RAISED SEA-BOTTOM ON THE BANKS OF THE DWINA. 
327 
In throwing his eye over our Map, the geographical reader will not fail to distin- 
guish some slight new contours of the shores of the Aral, particularly towards 
the north. For these, and the extension of the plateau towards the north-eastern 
angle of the sea, we are indebted to Captain Romanoff, of the Imperial Staff-Corps, 
who surveyed the ground. According to this intelligent officer, the island of some 
size which has so long found a place in our maps is a fable, which probably origi- 
nated in the allegorical style of the Kirghis inhabitants of the steppes, who spoke 
of it as a spot “ from whence no man returns.” Numerous low islands, however, 
occur near the mouth of the Sir or Jaxartes, and all the northern shores exhibit 
low cliffs of marl and steppe limestone. 
Shelly Sea-Bottoms — Post Pliocene or Pleistocene Beds in North-eastern Russia 
in Europe. — Let us now transport our readers to the north of Russia, and introduce 
to their notice certain raised bottoms of the Arctic Sea. Throughout a vast re- 
gion of Northern Russia no traces have been detected of tertiary deposits of 
Eocene, Miocene or Pliocene age. We have, indeed, already shown, that the 
whole of the subsoil of an enormous northern area, with the exception of some 
patches of Jurassic strata, is occupied by Palaeozoic rocks, the surfaces of which 
are, to a great extent, obscured by sand, clay and blocks of northern origin. To 
the consideration of these last-mentioned superficial accumulations we shall here- 
after advert, and we now proceed to describe certain true sea-bottoms which we 
ourselves discovered. 
That beds of sand and mud, containing marine shells, the most of which are 
undistinguishable from existing species, occur at various levels above the sea, and 
particularly near the eastern shores of Sweden and the western coasts of Nor- 
way, has long been known ; but it was still a problem whether this phaenomenon 
extended eastwards into Russia. No deposits of this age had ever been found in 
Finland, or near St. Petersburgh and the adjacent Baltic governments; but in 
ascending the banks of the Dwina from Archangel, it was our good fortune to 
observe certain beds, which from their structure, fine lamination and thickness, 
indicated the action of slow and long-continued deposit, whilst the shells abound- 
ing in them (almost undistinguishable from those of the adjacent White Sea) 
announced that this tract was submerged during a very recent period. We first 
noticed these beds on the right bank of the Dwina opposite the post station of 
Schastozerskaya, about 240 versts above the city of Archangel. At this spot we 
were much surprised to find a profusion of shells having a very modern aspect, 
2 u 2 
