﻿Frof. Milne — Across Europe and Asia. 291 



brought about, wbich by those who talk and write about Ice and its 

 actions is very often either ignored or forgotten, and this is the 

 action of Floe or Coast Ice. As I saw some striking examples of 

 tlie work done by this agent in the next section of my journey along 

 the coast of Finland towards St. Petersburg, I will not digress, but 

 continue my itinerary. As the oscillatory movement of the land is 

 intimately connected with the idea I wish to broach, I may here 

 mention that near Stockholm we appear to have an axis about which 

 the Baltic coast is moving. To the north it is rising, whilst for 

 some distance to the south it is sinking. 



After leaving Stockholm (Aug. 11th) and its flagstones, which, 

 like those of Gottenborg, are filled with sections of Orthoceras, I 

 at once found myself amongst the archipelago of islands which stud 

 the southern and south-western shores of Finland. As the sea was 

 smooth and the weather fine, I had ample opportunity of seeing every- 

 thing around me. Islands were everywhere. In fact they were often 

 so close together that they masked our route ; looking backwards 

 we seemed to have sailed away from the land, whilst looking for- 

 wards it seemed as if we were steering into it. Sometimes we passed 

 so close to them that we might easily have pitched stones upon them. 

 Where the water was more open, our course was shown by a white 

 mark or a pile of stone upon the land, o-r by an upright pole stand- 

 ing on some sunken rock. 



There is everywhere evidence of reefs and shallow water. The 

 islands vary very much in size, some have an area of several miles, 

 whilst others consist of a mere rock just peeping from the surface of 

 the water. They are generally destitute of vegetation, but some are 

 found capped with small clumps of dark-coloured stunted firs, whilst 

 near the water they are bordered with a fringe of green, looking 

 like bunches of alder. Now every year, as the winter months come 

 round, the water freezes, and every rock and island and the adjoin- 

 ing mainland give birth to a fringe of ice. But this coiigealation 

 does not go on quietly, it is continually interrupted. By the rise 

 and fall of the tides it is raised and lowered on the shore, strong 

 currents carry portions of it away, the wind and the driving in of 

 floating ice and other causes all tend to destroy any steady forma- 

 tion of a sheet of ice like that which forms on small freshwater 

 lakes and ponds. In this way the first fringe of ice most likely 

 attached to pebbles, boulders, and materials, to which, whilst resting 

 on the shore, it has become cemented, are driven high and dry upon 

 the land, scraping, scratching, and moulding in a definite manner all 

 the rocks over which they pass. Or again, this fringe with its load 

 of stones may by winds and tides be forcibly torn from its birth- 

 place, and borne away to do its work of moulding and depositing of 

 boulders at some distant locality. 



Grinding and moulding actions of this sort, together with the 

 transportation and deposition of boulders, will take place chiefly 

 during the formation and breaking up of this icy barrier, which 

 will be in the fall and spring of every year. And the action is by 

 no means confined to Finland, but is one which annually occurs 



