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Un daM symboiaa suivants apparaitra sur la damiAra imaga da chaqua microficha, salon la caa: la svmbola — c» signifia "A SUIVHE", la symbola V signifia "FIN". Mapa, plataa. charts, ate. may ba filmad at diff arant reduction ratioa. Thoaa too larga to ba anttraiy inciudad in ona axpoaura ara filmad beginning in tha upirir left hand comer, left to right and top to bottom, aa many framea aa required. Tha following diagrama iiluatratn tha method: Laa cartaa. planches, tableaux, etc., pauvent dtra flimia i daa taux da rMuction diffirants. Lorsque le document eat trop grand pour 4tre reprofduit en un seul cliche, il est film^ i partir da I'angia supMeur gauche, de gauche k droita. at da haut en baa, en prenant la nombre d'imagea n^aasaira. Lea diagrammea suivants iliuatrant la mithoda. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 /, ON THE OCCURRENCE OF NUMEROUS FRAGMENTS OF FIR-WOOD IN THE ISLANDS OF THE ARCTIC ARCHIPELAGO; WITH REMARKS ON THE ROCK-SPECIMENS BROUGHT FROM THAT REGION. BY Sir RODERICK I. MURCHISON, D.C.L., F.R.S., V.P.G.S., Director-General of the Geological Survey. { Frow flip QlARTKRLY Joi'RNAL of the GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY of London /or November 1855. J t I I , .iiii u V I'.fiii, . S(u \ 111. \: 1'!. \iv \n I ^X. •/ .^ y \ [^ \ f 4 \i :\ \ On the Occurence of numerous Fragmoifn of TtR-wooD in the hhinds of the Arctic Archii>klago ; with Rnmn-ks on the UocK-Si'KciMK7andinavia. Since those early days, the voyages of Franklin, and of the various gallant officers who have been iii search of our lamented friend, have amplified those views, and have shown us that over nearly the whole of ihe Arctic Archii)elago these vast islands possess a structure similar to that of North America. We shall soon, I believe, be made acquainted with the characters of the specimens collected by the expedition under Sir Edward IJeleher, who is pre- paring a description of the natural-history products of his survey. My chief object now is to call attention to the remarkable fact of the occurrence of considerable quantities of wood, capable of being used for fuel or other pur[)oses, which exist in the interior, and on the high a omuls of large islands in latitudes where the dwarf willow is now the only living shrub. Before I allude to this phamomenon, as brought to my notice bv ('apt. M'Clure and Lieut. Pim, I would, however, briefly advert to a few rock-specimens collected by the latter officer in Beeehey Island*, Bathurst Laiul, Eglinton Island, Melville island, Prince Patrick's Island, and Banks's Land, where he joined Capt. M'Clure, — speci- mens which we ought to value highly, seeing that they were saved from loss under very trying circumstances. From this collection, as well as from other sources to which I have had access, as derived from the voyages of Parry, Franklin, Back, Penny, Inglefield, and the recent work of Dr. l\ Sutherland, I am led to believe that the oldest fossiliferous rock of the Arctic region is the Upper Silurian, viz. a limestone identical in composition and organic contents with the well-known rocks of Wenlock, Dudley, and Gothland. * The reader is referred to tl\e accompanying Geological Sketch-Map, taken from Mr. Isbister's memoir (Qnart. Journ. Geol. Soc, Nov. 1855) on the Geology of the Northernmost parts of America, for a general view of the rlistri- biition of the crystalline rocks, Silurian limestones, and coal-bearing deposits of the Arctic lands. I ^ iM AHI liiiHV r.riii Sm ^||| M 1'! M =^-^1 y] •*••. «i i;() I. (t I. MAI Sh I T< II MM .,r ill. NORTHERN MOST PA RTS ^ A >I K U I r \ In A.K Imumku M A. -i A ^^ lf-#( iV 7 f ; I. V :::3s^ --".^^^.\ T—^ K Ml ^ " r7\^"^^V .\hsv, j£. I No dear pvidenot' Ims hoeu afforded as to the cxistcnoe of Devonian rocks, tl»ouf>;"i we have heard of red and hrownish sandstone, as ob- sp'ved in very many locahties by varions explorers, and whieh poi;'- siblv niav l)elon{; to that formation. Thus, in North Somerset, to thesoutli of Harrow Strait;!, red sandstone is assoeiated with the (;l(k'r limestone-i. IJyam Martin Island was described by I'arry as essentially coinnosed of sandstone, with some granitic and felspathic rocks; and, wiidst the north-eastern face of IJanks's Land is sand- stone, its north-western cliffs consist (as made known by Capt. M'Clure) of limestone. But whilst in the fossils we have keys to the age of the Silurian rocks, we have as yet no adetjuale grounds whereon to form a rational conjecture as to the {)rcsence of the Old Red Sandstone, or Devonian group. True Carboniferous Producti and Spin/eri have been brought home by Sir E. Belcher from Albert Land, north of Wellington Channel ; and hence we may affirm positively, that the old Cav- noniferous rocks ave also present. Here and there bituminous schist and coal are met with ; tlie existence of the lat -r being marked at several jtoints on the general chart published oy the Admiralty. With the palaeozoic rocks are associated others of igneous origin and of crystalline and metamorphosed character. Thus, {run Eglinton Island to