The Geology of Hingham. 65 



region, and constituting the innumerable kame hills and hillocks 

 that diversify the landscape. 



In considering this question, it should be borne in mind that 

 with the gradual increase of the ice in an epoch of intense cold, 

 there could probably have been but little flooding of the elevated 

 regions, and consequently less disturbance of the loose material 

 than in a later age. Consideration of this may result in the view 

 that the glacier during the greater part of its existence had less 

 to do with the transportation of the kame material than when 

 passing away, aided as it then was by the torrents of water that 

 (lowed over its surface and swept the hills of all movable matter, 

 as they emerged from the melting ice. The writer is strongly in- 

 clined to this view, as it will satisfactorily account for the immense 

 quantity of stones, gravel, and sand borne upon and deposited by 

 the glacier when it finally disappeared from the surface. 



Now let us picture to ourselves if we can the probable state of 

 things over and about this town when the ice-sheet had become 

 reduced from possibly thousands of feet in thickness to a few 

 hundred, bearing upon it great quantities of transported material, 

 and having floods of water pouring over it and in its channels such 

 as the world could never before have witnessed. Let us recog- 

 nize, too, that its water-courses were being gorged with stones, 

 gravel, and sand, and that vast collections of these were protecting 

 great areas of the ice from the sun's rays, often causing the chan- 

 nels of water to deviate from their normal course in seeking new 

 channels. Let us note, too, that the great bodv of the ice itself 

 had by lessened continuity ceased its onward movement, and we 

 shall find reasons for all we see and wonder at in the marvellous 

 diversity of the present surface over large portions of this territory. 

 Where great areas of the glacier by the protecting debris were kept 

 intact for a long period when that about them had melted away, 

 there would be found about each such area, as before stated in 

 treating of the formation of kettle-holes, hills and hillocks formed 

 by the falling of the gravel and sand from its summit, more or 

 less modified by the melting ice ; and when all the ice had melted 

 there would remain a deep depression such as we now know as 

 kettle-holes. Where channels existed of any length, and these 

 became filled with the sand and gravel, there would be formed 

 ridges ; and when large areas of the ice first melted away, the 

 material flooded into these areas would form hills and ranges 

 of hills such as we now find occupying a considerable portion of 

 our territory. 



It will be readily recognized that, though the course of the chan- 

 nels of the surface and in the glacier was generally the same as 

 that of the movement of the ice-sheet itself, and consequently 

 the ridges formed would be now found having a like direction, yet 

 when, by the clogging of the channel's unequal melting, the water 

 was forced to deviate, the ridges formed would present themselves 

 varying much from the normal direction, as they now do in regions 



VOL. I. 5 



