352 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [April 8, 



many degrees of latitude, there is, it seems to me, more distinct 

 proof than in any other part of the globe yet examined, that how- 

 ever glaciers may have once prevailed (as I believe they did in 

 ancient times) in the higher tracts which form the northern axis of 

 that country, its lower portions, and with them, the greater part of 

 Russia and Germany, were beneath the sea during the whole of 

 the period when the detritus to which I am now alluding was 

 accumulated. This inference has been sustained by much indepen- 

 dent evidence already recorded, and chiefly by the existence of 

 sea shells in sandy and argillaceous detritus beneath the erratic 

 blocks both on the east and west coasts of Sweden. To illustrate 

 this point, I formerly cited proofs, that post-pliocene marine shells 

 occur in the north-eastern extremity of European Russia under 

 the sand and detritus on the banks of the Dwina ; and in my last 

 tour I found that Colonel Osersky had discovered marine shells of 

 the same age and character in the gravel and sand and under the 

 great erratic blocks which cover the Silurian plateaux of Esthonia 

 on the southern side of the Gulf of Finland*. 



Referring to the published views of my friends and myself re- 

 specting the vast distances to which the northern detritus has been 

 carried southwards over Russia and Poland (usually in long trainees 

 which proceed in divergent directions from Scandinavia and Lap- 

 land as a common centre), I will now very briefly allude to some 

 observations of our French contemporaries in Norway, and after- 

 wards treat of those superficial appearances in Sweden, including 

 Gothland and Dalecarlia, which have recently fallen under my 

 notice, tracing the phaenomena from south to north. 



Both Spitzbergen and the region of Norway now occupied by 

 glaciers have been recently illustrated by different French natura- 

 lists attached to the " Expedition Scientifique du Nord." I need, 

 indeed, scarcely allude here to the memoirs of M. Martins, since 

 they have little bearing on the broad geological phaenomena to which 

 I now advert. M. Durocher, however, not only visited Spitzbergen 

 and the Alps, but has since travelled over North Sweden and also 

 those parts of Norway which are still occupied by glaciers; and as his 

 chief object, in a memoir recently read before the Geological Society 

 of France, has been to point out the real distinctions between true 

 glacial phaenomena and those resulting from aqueous transport or 

 drift, I would refer to his writings as bearing distinctly upon the 

 present question. 



It is almost needless to revert to M. Durocher's former opinions 

 respecting Scandinavian drift, as they were clearly placed before the 

 public by M. Elie de Beaumont in a report to the French Institute. 

 At that time M. Durocher believed (and I am not aware how far 

 he has yet changed his opinion) that the whole or the chief mass of 

 the drift had traversed Scandinavia from some more northern or 

 polar region. The subsequent observations however of Bohtlingk 



* I bad indeed anticipated that such would be found. See * Russia in Europe 

 and the Ural Mountains,' &c., vol. i. p. 327. 



