NO. 2.] GEOLOGICAL SKETCH BY NANSEN. 19 



from under the glacier" may be misleading. As the slope of the ground, 

 or the snow ( n glacier"), was so gentle above the place where the fossils were 

 found, it is hardly probable that the latter could have fallen or rolled from 

 above at any recent date. And as they could hardly have been lying on the 

 surface, as they were, for very long, there is a probability that the fossils found 

 n at the margin of the glacier", and on n the clay plain", had not been removed 

 very far from the place where they had originally been in situ, and where 

 they had been washed or weathered out of the clay 1 . 



I wrote to Koettlitz, and asked his opinion, and in the letter referred to 

 above, he says; ,,I am strongly of opinion that the fossils we found there 

 were weathered out of the strata immediately underneath. Since you were 

 with us at Cape Flora, I have spent some time, and taken some trouble to 

 investigate as thoroughly as possible this spot, and the rocks above it, and 

 I have come to the conclusion that the cone-in-cone argillaceous limestone 

 and the fossils we found there do not come from above, but are practically 

 in situ, for the deeper one digs under the surface, the more of the same 

 specimens are brought to light, and the supply is there practically inexhaus- 

 tible. The only difficulty there is in getting at them is the icy condition of 

 the rock surface". 



Presuming, therefore, that the fossils found here had been in situ some- 

 where about 60 metres (200 feet) above the present sea-level, I was rather 

 astonished to learn from Pompeckj that some of them belonged to exactly 

 the same horizon as those from the locality 3 (see p. 14), above Elmwood, 

 and just below the basalt at a height of about 165 metres (550 feet) above 

 sea-level. 



If Koettlitz and I are right, there must consequently have been a dislo- 

 cation of some kind here. In my diary, I mention at this place a basalt 

 rock (see above p. 18), the base of which must be at a height of some 150 



However, if they really did come from an originally much higher level, the following 

 explanation is also possible, namely, that a soft, viscous material, such as the clay of 

 these beds, might possibly flow slowly downwards, even where the slope is compara- 

 tively gentle, especially when the clay during the summer is covered with a sheet of 

 melting snow and ice which keeps it constantly wet instead of frozen. But whether 

 the ground underneath the snow, or the n glacier u , above this place was composed of 

 clay and not of basalt, I had no opportunity of investigating. I believe, however, that 

 there are, as we shall see, reasons for assuming that the rock here is basalt. 



