THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 DEPARTMENT OK GEOLOGY 
 
 UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES, CALIF. 
 
 
 Tke RALPH D. REED LIBRARY 
 
 of Oil Companies of Southern Cali 
 Fornia, Alumni and Faculty of Geology Depar 
 ment and University Library. 
 
 1940 


 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES 
 
 AT HOME AND ABROAD 
 
 BY 
 
 ARCHIBALD GEIKfE, L.L.D., F.R.S. 
 
 Director-General of the Geological Surveys of Great Britain and Ireland. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THE HUMBOLDT PUBLISHING CO. 
 ASTOR PLACE.
 
 Library 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES 
 
 AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 BY ARCHIBALD GEIKIE, LL.D., F.R.S, 
 
 Director-General of the Geological Surveys of Great Britain and Ireland. 
 
 IN TWO PARTS-PART L 
 
 I. 
 
 MY FIRST GEOLOGICAL EX- 
 CURSION. 
 
 Tis an old story now, so far back, indeed, 
 that I hardly like to reckon up the years that 
 have since passed away. But clear and 
 bright does it stand in my memory, notwith- 
 standing, that quiet autumnal afternoon, 
 with its long country ramble to an old quarry, 
 the merry shouts of my sc oolmates, the 
 endless yarns we span by the way, and the 
 priceless load of stones we bore homeward 
 over those \\ eary miles, when the SUD had 
 sunk, red and fiery, in the west, and the 
 shadows of twilight began to deepen the 
 gloom of the wood^. Many a country ramble 
 have I made since then, but none, perhaps, 
 with so deep and hearty an enjoyment, for it 
 opened up a new world, into which a fancy 
 fresh from the Arabian Nights and Don 
 Quixote could adventurously ride forth. 
 
 Up to that time my leisure hours, after 
 school-lessons were learnt, and all custom- 
 ary games were played, had been given to 
 laborious mechanical contrivances, based 
 sometimes on m 
 fttt a white I beli 
 
 ost preposterous principles, 
 ieved I had discovered per- 
 
 petual motion. Day and night the vision 
 haunted me of a wheel turning, turning, in 
 endless revolutions; and what was not this 
 wheel to accomplish? It was to be the motive- 
 power in every manufactory all through the 
 country to the end of time, to be called by 
 my name, just as other pieces of mechanism 
 bore the names of other inventive worthies, 
 in th it treasure of a book, The Century of In- 
 ventions. Among various contrivances I re- 
 member striving hard to construct a boat 
 that should go through the water by means 
 of paddles, to be worked by a couple of men, 
 or, failing them, by a horse; but though I 
 found (if my memory serve me) that my hero, 
 the old Marquis of Wo-cester, had antici- 
 pated the invention by almost 200 years, I 
 could not succeed in getting the paddles 
 to move except when the boat was out of the 
 water, and so the grand contrivance, that 
 might have made its discoverer famous in 
 every harbor in the kingdom, fell to the 
 ground. 
 
 The Saturday afternoons were always ob- 
 served by us as a consecrated holiday-time, 
 all school-work being then consigned to a de- 
 lightful oblivion. To learn a lesson during 
 these hours was regarded as something d 
 
 733919
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 generate and wholly unworthy the dignity of 
 a schoolboy. Besides, we had always plenty 
 of work of some kind to fill up the time, and 
 what the nature of that work was to be for 
 the ensuing Saturday had usually been de- 
 termined long before the covet d Saturday 
 came. Sometimes, if the weather was dull, 
 my comrades repaired to my room (which was 
 dignified as "the workshop") to hear a dis- 
 quisition on the last invention, or to help if 
 they could in removing some troublesome 
 and apparently insuperable mechanical diffi- 
 culty. Or we planned a glorious game of 
 cricket, or golf, or football, that seldom 
 came to a close until the evening grew too 
 dark for longer play. In spring-time we 
 would sally forth into the country to some 
 well-remembered bank, where the primroses 
 and violets bloomed earliest, and return at 
 dusk, bringing many a bunch for those at 
 home. The summer afternoons often found 
 us loitering, rod in hand, along the margin 
 ol a shady streamlet, in whose deeper pools 
 the silvery troutlets loved to feed. And it 
 fed, truly, with little danger from us. The 
 writhing worm (we never soared to the use of 
 tne fly), though ever so skilfully and unfeel- 
 ingly twined round the hook, failed to allure 
 the scaly brood, which we could see darting 
 up and down the current without so much as 
 a nibble at our tempting bait. Not so, how- 
 ever, with another member of that tribe, the 
 little stickleback, or "beardie," as we called 
 :t, to which we had the most determined and 
 unreasonable antipathy. The cry of "A 
 beardie ! a beardie ! " from one of cur party 
 was the sign for every rod and stick to be 
 thrown down on the bank, and a general 
 rush to the spot where the enemy of the 
 trout had been seen. Off went stockings 
 and shoes, and in plunged the wearer, straight 
 to the large stone in mid-channel under which 
 the foe was supposed to be lurking. Cau- 
 tiously were the fingers passed into the 
 crevices and round the base of the stone, and 
 the little victim, fairly caught at last in his 
 den, was thrown in triumph to the bank, 
 where many a stone was at hand to end his 
 torments and his life. 
 
 Autumn brought round the cornfields, and 
 the hedgerows rich in hip, and haw, and 
 bramble ; and then, dear to the heart of 
 schoolboy, came winter with its sliding, skat- 
 ing, and snowballing, and its long, merry 
 evenings, with their rounds of festivity and 
 plumcake. 
 
 'Tis an old story, truly ; but I remember 
 as if it had been yesterday, how my Saturday 
 employments were changed, and how the 
 vagrant, careless fancies of the schoolboy 
 passed into the settled purposes that have 
 moulded the man. I had passed a Saturday 
 afternoon alone, and next day as usual met 
 my comrades at church. On comparing 
 notes, I found that the previous afternoon 
 they had set out for some lime-quarries, 
 about four miles off, and had returned laden 
 
 with wonders plants of strange form, with 
 scales, teeth, and bones of uncouth fishes, 
 all embedded in the heart of the stone, and 
 drawn out of a subterranean territory of al- 
 most fabulous extent and gloom. Could any- 
 thing more marvellous have been suggested 
 to a youthful fancy ? The caverns of the 
 Genii, even that of the Wonderful Lamp, 
 seemed not more to be coveted. At least the 
 new cave had this great advantage over the 
 old ones, that I was sure it was really true ; 
 a faint suspicion having begun to arise that, 
 possibly, after all, the Eastern caverns might 
 have no more tangible existence than on the 
 pages of the story-book. But here, only four 
 miles from my own door, was a real cavern, 
 mysterious beyond the power of my friends 
 to describe, inhabited by living men wno 
 toiled like gnomes, with murky faces and 
 little lamps on their foreheads, driving 
 wagons, and blasting open the rock in vast 
 and seemingly impenetrable galleries, where 
 the sullen reverberations boomed as it were 
 for miles among endless gigantic pillars and 
 sheets of Stygian water and stretched awav 
 deep and dark into fathomless gloom. And 
 in that rock, wrapped up in its substance like 
 mummies in their cerements, lay heaps of 
 plants of wondrous kinds ; some resembled 
 those of our woods and streams, but there 
 were many, the like to which my companions 
 declared that even in our longest rambles 
 they had never seen on bank, or brake, or 
 hill ; fishes, too, there were, with strong, 
 massive scales, very different from our trouts 
 and minnows. Some of the spiny fins, in- 
 deed, just a little resembled those of our foe 
 the "beardie." Very likely (thought I) the 
 Genius of the cave being a sensible fellow, 
 has resolved to preserve his trout, and so 
 with a murrain on the beardies has buried 
 them bodily in the rock. 
 
 But above all, in these dark subterranean 
 recesses lurked the remains of gigantic rep- 
 tiles ; and one of the quarrymen possessed a 
 terrific tusk and some fragmentary scales, 
 which he would have sold to my friends could 
 their joint purse have supplied the stipulated 
 price. 
 
