E. E. Howorth—A Great Post-Glacial Flood. 309 



and of similar mineral character and contains nearly similar organic 

 contents, the La Neuville Moulien and St. Acheul gravels being 

 of the same age, and capped with a covering of Loess also of one 

 age and mineral character, the whole deposit being of a date not 

 much antecedent to the historical period " (Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. 

 xxiv. pp. 104:-5). 



■ In every way the position urged by Professor Ramsay is viewed 

 it seems to fail to exjDlain the facts, and I doubt if any one is to be 

 found who would now support it. Lyell's own words may best 

 sum up what seems the inevitable conclusion, "The main bod}'^ of 



the Loess in the valley of the Ehine, as in the case of the 



basin of the Sorame, was deposited in a wide and deep pre-existing 

 basin or strath, bounded by lofty mountain chains such as the Black 

 Forest, Vosges and Odenwald" (Antiquity of Man, p. 378). What 

 is true of the Rhine is true of the other river valleys of Western 

 Europe, notably the Seine, the Somme, and the Thames. The same 

 class of evidence is forthcoming in all these cases which makes it 

 almost if not universally accepted now that the carving out of the 

 valleys through which these rivers pass, however effected, was not 

 contemporaneous with, but antecedent to, the deposition in thera 

 of the various superficial deposits containing the remains of the 

 Mammoth and his companions. 



Having disposed of this cardinal factor in the problem, we must 

 now turn to another. Lyell, in affirming that the valley of the 

 Ehine had been carved out before the deposition of the Loess, went 

 on to urge that the deposits of Loess occurring on its flanks at a 

 considerable height show that, after it had been carved out, the 

 valley was once more filled up with Loess to that height, and that 

 what remains is the undenuded edge on either side of a vast mass of 

 Loess, the rest of which has been worn down by the river. This is 

 apparently the view held by Professor Prestwich in regard to the 

 terraced gravels and loams of the other French rivers and of the 

 Thames Valley. The position is well stated by Lyell himself : 



" The position of the Loess between Basle and Bonn is such as to 

 imply that the great valley of the Rhine had already acquired its 

 present shape and in some places, perhaps, more than its actual depth 

 and width, previously to the time ivhen it was gradually filled up to a 

 great extent with fine loam. The greater part of this loam has been 

 since removed, so that a fringe only of the deposit is now left on the 

 fianlcs of the boundary hills or occasionally some outliers in the middle 

 of the great plain of the Rhine where it expands in width " (Antiquity 

 of Man, p. 374). 



In regard to this theory, and others like it, involving gigantic 

 denudation as a postulate, I cannot avoid saying that they put a strain 

 upon our credulity in a way which is rather trying. It is the 

 fashion now to suppose that we can make any demands upon Eternity 

 we please, and invoke the operation of any cause, however stupend- 

 ous in its operation, if we only grant that the work was done sloivhj. 

 We consequently have a peiqietual appeal made to millions of years, 

 and to denudations of thousands of feet, as jauntily as if it were not in 



