SZAB(5. SOUTH-EAST OF EUROPE. 7 



upheaval and subsidence ; and consequently the first stratum of the 

 Pleistocene formation consists of a specifically heavy material, espe- 

 cially near the mountain-borders ; and the higher we ascend in the 

 series, the finer do the particles that were carried in appear to be, 

 and at last the finest detritus, forming the Loess, was deposited. 

 The Loess-sea was an inland lake, of which the area now occupied by 

 the Euxine was a constituent part. The author infers that two 

 branches were then extended from the Caucaso-Crimean chain 

 towards the west, the principal one connecting the Balkan with it, 

 while the others stretched towards Fidonisi, the only island in the 

 Euxine, and continued as far as the Dobrudscha Mountains on the 

 right bank of the St. George arm of the Danube : the existence of 

 the former was proved by Capt. Spratt, by sounding the Black Sea. 

 That geologist found a submarine elevation on the line connecting 

 the Crimean and the Balkan Mountains. These branches may have 

 constituted the coast of the Loess- sea. 



A considerable difference in the relative position of the whole of 

 the basin of the Loess-sea, and that part of it which is now occupied 

 by the Euxine, was caused by the subsidence of the latter. Thus 

 the Loess-sea and the ocean were brought into communication, the 

 water of the former was emptied into the latter, while, on the other 

 hand, that enormous land of steppes was formed of which Bitter, the 

 great geographer, says, it is, with its negative levels*, of all Asiatic 

 plains the most continental, being on no side open towards the ocean f. 



The author then enters into the changes in the surface-configura- 

 tion of the sea-bottom of that period, of which some unmistakeable 

 traces on a large scale are to be met with, especially in Hungary. 

 He explains the mode of formation of the best soils which occur in 

 Hungary under similar circumstances, as the black soil in the Danu- 

 bian Principalities called by the proprietors " Tschernosem." 



The best soil is always to be found most largely developed on the 

 slowly inclined plain of the Pleistocene basin, which at one time 

 formed the gradually sloping bottom of the Loess-sea ; while towards 

 the line of greatest depression the particles become more and more 

 decomposed, both chemically and mechanically, and the fitness of the 

 soil for the support of a luxurious vegetation decreases, and a 

 peculiar kind of soil, called in Hungarian " Szek," is found on the 

 banks of the Theiss : in this soil spots occur which are quite barren. 



The Bed of the Danube occupies the line of a fault. — Commencing 

 at Yacz, about sixteen miles above Pesth, and proceeding towards the 

 Black Sea along the sinuous course of the Danube, it may be observed 

 that the right bank is always the higher. The most striking instances 

 of this peculiarity are afforded beyond the Iron-gate, near Orsova ; 



* The signs + and — being sometimes used to distinguish between areas 

 above and below the level of the sea, the levels of the latter are consequently 

 termed "negative." — Ed. Q. J. G. S. 



t De Verneuil, in his " Memoire Greologique sur la Crimee " (Mem. Soc. Geol. 

 France, 1838), makes a distinction between freshwater, brackish, and marine 

 deposits, and, though chiefly treating of the older formations, infers that the 

 change of the freshwater lake into dry land, and the formation of the Euxine, 

 have both taken place in the most recent, even perhaps in historical times. 