 My interest'in the tale, of course, increased 
 at every new incident ; but when they came 
 to talk of reptiles, the exuberant fancy could 
 contain itself no longer. "Dragons! drag- 
 ons ! " I shouted, and rubbed my hands in an 
 ecstacy of delight. "Dragons, boys, be 
 sure they are, that have been turned into 
 stoie by the magic of some old necromancer." 
 
 They had found, too, in great abundance, 
 what they had been told were " coprolites " 
 that is, as we afterwards learnt, the petrified 
 excrement of ancient fishes. " Coppet -lites, " 
 thought I, nay, perchance it might be golds 
 for who ever read of such a famous cavern 
 with petrified forests, fishes, and dragons, 
 that had not besides huge treasures of yellow 
 gold? 
 
 So there and then we planned an excursion
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 for the following Saturday. * he days that 
 intervened stretched themselves somehow to 
 an interminable leng-.h. It seemed the long- 
 est week of my life, even though every sleep- 
 ing and waking hour was crowded with 
 visions of the wondrous caverns. At length 
 the long expected morning dawned, and sr on 
 brightened up into a clear, calm autumnal 
 day. 
 
 We started off about noon ; a goodly band 
 of some eight or nine striplings, with two or 
 three hammers, and a few pence amongst us, 
 and no need to be home before dusk. An 
 October sun shone merrily out upon us ; the 
 fields, bared of their sheaves, had begun to 
 be again laid under the plough, and long lines 
 of rich brown loam alternated with bands of 
 yellow stubble up and down which toiled 
 many a team of steaming -horses. The neigh- 
 boring woods, gorgeous in their tints of green, 
 gold, and russet, stnt forth clouds of rooks, 
 whose noisy jangle, borne onward by the 
 breeze, and mingling with the drone of the 
 bee and the carol of the lark, grew mellow in 
 the distance, as the cadence of a far-off hymn. 
 We were too young to analyze the landscape, 
 but not too young to find .n every feature of 
 it the intensest enjoyment. Moreover, our 
 path lay through a district rich in historic 
 associations. Watch-peels, castles, and towers 
 looked out upon us as we walked, each with 
 its traditionary tales, the recital of which 
 formed one of our chief delights. Or if a 
 castle lacked its story, our invention easily 
 supplied the defect. And thus every part of 
 the way came to be memorable in our eyes 
 for some thrilling event, real or imaginary 
 battles, stern and bloody, fierce encounters 
 in single combat, strange weird doings of 
 antique wizards, and marvelous achievements 
 of steel-clad knights, who rambled restlessly 
 through the wond to deliver imprisoned 
 maidens. 
 
 Thus beguiled, the four miles seemed to 
 shrink into one, and we arrived at length at 
 the quarries. They had been opened, I 
 found, along the slope of a gentle declivity. 
 At the north end stood the kilns where 
 the lime was burnt, the white smoke from 
 which we used to see some miles away. 
 About a quarter of a mile to the south 
 lay the workings where my com- 
 rades had seen the subterranean men ; 
 and there, too, stood the engine that 
 drew up the wagons and pumped out the 
 water. Between the engine and the kilns 
 the hillside had all been mined and exhaust- 
 ed; the quarry men having gradually exca- 
 vated their way southwards to where we saw 
 the smoking chimney of the engine-house. 
 We made for a point midway in the excava- 
 tions; and great indeed was our delight, on 
 climbing a long bank of grass-grown rubbish, 
 to see below us a green hollow, and beyond 
 it a wall of rock, in the centre of which 
 yawned a deep cavern, plunging away into 
 the hill far from the light of day. My com- 
 
 panions rushed down the slope with a shout of 
 triumph. For myself, I lingered a moment 
 on the top. With just a tinge of sadness in 
 the thought, I felt that though striking and 
 picturesque beyond anything of the kind I 
 had ever seen, this cavern was after all only 
 a piece of human handiwork. The heaps of 
 rubbish around me, with the smoking kilns at 
 the one end and the clanking engine at the 
 other, had no connection with beings of an- 
 other world, but told only too plainly of in- 
 genious, indefatigable man. The spell was 
 broken at once and forever, and as it fell to 
 pieces, I darted down the slope and rejoined 
 my comrades. 
 
 They had already entered the cave, which 
 was certainly vast and gloomy enough for 
 whole legions of gnomes. The roof, steep 
 as that of a house, sloped rapidly into the 
 hillside beneath a murky sheet of water, and 
 was supported by pillars of wide girth, some 
 of which had a third of their height, or more, 
 concealed by the lake, so that the cavern, 
 with its inclined roof and pillars, half sunk 
 in the water, looked as though it had been 
 rent and submerged by some old earthquake. 
 Not a vestige of vegetation could we see 
 save, near the entrance, some dwarfed scolo- 
 pendriums and pale patckes of moss. Not 
 an insect, nor indeed any living thing seemed ' 
 ever to venture into this dreary den. Away it 
 stretched to the right hand and the left, in 
 j long withdrawing vistas of gloom, broken, as 
 we could faintly see, by the light which, en- 
 tering from other openings along the hillside, 
 fell here and these on some hoary pillar, and 
 finally vanished into the shade. 
 
 It is needless to recall what achievements 
 we performed; how, with true boyish hardi- 
 hood, we essayed to climb the pillars, or 
 crept along the ledges of rock that overhung 
 the murky water, to let a ponderous stone 
 fall plump into the depths, and mark how 
 long the bubbles continued to rise gurgling 
 to the surface, and how long the reverbera- 
 tions of the plunge came floating back to us 
 from the far-off recesses of the cave. Enough 
 that, having satisfied our souls with the won- 
 ders below ground, we set out to explore 
 those above. 
 
 " But where are the petrified forests and 
 fishes?" cried one of the party. "Here!" 
 "Here!" was shouted in reply from the top of 
 the bank by two of the ringleaders of the 
 previous Saturday. W r e made for the heap 
 of broken stones whence the voices had 
 come, and there, truly, on every block and 
 every fragment the fossils met our eye, some- 
 times so thickly grouped together that we 
 could barely see the stone on which they lay. 
 I bent over the mound, and the first frag- 
 men^ that turned up (my first-found fossil) 
 was one that excited the deepest interest. 
 The commander-in-chief of the first excur- 
 sion, who was regarded (perhaps as much 
 from his bodily stature as for any other rea- 
 son) an authority on these questions, pro.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 nounced my treasure-trove to be, unmistaka- 
 bly and unequivocally, a fish. True, it 
 seemed to lack head and tail and fins; the 
 liveliest fancy amongst us hesitated as to 
 which were the scales; and in after years I 
 learned that it was really a vegetable the 
 seed-cone or catkin of a large extinct kind of 
 club-moss ; but, in the meantime, Tom had 
 declared it to be a fish, and a fish it must as- 
 suredly be. 
 
