966 PROFESSOR J. PRESTWICH ON THE EVIDENCES OF A SUBMERGENCE 
720 feet, with those of Nice and others on the Mediterranean coast, and considered 
them all to be due to a common cause. Ossiferous breccias are also found in parts of 
Istria, and there are large accumulations of red drift and loam filling cavities in the 
neighbourhood of Trieste ; but without further details it is not possible to judge with 
certainty of the exact relations of these deposits. So far as known to me, the 
explanation I have suggested in the other cases might possibly apply to these 
districts, but the great height of the ground, and the peculiar local conditions, render 
further investigation necessary. 
Dalmatia. — The travels of Alberto Fortis in Dalmatia* furnish some incidental 
notices of the ossiferous breccia on the Adriatic coast, and especially on the islands of 
Charso and Ossero, which consist of ranges of limestone hills of some height either 
bare or covered by red earth. The cliffs on the coast are traversed by numerous 
fissures filled with breccia, and containing, Fortis says, an extraordinary abundance 
of bones, but beyond these facts there is no reliable statement as to the character and 
nature of the bones or breccia. 
Dr. F. Lanza.,! who visited this coast long subsequently, adds little to our informa¬ 
tion, except that some of the bones belong to a species of Deer, and that the breccia 
contains land, but no marine, shells. These instances, however, help to show the 
generality and common characters of the phenomena over all this area. 
Ionian Islands. — Except a few incidental notices by AnstediJ; and Strickland,^ 
such as that the valley of Signies in Cephalonia is covered by an alluvium full of 
angular flints, I can find no mention of anything referable to a Rubble-drift. 
I am unable to extend this inquiry through central and south-eastern Europe, as 
it would involve many large and separate questions upon which I am not at present 
sufficiently informed, still, I should wish to call attention to a few points which may 
be found to bear upon the general subject. The great height of the plains and the 
vast extent of the area over which Loess deposits are spread in south-eastern Europe, 
is, as observesll Professor James Geikie, “ fatal, not only to every form of the 
lacustrine hypothesis, but also to the ingenious view supported by Lyell, as it is to 
that of Belt.”1[ Marine and fluviatile hypotheses are equally inapplicable, though in 
some districts, as in Roumania,the Loess, as in Western Europe, belongs both 
to the valley and plateau types. In other districts it cannot be so referred. Loess 
is very largely developed in Southern Russia, tt and with it some geologists associate 
* English Translation, London, 1778, p. 440. 
t ‘ Bull. Soc. Geol. de France,’ 2nd ser., vol. 13, p. 127, 1855. 
t ‘ The Ionian Islands.’ 
§ ‘ Memoirs,’ by Jardine, p. 68. 
II ‘ Pi’ehistoric Europe,’ p. 160. 
^ ‘Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc.,’ vol. 30, p. 490. 
** Stefanescu, ‘ Memoire relatif a la Geologic du Indet, &c. 
tt Murchison’s ‘ Geology of Russia,’ chap. 19. 
