270 PREHISTORIC EUROPE. 



scenes of this latest glacial epoch are more fully represented 

 than is the case either in Ireland or England. In neither of the 

 latter during or after the melting of the ice would the sea appear 

 to have gained to any extent upon what is now land ; there are 

 no late glacial shell-beds like those of the Scottish maritime 

 districts. 1 The ice melted off the low grounds of Scotland, and 

 was followed shortly afterwards by the sea, which rose to rather 

 more than 100 feet above its present level. To this partial sub- 

 mergence belong those marine and estuarine deposits of the 

 Clyde, the Forth, and the Tay, which are characterised by the 

 presence of arctic shells, the Arctic seal, and many ice-floated 

 blocks and stones. Farther north the submergence appears to 

 have increased to as much as 200 feet, my colleague, Mr. Home, 

 having detected late glacial marine beds up to that height above 

 the sea in Morayshire. 



Crossing over to Scandinavia, we learn that notwithstanding 

 the severe glaciation which that region has experienced, patches 

 of freshwater interglacial beds have been preserved. These 

 interesting relics, described by Holmstrom, E. Erdmann, Na- 

 thorst, and others, are eloquent of great physical and climatic 

 changes. Hitherto such " finds " have been encountered only in 

 the south of Sweden,. and, so far as I know, not a trace of any 

 interglacial epoch has been recognised in Norway. There are 

 certain phenomena, however, connected with the " gamle strand- 

 linier " or old beach-lines of that country which may possibly 

 be connected with interglacial changes. But before referring 

 to these I may first sum up in a few words what is known of 

 the late glacial deposits of Scandinavia. The final dissolution 

 of the ice-sheet was accompanied there, as in Britain, by the dis- 

 tribution of much gravel and sand and morainic dAbris, and by 

 the scattering of large erratics over hill-side and valley-bottom. 

 In many places the old bottom-moraines were much eroded and 

 their materials re-arranged and re-distributed. The melting of 

 the ice was likewise attended or followed by the gradual sub- 



1 With the somewhat trifling exception of the "Nar Valley beds" of East 

 Anglia. 