 The halo that broke forth from the Wizard's 
 tomb when William Deloraine and the 
 Monk of St. Mary's heaved at midnight the 
 ponderous stone was surely not brighter, 
 certainly not so benign in its results, as the 
 light that now seemed to stream into my 
 whole being, as I disinterred from their stony 
 folds these wondrous relics. Like other 
 schoolboys, I had, of course, had my lessons 
 on geology in the usual meagre, cut-and-dry 
 form in which physical science was then 
 taught in our schools. I could repeat a 
 " Table of Formations," and remember the 
 pictures of some uncouth monsters on the 
 pages of our text-books one with goggle- 
 eyes, no neck, and a preposterous tail ; an- 
 other with an unwieldy body, and no tail at 
 all, for which latter d feet I had endeavored 
 to compensate by inserting a long pipe into 
 'his mouth, receiving from our master (Iron- 
 sides, we called him) a hearty rap across the 
 knuckles, as a recompense for my attention 
 to the creature's comfort. But the notion 
 that these pictures were the representations of 
 actual, though now extinct monsters, that the 
 matter-of-fact details of our text-books really 
 symbolized living truths, and were not in- 
 vented solely to distract the brains and en- 
 danger the palms of schoolboys ; nay, that 
 the statements which seemed so dry and un- 
 intelligible in print were such as could be 
 actually verified by our own eyes in nature, 
 that beneath and beyond the present crea- 
 tion, in the glories of which we revelled, there 
 lay around us the memorials of other crea- 
 tions not less glorious, and infinitely older, 
 and thus that more, immensely more, than 
 our books or our teachers taught us could be 
 learnt by looking at nature for ourselves all 
 this was strange to me. It came now for the 
 first time like a i cvv revelation, one that has 
 gladdened my life ever since 
 
 We worked on industriously at the rubbish 
 heap, and found an untold sum Of wonders. 
 The human mind in its earlier stages dwells 
 on resemblances, rather than on differences. 
 We identified what we found in the stones 
 with that to which it most nearly approached 
 ia existing nature, and though many an**or- 
 ganism turned up to which we could think of 
 no analogue, we took no trouble to discrimi- 
 nate vherein it differed from others. Hence, 
 to our imagination, the plants, insects, shells, 
 and fishes of our rambles met us again in the 
 rock. There was little that some one of the 
 party could not explain, and thus our lime- 
 *one became a more extraordinary conglom- 
 
 eration of organic remains, I will venture to 
 say, than ever perturbed the brain of a geol- 
 ogist. It did not occur at the time to any of 
 us to inquire why a perch came to be em- 
 balmed among ivy and rose leaves ; why a 
 sea-shore whelk lay entwined in the arms of 
 a butterfly ; or why a beetle should seem to 
 have been doing his utmost to dance a pir- 
 ouette round the tooth of a fish. These ques- 
 tions came all to be asked afterward, and 
 then I saw how egregiously erroneous had 
 been our boyish identifications But, in the 
 meantime, knowing little of the subject, I 
 believed everything, and with implicit faith 
 piled up dragon-flies, ferns, fishes, beetle 
 cases, violets, sea-weeds, and shells. 
 
 The shadows of twilight had begun 10 
 fall while we still bent eagerly over the 
 stones The sun, with a fiery glare, had 
 sunk behind the distant hills, and the long 
 lines of ruddy light that mottled the sky as 
 he went down h;id crept slowly after him, and 
 left the clouds to come trooping up from the 
 east, cold, lifeless, and gray. The chill of 
 evening now began to fall over everything, 
 save the spirits of the treasure-seekers. And 
 yet they too in the end succumbed The ring 
 of the hammer became less frequent, and the 
 shout that announced the discovery of each 
 fresh marvel seldomer broke the stillness Oi 
 the scene. And, as the moanings of the 
 night-wind swept across the fields, and rustled 
 fitfully among the withered weeds of the 
 quarry, it was wisely icsolved that we should 
 all go home. 
 
 Then came the packing up. Each had 
 amassed a pile of specimens, well-nigh as 
 large as himself, and it- was of course impos- 
 sible to carry everything away. A rapid se- 
 lection had therefore to be made. And oh! 
 with how much reluctance were we compelled 
 to relinquish many of the stones, the dis- 
 covery w.iereof had made the opposite cavern 
 ring again with our jubilee. Not one of us 
 had had the foresight to provide himself with 
 a bag, so we stowed away the treasures in our 
 pockets. Surely practical geometry offers not 
 a more perplexing problem than to gauge the 
 capacity of these p-,rts of a schoolboy's dress. 
 So we loaded ourselves to the full, and 
 marched along with the fossils crowded into 
 every available corner. ' 
 
 Despite our loads, we left the quarry in 
 high glee. Arranging ourselves instinctively 
 into a concave phalanx, with the speaker in 
 the centre, we resumed a tale cf thrilling in- 
 terest, that had come to its most tragic part 
 just as we arrived at the quarry several hours 
 before. It lasted all the way back, beguiling 
 the tedium, darkness, and chill of the four 
 miles that lay between the limeworks and 
 our homes; and the final consummation of 
 the story was artfully reached just as we 
 came to the door of the first of the party who 
 had to wish us good night. 
 
 Such was my first geological excursion 
 a simple event enough, and yet the turning-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 point in a. life. Thenceforward the rocks and 
 their fossil treasures formed the chief sub- 
 ject of my every-day thoughts. That day 
 stamped my fate, and I became a geologist. 
 
 And yet, I had carried home with me a 
 strange medley of errors and misconceptions. 
 Nearly every fossil we found was incorrectly 
 named. We b.lievedthat we had discovered 
 in the rock organisms which had really never 
 been found fossil by living man. So far, 
 therefore, the whole lesson had to be un- 
 learned, and a hard process the unlearning 
 proved to be. But (what was of infinitely more 
 consequence at the time than the correct 
 names, or even the true natu e of the fossils) 
 I had now seen fossils with my own eyes, 
 and struck them out of the rock with my own 
 hand. The meaning of the lessons we had 
 been taught at school began to glimmer upon 
 me ; the dry bones of our books were touched 
 into life ; the idea of creations anterior toman 
 seemed clear as a revealed truth ; the fishes 
 and plants of the lime- quarry must have lived 
 and died, but when and how ? was it possible 
 for rue to discover ? 
 
 These quarries proved to our schoolboy 
 band a nevei -ending source of delight. They 
 formed the goal of many a Saturday ramble. 
 The fishing-rod and basket gave place 
 to hammer and bag ; even our bats and balls 
 and "shinties" were not unfrequently for- 
 saken. Our love of legends, too, went on in- 
 creasing, every walk giving rise to two or 
 three new ones, extemporized for the occa- 
 sion, and of course forgotten nearly as soon as 
 invented. 
 
 Frequent visits made us better acquainted, 
 cot only with the quarries but with the quarry- 
 men, and our ideas of the one were consider- 
 ably influenced by our impression of the other. 
 There were, I remember, three very distinct 
 groups of workmen. The kilns at the north 
 end were tended by a marked set of 
 men. They seemed to be mostly Irishmen, 
 whose duty it was to unload the wagons 
 of limestone into the kilns, ar.d keep up the 
 supply of coal. The deep pits in which the 
 rock was calcined sent up an intolerable heat, 
 and gave out a thick, white, stifling smoke, 
 that curled and drifted about with every veer- 
 ing of the wind. Creeping cautiously to 
 within a short way of the edge of these fiery 
 abysses, we could mark the red-hot rock 
 cracking, and the coal flaming up from below 
 it. The Irishmen, however, would march 
 round the brink without a trace of fear or 
 hesitation, and then, after the firing of the 
 kilns, would squat themselves in the lee of a 
 wall, an uncouth, sooty-faced company, each 
 with a pipe, or else an oath, in his mouth. 
 We never cultivated very closely the acquaint- 
 ance of the kiln-men, an uneasy apprehen- 
 sion constantly arising that, on the slightest 
 provocation, one of us might be tumbled 
 into the pit, and never more be seen or heard 
 
 Very different in the nature of their work, 
 
 and equally different in their disposition, were 
 the men who tended the wagons which the 
 engine drew up from the quarry. They had 
 once worked below ground, but had now an 
 easier post, their sole duty being to wheel off 
 the full wagons as they came up, and to put 
 empty ones on the rails to be let down the 
 slope into the mouth of the excavation. One 
 of them had lost a leg i:i his subterranean 
 service, and was therefore somewhat slow in 
 his movements. He had built himself a rude 
 hut, w th a fireplace and a wooden bench, and 
 there I have often sat with him and listened 
 to his eluc : dations of the fossils, and his ideas 
 of cosmogony in general. He was never at a 
 loss for an explanation of any of the numer- 
 ous fossils which he picked out of the lime- 
 stone blocks that came up from the quarry. 
 Some of his fellow-workmen maintained that 
 rock and fossil were all created together, but 
 my friend was a long way ahead of them. He 
 was certain that the plants in the rock must 
 have once bloomed green on the land, and that 
 the fishes must have darted through the water. 
 His Bible told him of a great flood that had 
 destroyed mankind and covered the lands 
 which they inhabited; and he had no manner 
 of doubt that the fishes and plants of the 
 limestone were memorials of that great inun- 
 dation, and therefore contemporaries of Noah 
 and the ark. 
 
