Geikie — Glaciation of Scotland and Norway. ' ^61 



recognized as the result of the abrading power of ice. Every skerry 

 and islet, among the countless thousands of that coast-line, is either 

 one smooth boss of rock, like the back of a whale or dolphin, or a 

 succession of such bosses rising and sinking in gentle undulations 

 into each other. Such too is the nature of the rocky shore of every 

 fjord ; the smoothed surface growing gradually rougher, as it is 

 traced upward from the sea-level, yet continuing to show itself, until 

 at a height of many hundred feet, it merges into the broken, scarped 

 outlines of the higher mountain sides and summits. In short, the 

 whole surface of the country, for many hundred feet above the sea, 

 has been ground down and smoothed by ice. 



An excursion was made, by the author and his friends, to the 

 glaciers of Svartisen ; starting from the island of Melo (a steamboat 

 station), which lies a little to the north of the Arctic Circle, the 

 party proceeded up Holands Fjord to Fordalen, This hamlet stands 

 at the mouth of a deep narrow valley, on the line of the terrace, 

 which here runs along the crest of a steep bank of rubbish covered with 

 enormous blocks of rock — an old moraine thrown across the end of 

 the valley. At the head of the valley a small glacier descends from 

 the snowfields of 'Svartisen. There could be no better locality for 

 studying the gradual diminution of the glaciers, and for learning 

 that it was land-ice that filled the Norwegian fjords, over-rode the 

 lower hills and moimtains, and went out boldly into the Atlantic and 

 Arctic Seas. 



Leaving Holands Fjord, the party took the steamer at Melovaer, 

 and proceeded northwards, halting at the island of Skjaervo (lat. 

 70°), ui order to make an excursion across the Krenangen Fjord, 

 and up the Jokuls fjord, to see the glacier which reaches the level 

 of the sea. The sides of the Fjord are icemoulded and striated, m the 

 direction of the inlets, and its islands are only large roches moutonnees. 



Several other fjords were visited by the paiiy. In fine, the 

 excursion uito this northern part of Scandinavia furnished abundant 

 proofs that the glaciation of the west of Norway was produced by a 

 mass of land-ice, of which the present glaciers are the representa- 

 tives It likewise confirmed, m a most impressive way, the con- 

 clusion which has gained ground so rapidly within the last few 

 years, that the glaciation of the Scottish Higlilands, as well as of 

 the rest of the British Isles, is in the main the work, not of floating 

 bergs, but of land-ice. 



II. — Repokt on the Aukifekotjs Drifts and Qtjaktz-Eeefs of 

 Victoria. — Observations on the Probable Age of the 

 "Lower G-old Drifts." 

 By Alfred R. C. Selwyn, Director of tlie Geological Survey of Victoria. 



THE attention of the Geological Survey has latterly been directed 

 to the very important question of the age, and probable aurif- 

 erous or non-auriferous character of what are called the "Lower 

 drifts of Victoria," and from the facts observed, the following con- 

 clusions have been arrived at : — 



