252 R. S. TARR— FORMER EXTENSION OF CORNELL GLACIER. 



peninsulas bounding the Greenland insular land mass escaped glaciation. 

 This opinion has been expressed by both Professors Chamberlin and 

 Salisbury as a result of their recent studies upon the Greenland coast.* 

 My conclusions, based on a study of a part of the Greenland coast in 

 1896, are of a directly opposite nature. All the land studied in any de- 

 tail by the Cornell party was found to have been glaciated, and we saw 

 no reason for believing that glaciers had not covered all the land and 

 reached beyond it out to sea. Direct evidence of markedly greater ice 

 extension was found on the Upper Nugsuak peninsula in latitude 74° 

 10-15'. It is a statement of the conditions in this locality that this paper 

 is chiefly intended to give. 



CONSIDERATION OF THE EVIDENCE OPPOSING GENERAL GLACIATION. 



As has been said, the Cornell party found no evidence opposing the 

 theory of general glaciation ; but both Chamberlin and Salisbury have 

 put forward evidence of this nature. This is of two kinds : One the 

 presence of a driftless area in the Inglefield Gulf region, announced by 

 Professor Chamberlin, and a second the angular topography of part of 

 the Greenland coast, described by both. The first I do not propose to 

 discuss.f 



The second evidence is that, although some of the land is noticeably 

 rounded, other parts, and usually the higher areas, are angular. Dis- 

 tinctly angular peaks are said to rise above well polished and rounded 

 valley bottoms and low hillsides. These facts are strikingly shown all 

 along the Greenland coast, and in this respect I can agree to the obser- 

 vations ; but my interpretation of them is quite different from that of 

 Chamberlin and Salisbury. In this difference of topography I have 

 found evidence that the ice had more work to do on the higher peaks, 

 less ability to perform the work, and less time in which to do it than in 

 the valley bottoms. Since it is diametrically opposed to the current 

 belief, this interpretation needs amplification. 



Other things being equal, a high peak is more rugged than the lower 

 hills, because the action of the agents of denudation is more powerful. 

 This applies to both preglacial and postglacial conditions ; conse- 



* See "particularly Chamberlin : Jour. Geol., vol. ii, 1894, p. 652, and Bull. Geol. Soc. Am., vol. vi, 

 1894, p. 219 ; and Salisbury : Jour. Geol., vol. iii, 1895, p. 875, and vol. iv, 1896, p. 769. 



Since the above was written there has been a discussion upon this point, commenced by Pro- 

 fessor Chamberlin, Jour. Geol., vol. v, 1897, p. 81, and continued in Science, 1897, pp. 344, 400, and 

 later numbers. 



•f I would hardly be warranted in discussing the evidence from a region that I have never seen ; 

 yet I cannot let this opportunity pass without raising the query whether the topography in the 

 neighborhood of the Greenland driftless area is not such that an area of this sort would naturally 

 be expected. Was not the movement of the ice outward and the main stream down the Ingle- 

 field gulf? And is not the driftless area located in the place where the high Red Cliff peninsula 

 might naturally have clogged the ice and hence prevented its action of erosion and notable 

 transportation ? 



