TJie Evolution of Climates. — Ma?ison. 1 1 3 
tained from the marshes of New York, New Jersey, Indiana, 
and Missouri — " 
The next is from Prof. Branner's description of boulders, 
gravels, cobbles, sand, and clay, scattered over hill and dale, 
over mountain and valley, in tropical Brazil: — * 
"This formation is spread over the hills and valleys of the 
Sergipe-Alagoas basin, and over the adjacent country in the 
form of a thin coating of cobble stones, pebbles, and sand, 
sometimes loose and sometimes cemented into a pudding stone 
as much as ten feet in thickness, and, when exposed, stained 
black by manganese. It caps the summit of the Tertiary pla- 
teaux or their outliers, and is frequently strewn along down the 
sides of hills, and accumulated in the valleys. It is not con- 
fined to the geographic limits of the Cretaceous or Tertiary, 
but is found further inland and far beyond the present limits 
of these formations. It is everywhere more or less irregular 
in thickness, and nowhere can it be said to be universal or con- 
tinuous. The writer has seen this material throughout Sergipe 
and Alagoas, in Parahyba, and as far inland as the headwaters 
of the Rio Ipanema in the interior of the province of Pernam- 
buco, where there is no remnant of stratified Tertiary beds." 
"Between the lower Rio Sao Francisco and the frontier 
of the province of Pernambuco, this water worn material is 
found mingled in bogs with the remains of extinct gigantic 
mammals." 
"One of the marked characteristics of this post-Tertiary 
formation is that it is much coarser inland, and grows finer as 
the coast is approached." f 
Prof. Branner accounts for these materials by assuming 
that at the close of the Tertiary a gradual depression took 
place. J Then a gradual upheaval,§ during which the action 
*See Trans. Am. Phil. Soc, Vol. XVI, N. S., 1889, pp. 421-422. 
Also, Vol. I, No. 8, Journal of Geol., pp. 767-768. 
t"If a continental glacier moved down the Andes to the Atlantic 
we would naturally look for porphyritic boulders scattered over the 
valley and decreasing in number and size as we near Para." (Sir H. 
•H. Howarth, The Glacial Nightmare and the Flood. Vol. II, p. 495, 
London. 1893.) Dr. Branner has therefore supplied the very evidence 
which Sir H. H. Howarth considers essential. 
jMany geologists cite facts showing a slight elevation at the close 
of the Tertiary as accounting for the cold causing the Ice age. Glac- 
ialists' Magazine, Vol. I, No. 10, 1894. See also the authorities there 
•quoted by the distinguished geologist, Prof. Upham. 
§This is a reversal of the order of upheaval and depression shown 