the south of I'rince Patrick's Island, first defined by the survey of Caj)t. Kellett and his officers, we see concretions of green- stone, associated with siliceous or quartzose rocks and coarse ferru- ginous grits ; and in Princess Royal Island, besides the characteristic Silurian limestones, there are black basalts and red jaspers, as well as red rocks, less altered by heat, but showing a passage into jasper. Highly crystalline gypsum was also procured by Lient. Rim from the north-western shores of ISIelville Island. In the collection before us there are silicified stems of plants, which Lieut. Pirn gathered on various po'nts between Wellington Channel on the east and Banks's Land on the west. Similar silicified plants were also brought home by Capt. M'Clure from Banks's Land ; and, through the kindness of Mr. Barrow, to whom they were presented, they are now ex- hibited, together with a collection made by Capt. Kellett, whieh he sent to Dr. J. E.Gray of the British Museum, who has obligingly lent them for comparison. I had requested Dr. Hooker to examine all those sjjecimens which passed through my hands, and I learn from him that he will prepare z description of them, as well as of a great number from the same region, which had been sent to his father, Sir W. Hooker, associated, like those now luuler consideration, with fragments of recent wood. Of Secondary formatio*^:: no other evidence has been met with except some fossil bones of Saurians, bronght home / Sir E. Belther, from the smaller islands north of Wellington Channel ; and of these fossils Sir Edward will give a descri})tion Of the old Tertiary rocks, as characterized by their organic remains, no distinct traces have, as far as I am aware, been discovered ; and hence we may infer that the ancient submarine sediments, having been elevated, remained during a very long period beyond the influence of depositary action. n Let us now sec how *he other facts, brought to our notice by the gallant Arctic explorers who have recently returned to our country, bear upon th( relptiotis of laud and water in 'his Arctic region during the (juasi-modcru period, when the present species of trees were in existence. Capt, M'Clurc states that in Banks's Land, in latitude 7\^ '18', and thence extenc'ing along a range of lulls vai\ing from .iM) to "lOO feet above the sea, and from half a mile to upwards inland he fouiid great (|uantities of wood, some of which was rotton and decom.)osed, but much of it sutSciently fresh to be cut »ip and used as' fuel. Whenever this wood was in a well-preserved state, it was cither detected in gullies or raviiu-s, or had probably b'-i'n recently exhunu'd from the frozen soil or ice. lu such cases, and particularly on the northern faces of the slopt-.- /here the sua never acts, wood migbt be preserved any length of time, inasmuch as Capt. M'Clure tells iiic be has eaten beef, which, though hung up i. his cold larder for two ycrs, was jjcrfectly untainted. ' ""he most remarkable of these specimens of well-preserved recent wooi.' is the segment of a tree, wh" -h, by Capt. M'Clure's orders, was -eawn from a trunk sticking out of a ravine, and which is now exhibiicd*. It measures 3 feec (J inches in circumference. Still more interesting is the cone of one of these tir-trees which be brou'^bt home, and which apparently belongs to an Jljies resembling J. alba, a plant still li' ing within the Arctic circle. One of Lieut. Pirn's spt^lmens of wood from Prince Patrick's Lslnnd is of the same cha- racter as that, just mentioned, and in its microsco])ieal characters much resembles Piims strobus, the American Tmic, according to Prof. Qu(!kett, who refers another s|)ecimen, brongut from llecla and Griper Bay, to the Larch. In like manner Lieut. Pirn detected similar fragments of wood two degrees further to the north, in Prince Patrick's Land, and also in ravines of the inferior of that island, where, as he informed me, a fragment was found, like the tree describe'! by M'Clure, protruding from the soil on the side of a gully. We learn, indeed, from Parry's 'Voyage,' that portions of a large fir-tree were found at some distance from the south shore of Melville Island, at about 30 feet above high-water mark, in latitude 74° 59' and longitude 10(i°t- According to the testimony of Capt. M'Clure and Lieut. Pirn, all the timber they saw resembled the present drift-wood so well known to Arctic explorers, being irregularly distributed, and in a fragmentary condition, as if it had been broken up and floated to its present positions by water. If such were the method by which the umber was distributed, * Through the kindness of Mr. John Barrow, to whom it had been given, this wood, with some silicilied stems, has been presented to the Museum of Practical Geology. t " Serjeant Martin of the Artillery and Capt. Sabine's servant brought down to the beach several pieces of a large tir-tree, which they found nearly buried in the sand at the distance of 300 or 400 yards from the present high-water mark, and not less than .30 feet above the level of the sea." — Parry's Voyage for the Discovery of the