536 



NA TURE 



\Oct. 31, 1872 



Besides these laboratories, there arc rooms withwindows 

 and glass doors, all capable of being transformed, when 

 necessary, into laboratories, for every room has its tube 

 with sea-water. But as it is most likely that by-and-by 

 extensive collections will be formed, to assist in working 

 out a most accurate and detailed fauna of the Bay, or 

 even of the Tuscan Sea, these rooms, especially a 

 large one on the south side, will at first be left empty. 



Downstairs there is another small apartment on the 

 north side, destined for a botanical laboratory. It has 

 one large and two smaller windows, thus allowing four 

 microscopical tables to be furnished, three of which will 

 be let, whilst the fourth belongs to the botanist of the 

 station, who is to be engaged next winter. In the base- 

 ment two series of store-tanks will be placed, into which 

 all the animals will be put immediately after being caught 

 by the fishing and dredging expeditions, which will be 

 sent out every day, weather permitting. 



The library of the station has received many valuable 

 presents. Thus Prof. Allman, Mr. Darwin, Prof. Flower, 

 Mr. Gosse, Prof. Huxley, Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys, Sir John 

 Lubbock, and Prof. Owen, have promised or sent their 

 biological works ; and German publishers, such as Georg 

 Reimer of Berlin, and BraumiiUer of Vienna, hare joined 

 Engelmann, Viewcg, and Fischer, in offering all their bio- 

 logical publications. A catalogue is being prepared, con- 

 taining a complete list of the actual state of the station 

 library. 



By the kindness of Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys, dredges have 

 been procured of the best pattern, such as that experienced 

 zoologist recommended ; boats have been built for special 

 dredging purposes, and everything also is being prepared 

 to render the station as efficient as possible. 



We hope in our next article to give some information as 

 to the relations, into which the new institute has entered 

 with governments and learned bodies. Here we may still 

 be allowed to point out, that since the foundation of the 

 Naples station has been taken earnestly into hand, similar 

 endeavours have been made both in Austria and France. 

 In both countries the Government has been asked to 

 establish Zoological Laboratories on the coast. We have 

 still to wait the results of such demands. 



Naples, Oct. 24 Anton Dohrn 



VESTIGES OF GLACIAL ACTION IN NORTH- 

 EASTERN ANATOLIA 

 IN a paper dated some months back* I gave an abridged 

 notice of some traces of ice-action, referable to the so- 

 called epoch, in the central plateau of Asia-Minor. A 

 journey undertaken this summer through the north-eastern 

 districts of the peninsula has enabled me to observe seve- 

 ral other phenomena of the same class, and to determine 

 in some measure the extent and degree in which that pro- 

 longed depression of temperature affected this region. 



My route traversed an extensive but rarely visited tract 

 of country, that, namely, of the great Chorok, or Harpagus 

 river-valley from Beyboort to Artween, and the mountain 

 lands that extend beyond that valley east and north up to 

 the frontier of Russian Georgia, returning by the Black 

 Sea coast. The space thus explored extends from long. 

 40" to 44° E., and from lat. 40° to 42° N. 



The valley of the Chorok river, for a distance of about 

 120 miles — that is, from the neighbourhood of Beyboort to 

 that of the town of Artween — runs almost parallel with the 

 sea-coast in an E.N.E. direction, and is separated from 

 the basin of the Euxine by a lofty chain of mountains, the 

 higher peaks of which reach an altitude of 11,000 feet 

 above tlie sea-level, and even more. The whole long and 

 narrow strip of land bears the name of Lazistan, or country 

 of the Lazes, a Mingrelian tribe, mentioned by Strabo as 

 tenanting the same region in his time. 



' See Nature, vol. v. p. 444 



Near Artween, long. 42,° the valley turns sharp to the 

 north, and finds its way through a narrow and precipitous 

 cleft to the sea. 



The southern side is determined by the highlands which 

 form the watershed between the tributaries of the Black 

 Sea and those of the Persian Gulf ; but farther east the 

 same range, deflecting somewhat to the north, unites with 

 the prolongation of the Lazistan mountains, and acts as 

 watershed not only to the already-mentioned streams, but 

 also to those of the Caspian, whicli it separates from the two 

 other fluvial systems. Farther on the Russo-Georgian 

 frontier follows its eastern slope. 



Returning to the Chorok valley — one might almost call 

 it trench — I may as well notice that its height above sea- 

 level at Beyboort is about 5,000 feet, and at Artween only 

 1,000 feet, whence the extreme rapidity of the river, suit- 

 ably named the Harpagus, may be inferred. The geo- 

 logical character of the mountain chains on either side is 

 extremely varied. Cretaceous and Jurassic strata have in 

 both been extensively superimposed on the plutonic rocks 

 that frequently pierce through and form the higher ranges ; 

 volcanic formations, less ordinary in the southern chain, 

 are of frequent recurrence in the northern. Indeed 

 the Lazistan mountains, where they dip into the sea, are 

 almost wholly volcanic in structure. Large tracts of a 

 metamorphic character also occur, but more on the nor- 

 thern than on the southern side. 



Roads, in a European sense of the word, throughout all 

 these districts, there are none ; even a tolerable horse- 

 track is only an occasional luxury. Hence my entire tour 

 was performed partly on horseback at walking pace, 

 partly on foot ; so that 1 had full opportunity for the 

 most leisurely observation. My route first followed the 

 southern side of the Chorok valley for about seventy 

 miles, then the northern for about fifty more, after which 

 I traversed the eastern highlands to the Russian frontier, 

 a distance of about 160 miles, then turned north till I 

 reached the Black Sea coast, along which I returned. 



And having now given these summary indications, 

 which the nature of the country, scarcely ever visited by 

 Europeans, and in general very little known, seemed to 

 make necessary, 1 will now proceed ;_-to the account of the 

 principal phenomena referable to the glacial period. 



While travelling at an altitude varying from 3,000 to 

 7,600 feet according to the exigencies of the route along 

 the southern side of the valley — that is, on the northern 

 slope of the Euphrates watershed — I crossed three large 

 moraines, two of them descending from the slopes of 

 Charmeli Dagh, a lofty granite ridge, streaked with snow 

 all through the year. Their lower extremity was at about 

 5,000 feet above sea-level, their upper origin attaining 

 nearly 8,000 feet. The mountain sides here are Jurassic 

 or limestone ; but the broad streams of angular blocks 

 that follow their depressions were almost exclusively 

 granite of the same kind as that which forms the mountain 

 wall above. Where, however, the general altitude of the 

 chain does not exceed 7,000 feet, as is occasionally the 

 case, no moraines are to be observed, though large angu- 

 lar boulders are not uncommon on the broad ledges. 

 The upper mountain lines are invariably rounded, and, as 

 it were, smoothed off; the sides marked with scooped 

 depressions much too wide for their depth to be attri- 

 butable to torrent action ; low down in the valley the 

 slopes terminate in rifted precipices. 



That the epoch to which these moraines belong was 

 posterior to that of the volcanic action which, though long 

 since extinct at the surface, has left so many traces along 

 the north-eastern coast of Asia-Minor, was rendered in 

 one instance sufficiently evident by the constituents of a 

 broad stone-ridge which 1 crossed near the highest point 

 of the mountain chain, a little to the east of Erzeroom. 



Here, at an elevation reaching to upwards of 7,000 feet, 

 the ordinai-y Jurassic strata were interrupted by a volcanic 

 outbreak of several miles in extent, like a huge patch of 