 The third, and by much the most numer- 
 ous, group of workmen, were those whose 
 labor went on underground blasting and 
 quarrying the limestone, and then wheeling 
 it in wagons along the galleries to the mouth 
 of the quarry, whence it was drawn up by 
 the engine. Murky and grim, each with a 
 slouched cap, from the front of which hung a 
 little lamp, they formed, nevertheless, a merry 
 company, keeping up a ceaseless din of ham- 
 mering in these gloomy regions, save at in- 
 tervals when a blast-hole was charged witb 
 gunpowder, and then all hurried away behind 
 some of the huge pillars until the explosion 
 was over. It was during one of these pauses 
 that I first made their acquaintance. With 
 one or two companions, I had been prying 1 
 into the mouth of the quarry, and venturing 
 for some way within, until, as the daylight 
 grew dim, our courage failed, and we re- 
 turned. A rumbling noise gradually ap- 
 proached, and there at last emerged from the 
 darkness a full wagon, with a grimy workman 
 pushing it from behind. The lamp that 
 flickered on his forehead added greatly to 
 his uncouthness as he came into the full 
 light of day; and it was not without some 
 hesitation that we accepted his invitation to 
 hold on by the end of an empty truck, and re- 
 turn with him into the innermost recesses of 
 the quarry. It was a long jo rney, and, 
 of course, save for the feeble glimmer of the 
 lamp in his cap, in total darkness. Eventu- 
 ally we began to hear the sound of clinking 
 hammers, and then in the dim distance we 
 saw little lights moving, to and fro. Tb*
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 sounds ceased as we approached, and the 
 lights drew nearer, until we found ourselves 
 in the centre of a group of begrimed work- 
 men, which increased in numbers every mo- 
 ment as the men hurried from different parts 
 of the workings to be out cf the way A an 
 impending blast. 
 
 They gathered round us and examined our 
 hammers as well as the specimens we had 
 procured. One fossil had especially puzzled 
 us, which we now submitted to the decision 
 of our subterranean acquaintances. One of 
 them styled by his comrades "the Philoso- 
 pher," a tall, wiry, young man took the 
 stone, and after eyeing it gravely for a few 
 seconds, pronounced it to be an oyster-shell. 
 I could see no resemblance on which to found 
 such a decision ; but the dictum of "Lang 
 Willie " seemed to settle the matter finally in 
 the eyes of the quarrymen. Seating himself 
 on a large prostrate block of limestone, and 
 stuffing his short pipe into his pocket, he pro- 
 ceeded to point out to the company the evi- 
 dence that the scene of their labors had once 
 been under the sea. There was the oyster- 
 shell to begin with. Surely none of us could 
 dispute- fhat oysters only lived in the sea, and 
 therefore, as the oyster occurred in the quarry, 
 the quarry must once have formed part of the 
 sea-bottom. Then there were the scales, 
 bones, and teeth of fishes, very much longer 
 than trout or any " siclike " fresh-water fish, 
 and these must have dwelt in the sea. Be- 
 sides this, he sometimes noticed a white 
 powder crusting the rock like a sprinkling of 
 salt, and the stone had occasionally what 
 Trinculo would have called "an ancient and 
 fishlike smell, "that to Willie's mind clearly 
 bespoke the former presence of the sea. All 
 this and more was told at considerable length, 
 with many a flourish of the fist, to the great 
 apparent comfort and satisfaction of his 
 brother workmen. 
 
 And there was some truth in the reasoning. 
 His facts, indeed, would not stand a very 
 close scrutiny ; even the little experience I 
 had at the time enabled me to see their eno- 
 neousness ; but his deductions; had the 
 premises been sound, were fair enough. 
 They showed, at least, a habit of thought- 
 fulness and observation much rarer among 
 this class of men than we should expect to 
 find it. 
 
 Such were my earliest clinical instructors 
 in geology. With the help of their crude no- 
 tions, added to our own boyish fancies, those 
 of our number who cared to think out the 
 subject at all strove to solve the problems that 
 the quarry suggested. I cannot recall the pro- 
 cess of inquiry among my comrades. But I 
 well remember how it went on with myself. 
 Our early identifications of all that we saw in 
 the rock with lomething we had seen in living 
 nature were unconsciously abandoned. I 
 gradually came to learn the true character of 
 most of the fossils, and recognized, too, that 
 there was much which I did not understand, 
 
 but might fairly attempt to discover. The 
 first love of rarities and curiosities passed 
 away, and in its place there sprang up a 
 settled belief that in these gray rocks there 
 lay a hidden story, if one could only get at 
 the key. 
 
 There was no one within our circie of ac- 
 quaintance from whom any practical instruc- 
 tion in the subject could be obtained. 
 Probably this was a piece of good fortune for 
 those of us who had the courage to persevere 
 in the quest for knowledge. I can remember 
 the long communings we had as to the nature 
 of this or that organism, and its bearing 
 on the history of the limestone. The 
 text-books were of little service. So, thrown 
 back upon ourselves, we allowed our fancy to 
 supply what we could obtain in no other way. 
 The ferns and other land-plants found in the 
 limestone, together with the minute cyprids, 
 of which the rock seemed in some places 
 almost wholly composed, and the scales, 
 bones, and teeth of ganoid fishes, indicated, 
 as far as we could learn, that the deposit had 
 accumulated in fresh water, perhaps in a lake 
 or in the estuary of a river. But of course it 
 was natural that we should try to discover 
 what might have been the general aspect of 
 the country when the animals and plants of 
 the limestone were alive. We asked our- 
 selves if the same hills existed then as now ; 
 if perchance the old river that swept over the 
 site of the quarry took its rise among yonder 
 pastoral glens ; if the same sea rolled in the 
 distance then as now, curling white along 
 the same green shore. Happily ignorant of 
 how far we had here ventured beyond our 
 depth, it was not until after much question- 
 ing and disappointment that I found these 
 problems to require years of patient research. 
 The whole country for many miles round had 
 yet to be explored, and minute observations 
 to be made before even an approximation to 
 a reliable answer could be given. But a boy's 
 fancy is an admirable substitute for the want 
 of facts. I did feel at times a little sorry 
 that no evidence turned up on which to 
 ground my restoration of the ancient topog- 
 raphy of the district, or rather that such a 
 world of work seemed to rise before me ere I 
 could obtain the evidence that was needed. 
 But the feeling did not last long. And so I 
 conjured up the most glorious pictures of an 
 ancient world, where, as in the land of the 
 lotus-eaters, it was always afternoon, and one 
 could dream away life among isles clothed 
 with ferns and huge club-mosses, and washed 
 by lakes and rivers that lay without a tipple, 
 save now and then when some glittering 
 monster leapt out into the sunlight, and fell 
 back again with a sullen plunge. 
 
 Happy afternoons were these ! To steal 
 away alone among the cornfields, and feast 
 he eye on hill and valley, with their green 
 slopes and bosky woods and gray feudal 
 towers, and on the distant sea with the whit* 
 sails speckled over its broad expanse of blue.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 And then when every part of that well-loved | 
 scene had been taken in, to let loose the fancy 
 and allow the landscape to fade like a dis- 
 solving view until every feature had fled, and 
 there arose again the old vanished lakes, and 
 rivers, and palmy isles. 
 
 fully a much more matured imagination 
 than that of boyhood : I have often since 
 visited it, and always with fresh interest. It 
 has quiet, tree-shaded nooks, where, the din 
 of the workmen being hushed by distance, 
 one may sit alone and undisturbed for hours, 
 
 About two miles from the spot where we | gathering up from the grans grown mounds 
 
 began our geological labors lay another 
 quarry, from which lime had been extracted. 
 When we first heard of it from our one- 
 legged friend at the engine-house, we set it 
 down as a continuation of his limework, the 
 caverns of which seemed to run on under- 
 ground to an indefinite length. There seemed 
 nothing unlikely in the identification of two 
 limestones only two miles distant from each 
 -other as part of one seam. So a Saturday 
 afternoon was spent in the investigation of 
 this second quarry. 
 
