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Yorkshire. But this dream of a vast ocean with its burdens 
of ice and stone has been most successfully supplanted by one 
(if it also be a dream) which shows the north of Europe, and 
especially the regions spoken of above, all covered by a mass 
of snow like that now covering Iceland, which travels over 
even the tops of high mountains, and across valleys, car- 
rying with it similar boulders to those advanced in proof of 
the submergence of the land, even to the thousands of feet 
spoken of. Especially by Mr. T. E. Jamieson, of Aberdeen, 
we are shown the folly of the fashionable faith in an ocean 
flowing over mountains now 2,000 feet above the sea-level, and 
the reasonableness of the mass of superincumbent snow, 
such as is still creeping over the inequalities of the northern 
surface, carrying with it all that is required to account for 
the boulder formations.* 
Other ice-theories are contending with this of Mr. Jamieson 
for the mastery over the upheavals and subsidences of the 
ocean-bed. Among these, the most important is that which 
is founded on the fancied displacement of the centre of gravity 
in the globe by means of an immense accumulation of snow at 
the Pole. A grand difficulty in the way of this is the fact of 
open sea at the Pole now, though such masses as those which 
covei Iceland lie on Polar lands. But even if this displace- 
ment theory could be accepted fully, it would not at all change 
the relation of the boulder formations to the ice-covering. 
It might account for a submergence of northern regions to the 
extent of 300 or 400 feet, but could say nothing as to those 
facts which call for one of more than 3,500 feet, if an ice-bearing 
sea were to be maintained instead of snow. This dissolving 
view of an immense frozen ocean, with all its accessory ideas, 
is disappearing, like those of the central fires and the nebulse 
of space. 
li we pass from these glacial affairs, and examine into what 
is known as to the formation and transformation of the rocks, 
we find that the same absence of true thought characterizes 
the present condition of this science which is seen in the 
matters we have thus reviewed. The mineral constitution of 
the strata, as. enabling men to say how they were formed or 
tiansformed, is a cardinal affair in geology. Let us take up 
the popular notions of “ trap ” rocks, as a striking example of 
the light which prevails in this direction. 
Looking into the Geological Magazine of July 2nd, 1866, we 
find, m a brief notice of an excursion of che Bath Naturalists' 
* Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, vol. xviii. p. 164. 
O u 9. 
