130 SCIENCE IN SHORT CHAPTERS. 



of shells, odd fragments of earthenware, and other rubbish 

 thrown overboard from vessels. It is evident that breakers 

 of considerable magnitude are necessary for the loosening 

 'of this tough compact deposit that it is very slightly, if at 

 all, affected by the mere flow of running water. 



I specify these instances as characteristic and easy of 

 verification, as the packets all stop at these stations; but a 

 yachtsman sailing at leisure amidst the glorious coast scenery 

 of the Arctic Ocean might multiply such observations a 

 hundredfold by stopping wherever such strands are indi- 

 cated in passing. I saw a multitude of these in places where 

 I was unable to go ashore and examine them. 



A further question in this direction suggested itself on the 

 spot, viz., what is the nature of the " banks" which consti- 

 tute the fishing-grounds of Norway, Iceland, .Newfound- 

 land, etc. They are submarine plains unquestionably they 

 must have a high degree of fertility in order to supply food 

 for the hundreds of millions of voracious cod-fish, coal-fish, 

 haddocks, hallibut, etc., that people them. These large 

 fishes all feed on the bottom, their chief food being mollusca 

 and Crustacea, which must and, either directly or indirectly, 

 some pasture of vegetable origin. The banks are, in fact, 

 great meadows or feeding grounds for the lower animals 

 which support the higher. 



From the Lofoten bank alone twenty millions of cod-fish 

 are taken annually, besides those devoured by the vast mul- 

 titude of sea-birds. Now this bank is situated precisely 

 where, according to the above-stated view of the origin of 

 the till, there should be a huge deposit. It occupies the 

 Vest fjord, i.e., the opening between the mainland and the 

 Lofoden Islands, extending from Moskenes, to Lodingen on 

 Hindo, just where the culminating masses of the Kjolen 

 Mountains must have poured their greatest glaciers into the 

 sea by a westward course, and these glaciers must have been 

 met by another stream pouring from the north, formed by 

 the glaciers of HindO and Senjeno, and both must have 

 coalesced with a third flood pouring through the Ofoten 

 fjord, the Tys fjord, etc., from the mainland. The Vest 

 fjord is about sixty miles wide at its mouth, and narrows 

 northward till it terminates in the Ofoten fjord, which forks 



