492 



NA TURE 



I March 27, 1902 



observation advanced and confirmed the deduction that 

 the valleys which diveige from the Weald began to be 

 eroded by the streams that flow in them when the 

 drainage descended from the still existing dome of chalk, 

 and that during the enormous time in which atmospheric 

 degradation has been at work that dome has been com- 

 pletely removed, the rivers gradually sinking to lower 

 levels, but still continuing to flow outward as at first. 

 Ramsay proclaimed his conversion to these views in the 

 second edition of his book, which was issued in 1S64. 

 Next year there appeared the detailed essay on the 

 subject by Dr. C. Le Neve Foster and the late Mr. 

 Topley, which established beyond all further doubt the 

 potency of atmospheric decay and river-erosion in the 

 sculpture of the surface of this country. 



The Huttonian doctrine, though thus long in gaining 

 acceptance, made rapid progress when once a few enthu- 

 siastic workers, drawn under the spell of its attractive- 

 ness, began to apply it to the interpretation of all parts 

 of the British Isles. In England and Wales, in Scotland 

 and in Ireland, it gained every year an increasing 

 number of followers, many of whom, with the usual 

 geological alacrity, have contrived to pile up quite a 

 respectable mass of scientific literature devoted to its 

 discussion and promulgation. This great phalanx of 

 observers and writers on the subject has now to hail as 

 its latest recruit Lord Avebury, who has given another 

 proof of his versatility by a contribution of more than 

 500 pages to a discussion of the origin of the scenery of 

 England and Wales. Encouraged by the favourable re- 

 ception accorded to his volume on the ".Scenery of 

 Switzerland," he has been led to produce another on that 

 of his own country. Paradoxical as it may seem, it is 

 nevertheless true that the task he set before himself in 

 the preparation of this work was in many respects more 

 difticult than that of the earlier publication. Notwith- 

 standing the complicated structure of the Alps, the story 

 of the origin of their valleys and the sculpture of their 

 great blocks of mountain is on the whole less complicated 

 and obscure than that of the tamer English landscapes. 

 In this country the problems of topography involve 

 questions of higher antiquity and lead the inquiry into 

 a domain where the evidence is less distinct and abun- 

 dant, and where a larger demand is made for detailed 

 knowledge of the geological structure and history of the 

 ground. 



Lord Avebury devotes his earlier chapters to an out- 

 line of the geology of the country, and gives a brief 

 account of the various rocks from the oldest to the 

 youngest. In dealing with the scenery, he begins at the 

 coast-line and notes the distinctive characters of our 

 shores with the causes to which their variations are due. 

 With regard to the interior, after some general state- 

 ments respecting the inovements of the terrestrial crust 

 and their effects, he discusses the distribution, structure 

 and origin of the mountains and hills, citing numerous 

 examples from different parts of the country. He then 

 passes on to the consideration of the rivers, dealing first 

 with the general history of a typical river and illustrating 

 his subject by references to the various English and 

 Welsh streams by which the successive features of that 

 history are best displayed. From moving water he 

 naturally turns to the lakes, and picks his way with great 

 skill among the rocks and shoals of that much-debated 

 subject. The influence of the rocks in determining 

 variations in the character of the landscapes is rapidly 

 treated in a single short chapter, which is followed by 

 one that probably gave him as much pleasure to write as 

 any part of the book, for it deals with the downs, wolds, 

 moors and commons which have been so familiar and 

 delightful to him all his life. The next two chapters are 

 not unlikely to have more interest for the unscientific 

 reader than the rest of the volume, seeing that they treat 

 of the connection of certain topographical features with 



NO. 1691, VOL. 65] 



old systems of land-tenure and methods of agriculture. 

 They show why parish-boundaries run as they do and 

 what causes have often determined the sites of towns. 

 We are led across the country from one interesting 

 historical spot to another, and are finally brought back to 

 London and set to think of the geological reasons that 

 have fixed the position of the chief city of the empire. 

 It might, perhaps, have been better had the book appro- 

 priately ended there, but a final chapter is added in 

 which, quitting the scenery and history of the Thames 

 valley, the reader is suddenly plunged into the "nebular 

 theory" and the tetrahedral collapse of the globe. 



In his preface the author expresses a hope that the 

 book may prove half as interesting to read as he has 

 found it to write. Every reader must recognise the 

 enthusiasm with which Lord Avebury has followed out 

 his self-imposed task in a field which he had not made 

 specially his own. He has brought together in readable 

 compass a summary of what has been done in the investi- 

 gation of the history of the scenery of England. Every 

 here and there his narrative glows with the fervour of a 

 true naturalist, as where he describes the shore-life of 

 our coast-line with a minuteness which shows how 

 closely he has observed, and with a breadth that brings 

 the whole scene before us, or where he depicts the charms 

 of the downs, noting their wild flowers one by one, and 

 carrying us with him over their breezy crests, past green 

 barrow and grey standing-stones. His book will doubt- 

 less do good service in attracting more general interest 

 to one of the most fascinating branches of geology. 



One feature of the volume gives it a special attraction. 

 It is profusely provided with illustrations from photo- 

 graphs of English scenery, chiefly selected from the great 

 collection which is gradually being gathered together by 

 a committee of the British Association. We give two of 

 them in this article, by way of examples Figs. I and 2). 

 Most of them have never before been published. But, 

 beside the charm of novelty, they possess the still 

 greater merit of having been taken, either by geologists 

 or others, for the express purpose of preserving a record 

 of interesting geological features. Those chosen for this- 

 volume have been excellently reproduced, and the print- 

 ing of them is perhaps as near perfection as can be 

 secured for illustrations that are printed with the general 

 body of the type. The name of Messrs. Clark is a 

 sufficient voucher for the beauty of the typography. But 

 how did their reader or pressman allow the map (Fig. 

 183) to appear upside down ? 



Lord Avebury has not adopted the topographical 

 nomenclature which our cousins on the other side of the 

 Atlantic have devised and seem to be so proud of Like 

 other writers in this country, he has been able to treat his 

 subject in plain English words, without recourse to a set 

 of uncouth terms which are as unnecessary as they are 

 undesirable. 



The history of the landscapes of England, notwith- 

 standing all that has been published on the subject, still 

 presents many difficult problems for solution. Though 

 Ramsay in his later papers so ably led the way, one great 

 cause of stumbling to many of the workers in this field 

 of inquiry still arises from their inability to realise the 

 vastness of the denudation of the country within Tertiary 

 and recent times. They shrink from the boldness of 

 covering hundreds and thousands of sc|uare miles of 

 ground with formations of considerable thickness, every 

 vestige of which has disappeared. Vet it is only by con- 

 ceding the former existence of such formations that they 

 can possibly explain the present topography of the country 

 and lines of drainage. The mere existence of an 

 area of Palaozoic formations at the surface, especially, 

 too, where it forn-.s high land, ought to be regarded as in 

 itself a proof that, for a vast period of time and until a 

 comparatively late date, that area inust have lain under 

 a covering of later rocks. It was over this vanished 