North- West Passage, p. 68. geologists can readily account for its present position in the interior of the Arctic Islands. They infer that at the period of such distribution large portions of these tracts were beneath the waters, and that the trees and coneswere drifts- from the nearest lands on which they grew. A subsequent elevation, by which these islands assumed their pre- sent configuration, would really be in perfect harmony with those great changes of relative level which we know to have occurred in the British Isles, Germany, Scandinavia, and Russia since the glacial period. The transportation of immense quantities of timber towards the North Pole, and its deposit on submarine rocks, is by no means so remarkable a phajnomenon as the wide distribution of erratic blocks during the glacial epoch over Northern Germany, Central Russia, and large portions of our island when under water, followed by the rise of these vast masses into land. If we adopt this explanation, and look to the extreme cold of the Arctic region in the comparatively modern period during which this wood has been drifted or preserved, we can have no difficulty in accounting for the different states in which the timber is found. Those portions of it which happen to have been exposed to the alternations of frost and thaw, and the influence of the sun, have necessarily become rotten ; whilst all those fragments which remained enclosed in frozen mud or ice which have never been melted would, when brought to light by the opening of ravines or other accidental causes, present just as fresh an appearance as the specimens now exhibited. The only circumstance within my knowledge which mihtates against this view is one communicated to me by Capt. Sir Edward Belcher, who, in iat. 7')° 30', long. 92° 15', observed on the east side of Wellington Channel the trunk of a fir-tree standing vertically, and which, being cleared of the surrounding earth, &c., was found to extend its roots into what he supposed to be the soil. If from this observat: jn we should be led to imagine that all the innumerable fragments of timber found in these polar latitude- be- longed to trees that grew upon the spot, and on the ground over which they are now distributed, we should be driven to adopt the anomalous hypothesis, that, notwithstanding physical relations of land and water similar to those which now prevail (i. e. of great masses of land high above the sea), trees of large size grew on such terra Jirtna within a few degrees of the North Pole !— a supposition which I consider to be wholly incompatible with the data in our possession, and at variance with the laws of isothermal lines. If, however, we adopt the theory of a former submarine drift*, followed by a subsequent elevation of the sea-bottom, as easily ac- counting for all the phsenom.ena, we may explain the curious case brought to our notice by Sir Edward Belcher, by supposing that the tree he uncovered had been floatciens sent to him were collected in mounds of silt, rising up from the level of the sea to 100 feet or more above it; and he entirely coincides with me in tlie belief that the whole of this timber was drifted to thf spots where it now lies. in a bay, like certain " snags " of the great American rivers. Under this view, the case referred to must be considered as a mere excep- tion, whilst the general inference we naturally draw is, that the vast quantities of broken recent timber, as observed by numerous exj lorers, were drifted to their present position when the islands of the Arctic Archipelago -vere submerged. This inference is indeed supported by the unanswerable evidence of the submarine associates of the timber ; for^ from the summit of Coxcomb Range in Banks's Laud, and at a height of 500 feet above the sea, Capt. M'Clure brought home a fine large specimen of Cyprina Islandica, which is undistinguishable from the species so common in the glacial drift of the Clyde* ; whilst Capt. Sir E. Belcher found the remains of whales on lands of considerable altitude in lat. 78'^ north. Reasoning from such facts, all geologists are agreed in considering the shingle, mud, gravel, and beaches in which animals of the Arctic region are imbedded in many parts of Northern Europe, as decisive proofs of a period when a glacial sea covered large portions of such lands ; and the only distinction between such deposits in Britain and those which were formed in the Arctic Circle, is, that the wood which was transported to the latter has been preserved in its ligneous state for thousands of years, through the excessive cold of the region. P.C. — Since the above was written, Capt. CoUinson transmitted to me an instructive collection of rock-specimens, collected during his survey. Most of them show the great prevalence of crystalline rocks along the north coast of America. * In Parry's ' Voyages ' (page 61) we learn that a number of marine shells, of the Venus tribe, were found imbedded in the ravines of Byam Martin's Island ; a fact which strengthens the view here adopted of the submergence of large' portions of these tracts at a very recent geological epoch.