 Like the first, it had been opened along the 
 slope of a gentle hill, and the excavations 
 presented to our view a long line of civerns 
 similar to those we had seen before. But the 
 quarry was disused, and appeared to have 
 been so for many years. The roof had fallen 
 down in many places, the mouths of the 
 caves had become well-nigh choked up with 
 rubbish and tangled gorse, and the heaps of 
 d<!b>is, so fresh and clean in our own quarry, 
 were here overgrown with gray lichens and 
 green moss, damp and old. The kilns had 
 not been fired for many a day. The cracks 
 and rents that had fissured their walls, from 
 the fierce heat that once blazed within, were 
 yawning hideously, as if a strong gale would 
 nuri them with a crash into the half-buried 
 cavern below. Only one human habitation 
 was near, a small moss-grown cottage, where 
 lived a little old woman, her skin brown and 
 shriveled as parchment, who was busy hang- 
 ing out linen on a neighboring hedge. Alto- 
 gether, therefore, this second quarry had a 
 very grave-like, antique look, and we entered 
 it with a kind of ooyish wonder whether so 
 different a scene would yield us the same 
 treasures as we had found so abundantly only 
 two miles off. 
 
 It required but a cursory glance to show 
 us that the two limestones were not the 
 same. They differed in color and texture; but 
 still more in their fossil contents. We 
 searched long but unsuccessfully for traces 
 of the plants, or cyprids, or fish, so common 
 at our first quarry. In their stead we ham- 
 
 been exposed to the weather for many a 
 year. Its steep sides are crowded with 
 
 delicate lamp-shells and sea-mats, crinoids, 
 cup-corals, and many other denizens of the 
 palaeozoic ocean. A mass of rock, from 
 which the rest has been quarried away.stands 
 in a secluded coppice, overlooking the sea, as 
 if to show how thick the seam was before the 
 quarrymen began to remove it. This mass 
 has 
 
 long ye 
 
 stone-lilies, corals, and shells, which stand 
 out in relief like an arabesque fretwork. The 
 marks of the quarrymen's tools have passed 
 away, and a gray hue of age has spread over 
 the rock, aided by patches of lichen and 
 moss, or by tufts of fern, that here and there 
 have found a nestling place. For here, as 
 always, where man has scarped and wounded 
 the surface of the globe on which he dwells, 
 
 " Nature, softening and concealing. 
 Is busy with a hand of healing. 
 
 From this point, between the overhanging 
 branches, our schoolboy band could watch 
 the lights and shadows flitting athwart the 
 distant hills, the breeze sweeping the neigh- 
 boring sea into fitful sheets of darker blue, 
 and the sails forever passing to and fro. 
 
 And then, turning round, there rose behind 
 us this strange wall of rock the bottom of 
 an older sea, with its dead organisms piled 
 by thousands over each other. I c in never 
 forget the impiession made on my boyish 
 mind by the realization of this tremendous 
 contrast in scenery and life, and of the vast 
 gulf of time between the living world and 
 the dead. It made a kind of epoch in one's 
 life. My first afternoon in this old lime- 
 quarry was of more service at this time than 
 any number of books and lectures. 
 
 The recollection of these early days has 
 often since impressed me with a sense of the 
 enormous advantage which a boy or girl may 
 derive from any pursuit that stimulates the 
 magination. My boyish geology was ab- 
 surdly, grotesquely erroneous. I should have 
 failed ignominiouly at an examination 
 which would be thought easy enough at 
 
 mered out an abundant series of quite j a modern elementary science class. But I 
 different fossils, all quite new to us. Of j had gained for myself what these science 
 course, in our attempts to discover the na- I classes so seldom infuse into the pupils an 
 
 ture and habitats of these objects, we wan- 
 dered quite as far from the truth as we had 
 done b fore. After much blundering we 
 eventually ascertained that the new treasures 
 included corals, stone-lilies and shells all 
 organisms of the sea-floor. But our most 
 instructive collection of these relics of marine 
 life were obtained from a much larger quarry 
 
 some twelve miles away. This more distant zoological system, or specimens to take up so 
 Ideality was calculated to impress power- much room in a museum, but as the remains 
 
 enthusiastic love of the subject, and a deter- 
 mination to get somehow at the living truth 
 of which the rocks are the records. I had 
 learnt to treat fossils not as mere dead min- 
 eral matter, or as mere curiosities valuable in 
 proportion to their rarity or perfection of 
 preservation, but as enduring records ' of 
 former life; not as species to fill a place in a
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 of once living organisms, which formed part 
 of a creation as real as that in which we our- 
 selves pass our existence. They were wit- 
 nesses of early ages in our planet's history, 
 and fvere ready to tell their tale if one could 
 only (earn how to read it from them. Few 
 occupations possess greater power of fasci- 
 nation than to marshal all those witnesses and 
 elicit from them the evidence which allows us 
 to restore one after another the successive 
 conditions through which the solid land has 
 passed. To realize how this is done, and to 
 take part in the doing of it, is for a boy a 
 lifelong advantage. He may never become 
 a geologist in any sense, but he gains such 
 an enlarged view of nature, and such a vivid 
 conception of the long evolution through 
 which the present condition of things has 
 been reached, as can be mastered in no other 
 way. A single excursion under sympathetic 
 and intelligent guidance to an instructive 
 quarry, river ravine, or sea-shore, is worth 
 many books and a long course of systematic 
 lectures. 
 
 II. 
 "THE OLD MAN OF HOY." 
 
 The tidal wave of travelers, which, thanks 
 to railroads and steamboats, pours northward 
 over the country every summer, even as far 
 as John o' Groat's, has as yet hardly risen 
 much beyond that utmost shore. The tourist 
 stops short at the Pentland Firth; indeed, 
 when he reaches its bare treeless coast, and 
 finds that there is really no traditional house 
 at John o' Groat's (though a good inn, with 
 careful host and kindly hostess, should tempt 
 him to rest there a while), he is in a hurry 
 to get back by daylight to the busy hum 
 of men in the hyperborean city of Wick or of 
 Thurso, and as eager to flit southward again 
 next morning. He makes a fatal mistake, 
 however; for he misses the very points which 
 it would have been worth his while to make 
 the whole of his long journey to see. Let 
 him, for instance, take up his quarters for a 
 day or two by the side of the Pentland Firth, 
 and spend his hours watching from one of its 
 grim cliffs the race of its tideway. Nowhere 
 else round the British I lands can he look 
 down on such a sea. It seems to rush and 
 roar past him like a vast river, but with a flow 
 some three times swifter than our most rapid 
 rivers. Such a broad breast of rolling, eddying, 
 foaming water! Even when there is no wind, the 
 tide ebbs and flows in this way, pouring now 
 eastward, now westward, as the tidal wave 
 rises and falls. But if he should be lucky 
 enough to come in for a gale of wind (and 
 they are not unknown there in summer, as he 
 will probably learn), let him by no means fail 
 to take up his station on Duncansbay Head, 
 or at the point of Mey. The shelter of a 
 flagstone "dyke" and a waterproof will save 
 him from any ulterior consequences of the 
 
 exposure, or should he have some misgivings 
 on this point, he will find, when he gets back 
 to the shelter of the inn at John o' Groat's, 
 that mine host has sundry specifics of well- 
 tried potency, at the very sight and taste of 
 which rheums, catarrhs, and the rest of that 
 tribe of ailments at once decamp. Ensconced 
 in his " neuk," he can quietly try to fix in his 
 mind a picture of what is before him. He 
 will choose if he can a time when the tide is 
 coming up against the wind. The water no 
 longer looks like the eddying current of a 
 mighty river. It rather resembles the surging 
 of rocky rapids. Its surface is one vast sheet 
 of foam and green yeasty waves. Every 
 now and then a huge billow rears itself im- 
 patiently above the rest, tossing its sheets of 
 spray in the face of the wind, which scatters 
 them back into the boiling flood. Here and 
 there, owing to the configuration of the bot- 
 tom, this turmoil waxes so furious that a 
 constant dance of towering breakers is kept 
 up. Such are the terrible ' ' Roost of Dun- 
 cansbay, " and the broken water grimly termed 
 the "Merry Men of Mey." With a great 
 gale from the northeast, or southeast, the 
 shelter even of the stone wall on Duncansbay 
 Head would be of little avail. For solid 
 sheets of water rush up the face of the cliffs 
 for more than a hundred feet, and pour over 
 the top in such volume that it is said they 
 have actually been intercepted on the land- 
 ward side by a dam across a little valley, and 
 have been used to turn a mill. Should the 
 meditative tourist be overtaken by such a 
 gale, he will find shelter in the quaint cottage 
 of the kind-hearted but hard-headed John 
 Gibson, who, perched like a sea-eagle at the 
 head of a tremendous chasm in the cliffs, can 
 spin many a yarn about the tempests of the 
 north. 
 
