JOURNEYS THEOUGH KOREA. 195 



since the great diastrophic revolution which happened at the end of 

 the Mesozoic era. The Tertiary is meageiiy represented and only 

 on the east coast. The seolian loess of China is the deposit at 

 one phase of that continental period. According to the late von 

 RiCHTHOFEN, the Diluvial loess '' is confined to North China and 

 its neighbourhood within the mountain barrier which once 

 described a curve from Tchin-lin-shan through the Huai mountains 

 to the peninsula of Korea. I searched in vain for the loess not 

 only in the peninsula, but also in eastern Manchuria. The limit 

 of the loess seems to me to run through western Shan-tung and 

 the eastern margin of the Liao valley in Manchuria. 



Through the long interval of a later geologic period the 

 peninsula has been subjected to intense subaerial degradation, 

 and the waste has been carried down to the sea as fast as it 

 has been formed ; consequently we expect the Diluvium only in 

 the present sea bottom. The Diluvium is therefore a lost period 

 in the record of the deposits on the peninsula. Wave-built ter- 

 races, so common in Japan, are not found at any place on the 

 coast nor inland. Only a few terraces, either alluviated or 

 iplanated, are observed near Kap-san on the east Kai-ma '^ plateau 

 forming cuspates above the river-bed ; but even in the case of 

 these we have no positive proof that they are of the Diluvial 

 age. 



What we should take for the representative of tlie Diluvial 

 rock, is the immence sheet of basalt flows which w^e find in 

 North Korea. This moreover is rare in the present area, and 



1) fluvial and lacustrine loesses may according to ray view belong in part to the Al- 

 luvium. Prof. B. Willis is of opinion that a part of the loess is of late Tertiary age (" Research 

 in China "). 



2) Popularly called the Koan-pevk Plateau (^:Jl:^tBi). See " An Orographic Sketch of 

 Korea". This Journal, Vol. XIX. Art. 1, page 31. 



