Dr. Nils Olof Hoist — The Ice Age in England. 419 



In no circumstances, however, could there be any question of 

 ascribing to the oldest striae in Scania an earlier age than Cromerian. 

 In this province there has now been found an analogue of the Cromer 

 lliver, the so-called Alnarps Kiver, 1 and there is not the least doubt 

 that this is distinctly older than any of the Scauian moraines or strife. 



Geikie's fourth glacial epoch, Mecklenburgian, also called " Epoch 

 of the great Baltic Glacier", in spite of its first German name may 

 also be called Swedish in so far as its establishment was prompted by 

 G. De Geer's paper " On the Second Extension of the Scandinavian 

 Land-ice", published in 1884. 2 The maps of this extension drawn 

 up by Geikie and De Geer are almost completely identical. Con- 

 cerning this proposal of 1884, it may be enough to say that eventually, 

 ten years later, De Geer so completely gave it up as to express the wish 

 that his view of 1884 might be considered merely as a "working 

 hypothesis" needed for that date. 3 ■ He was forced to this admission 

 by Ussing, who was able to show that the inland ice of Denmark 

 had never such an extension as was given to it by De Geer. 4 



There remain Geikie's two purely German glacial epochs ; but it 

 seems right and fitting to let the Germans themselves reply for them. 



At the International Geological Congress in Canada W. Wolff, who, 

 as a Prussian geological surveyor and in particular a Quaternary 

 geologist of many years experience, knows the North German Drift 

 as well as anyone else, subjected the ' glaciations ' of Northern 

 Germany to a critical but, as it seems to me, a somewhat too 

 favourable examination. 5 



There "may be question", he says, "of three such, but in no 

 circumstances of four." The first great difficulty met with is that 

 no geologist, can even yet fix the extreme limit for more than the 

 middle one — the greatest glaciation. As regards the first, this may 

 be explained by the fact that its traces are completely covered by 

 those of the second or middle glaciation ; but this explanation cannot 

 apply to the third or last glaciation, the southern limit of which is 

 supposed to lie somewhere between the Baltic and the Elbe, or 

 perhaps south of the Elbe, without anybody precisely knowing where 

 it really is. 



Wolff admits, as he is bound to do, that it is only the interglacial 

 deposits which can be adduced as proof for the separate glaciations. 

 But no such persistent deposit traceable over the whole or the greater 

 part of North Germany has ever yet been proved. The interglacial 

 deposits are more or less local or sporadic, but such as they are they 

 appear in considerable numbers and constitute the most confused 



1 N. 0. Hoist, 1911. " Alnarpsfloden, en Svensk ' Cromerflod ' " : Sveriges 

 geol. Undersok., ser. C, No. 237. 



2 Gerard De Geer, 1884. " Om den skandinaviska landisens andra ut- 

 bredning": Geol. Foren. Stockholm Fork., Bd. 7, p. 436. Also, 1885, 

 Zeitschr. Deutsck. Geol. Ges., Bd. 37, p. 177. 



3 Feb. 4, 1904. Geol. Foren. Stockholm Fork., Bd. 26, p. 92. 



4 N. V. Ussing, 1903-4. " Om Jyllands Hedesletter og Teorierne for deres 

 Dannelse " : Oversigt Danske Videnskab. Selsk. Fork., 1903, pp. 99-152. 

 Resume en francais, pp. 153-65. 



5 W. Wolff, 1914. " Ueber Glazial und Interglazial in Norddeutschland " : 

 C.E. Congr. Geol. Intemat. Canada, 1913, pp. 467-77. 