 No one can see such scenes without real- 
 izing as he probably has never done before, 
 the restless energy of nature. His eyes are 
 opened. He feels how wind and rain, wave 
 and tide, are leagued together, as it were, in 
 spite of their apparent antagonism, to batter 
 down the shores. Everywhere he witnesses 
 proofs of their prowess. Tall gaunt stacks 
 rise out of the waves in front of the cliffs of 
 which they once formed a part. -Yawning 
 rents run through them from summit to base ; 
 fheir sides are frayed into cusp and pinnacle 
 that seem ready to topple over when the next 
 storm assails them ; their surf-beaten base- 
 ments are pierced with caverns and tunnels 
 into which the surge is forever booming. On 
 the solid cliffs behind, the same tale of war- 
 fare is inscribed. But the traveler who has 
 seen so much will perforce desire to see more. 
 From his perch on the southern side of the 
 foaming Pentland Firth he looks across to the 
 distant hills of Hoy the only hills, indeed, 
 which are visible from the monotonous moor- 
 lands of northern Caithness, save when from 
 j some higher eminence one catches the blue 
 ' outlines of Morven on the southern sky-line.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 The Orkney Islands are otherwise as tame 
 and as flat as Caithness. But in Hoy they 
 certainly make amends for their generally 
 featureless surface. Yet even there it is not 
 the interior, hilly though it be, but the 
 western coast-cliffs, which redeem the whole of 
 the far north of Scotland from the charge of 
 failure in picturesque and impressive 
 scenery. One looks across the Pent land 
 Firth and marks how the flat islands of the 
 Orkney group rise from its northern side as 
 a long low line, until westwards they mount 
 into the rounded heights of Hoy, and how 
 these again plunge in a range of prec pices 
 into the Atlan ic. Yeltow and red in hue, 
 these marvelous cliffs gleam across the wa- 
 ter as if the sunlight, always bathed them. 
 They brighten a gray day, and gray days 
 are only too common in the northern summer; 
 on a sunny forenoon, or still better on a clear 
 evening, when the sun ir, sinking beneath the 
 western waters, they glow and burn, yet be- 
 hind such a dreamy sea-born haze, that the 
 onlooker can hardly believe himself to be in 
 the far north, but recalls perhaps memories cf 
 Capri and Sorrento, and the blue Mediter- 
 ranean. Looking at them from the mainland, 
 we are soon struck by one feature at their 
 western end. A strange square tower-like 
 projection rises behind the last and lowest 
 spur of cliffs wl- ich descends into the sea. 
 We may walk mile after mile along the Caith- 
 ness shore.and still that mysterious mass keeps j 
 its place. As we move westAard, however, 
 the higher cliffs behind open out, and we can 
 see on a clear day with the naked eye that the 
 mass is a huge column of rock rising in ad- 
 vance of the cliff. It is the "Old Man of 
 Hoy" a notable landmark, well deserving 
 its fame. 
 
 Let no tourist who has journeyed as far as 
 Thurso hesitate to cross the Firth and reach 
 Stromness in Orkney. He will find a steam- 
 er ready to carry him thither in a few hours, 
 and in the voyage will pass close under the 
 grandest cliffs in the British Islands. Above 
 all, he will make the personal acquaintance 
 -of the Old Man, or at least will be brought so 
 near as to conceive a very profound respect 
 for him. 
 
 The Old Man is a column of yellow and 
 red sandstone more than 600 feet high. It 
 stands well in front of the cliff, with which, 
 however, it is still connected by a low ridge 
 strewn with blocks. Doubtless one main 
 cause of its impressiveness lies in the fact 
 that its summit is considerably higher than 
 the cliff behind it. Thus it stands out against 
 the sky even when seen from a distance. Its 
 base is washed on three sides by the waves, 
 which rise and fall over a low reef running 
 out from underneath the base of the column. 
 Formerly a -huge buttress, like the Giant's 
 Leg of Bressay in Shetland, used to project 
 into the sea. But it has been swept away, and 
 for many years the Old Man, with the sup- 
 port of but one leg, has had to keep his 
 
 watch and wage his unequal battle with the 
 elements. 
 
 Unless the ground-swell be too heavy, the 
 steamboat usually keeps close enough to the 
 base of the great precipices to allow the 
 masonry of this wonderful obelisk to be dis- 
 tinctly seen. Like the cliff behind, it is built 
 up of successive bars of sandstone forming 
 portions of horizontal or very gently inclined 
 strata. Its base, however, rests on a pedestal 
 of different materials, consisting of two well- 
 defined bands, both of which can be traced 
 stretching landward and passing under the 
 base of the cliff. The lower of these two 
 bands is plainly marked by lines of parallel 
 stratification inclined at a considerably higher 
 angle than Vhe .1ip of the sandstones, and 
 evidently composed of something quite differ- 
 ent from them. Viewed thus from the sea in. 
 a brief and passing way, the whole structure 
 can be recognized as composed of three dis- 
 tinct portions. The main pillar, of pale red 
 and yellow sa'idstone, rests unconformably 
 upon a platform composed of two layers, of 
 which the uppermost is j dark band of seem- 
 ingly structureless rock, while the lower is 
 formed of dark slate-colored tilted strata. 
 
 It is only when one lands on the island of 
 Hoy, and examines the cliffs in detail, that 
 the true nature and history of the three bars 
 of the Old Man can be made out. The 
 yellow and red sandstones of the column and 
 the cliff behind it are then found to present 
 the ordinary characters of the Upper Old 
 Red Sandstone, to which they are with proba- 
 bility referred, though as y^t they have 
 yielded no fossils. Irregularly alternating in 
 thick and thinner beds, they are rent by in- 
 numerable perpendicular joints. By means 
 of these divisional lines, slice after slice tails 
 away from the face of the cliffs, which thus 
 maintain their precipitous front towards the 
 Atlantic. 'Except in regard to their scenic 
 features, these sandstones, however, are less 
 full of interest than the two bars comprising 
 the Old Man's pedestal. The upper bar con- 
 sists of a band of dark amygdaloidal lava 
 with a slaggy surface. The same rock 
 appears elsewhere, rising out from beneath 
 the sandstones of the precipices, particularly 
 at the northwestern headland, where it con- 
 sists of three or more distinct bands with well 
 sfratified volcanic tuffs. To the northeast 
 of that headland, on a tract of lower ground 
 intervening between the base of the hills and 
 the edge of the sea, several well-marked vol- 
 canic " necks " or pipes occur, representing 
 some of the vents from which the streams of 
 lava and showers of ash were poured The 
 complete interstratification of the beds of 
 erupted material with the lower portion of 
 the sandstones proves that the volcanic action 
 showed itself at the beginning .of the deposi- 
 tion of the Upper Old Red Sandstone in this 
 region. Another little vent may be observed 
 on the Caithness coast, near John o* Groat's 
 House. Perhaps some may still remain to be
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 noticed among the central and northern mem- 
 bers of the Orkney Islands. It seems to 
 have been a singular and local outburst of 
 volcanic energy during Upper Old Red Sand- 
 stone times the only one yet discovered to 
 the north of the Highlands. The uppermost 
 bar, then, of the pedestal on which the Old 
 Man has taken his stand is a massive sheet of 
 lava. 
 
