56 ' I'he American Geologist. July, i8!)7 
de grace to this bureaucratic, seli"-))erpetuutii]g pi'uctice is not 
very briglit. but by tlie terms of tlie resolution some action 
must be taken by the Bureau, wliich should be made the basis 
of an organized effort by all freemen to kill favoritism of 
every kind and throw open tlie Congress to all geologists 
alike. It would be very significant if this reform step were 
taken in St. Petersburg. p, f. 
Paleozoic Glaciation. 
In the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society Mr. 
Aubrey Strahan gives an account of a recent visit to Norway 
to examine the so-called glacial phenomena of the Varanger 
fiord. His report fully confirms tliat of Dr. Reusch, and there 
is now no standing-ground foi- maintaining any opposing 
opinion. 
His report and his photographs must be regarded as decis- 
ive. The planed and smooth rock face with a lenticular mass 
of genuine boulder clay lying on it, and covered in turn with 
a second layer of similar quartz grit, are as clearly of glacial 
origin as are the boulder-clays of our recent glacial era. So 
close is the resemblance that were it not for the important de- 
ductions consequent upon the admission, hesitation would be 
impossible. Microscopical examination has shown that the 
quartz-gravels in the indurated boulder-clay or boulder-rock 
have been enlarged by secondary deposition in optical contin- 
uity, just as those in the Waverly quartz-grits have been re- 
juvenated with the same material. Regarding the exact age 
of these beds in the absence of fossils, the palaeontologist can 
give no opinion. But the researches of the Norwegian geolo- 
gist lead to the belief that all these strata are overlain with 
beds holding the Olenellus fauna, and therefore of the age "of 
the basal (]!ambrian quartzite or the}' may be even as old as 
the Torridon sandstone." 
Previous results in India and Australia have prepared us to 
look for signs of glaciation even under the equator in days as 
distant as the Carboniferous era. Norway, or at least Varan- 
ger fiord, is, on the other hand, close to the Arctic circle. Yet 
the occurrence of ice so far down in the rock and so long ago 
as the oldest Cambrian or pre-Cambrian time is not a little 
surprising. In any case, this ice action must be coeval with 
