310 SUMMARY OF GEOGRAPHICAL EVOLUTION. [CHAP. XIV. 



Ireland, Wales, and the Ocrynian peninsula are the only 

 remnants, but these territories were doubtless then united 

 to one another, as well as to Brittany on the south and 

 to the Hebridean land on the north. 



The country that lay to the south of the British lacus- 

 trine area was probably low and flat, though whether in 

 the condition of a steppe or of a desert-plain can hardly be 

 decided, though the close proximity of salt lakes makes it 

 probable that most of the surrounding land was either a* 

 rocky or sandy desert. To the eastward there appears to 

 have been another tract of high and rocky land separating 

 the lake-basin and the southern plains from those of 

 Germany and Eussia ; part of this high land lay over the 

 north-east of France, Belgium, and the east of England, 

 with the intervening portion of the North Sea area, but 

 whether it extended northward to the Scandinavian area,, 

 or was divided from that by desert plains connecting those- 

 round the salt lakes of Germany with the north-eastern 

 end of the British lake, we are unable to say from lack of 

 evidence. 



Thus the picture which is presented to our mental view 

 as that of the British region at the close of Triassic time is 

 a dry and arid country, comprising rocky mountains, deep 

 valleys, desert plains and large lakes, the most important 

 sheet of water being apparently as salt, as clear and heavy,, 

 and as nearly lifeless, as the modern waters of the Dead 

 Sea or of the Great Salt Lake of Utah. 



The next picture in our geological gallery is a very 

 different one, so far as local colouring and general environ- 

 ment are concerned : a magic touch has altered the character 

 of the soil, the humidity of the air, and the salinity of the 

 waters, so that the land supports a luxuriant vegetation,, 

 and the waters, now those of an open sea, swarm with 

 creatures of various kinds. But the geographical change 

 which produced such great climatic effects was a com- 



