126 NEOZOIC TIME. [CHAP. VIII. 



During the formation of the Bunter deposits it seems 

 probable that the whole European region, including the 

 North Sea and Baltic areas, formed one large continent, in 

 which there may have been both salt and freshwater lakes, 

 but that all such water- spaces were then reduced to a 

 minimum. We know, however, that there was a greater 

 amount of elevation in the northern than in the southern 

 part of the European region, and that in the Alpine area 

 it was soon followed by submergence ; a sea of considerable 

 depth covered this area which is now so mountainous, and 

 its waters at one time extended northward as far as Ger- 

 many and the eastern borders of France. The Muschel- 

 kalk limestones thin out in the Vosges country, and are 

 not found to the westward of a line between Luxembourg 

 and the Cote d'Or. The north-east of France and the 

 region of the Ardennes seem at this time to have con- 

 stituted a tract of high and mountainous ground, which 

 probably extended northward through Belgium l and the 

 east of England, and thus separated the British from the 

 Germanic area of deposit. 



The formation of the Keuper deposits marks another 

 change, and we may suppose that the depression of the 

 Triassic continent, which is indicated by the extension of 

 the Muschelkalk sea, was continued in such a manner that, 

 though the sea was still excluded from the northern areas, 

 the courses of the principal rivers which had previously 



1 Messrs. Cornet and Briart have attempted to estimate the height to 

 which this land rose above the sea-level of the period, and place it at 

 from 16,000 to 20,000 feet. They arrive at this result by a considera- 

 tion of the complicated system of fractures and flexures in the axis of 

 Artois (Belgium). They attribute these to a succession of movements, 

 and describe the several stages in the process by which the present 

 collocation of rock masses was in their opinion accomplished 5 but their 

 views are somewhat cataclysmic, and they do not seem to have allowed 

 sufficiently for the removal of material by detrition during the process 

 of faulting, flexure, and elevation. (" Ann. Soc. Geol. Belg.," iv. p. 71.) 



