may be near 
the base of the Hudson River Group; and these strata are comparatively un- 
disturbed ; but they are brought down by a fault against older rocks, at the base 
of which the sandstones are displayed in great disturbance. Having weighed all the 
evidences with great carc, I have come to the conclusion that the great igneous intru- 
sion, of which mention is made in the above extract, must be nearly of the age of the 
Chazy, or perhaps later; that it has been the metamorphosing agent, and that 
the altered strata consisting of chloritic slates, serpentines, melaphyres, diorites, etc., 
belong to a horizon somewhere intermediate between the Chazy and the Hudson 
River Group. — A.M. 
