OF CREATION. 323 



as these are with the equally striking extinct feline 

 animals allied to the lion and tiger, with the hysenas, 

 the numerous herds of gigantic and wild oxen, the 

 large-horned deer and others, many of which are only 

 locally extinct, some now locally abundant, I have 

 hitherto omitted to direct especial attention to the 

 changes that must meanwhile have gone on with 

 regard to the relative level, the extent, and the posi- 

 tion of the dry land. The picture given of the con- 

 dition of Europe in this respect at the commence- 

 ment of the present chapter being referred to, and 

 compared with its present appearance, some idea will, 

 however, be formed of the nature and amount of the 

 modifications that the surface has undergone. 



It seems reasonable to assume that the first ele- 

 vation of great masses of land, some part of which 

 now consists of lofty mountain-peaks of granite and 

 of igneous rocks, should have been accompanied by 

 local disturbances of the bed of the sea, producing 

 waves capable of transporting large quantities of 

 broken rock, and that by a succession of similar 

 movements these fragments might be conveyed, being 

 more and more pounded and rolled, to a distance 

 of many miles, or even hundreds of miles. Perhaps 

 it may be because the quantity of land elevated in 

 the Arctic Circle was lifted up under different cir- 

 cumstances, and in more uniform, dome-shaped, and 

 larger masses, producing more powerful waves, that 

 the fragments broken off from the old rocks of 

 Scandinavia, Lapland, and northern Russia, and the 

 northern parts of our own island (which have all 

 partaken of this movement and its consequences), 

 have been farther transported, and are deposited in 



