Davis.] 
832 
[January 18 , 
tom. 1 Lakes Geneva, Brienz and the upper part of Lucerne show 
this very well; Brienz has not, according to recent measures, the 
excessive depth formerly attributed to it, but is scarcely deeper 
than Lake Thun. 2 The lakes that probably owe at least part of 
their formation to the late changes on the north flank of the Alps 
are, beginning at the southwest, Annecy, Geneva, Thun-Brienz, 
Lucerne, Zug, Egeri, Wallenstadt, Constance, (Loisach, extinct), 
Kochel-Walchen, (Inn, extinct), Gmundner and some other smaller 
ones. 3 
The rarity, or indeed we may say absence, of this species of 
lake in other mountains is due to their age being generally much 
greater than that of the Alps ; if they ever possessed such lakes, 
they have long since been filled or drained. Their absence on the 
southern slope of the Himalaya, which like the Alps is a young 
range, may be partly due to the excessive rain there, by which 
the barriers have been cut down as fast as they grew. 
W arping of a very gentle kind has probably aided in the for- 
mation of our Great Lakes, which seem to be old broad river 
valleys, depressed at their head waters and obstructed at their 
outlets (C. 4) ; a similar change has been appealed to in account- 
ing for the lakes of Hew Zealand, 4 and for some of those in Scot- 
land. 5 
A. 5. Earthquake Basins. An unimportant but well-defined 
species includes those lakes made by local subsidence resulting 
from earthquakes. Southeastern Missouri affords several exam- 
ples, formed in 1811-12, when a large area of the Mississippi Valley 
was shaken, and certain parts of the bottom land were depressed 
so as to be submerged to a small depth by river water; trees were 
killed by drowning, but remained standing above water for many 
1 Heim, i, 293. Simony, Die Seen des Salzkammergutes, Wien, Akad. Wiss. Sitz- 
ungsb. Math. Naturw. Cl., iv, 1850, 542-566. 
2 Riitimeyer, op. cit. 58. 
3 Bonney, Geol. Soc. Journ., xxvn, 1871, 312; xxix, 1873, 382. 
4 Hector, Geol. Mag., n, 1865, 377-378. 
5 Duke of Argyll, Annual Address, Geol. Soc. Journ., xxix, 1873, p. lxx. 
