310 Sir H. H. Howorth—North Norfolk Geology— 
grounds or inductively, the explanation of the phenomena presented 
by the dislocation of the Norfolk Chalk by the agency of land ice 
utterly fails. 
Let us now turn to the iceberg theory, which still has some powerful 
advocates. How icebergs could arise in the North Sea I have never 
been able to realize, for the Norwegian geologists have virtually shown 
that they could not have come from Western Norway. Nor do I know, 
if they could, how the necessary marine currents could have arisen 
to drive them hither instead of choking the English Channel with 
them, of which fact, if it ever happened, there ought to be some 
evidence, and I know of none. The former existence of icebergs im 
the North Sea is, in fact, a mere unsupported hypothesis and one 
traversing all probabilities. 
Granting the possible existence of icebergs in the North Sea, how 
are we to explain the dislocated chalk of Norfolk by them ? 
First, as to the actual bending of the chalk into its serpentinous folds 
in some places and its breakage “in others. How these phenomena are 
to be traced to iceberg action I have never seen explained. When 
icebergs are floating they cannot of course reach the bed of the ocean 
to break or dislocate it. When they come to anchor in shallow water, 
as they do sometimes, they do not rise and fall with the tide. They 
are much too heavy to do that, so that bumping by icebergs is not to 
be thought of. All that they can do in the dynamical way is to rock 
to and fro; but this process, or even bumping if it were possible on 
a slight scale, would not roll the chalk cm sti or the chalk cakes 
into meandering curves, nor detach these vast polygonal masses as big 
as churches from a solid matrix many hundreds of feet thick, nor would 
or could it similarly detach ribbons and cakes of chalk requiring 
an enormous tearing force; a fortior?d would it fail to do this when 
the masses and cakes of chalk were covered with the laminated 
sands and clays of the Crag and yet not disturb their lines of deposit, 
and under any circumstances the detached masses would not be 
unweathered and unworn as we find them. Nor can we in this 
behalf overlook the very wide extent of country over which these 
detached chalk masses have occurred, not only very far from the 
present sea but very far from any probable sea margin in Pleistocene 
times. 
Suppose the breaking of the chalk were explained, the detachment 
of the great masses from their matrix by tearing them up by the roots 
out of their sockets seems an utterly impossible | process to attribute to 
icebergs, which under certain conditions may squeeze and press with 
great for ce but cannot simulate the tooth-drawing process. 
Lastly, how were icebergs to convey the masses when broken and 
detached ? Icebergs cannot gather up material which lies beneath 
them and transport - it. When in water their temperature is too high 
to enable them to be frozen fast to their unstable anchorage. The 
only way we can suppose that the vast and most fragile ribbons 
of combined Chalk and laminated Crag were gathered up by icebergs. 
is either that they squeezed them into their substance by pressing on 
them, which they could not do without crushing their delicate arrange- 
ment, or carried them on their backs ; but how isit possible for submerged 
masses of chalk detached from chalk beds lying at the bottom of the 