 The lower bar belongs to a very different 
 period, and has a , totally dissimilar history. 
 Its component strata have been upturned and 
 worn away before the eruption of the lava, 
 which had rolled over their broken and bared 
 edges. On looking more closely into these 
 strata, which, even seen from the sea, present 
 such a contrast in disposition to the lava and 
 overlying sandstones, we find that they 
 consist of dark, thin-bedded sandstones, 
 shales, and impure limestones. In short, 
 they are a portion of the great series of de- 
 posits known as the Caithness flagstones of 
 the Lower Old Red Sandstone. From many 
 of their exposed surfaces shin ng, jet-black 
 scales, bones, and teeth of the characteristic 
 fishes of these flagstones project. What a 
 suggestive picture of the imperfection of the 
 geological record is presented to us by some 
 of these weather-beaten or surf-worn sheets 
 of rock ! We pick up from their crannies 
 broken whelks, nullipores, and corallines, 
 tossed up by the last storm from the zones of 
 life now tenanting the sea below us. The 
 limpet and sea-anemone, the whelk and bar- 
 nacle, are clinging to the hardened sand over 
 which, while it was still soft, the Osteolepis 
 and Coccoteus and their bone-cased brethren 
 disported in the ancient northern lake of 
 Lower Old Red Sandstone times. Nay, we 
 may now and then watch a living mollusk 
 creeping over the cuirass of a palaeozoic fish. 
 Yet who can realize the lapse of time which 
 here separates the living from the dead ? 
 
 Below and beyond the horizon of the flag- 
 stones no evidence among the Hoy cliffs re- 
 mains to lead us. But in the neighboring 
 isles of Pomona and Gremsa, bosses of crys- 
 talline rocks granite, gneiss, and sch sts 
 project from under the flagstones, and are 
 wrapped round with conglomerates, doubt- 
 less representing islets with the shore-gravel 
 heaped up around them when they rose out 
 of the Old Red Sandstone lake. 
 
 So iruch for the materials out of which the 
 Old Man has been carved. And now a few 
 words as to the process of carving. If the 
 traveler who has reached Stromness finds 
 himself with even one spare day at his dis- 
 posal, he cannot employ it to more conspicu- 
 ous advantage than by taking a boat with a 
 couple of stalwart, Norse-like Orcadian boat- 
 men, crossing the strait to Hoy, and ascend- 
 ing that island by the Cam and the north- 
 western headland, with its rock-grit corry and 
 glacier-moraines, until he finds himself at the 
 summit of the great western precipice, with 
 th surface of the surging Atlantic some 1 , 300 
 
 | feet below him. The scene tells its own tale 
 i of ceaseless waste, and needs no lecture or 
 text-book for its comprehension. Pinnacle! 
 and turrets of richly tinted yellow and red 
 sandstone roughen the upper edge of the 
 cliff, often fretted into the strangest shapes, 
 and worn into such perilous narrowness of 
 base that they seemed doomed'to go headlong 
 down info the gulf below when the next 
 tempest sweeps across from the west. But 
 tresses, sorely rifted and honey-combed, lean 
 against the main cliff as'if to prop it up ; but 
 separated from it by the yawning fissures 
 which will surely widen until they wedge off 
 the projecting masses, and strip huge slices 
 from the face of the cliff. One see-, as it 
 were, every step in the progress of degrada- 
 tion. It is by this prolonged splitting and 
 slicing and fretting that the precipice has 
 been made to recede, and has acquired its 
 shattered but picturesque contours. The 
 Old Man is thus a monument of the retreat 
 and destruction of the cliffs of which it once 
 formed a part. To what accidental circum- 
 stance it may have owed its isolation cannot 
 be affirmed with certainty. But it shares in 
 the prevalent decay. Every year must in- 
 sensibly tell upon its features. 
 
 On the caimest day some motion of air al- 
 ways plays about the giddy crest of these 
 precipices, and a surge with creaming lines of 
 white foam sweeps around their base. But 
 when a westerly gale sets in, the scene is 
 said to be wholly indescribable. The cliffs are 
 then enveloped in driving spray torn from the 
 solid sheets of water which rush up the w?jls 
 of rock for a hundred feet or more, and roll 
 back into thousands of tumultuous waterfalls. 
 The fo-ce of the wind is such as actually to 
 loosen the weathered parts of the rock and 
 dislodge them. Thus along the mossy sur- 
 face of the slope, which ascends inland from 
 the edge of the cliff, large flat pieces of 
 naked stone may be picked up by scores lying 
 on the heather and coarse grass, whither they 
 have been whirled up from the shattered crags 
 by successive gusts of the storms. 
 
 The destruction of this coast-line has not 
 yet, however, wholly effaced traces of other 
 powers of waste which have long since passed 
 away. On the very edge of the cliff, to the 
 southeast of the Old Man, some well-pre- 
 served striations on the sandstone point to 
 the movement of the ice-sheet of the glacial 
 period across even the hilly island of Hoy in 
 a N.W. and S.E. direction. Again, in the 
 green corry at the Cam of Hoy, some beau- 
 tifully perfect little moraines remain to show 
 that after the great land ice had subsided the 
 snow-fall in these northern regions continued 
 heavy enough to nourish in so small an 
 island as Hoy groups of valley glaciers. 
 Though the general form of the hills and val- 
 leys remains now much as it was when the 
 last lingering glacier melted away, there have 
 been stupendous changes since then in the 
 shaping of the precipices. At that time tlie
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 il 
 
 Old Man still formed a portion of the solid 
 cliff. It is in the ensuing interval that this 
 impressing landmark has been left during the 
 destruction of the surrounding masses. Long 
 
 may he be able to stand his ground! When, slowly widened above, while the breakers 
 
 his last hour comes, as come it must, may 
 some reverential geologist, duly impressed 
 with a sense of the might of denudation in 
 the sculpture of the land, be there- to pay the 
 last honors to his dust! 
 
 In the scenery of the British Islands no 
 geological formation plays a more varied part 
 than the Old Red Sandstone, and nowhere 
 can its characteristic landscapes be more in- 
 structively seen than in these tar northern dis- 
 tricts of Scotland. In Hoy, for example, the 
 upper sandstones rise in a group ol smooth 
 dome-shaped hi Is, which, from all sides, 
 stand out in striking contrast to every other 
 form of ground within sight. In Caithness 
 the lower sandstones and conglomerates have 
 concentrated all their efforts on the produc- 
 tion of the one solitary mountain of that 
 country Morven a graceful cone, which so 
 towers above the moors on the one side and 
 the sea on the other as to form one of the 
 most notable landmarks in the north of Scot- 
 land. But on the coast-line, where the rocks 
 assert most strongly their individuality of 
 character, swept bare of all protecting soil by 
 the restless and resistless surge, their minu- 
 test points of structure are so exposed as to 
 affect even the most delicate lineaments of the 
 cliffs. The two fundamenta structures, bed- 
 ding and jointing, are developed with a tren- 
 chant emphasis, which gives a dominant char- 
 acter to the scenery of the shores of 
 Caithness and Orkney. Walls of flagstone 
 several hundred feet high, are seen from base 
 to summit to consist of thin parallel bands of 
 horizontal or gently-inclined strata. These 
 beds, though everywhere singularly durable, 
 vary slightly in their powers of resistance to 
 the elements. The less tenacious layers are 
 eaten away, while the harder project beyond 
 
 be driven home. In another case, the wedge 
 has gone down to the very base of the cliff. 
 The disjointed buttress is severed from the 
 main mass by a yawning rent, which will be 
 
 breach it below, until the whole will fall into 
 the surf, and expose the naked cliff behind to 
 a repetition of the same waste. 
 
