132 The American Geolorjist. August, 1895„ 
this trip. These formations illustrate the crystalline rocks 
west of the Cenneeticut river. Proffssor W. O. Crosby, of 
Boston, will accompany the party which makes this excursion. 
(2) An excursion to study the Triassic sandstones and also 
contacts of these rocks with the Holyoke trap sheets and in- 
trusives. This trip will include Mount Tom and Mount 
Holyoke. Professor B. K. Emerson^ will conduct this excursion. 
(3) Professor W.- M, Davis, in connection with Professor 
William North Rice, has arranged for an excursion to Meri- 
den and Southington, Connecticut. This region aifords fine 
examples of contact between the older crystalline rocks and 
sandstone. The Meriden quarry exhibits lava flows and faults. 
Professor Robert Bell, of the Geological Survey, read a 
paper on "A great pre-glacial river in northern Canada" at 
the annual meeting of the Royal Society of Canada held at 
Ottawa in May last. It was the outcome of much study and 
extensive observation in the North. The paper was illustrated 
by a map. The following short abstract is from the Ottawa 
J our a at, 
" It was," he said, "generally conceded by geologists that just before 
the advent of the glacial epoch, the continent of North America stood 
at a considerably greater elevation than at present, the difference accord- 
ing to some authorities, amovmting to two or three thousand feet, if not 
more. The difference was greater towards the sovith, as compared with 
the present general altitudes. The inevitable result of this wovild be to 
greatly alter the river systems. We should find in northern Canada a 
wide central drainage area equal to about one-third of the present land 
surface of the continent, the center of which would be in the region now 
covered by Hudson bay. 
" This great inland sea does not average 400 feet in depth, and it would 
be all dry land even with a very moderate elevation. 
" Hudson Strait is much deeper and it would either form a long bay 
or a river valley, according to the amount of the continental elevation. 
"Some geologiststs think that about this time the upper part of the 
St. Lawrence basin, including all the lakes, except Ontario, discharged 
its waters northward from lake Superior. But even without this doubt- 
ful part, the drainage area of this one great northern river would be 
seven times that of the present St. Lawrence. Judging from the an- 
cient erosion of the valleys and from other considerations, the annual 
precipitation was at least as great then as now, so that this former river 
must have been of gigantic proportions compared with any river of the 
present world. 
" Its catch-basin would extent from the sources of the Saskatchewan 
and the Athabasca beyond the Rocky mountains to near the eastern 
coast of Labrador, and from the Minnesota river in the south to the 
northern part of Baffin land, and would also include the southern part 
of the great McKenzie basin. It would flow through the centre of 
Hudson bay and down Hudson strait. The former existence of this 
great river was not a mere speculation as to what might have been, but 
a necessary consequence of the elevation and change in the slope of the 
land, and it was proved in detail by a multitude of concordent facts all 
over the territory involved." 
