GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION 335 



plainest evidence of the cold period, from the western 

 shores of Britain to the Oural range, and southward to 

 the Pyrenees. We may infer from the frozen mammals 

 and nature of the mountain vegetation, that Siberia was 

 similarly affected. Along the Himalaya, at points 900 

 miles apart, glaciers have left the marks of their former 

 low descent ; and in Sikkim, Dr Hooker saw maize 

 growing on gigantic ancient moraines. South of the 

 equator, we have some direct evidence of former glacial 

 action in New Zealand ; and the same plants, found on 

 widely separated mountains in that island, tell the same 

 story. If one account which has been published can be 

 trusted, we have direct evidence of glacial action in the 

 south-eastern corner of Australia. 



Looking to America ; in the northern half, ice-borne 

 fragments of rock have been observed on the eastern 

 side as far south as lat. 36°-37% and on the shores of 

 the Pacific, where the climate is now so different, as 

 far south as lat. 46° ; erratic boulders have, also, been 

 noticed on the Rocky Mountains. In the Cordillera of 

 Equatorial South America, glaciers once extended far 

 below their present level. In central Chili I was 

 astonished at the structure of a vast mound of detritus, 

 about 800 feet in height, crossing a valley of the Andes ; 

 and this I now feel convinced was a gigantic moraine, 

 left far below any existing glacier. Further south 

 on both sides of the continent, from lat. 41° to the 

 southernmost extremity, we have the clearest evidence 

 of former glacial action, in huge boulders transported 

 far from their parent source. 



We do not know that the Glacial epoch was strictly 

 simultaneous at these several far distant points on op- 

 posite sides of the world. But we have good evidence 

 in almost every case, that the epoch was included within 

 the latest geological period. We have, also, excellent 

 evidence, that it endured for an enormous time, as 

 measured by years, at each point. The cold may have 

 come on, or have ceased, earlier at one point of the 

 globe than at another, but seeing that it endured for 

 long at each, and that it was contemporaneous in a 



