WILDEENESS REGION. 89 



glacial gravel. I have in the past been obliged to change my views con- 

 cerning some of these formations, yet, in spite of all the difficulties, enough 

 is known to mark the region as a very interesting one. The map shows 

 several of the longer osar systems of the State converging toward an area 

 10 or 16 miles broad (from east to west) lying in Columbia, Columbia 

 Falls, and Jonesboi'o. Over a very large area there is a convergence of 

 the glacial strise toward a north-and-south line passing through the same 

 place. At several other places on the coast there are converging striae, but 

 they are shown in small areas where only the scratches last made converge. 

 It thus appears that in these cases the convergence took place only during 

 the final retreat of the ice. But in the Columbia-Jonesboro region all the 

 scratches converge, the later ones more than the earlier ones. It is thus 

 shown that, like the Greenland glaciers of to-day, the ice-sheet did not 

 advance with an equal rate of flow in all parts, but that the snow fields of 

 the interior parts of the State were discharged more rapidly along certain 

 belts, which made them practically glaciers of limited breadth, confluent, 

 however, with more slowly moving ice. A stream of ice about 10 miles 

 wide here served as the outlet of an area which broadened toward the 

 north to 30 and perhaps 50 miles, and doubtless its rate of flow was corre- 

 spondingly rapid. An observer off" the coast during the Ice period would 

 have seen a greater number of icebergs from opposite this place than else- 

 where. It is difficult to account for the convergence to so narrow limits by 

 the surface features of the land. The area between the Big Tunk range of 

 hills Ij^ing west of Cherryfield and the hills of Marshfield is a gently rolling 

 plain, with only here and there a hill rising more than 100 feet. It would 

 be very natural for the ice to be wedged in between these ranges of hills, a 

 distance of 25 miles. Instead, the ice abandoned the level valley of the 

 Narraguagus River, which extends for 15 miles east of the Big Tunk 

 Mountain, and crowded eastward toward Columbia. So also the deflection 

 westward extended as far east as Marion, 10 miles east of the Marshfield 

 Hills. The central line toward which the strise converge passes near Jones- 

 boro Village, and the lines of striation, if prolonged, would meet at a point 

 in the sea several miles south of the most projecting point of the coast. 

 I have not been able to determine whether there is any deep channel of 

 the sea south of Jonesboro or other features causing this remarkable con- 

 vergence of glacial flow. It was certainly determined by causes to a 



