302 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 19 3 8 



coasts of Europe being washed by relatively warm water they were 

 washed by cold seas dotted with ice. In the second place the Ice- 

 landic depression would either cease to exist or would be displaced 

 to the south, so that the warm southwesterly winds to which we owe 

 our mild climate were replaced by cold northwesterly winds. With 

 these large changes there is no wonder that ice sheets formed on the 

 British Isles. On the American coast the winds would be northeast 

 and drive the ice-ladeD water on to the American coast. Thus 

 glacial conditions extended far to the south on both coasts of the 

 Atlantic Ocean. As there was no corresponding flow of ice into the 

 Pacific Ocean, there was no similar glaciation of the Pacific coasts. 

 Thus the glaciation of the British Isles and the unsymmetrical 

 position of the ice sheets relative to the Pole were both due to flow 

 of ice from the Arctic Ocean into the North Atlantic. If this con- 

 nection had not existed, the distribution of the ice would have been 

 quite different. 



