Professor Hull — On the Glaciation of Norway. 455 



unless he can furnish a sufficient explanation differing from that 

 here suggested, his whole argument falls to the ground.' 



When we come to inquire what may be the grounds on which 

 Sir H. Howorth has been compelled to dissent from views which 

 have beea advanced and illustrated by numerous writers, we find 

 that they are based on the striking evidences of submergence 

 and subsequent emergence which abound around the coasts of 

 Scandinavia and adjoining regions, in which we may include the 

 British Isles ; for the Post-Pliocene phenomena of both are similar 

 in kind, if not in degree. These are so obtrusive and over- 

 whelming that they leave no room in the author's mind for the 

 equally striking evidences of extensive glaciation. But the 

 phenomena resulting from both conditions lie side by side ; yet 

 are they sufficiently distinct to demand distinct explanation. As 

 regards the proofs of submergence and subsequent elevation 

 we are fully agreed. Some of the evidences adduced by the 

 author, gathered from Credner, regarding the marine forms 

 still surviving in the Swedish, Norwegian, and Finnish lakes, 

 are of extreme interest and importance.. These evidences of 

 former Scandinavian submergence to the extent of 600 to 800 

 feet, based on unquestionable data, are especially opportune, since 

 there are some British geologists who do not admit the evidences 

 of similar subsidence in the case of their own country ; but it would 

 have been strange indeed, if not incredible, that Scandinavia could 

 have been depressed to so great an extent while the British Isles 

 remained stationary. Passing, therefore, from the question of 

 subsidence and re-elevation, we have only to deal with that of 

 former elevation and glaciation. On this point, Sir H. Howorth saj's 

 (p. 360): "They [namely, the champions of the Glacial theory] 

 claim further that before the land was covered by the sea it 

 stood at a probably much higher level than it even does now, 

 and was consequently capable of nursing a great ice-sheet. Of 

 direct evidence of this former higher level of the land, I know 

 none whatever." 



In the first place I may observe that direct evidence, such as can 

 be afforded by the glaciated rock-surfaces, can only be followed 

 down to the low-water line, and so far it is clear enough. The 

 polished and striated surfaces may be traced downwards so far; but 

 is there any warrant for supposing that they cease at this line ? 

 Nay, is it not more probable that they accompany the surfaces 

 which form the sea-bord down to considerably greater depths? 

 In any case, it is equally open to contend that this is the case, as 

 is the contrary. 



But it is here necessary to deny in the most positive terms that 

 the glaciated rock-surfaces which we find lining the coasts and 



' The course of the icp moveraeut over the sarae region is shown on Professor 

 James Geikie's glacial map of Scotland, and on one of the general glaciation of the 

 British Isles in the writer's " Physical History of the British Isles " (p. 118, pi. xiii). 

 Also : CroU, " Climate and Time," p. 444 ; Peach and Home, Quart. Journ. Geol. 

 Soc, vol. xsxvi, p. 648 ; T. F. Jamieson, ibid., vol. xxii, p. 261. 



