Sir H. H. Hoicorth — The Southern Baltic Coast. 407 



IV. — The Eecent Geological History of the Baltic, Part III : 

 The Western part of the Sea, the Sound, and the Belts. 



By Sir H. H. Hoavorth, F.R.S., F.G.S. 



IN two previous papers I have set out the conclusions generally 

 held by Northern geologists in regard to the more recent 

 history of the Eastern Baltic, according to which it was once a great 

 enclosed fresh-water lake or sea, the Ancylus lake, which by the 

 breach in the land-bridge connecting Skane and Denmark was 

 converted into a brackish-water sea, the Litorina sea, which has in 

 turn become less and less saline until it has reached its present 

 condition. 



In the second of these papers I quoted a number of facts proving 

 the breach just mentioned. Before I turn to another chapter of the 

 interesting history, I propose to add to these facts, and to show more 

 conclusively that the whole coast of the Southern Baltic is an area 

 of depression where evidences of the subsidence of the land in recent 

 times are general and consistent, and whei'e, so far as we know, this 

 subsidence while in progress was not qualified by any partial or 

 intermittent upheaval. I shall quote some additional facts in this 

 behalf from Hahn's memoir entitled " Untersuchungen ueber das 

 Aufsteigeh und Sinken der Kiisten " (Leipzig, 1879). He first 

 quotes the observations of Berendt that in the delta of the Niemen 

 the land has sunk so much and become so marshy that where, as is 

 attested by Church-records, as late as 1576 forests of oak grew, no 

 such trees will now grow because of the wet nature of the 

 ground. He also quotes numerous cases of sunken peat bogs, 

 attesting the same fact. Thus, west of Labiau there are found at 

 a depth of 3-1 metres remains of a submarine forest with pieces of 

 coal among the trees, and near Schwarzort in the Kurische-Nehrung 

 at a depth of 6-2 metres have been found ornaments of amber, showing 

 that a considerable subsidence has taken place in the human period. 



An old stone sea-wall at Fielenhof on the so-called Windenburger 

 Ecke, which is not more than 110 to 115 years old and which was 

 erected to protect a garden against the sea, is now overflowed. 

 A lawsuit between the fiscal authorities and the inhabitants has 

 shown that some islands covered with reeds and rushes in the haven 

 were not long ago parts of the mainland, and were not detached by. 

 a gradual process of eating away, but by a rapid overwhelming by 

 the water. 



In the Kurische-hafi" the water has so encroached that the distance 

 between it and the so-called ' Grossen Friedrichsgraben' has greatly 

 diminished. The foundations of the old Kurhaus of Cranz are now 

 under the sea, and the land there is said to lose 1'89 metres a year — 

 this, be it remarked, in an enclosed bay where there is no tide. 

 Kugen and the small islands round it have become considerably 

 smaller in late years. 



Submerged forests occur along the coast of Pomerania, near 

 Koslin, between Eator and Lieps, in Eugen at Lindenhaken, and 

 the Lobber Schaar (the Monks estate) . The Mecklenburg coast, as far 



