402 
Notices of Books, 
[July. 
Acadian Geology. The Geological Structure, Organic Remains, 
and Mineral Resources of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, 
and Prince Edward’s Island. By J. W. Dawson, F.R.S. 
London : Macmillan and Co. 
We have here the pleasure of meeting with Principal Dawson 
not as the scarcely-candid anti-Evolutionist zealot, prone to 
“ high-falutin ” language, and to bringing against opponents 
charges of intellectual and even moral obliquity, but as the 
earnest and successful worker in geological research. In this 
field he has made his mark, and, even though the evidence in 
favour of the organic nature of his Eozoon is not increasing, 
he has an indisputable claim to the gratitude of the scientific 
world. 
The work before us is full of important observations, and 
brings us face to face with some most interesting questions, at 
which we regret that want of space allows us to take merely a 
passing glance. 
Is Nova Scotia, with the adjacent parts of the Dominion, 
subsiding ? We have heard it maintained that the harbour of 
Halifax was being gradually upheaved, and must at no very 
distant date become useless. But Prof. Cook, in a paper here 
referred to, gives a summary of indications of modern subsi- 
dence observed on the coasts of New England and New York, 
and estimates the average rate of sinking, as now in progress, 
at 2 feet per century. In some parts of Nova Scotia the tides 
are found to rise higher than formerly, and the reclaimed 
marshes — an exceedingly fruitful trad! — are exposed to some 
peril. 
A question of wider interest is the existence of a former Gla- 
cial epoch as the cause of certain geological phenomena observed 
both in Europe and America. The existence of such a period 
“ when the whole of the northern parts of Europe and North 
America are imagined to have been covered "'th glaciers, or 
rather with an universal glacier like that of Greenland, but on 
an enormously larger scale,” the author considers improbable, 
whether considered “ in a mechanical, meteorological, or geolo- 
gical point of view.” He contends that floating ice and the 
ArCtic currents have been the grand agents in the distribution 
of erratic blocks, and in the production of scratched and polished 
rock-surfaces. He suggests that, as the country was gradually 
subsiding, blocks imbedded in ice were driven against the base 
of the hills. As the land continued to sink, the ice-fields of 
successive years gradually pushed them higher, until the sum- 
mits of the hills were submerged so deeply that the ice could no 
longer take up the blocks. Concerning Prof. Frankland’s hypo- 
thesis of a higher temperature of the sea conjointly with a lower 
temperature of the land, Dr. Dawson remarks that such an 
“ inversion of the usual state of things is unwarranted by the 
