148 FORESTRY OF NORWAY. 



ture may have risen, or fallen, or remained stationary for 

 a time. 



While on its progress from the higher-lying resting- 

 place to the lower-lying ocean bed, the base of the bed, as 

 well as its sides, is often made to feel the effects of its 

 passage. As the waterfall washes out at its base a basin 

 into which it falls, so does the glacier, not at its extreme 

 edge, but wherever it descends from a higher to a lower 

 altitude, excavate a hollow. And thus may these pro- 

 found depths in the fiords have been produced. 



In a volume entitled The Forest Lands and Forest Man- 

 agement of Finland* I have had occasion to remark: 



-With ice as with water, notwithstanding its hardness 

 and its tenacity, it seeks the lowest level to which it can 

 attain ; and the glacier is ever in a state of flux from the 

 land towards the lower level of the sea, on its advance 

 grinding away, smoothing, and striating the surface of the 

 rocks, past which, or over which, it flows. The pressure, 

 and consequent abraiding power of a glacier must be tre- 

 mendous : the vis a tergo being such that it treats as mere 

 pebbles in its path ridges, and even hills of considerable 

 elevation, and it seems to pass as easily over them as a deep 

 river flows over the stones that may be in its channel. 



Thus may be accounted for the numerous lakes existing 

 in Finland, giving to it its character aod its poetic designa- 

 tion The Land of a Thousand Lakes, and the existence 

 of the lakes so abounding in Norway and in Sweden. 



In the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, vol. 

 xviii., p. 185, in a paper by Professor (now Sir Andrew) 

 Ramsay, entitled c The Physical Geology and Geography of 



* Finland : Its Forests and Forest Management. In this volume is supplied in- 

 formation in regard to the lakes and rivers of Finland, known as the Land of a Thou- 

 sand Lakes, and as the Last-born Daughter of the Sea. In regard to its Physical 

 Geography, including notices of the contour of the country, its geological formations, 

 and indication of glacial action, its flora, fauna, and climate ; and in regard to its 

 Forest Economy, embracing a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of 

 Svedjande, the Sartage of France, and the Koomaree of India Details of the develop- 

 ment of Modern Forest Economy in Finland, with notices of its School of Forestry, of 

 its forests and forest trees, of the disposal of its forest products, of its legislation, litera 

 ture/and forestry. 



