> > > "How far down that canyon dropped --
> > > / A body twisting, twisting as it falls"
> >
> > After watching the silly black-and-white film in English Comp, those lines got instantly and permanently associated with Lady Macbeth.
>

They did?????


> Plus, I didn't know what an escarpment is.
>
> A steep, sloping bank. Does that mean that this bank in particular is *extra* steep?

This particular escarpment is -- which for lack of a better descriptor, McGill University designates as the "St. Jacques escarpment," after the name of the street running parallel along its top. It's about 50 to 80 feet high, completely vertical, and therefore as rocky as a cliff. Standing on top of it gives an excellent view of both Parc Mount Royal (in the city's center) and Montreal's South Shore (across the St.Lawrence River). At the foot of the cliff is the Canadian Pacific Railway trainyards.

I always thought the escarpment was a particularly odd feature of Montreal island -- you're driving along the expressway and suddenly this blank solid wall of grey rock looms up at you. Dave says it was probably carved out by glaciers the last time the Champlain Sea filled the entire Ottawa valley-St.Lawrence Seaway basin (about 8000 to 13000 years ago). Marine fossils litter the entire island.

Wolf "weird geological features of one's hometown" spirit