134 SCIENCE IN SHORT CHAPTERS. 



Mr. Geikie describes the Scandinavian ice-sheet in simi- 

 lar terms, but ascribes to it a still greater thickness. He 

 says (page 404) " The whole country has been moulded 

 and rubbed and polished by an immense sheet of ice, which 

 could hardly have been less than 6,000 or even 7,000 feat 

 thick," and he maintains that this spread over the sea and 

 coalesced with the ice-sheet of Scotland. 



My recollection of the Lof oden Islands, which from their 

 position afford an excellent crucial test of this question, led 

 me to believe that their configuration presented a direct 

 refutation of Mr. Geikie's remarkable inference: but a mere 

 recollection of scenery being too vague, a second visit was 

 especially desirable in reference to this point. The result 

 of the special observations I made during this second visit 

 fully confirmed the impression derived from memory. 



I found in the first place that all along the coast from 

 Stavanger to the Varanger fjord every rock near the shore 

 is glaciated; among the thousands of low-lying ridges that 

 peer above the water to various heights none near the main- 

 land are angular. The general character of these is shown 

 in the sketch of " My Sea Serpent," in the last edition of 

 " Through Norway with a Knapsack." 



The rocks which constitute the extreme outlying limits 

 of the Lofoden group, and which are between 60 and 70 

 miles from the shore, although mineralogically correspond- 

 ing with those near the shore, are totally different in their 

 conformation, as the sketch of three characteristic speci- 

 mens plainly shows. Mr. Everest very aptly compares 

 them to shark's teeth. Proceeding northward, these rocks 

 gradually progress in magnitude, until they become moun- 

 tains of 3,000 to 4,000 feet in height; their outspread 

 bases form large islands, and the Vest fjord gradually nar- 

 rows. 



The remarkably angular and jagged character of these 

 rocks when weathered in the air renders it very easy to 

 trace the limits of glaciation on viewing them at a distance. 

 The outermost and smallest rocks show from a distance no 

 signs of glaciation. If submerged, the ice of the great ice 

 age was then enough to float over without touching them; 

 if they stood above the sea, as at present, they suffered no 



