96 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



North of latitude 08° north the range "scatters," and finally sinks into 

 slight and timid heights or gradually disappears. South of Drontheim 

 this central axis unfolds and deliquesces into a series of separate lines 

 of elevation, forming the wide expansion of Southern Norway which, 

 thickened and braced by ridges of crystalline rock, held back the force 

 of the North Sea, and bore the searching pressure of the northern gla- 

 cier, when in a single and enormous surface it invaded Europe. This 

 southern extension of the Norwegian highlands has less height than the 

 narrow fork which enters the north, and is really a succession of table- 

 lands interrupted by occasional peaks, or narrow and precipitous valleys. 

 These level floors, barren and monotonous, constitute over forty per cent, 

 of the surface, reducing the available land for cultivation, roughly esti- 

 mated, to less than eleven per cent. The coast of Norway along its en- 

 tire extent is deeply penetrated by a complex sj^stem of fiords, long 

 channels which wind in almost inextricable detail amid its highlands 

 and at the base of its loftiest summits. Running for miles inland, and 

 connected with the labyrinth of straits which fimbriate the shores and 

 break the outlines with detached islands, these wonderful expanses ex- 

 pose the most bewitching and lovely scenery which Norway boasts. 

 Glacier, snow-capped mountain, green fields verdant under cultivation, 

 villages, and dizzy cliffs, are exquisitely blended into a diversified pano- 

 rama of sublimity and beauty. 



The glaciers of Norway are not so imposing, so numerous, or so 

 accessible, as those of the AIjds. The peaks are frequently too isolated 

 and too steep, the valleys too shallow and too small, and the stretches 

 of table-land too frequent, to permit the best exhibition of glacial forms ; 

 yet the accumulations of snow are very formidable. The snoAV-fields of 

 Justedals Bracen, which feed several glaciers, the largest of which is 

 only one-seventh the size of the Aletsch glacier in the Alps, stretch for 

 fifty miles upon one range, and cover an area of four hundred square 

 miles. Sognefield and Ymesfield form imperfect reservoirs of snow, 

 and generate only inferior though numerous ice-streams, falling off 

 their declivities through abrupt and narrow passes. The Fondalen 

 Mountains and the Borgefield both release glacial currents, in some 

 instances impinging their icy barriers upon the sea, but all subordinate 

 in interest. 



Sulitelma, the highest mountain within the arctic circle, occupies a 

 conspicuous centre of glacial activity. It dominates over an extensive 

 region of elevated and snowy ranges, and distributes its frigid emis- 

 sions on either side to Lapland or to Norway. The peaks of the Lof- 

 foden Islands reach above the snow-line, but no adequate footing is 

 afforded for the formation of glaciers, though the islands of Ringvadso 

 and Kraagen contain glaciers, which in the first instance have pushed 

 their moraines to the water's edge. If we now examine the actual 

 evidence of glacial action, we shall find it analogous to that we have 

 witnessed in the Alps, except that it is perhaps less emphatic. The 



