Upham.] 44 [Maicli 15, 
Continuing in this direction, tlie large Western Bank and 
Baiiquereau stretch two hundred and fifty miles east-northeast, 
varyitig from 50 to 75 miles in width, and sejjarated by a breadth 
of twenty-five to a hundred miles of deep water from the eastern 
part of Nova Scotia and from Cape Breton Island. On the 
east half of the Western Bank its highest portion is the wave- 
built broad sand beach of Sable Island, about twenty-five miles 
long from west to east, heaped in dunes bj'^ the winds. Between 
Banquereau and Cape Breton Island are some half a dozen small 
banks, of which the Misaine, about sixty miles long, is the 
largest and extends farthest northeast. 
Next eastward the now deeply submerged preglacial valley of 
the River St. Lawrence lies at a depth of 260 to 300 fathoms, 
showing, as Prof. J. W. Spencer has well pointed out, that before 
the Ice age this part of North America was elevated at least 
from 1,500 to 2,000 feet above its present height.^ 
Beyond this great submarine valley the St. Pierre Bank, 
covered by only from 22 to 50 fiithoms of water, reaches about a 
hundred and twenty-five miles from northwest to southeast, 
with a width of thirty to sixty miles. On the north this bank is 
divided from the Miquelon Islands by water from (U to 63 
fathoms deep. 
Soundings of from 80 to 96 fathoms separate the St. Pierre 
from Green Bank, of which the latter has a length of about sixty 
miles from north to south with half as great width, being in its 
turn separated from the Grand Bank by water of 64 fathoms. 
Farther east the deep water between Cape Race, Newfoundland, 
and the Grand liank is mostly from 80 to 100 fathoms, and in 
one place 115 fathoms. On the northwest, however, Placentia 
Bay of Newfoundland has maximum soundings of from 125 to 
147 fathoms, being thus probably 67 fathoms deeper than any 
outlet from it to the depths of the North Atlantic. 
The Grand Bank has approximately the outline of an equi- 
lateral triangle measuring from 275 to 300 miles on each side, or 
very nearly the same as the far more irregular area of New- 
foundland. Its depth of water ranges mainly from 25 to 50 
fathoms, and its shallowest places are found along the northern 
1 "The hiffh continental elevation precerling the Pleistocene period." Bulletin 
G. S. A., vol. 1, 1890, p. 65—70, with map of the preglacial Laurentian river. Also 
in the Geol. mag., ser. 3, v. 7, 1890, p. 208-212. 
