Br. W. T. Blanford — Age of the Himalayas. 167 



Howorth would have done wisely either to avoid quoting General 

 MacMahon or else to give the whole of his evidence and not 

 merely the few extracts which are in favour of Mr. Howorth's thesis. 

 For although in his "Notes of a Tour through Hangrang and Spiti," 

 General MacMahon remarks on the paucity — not the absence— of 

 old glacial markings, in another paper " On the Geology of Dalhousie 

 in the North-western Himalaya" (Rec. Geol. Sury. India, vol. xv. 

 p. 49), he gives an account of moraines and ice-marks on the outer 

 ranges at an elevation of only 4700 feet above the sea, and, thus 

 absolutely contradicts Mr. Campbell on the only point concerning 

 which the latter's evidence was valid, the presence of glacial 

 markings on the lower Himalayan spurs. Why is this important 

 observation ignoi'ed ? an observation not by a mere visitor like 

 Mr. Campbell, but by an officer who long resided on the spot and 

 had exceptional opportunities for careful observation? 



A little consideration will show that General MacMahon's notes 

 on Spiti agree with the observations in other high Himalayan valleys 

 in showing that the glaciers during the Glacial epoch descended 

 considerably below their present level. General MacMahon espe- 

 cially notes that the Spiti valley itself at an elevation of about 

 11,000 feet appears to have been moulded by ice. Naturally the 

 question that occurs is — What is at present the mean level to which 

 glaciers descend in the Spiti valley ? Strange to say, although the 

 ranges that surround the valley rise to 19,000 or 20,000 feet, there 

 are no glaciers at all on the Spiti side except (as General MacMahon 

 tells me) a very small one just inside the Bhabeh Pass. It is 

 clear that in this case the ancient glaciers descended far below the 

 level at which glaciers can now exist. And it is only right to add 

 that 11,000 to 12,000 feet, the lower limit, according to General 

 MacMahon, of the ancient glaciers in the Sutlej valley, is consider- 

 ably below the level to which any now descend, so far as I am aware, 

 in any part of the Himalaya. 



In concluding these remarks, which have extended to an inordinate 

 length, partly because hitherto, when I endeavoured to compress my 

 arguments, I have unfortunately failed to make myself understood, I 

 may briefly point out that, whilst I have accepted battle on Mr. 

 Howorth's ground, and fairly met the arguments he has brought 

 forward, he has never attempted to deal with the data on which the 

 geologists who have devoted most time and study to the Himalayas 

 have been led to the conclusion that these mountains were undergoing 

 elevation throughout a great part of the Tertiary era. The questions 

 of the glacial evidence, and of the Tibetan Rhinoceros, are side issues, 

 and although I believe I have shown that Mr. Howorth is in error in 

 both instances, and only appears to have made out a case because 

 he has left out half the evidence, yet both might be decided in 

 his favour without necessarily involving the recent origin of the 

 Himalayas. Almost any hypothesis may be rendered plausible by 

 ignoring the principal arguments that are opposed to it, and by 

 selecting from the works of various writers a series of extracts 

 that appear to tell in its favour. If, for instance, any one wishes 



