56 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ASSOCIATION OF 



rent, it is at length stranded on the coast of South America, and 

 undergoes one or more overturns, hringing up at each time an addi- 

 tional amount of material. It then is forced offby a strong ofl-shore 

 wind, and after drifting still further north is stranded again, perhaps 

 at a long distance from its first anchorage. New overturns follow, 

 fresh materials are accumulated, but from waste, the whole mass 

 becoming lighter, it is once more lloated off, and pursuing a somewhat 

 devious course towards the tropics, is gradually melted away. Conld 

 that part of the ocean's bed over which such an iceberg has passed 

 be laid bare for our inspection, what would be the appearances pre- 

 sented ? The early progress of the mass would be marked by a 

 deposition of large angular fragments of polar rocks. Subsequent to 

 the overturn there would be an interval with few or no traces of its 

 path, till the rocky portion of the berg had resumed its original situa- 

 tion, when the deposition would be continued, and these alternations 

 would evidently correspond to the number of overturns. The larger 

 masses of rock would for the most part be the first to drop out, and 

 latterly the majority of matter might consist of smaller and more 

 rounded fragments, such as had been worn by the grinding of the 

 ice on the beach or bottom. Prior to the last, or even the first 

 stranding, all, or nearly all the rock and earth originally contained in 

 it miglit be deposited, Avhen the latter portion of its track would be 

 marked by a comparatively scanty amount of material from its more 

 recent halting places, perhaps confusedly mixed, and affording here 

 and there some slight indications of the birthplace of the berg, in the 

 occasional presence of a fragment of the remote Antarctic soil. 



Was there aught, asked INIr. C, in the evidences of ancient aqueo- 

 glacial action, analogous to such a mixed deposition, and irregular 

 distribution of materials from widely separated localities, as would 

 result from the conjectural case here presented, or the actual one of 

 the iceberg previously cited as fallen in with on the southern margin 

 of the Gulf Stream? Did they explain any of the obstacles and 

 apparent anomalies presented by the aqueo-glacial theory of the drift 

 formation ? These were questions which he submitted for the 

 decision of those whose attention had been more specially directed 

 to this subject. 



In reference to the advance and northern limits of icebergs from 

 the Antarctic in the eastern hemisphere, Mr. C. could state nothing 

 from his personal knowledge, further than that they frequently occur 

 at least as low as the thirty-fifth parallel of latitude. During his 

 residence in New South Wales, in the summer and autumn of 

 1839-40, (December to March,) several ships arriving at Sydney 

 from England, reported having fallen in with large icebergs in the 

 vicinity of the Cape of Good Hope, at least eighteen hundred miles 

 from the nearest southern land ; along the whole of which distance 

 they possibly deposited material from their polar starting ix)int. 



Mr. C. stated that he would here offer a few brief remarks upon 

 the bearing of the facts he had submitted upon the question of the 



