the Displacement of SJwre-lines. 501 



has a thickness of only 25 metres, and cannot have many 

 alternations. After this stage was formed the land rose, but 

 was again partially depressed under the sea. During this 

 depression was formed the Red Crag, with the Chillesford 

 Clay. In the Coralline Crag two shore-lines were hollowed 

 out one over the other and the new stage lies now on the old 

 shore-platforms. The Red Crag is thinner than the Coralline 

 Crag and cannot include many alternations. 



In Belgium, also, we have two Pliocene stages, which cor- 

 respond to the two English Crag-stages : — the Scaldisien, 

 etages superieur et inferieur. To these two oscillations of 

 the North Sea correspond two contemporaneous ones of the 

 Mediterranean. Suess calls them the third and fourth Medi- 

 terranean stages. And even in the earliest part of the 

 Pliocene the Mediterranean fauna indicates a somewhat colder 

 cHmate (Suess, I. c. i. p. 431). 



Italy possesses thick Pliocene formations. Seguenza de- 

 scribes deposits 500-600 metres in thickness from this period. 

 I have been unable to obtain profiles of these deposits. They 

 are in part conglomerates and shore-formations, like the great 

 Miocene Mollasse of Switzerland, and near the shore thick 

 deposits can be formed in a short time. 



The profiles of Roussillon (by Deperet, in Ann. Sci. Gdol, 

 vol. xvii. 1885) show four alternations in the stage contem- 

 poraneous with the Coralline Crag (arc 14'). The overlying 

 stage in Roussillon is a freshwater formation. The land had 

 risen. The freshwater stage has several alternations, probably 

 6-8, so far as I can see from the profiles given, which, how- 

 ever, are not quite accurately described (arcs 15—16'). 



We now turn again to England. The fossils of the Red 

 Crag show a colder climate than that of the Coralline Crag, 

 and the Chillesford beds, which belong to the last portion of 

 the Red Crag, have distinctly arctic shells. The Glacial 

 epoch was advancing. After the Red Crag was formed 

 England again rose and became united by land with the 

 continent. Extinct mammals wandered in its forests, which 

 consisted of existing trees (spruce, pines, &c.) and show a tem- 

 perate climate, milder than that of the Chillesford beds, and 

 about as at present. " The forest-bed of Cromer " was over- 

 lain by marine deposits — Westleton Shingle and Cromer Clay 

 (arc 16'). In the latest terrestrial formation at Cromer 

 Nathorst has found Arctic plants (Salix jwlaris, &c.), and the 

 Cromer Clay indicates the vicinity of inland ice. With this 

 the Pliocene closes. 



As regards the Quaternary oscillations, we will take the 



