THE ICE AGE AND IT8 WORK. 289 



under lofty precipices ; and small or large plateau or low level lakes 

 which occur literally by thousands in northern Canada, in Sweden, Fin- 

 laud, Lapland, and northwestern Russia. The valley lakes and the 

 alpine tarus are admitted by all geologists to be mostly true rock basins, 

 while the plateau and low country lakes are many of them hollows in 

 the drift with which much of the country is covered, though rock basins 

 are also not un frequent. 



Here then we see a remarkable association of lakes of various kinds 

 with highly glaciated regions. The question is whether there is any 

 relation of cause and effect in the association ; and to determine this 

 we must take a rapid survey of other mountain regions where indica- 

 tions of ice action are comparatively slight or altogether wanting, and 

 see whether similar lakes occur there also. The comparison will, I 

 think, prove very instructive. 



Spain and Portugal are preeminently mountainous countries, there 

 being a successi<m of distinct ranges and isolated mountain groups from 

 east to west and from north to south; yet there is not a single valley 

 lake in the whole i)eninsula, and but very few mountain tarns, Sar- 

 dinia and Corsica are wholly mountainous, but they do not appear to 

 possess a single valley lake. Nor does the whole range of the Appe- 

 nines, though there are many large plateau lakes in southern Italy. 

 Farther south we have the lofty Atlas Mountain, but giving rise to no 

 subalpine valley lakes. The innumerable mountains and valleys of 

 Asia Minor have no lakes but those of the plateaus; neither has the 

 grand range of the Lebanon, 100 miles long, and giving rise to an 

 abundance of rivers. Turning to the peninsula of India we have the 

 ranges of the Ghauts, 800 miles long, the mountain mass of the Neil- 

 gherries and that of Ceylon, ail without such lakes as we are seeking, 

 though Ceylon has a few i)lateau lakes in the north. The same phe- 

 nomenon meets us in Soutli Africa and Madagascar — abundance of 

 mountains and rivers, but no valley lakes. In Australia, again, the 

 whole great range of mountains from the uplands of Victoria, through 

 New South Wales and Queensland to the peninsula of Cape York, has 

 not a single true valley lake. Turning now to the New World, we find 

 no valley lakes in the southern Alleghanies, while the grand mountains 

 of Mexico and Central America have a few plateau lakes, but none of 

 the class we are seeking. The extremely mountainous islands of the 

 West Indies — Cuba, Hayti, and Jamaica — are equally deficient. In 

 South xVmerica we have on the east the two great mountain systems of 

 Guiana and Brazil, furrowed with valleys and rich in mountain streams, 

 but none of these are adorned with lakes. And, lastly, the grand 

 ranges of the equatorial Andes, for 10 degrees on each side of the 

 Equator, produce only a few small lakes on the high plateaus, and a 

 few in the great lowland river plains — probably the sites of old river 

 channels — but no valley lakes in any way comparable with those of 

 Switzerland or even of our own insignificant mountains. - - - 

 SM 93 19 



