662 
FIORDS AND OTHER INLETS OF THE 
SEA. 
| ene an experienced teacher, Prof. Gregory 
begins his book on ‘‘ The Nature and Origin 
of Fiords” by a definition of its subject. Fiord is 
a Scandinavian word, and fiords are common on a 
large part of the coast of Norway, but the term is 
often used vaguely, and sometimes, as we shall 
see, with unjustifiable restrictions. With him it 
denotes an inlet of the sea, bounded by lofty and 
steep opposing walls; piercing far into the land, 
and consisting of long straight reaches, which 
turn and receive their tributaries at sharp angles. 
Thus, though a fiord is a sea-drowned valley, not 
all such valleys can be called fiords. It has been 
carved, as the definition suggests, in a plateau 
more or less elevated, which consists of hard 
rocks, and it is named a fiard when this 
plateau is low, the difference between the 
two being obviously varietal rather than 
specific, and a comparatively — slight 
elevation, on such a coast as that of Nor-- 
way, might show the one to end in the 
other. It remains narrow to its seaward 
end, thus differing from an ordinary estu- 
ary, which widens in that direction, so 
that waves may have helped in forming it, 
while they have done little for the fiord; 
and when one of the former has an irre- 
gular outline, and is bordered by bold 
rugged hills, it is designated a ria, from 
a Spanish name. Fiords are frequent in 
the northern and southern portions of the 
globe, and practically absent from the 
more tropical regions; they also often 
bear marked signs of glaciation. That, 
however, does not prove them to have 
been excavated by ice, or justify refusing 
to give the name fiord to a submerged 
valley with the other qualifications, for 
any such limitation is importing a hypo- 
thesis into a definition. This geo- 
graphical distribution, howev er, is a fact, 
and Prof. Gregory attributes it to terres- 
trial conditions, which make oscillations 
in level more frequent in the higher than 
in the lower latitudes. 
From this preliminary discussion he proceeds 
to describe concisely the fiords in the several parts 
of the globe, in order to ascertain, by inductive 
study of their phenomena, by what agencies they 
may have been formed. Beginning with those of 
Norway, the home of the name, he points out the 
more important features in each, its relation to 
the neighbouring district, its outline and dimen- 
sions, with details, whenever obtainable, of its 
subaqueous contour. The Sogne fiord in Norway, 
one of the most accessible to English visitors, 
exhibits the characteristic features of such an inlet, 
especially in its upper branches, not less distinc- 
tively than that grand example, Milford Sound, 
in New Zealand (Fig. 1). The sides, to summarise 
Prof. Gregory’s description, are high and steep, 
1 “The Nature and Origin of Fiords.”” By Prof. J. W. Gregory, F.R.S. 
Pp. xvi-+542+viii plates. (London: John Murray, 1913.) Price 16s. net. 
NO. 2311, VOL. 92| 
NATURE 
[FEBRUARY 12, 1914 
not broken by deep gullies, so that the streams 
rising on the uplands frequently descend as water- 
falls over the walls instead of"as cataracts hidden 
in deep gullies. We may therefore conclude that 
these cascades are comparatively modern—more 
modern, for instance, than in the Alps, where the 
other habit is the more common. Those side-: 
walls also are often subparallel, so that the fiords 
for considerable distances are uniform in width, 
their valleys also taking a straight course. The 
most typical Norway fiords are surprisingly deep, 
the maximum in the Sogne fiord being almost 
4000 ft., and the walls descend for a long way 
beneath the surface of the water with as steep a 
slope as they have for some 2000 ft. above it. 
Liawrenny Pe 
(Snow cael) SW 
6500 fb.. 
Fic. {1.—Map of Milford Sound, New Zealand. 
Thus a cross-section of their floors is trough-like, 
but the longitudinal one is a concave curve. In 
AliPembroke pau 
SWZ always snow capped ) 
‘ 6 ft. 
Mh 
I 
MTN ont ii 
: 
5560 Peale 
A oi i 
Wi y 
Zz me < iA a ve 
SS \S WA ANTA 
oe ‘4 a it rn 
i 
Hi 
ani IN ny 
MI Mp 
mi wah 
"ally 
Figures = Soundings in fathoms 
Scale of Nautical Miles 
2 2 3 
From ‘‘ The Nature and Origin of 
Fiords.” 
some cases the fiord bed rises and falls more than 
once in this direction, as in some Alpine and 
Scotch lakes, but in most cases, though not in all, 
the fiord has an outer (submerged) rim, sometimes 
narrow, sometimes comparatively wide, which 
prevents a free influx of the deeper ocean water. 
This, though it may sometimes consist of moraine 
deposited by a retreating glacier, or of ordinary 
detritus, like the bar at “the mouth of an estuary, 
must often be, as Prof. Gregory explains, a true 
rock barrier. This last characteristic, together 
with their ice-worn rocks, the truncation of spurs 
from the mountain on either side, and their geo- 
graphical distribution, have caused some geologists 
not only to attribute 'fiords to glacier erosion, but 
also to refuse the name to any similar submerged 
valley which could not have been formed in this 
way. 
