138 THE JOURNAL OF GEOLOGY. 



will immediately vanish when the two great humid periods are 

 regarded not as proteroglacial and as deuteroglacial, but as 

 deuteroglacial and subglacial or — what I think is more probable — 

 as correlate with the two Norwegian post-glacial warm periods 

 (before and after the subglacial), the climatic changes caused by 

 a shifting of the pole westwards, which alone is able to account 

 for the late glaciation of the Cordilleras in Atlantic post-glacial. 



At last also the subglacial remainder of the inland ice com- 

 menced to melt away in the warm subboreal period. The coun- 

 try rose farther above the sea, and finally, by some intermediate 

 steps, attained its present position. The modern sea beach shows 

 everywhere so great a development, and is so sharply built, that 

 all alleged displacement in historical times must be received with 

 the greatest distrust. We have, notwithstanding all such rela- 

 tions, full reason to maintain that the seashore since the ice left 

 has remained practically unchanged, as also the climate in histor- 

 ical time. We have reached the constant recent period in the most 

 rigorous sense, and therewith conclude our synopsis of the Qua- 

 ternary history of Norway. 



There is, however, yet a problem of capital interest, which I 

 cannot quite pass even in this short account. It is the question, 

 When did mail appear in geological history ? The evidence 

 given in Norway is, however, not very direct. We have seen 

 that all traces of preglacial life were swept away, except the 

 littoral find at great depth at Storeggen. We have also seen 

 that the traces of interglacial life are very doubtful, and that 

 we were obliged to go to Denmark to get better information 

 about interglacial time. We have found that the Arctic flora 

 here (with the reindeer) which flourished upon the protero- 

 glacial bottom moraine, was superseded by the aspen vegeta- 

 tion (with elk) when the reindeer had already disappeared (J. 

 Steenstrup). Now we know that in central Europe paleolithic 

 man was contemporaneous with the reindeer, which will date 

 this reindeer period back to the close of the proteroglacial time, 

 and probably yet higher up. But in Denmark, it is only with the 

 next vegetation, with Pi?ms sylvestris, that the first traces of man 



