1 66 



NATURE 



[October io, 19 12 



i.e., the trough faulting- which gave rise to the 

 Red Sea and the Gulf of Akabah, the Wady Arabah 

 and the Jordan valley, at the beginning of the 

 Pleistocene, and with this he associates the great 

 basaltic discharges already mentioned. 



A large fresh-water lake was next formed in 

 the Jordan valley, which he considers to be a 

 record of a pluvial phase and contemporaneous 

 with the Giinz glaciation of the Alps. Towards 

 the end of this began a third epoch of earth move- 

 ments, producing some folding and faulting in a 

 north to south and north-north-east to south-south- 

 westerly direction and bringing up some older 

 strata, among them probably the Cambrian, which 

 ho discovere'd south of the Dead Sea. These 

 caused some more eruptions. A short dry period 

 followed, in which the level of the lake was 

 lowered, the water became brackish, and the salt 

 beds of Jebel Usdum (the top of which is about 

 600 feet above the present level of the Dead Sea) 

 were deposited. This corresponded with the first 

 interglacial phase of the Alps. The Mindel glacia- 

 tion of that region brought on a pluvial phase 

 in Palestine when the Jordan valley-lake was at 

 its greatest, extending from the north of the 

 Lake of Gennesaret to some distance south of the 

 Dead Sea, and small glaciers formed in the 

 Lebanon. A long dry phase succeeded, corres- 

 ponding with the second interglacial of the Alps, 

 during which the Jordan lake sank nearly to the 

 present level of the Dead Sea ; all the valleys were 

 much eroded, and some streams of lava (the last 

 in this region) were ejected. 



The Riss ice age of the .-^Ips (that when the 

 glaciers attained their greatest size) corresponded 

 with a third pluvial phase which produced the 

 middle terraces in the Jordan valley. The lake 

 again retreated in another dry period, represent- 

 ing the third interglacial of the Alps, but the 

 lower terraces in the Jordan valley are records of 

 the Wiirm glaciation, after which the climate 

 gradually changed to its present condition. Valley 

 erosion went on throughout, and an elevation of 

 the coast occurred just before the Wiirm ice age. 

 This, according to Dr. Blanckenhorn, corresponds 

 with the Mousterian, Aurignacian and Solutrian 

 ages of man, the Chellean and Acheulean being 

 placed in the preceding interglacial phase and the 

 earliest of our forerunners at present acknowledged 

 (the Reutelian) being regarded- as contemporaries 

 of the glaciers of the Lebanon. 



The tabulation is undoubtedly a neat one, but 

 it does not seem clear how Dr. Blanckenhorn ex- 

 plains the separation of the Dead Sea (and the 

 greater part of the Jordan valley) from the Gulf 

 of Akabah. The watershed between these is about 

 700 feet above the latter and is suggestive of move- 

 ments transverse to the Jordan-Akabah trough. 

 It is also singular that the period of greatest cold 

 in Palestine — that of the Lebanon moraines — 

 should correspond with the Mindel glaciation of 

 the Alps, and that both the times of heaviest 

 precipitation should be contemporaneous with the 

 two smaller advances of the Alpine ice and not 

 with the two greater, the Riss and the Wiirm. It 



NO. 2241, VOL. go] 



is, of course, possible that the zone of heaviest 

 precipitation did not shift southward with that of 

 lowest temperature, but some explanation, we 

 think, might have been offered of this rather 

 obvious anomaly. 



Perhaps also scepticism may be still permitted 

 as to some of the subdivisions in the relics of 

 primitive man, and even the identification of the 

 earliest among them, but this we know is thorny 

 ground. 



The book, we think, would have been improved 

 if the author, instead of retaining the form of a 

 diary, had been content to give his itinerary in 

 the fewest possible words and to group together 

 his results so as to give continuous accounts of 

 the stratigraphy and of his views about the 

 physical geology, with the reasons for them. 

 The reader at present loses his way in the mixed 

 multitude of personal and scientific details, and 

 perhaps sometimes fails duly to appreciate the 

 latter. The illustrations also leave something to 

 be desired, the sketches of sections generally being 

 very rough. Still, Dr. Blanckenhorn has spared 

 no pains in collecting a great quantity of informa- 

 tion on the geology of Palestine, besides giving 

 lists of the fauna and flora of the country, so that 

 his book will be a very valuable addition to our 

 knowledge of that interesting region. 



T. G. B. 



THE MEDICAL NEW YEAR. 



ON October i, our medical schools begin their 

 winter session ; and in many of the chief 

 medical schools this New Year's Day is observed 

 by giving a ceremonial address to students and 

 others. This good custom shows some signs 

 of old age. The need is less than it was that 

 medical students should be warned against idle- 

 ness, off-hand manners, or unkindness. The 

 introductory address tends to have an old-fashioned 

 air ; and, it may be, the time is coming for some 

 kind of ceremony more in accord with our present 

 ways. The like embarrassment seems to attend 

 the annual orations in praise of Harvey and of 

 Hunter at the Royal Colleges of Physicians and 

 Surgeons of England. Harvey and Hunter, we 

 begin to think, would be glad to know that their 

 immortal names were given a rest, in favour of 

 the praises of some of their successors. 



Still, one would be sorry that the First of October 

 addresses should be abandoned at our medical 

 schools. The reports of some of them, published 

 last week in The Lancet and The British Medical 

 journal, are of notable interest, and cover a wide 

 range of thought. 



At St. George's Hospital, Mr. Grimsdale spoke 

 on the present duty of the medical citizen ; and 

 the very phrase "the medical citizen" tells how 

 far we have come from the old professional 

 individualism of the doctor. Imagine the feelings 

 of the physicians of King George III. if they had 

 been told they were medical citizens. Still, there 

 was no National Insurance Act in those not very 

 spacious times ; and Mr. Grimsdale was mostly 



