THE COASTS OF SAINTONGE. 305 



were really the case, this accumulation of soil may 

 not be the sole cause of the actual progress of the 

 continent. It is probable that we must associate 

 this fact with a totally different order of phenomena* 

 of which Scandinavia furnishes a remarkable ex- 

 ample. 



It is well known that the coasts of this peninsula 

 are rising on the one side by a movement which is 

 so regular and slow that it admits of being measured.* 



* According to an ancient tradition, the Scandinavian peninsula 

 was formerly an island, and this opinion seems to be confirmed by 

 numerous facts. Several towns which were originally built on the 

 borders of the sea are now more or less distant from the coast. 

 We may explain this phenomenon, as in the case of Aigues-Mortes, 

 by the deposition of soil. Rocks mentioned by ancient bards, and 

 which have maintained their old names, served formerly as a place 

 to which Seals resorted, although at the present day these ledges 

 lie far too high above the level of the sea to allow of their being 

 reached by those animals. These facts, and several others which 

 have been long known, had led to the opinion that the level of the 

 Baltic was gradually sinking a view which was advocated by 

 Celsius, Bergman, and Linnaeus. In 1820 the Russian and Swedish 

 governments appointed a scientific commission to examine this 

 question, which was at once curious in a scientific point of view and 

 very important in respect to all littoral districts. This commission 

 ascertained, indeed, that the level was gradually declining at certain 

 points, but they discovered at the same time that the fall was not 

 everywhere uniform, and that at some points it was absolutely null. 

 The opinion that had long prevailed among the simple fishermen 

 was then finally adopted, namely, that the sea kept its level but 

 that the land was rising. 



Some of the most eminent of our geologists, amongst others 

 Leopold von Buch and Sir Charles Lyell, made a voyage expressly 

 to test the accuracy of these conclusions, and they confirmed the 

 results, which have been still further verified by MM. Bravais and 

 Martins. From these researches it would appear that the shores of 

 the Gulf of Bothnia are slowly rising, and that this rise is about 



VOL. II. X 



