EVIDENCE FROM NORWAY AND SCOTLAND 33 



Norway. — To several of the geologists of Norway * the very striking- 

 topographic features of that country have seemed to require glacial 

 erosion, and recently Professor Davis has favored the same conclusion. 

 In the paper noted on page 32 he says : 



" . . . Hence glacial erosion must under this supposition be appealed to for 

 the widening of preglacial canyons, steep-walled and narrow, into the existing 

 fiord troughs, steep-walled and broad. At the middle of the fiord troughs the 

 lateral erosion thus demanded would often measure thousands of feet, and that in 

 the most massive and resistant crystalline rocks." 



" . . . Hence to develop the existing discordant valley system from a mature 

 preglacial valley system of normal river erosion requires a great deepening of the 

 fiords by ice action, again to be measured by thousands of feet. Thus there seems 

 to be no escape from the conclusion that glacial erosion has profoundly modified 

 Norwegian topography." (Page 290.) 



It should be noted that Professor Davis does not unequivocally assert 

 that the fiords have been deepened thousands of feet, but the next 

 maker of a text-book may use it as a positive and conclusive statement. 



Doubtless the fiords are difficult of immediate and precise explanation 

 by stream work. They have recently been occupied by glaciers, and it 

 was not unnatural to appeal to them as the cause of the deep valleys 

 and the discordance. The whole argument is based on the physiographic 

 features, and implies glacial cutting of thousands of feet in the hardest 

 crystallines. The conception certainly ignores the facts of observation, 

 which show the impotency of ice-work. The Norwegian glaciers were 

 of the alpine type, and there is no reason for attributing to them any 

 special property or power. 



Scotland. — The British geologists, even those who follow more or less 

 the lead of Ramsay in the belief in ice erosion, have not appealed spe- 

 cially to their own physiography. But a recent paper f requires brief 

 notice, because it has been quoted in this connection (page 51). 



This paper is a description or reference to features of topography and 

 drainage in Scotland which seem to the author to be due to ice action. 

 The paper is far from convincing. The statements are too general, too 

 theoretical, too discursive, and too largely assertive. No maps or other 

 illustrations of any kind are given. Apparently the author sees evidence 

 of ice-cutting which expert glacialists have not seen, for if the features 

 possessed the clearness and significance which he attaches to them they 

 should have been thoroughly described long ago. The doubt concern- 

 ing the matter of this paper pertains to much of the physiographic evi- 



* Most of the literature is foreign, but the facts and discussion may be found in Heim's " Hand- 

 ouch der Gletscherkunde," in the paper by Davis, noted on page 32, and in an article by Andr. 

 If. Hansen, Jour. Geol., vol. 2, pp. 123-143. 



t J. G. Goodchild : " Glacial furrows." Geologists Magazine, vol. iv, pp. 1-7, June, 18!>6. 