 If the joints are vertical the resulting face 
 of the precipice will be vertical also; and this 
 fact, combined with the singular durability of 
 the flagstone, accounts for the sheer walls 
 by which so much of Caithness and Orkney 
 is girdled round. Any deviation from verti- 
 cality in the joints will of course produce a 
 corresponding departure in the resulting cliff. 
 Henc"e where, as often happens in these re- 
 gions, the joints are slightly inclined land- 
 wards, the precipices are actually made to 
 overhang. In such cases it is easy to show 
 that the beetling wails are not really eaten 
 away faster by the waves below than by the 
 subaerial agents above. 
 
 Another singular feature of these northern 
 coasts is the number olgios, or narrow steep- 
 walled gullies, or inlets, bv which the sea- 
 cliffs are indented. Here again we trace the 
 dominant influence of the joints. In fact, 
 the waste of these shores may be compared to 
 a gigantic process of quarrying, wherein the 
 rains, snows and frosts above, the springs 
 and trickling waters within, and the breakers 
 below, are the unwearying workmen. 
 Whether the sea-wall is demoiished uniform- 
 ly, or portions of it are allowed to remain as 
 projecting buttresses, or isolated into massive 
 quadrangular sea-stacks, or cut into deep 
 narrow recesses, nature works along the 
 joints as quarrymen would do, and thus the 
 massive architectural character of these cliffs 
 is preserved. At the same time the slow 
 progress of atmospheric waste sculptures the 
 bare wall of rock into its characteristically 
 striped and fretted surface, and brings out the 
 peculiar weather-tint of each bed, from deep- 
 
 them. Hence the precipices are fretted into ( est indigo to palest emerald-green. On some 
 
 alternate lines of cornice and frieze, which 
 can be followed by the eye from buttress to 
 buttress along the front of thest grim cliffs. 
 
 That the flagstone must, however, be en- 
 dowed on the whole with exceptional dura- 
 bility is shown by the striking verticality 
 which the precipices maintain. Their per- 
 pendicular walls are defined by the system of 
 joints which always traverse the rock vertically 
 
 of the ledges a scanty vegetation finds root, 
 and where the cliffs rise most inaccessibly 
 from the waves each cornice along their front 
 is the nestling-place of innu r.erable sea-birds, 
 whose shrill screams blend with the sough of 
 the wind and the monotonous cadence of the 
 surge into a wild northern music that wakens 
 many a chord in the heart of one to whom the 
 elemental sounds of nature are ever dear. No 
 
 or at high angles. Slice after slice is wedged sooner do we step off the Old Red Sandstone 
 
 off by means of these joints, and in this way 
 the perpendicular front of the cliffs is main- 
 tained. In many places the observer may 
 watch the process of sculpture in successive 
 stages of progress. He will notice that, as a 
 rule, the dismemberment begins at the top of 
 the cliff, where the agents are not the break- 
 ers of the ocean, but rain, frost, and the 
 other powers of the air. A joint may be 
 observed to gape a little at the summit of the 
 precipice, where nature's wedge has begun to 
 
 than these singularly chai acteristic and per- 
 sistent features disappear. The contrast pre- 
 sented by some of the other rocks of the 
 North must strike every observer, even one 
 to whom the very name of geology is un- 
 known. The traveler who journeys west- 
 ward into Sutherlandshire encounters many 
 varieties of coast scenery, but he leaves be- 
 hind him the peculiar cliffs of the Caithness 
 flagstones. At one point he is confronted 
 with gleaming precipices ana steep acclivi-
 
 12 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 ties of white glistening quartzite, at another 
 he beholds vast sea-walls of a sombre dull 
 red sandstone, even more cofossal than those 
 of Caithness, but wanting in those charms of 
 light and shade, wealth of color, and multi- 
 plicity of detail in form, which give the flag- 
 stone scenery so defined a character. Per- 
 haps the greatest contrast is to be seen among 
 the gneiss precipices of Cape Wrath. That 
 northwestern headland of Scotland is com- 
 posed of the oldest rock in Britain, and one 
 that from its tough, massive, gnarled aspect 
 is well worthy of its position as the founda- 
 tion on which the geological structure of 
 these islands has been erected. Rising into 
 a range of singularly scarped and rugged 
 cliffs, it bears the full brunt of every storm 
 that sweeps across the open Atlantic. Every 
 weak part of its framework is discovered by the 
 powerful battery of breakers, and is hollowed 
 into tunnel, cave, or gully, while the harder 
 parts tower up into fantastic columns or but 
 tresses. It possesses no symmetry of struc- 
 ture like that of bedding and jointing among 
 the flagstones. Huge tortuous veins of a 
 coarse kind of granite run up the face of the 
 cliffr, reminding one of the prominent sinews 
 of some antique statue. The main mass of 
 .the rock through which these veins interlace 
 is of a dull dusky green or livid gray, while 
 the veins themselves stand out in pale flesh 
 color, so that even from a distance of several 
 miles this singular feature of tne cliffs may be 
 distinctly seen. 
 
 As still another illustration of the intimate 
 dependence of our rocky co;st scenery upon 
 geological structure, reference may be made 
 to the range of cliffs on the southeastern 
 margin of Scotland on either side of St. Abb's 
 Head. Here the bedding of the rocks is al- 
 most as plainly marked as among the flag- 
 stones of Caithness. But the strata, instead 
 of lying in horizontal or gently-inclined un- 
 disturbed succession, have been thrown into 
 huge folds which sweep from summit to base 
 of precipices sometimes five hundred feet 
 high. The lines of stratification conse- 
 quently curve to and fro among the cliffs, 
 carrying with them their successive bars of 
 massive graywacke or fissile shale. An in- 
 tricate system of minor cross-joints causes 
 these bands of rocks to split up into irregular 
 blocks, while by a set of large but somewhat 
 ill-defined joints the cliffs are cleft into vast 
 irregular bastions and recesses. On one of 
 these projecting crags the ruined fortalice of 
 Fast Castle the prototype of Scott's Castle 
 of Ravenswood: is perched. Here and there 
 at the base of the cliffs are sheltered caves, 
 once favorite haunts of smugglers, now hardly 
 ever disturbed by human voices. Gaunt sea- 
 stacks, once part of the main cliff, but now 
 isolated amid the surf, stand up in front and 
 are favori.e resting-places for crowds of sea- 
 fowl. On all of these rock-faces, whether 
 main precipice or detached outlier, the pe- 
 .culiar contour of the curved strata may be 
 
 traced, giving the scenery a character of its 
 own, which only reappears with the recurrence 
 of the same kind of geological structure. 
 
 THE BARON'S STONE OF KIL- 
 LOCHAN. 
 
 On a gentle green declivif" that slopes 
 down to the Water of Girvan, ai.ti within sight 
 of the broad Firth of Clyde, which the Girvan 
 enters only three miles farther down the val- 
 ley, stands a large gray block of granite, 
 known in the district as the Baron's Stone of 
 Killochan. From this stone looking seaward, 
 on a clear day, when a breeze from the north- 
 west has freshened the Firth into deepest 
 azure, you can see, far away beyond the bold 
 headlands of Carrick, the long, blue lines of 
 the hills of Antrim. And if you go but a few 
 yards up the hill you may trace these faint 
 promontories vanishing into the west, and 
 then the long low hills of Cantyre bounding 
 the western horizon, while in the midst of 
 the wide stretch of sea Ailsa Craig lifts its 
 scarred sides 1,100 feet above the surf that 
 beats about their base. The nearer land- 
 scape is formed by the valley of the Girvan, 
 narrow and straight, with a ridge of green 
 hills about 1,000 feet high on the south side, 
 a range of lower wooded eminences on the 
 north, and the river winding in endless curves 
 along the bottom. Looking up this valley, 
 the eye wanders with delight over a mingled 
 grouping of woodland and meadow, revealing 
 here and there a reach of the blue stream and 
 a strip of soft bright pasture. The woods 
 climb up boldly along the hillsides, overshad- 
 owing every little dingle and watercourse, 
 and so sweeping onward up the valley, in 
 every tint of green, and every variety of mass 
 and outline, until a bend of the hills closes in 
 the view. Even as a piece of scenery, this 
 vale of the Girvan, though less known than 
 many others in the lowlands of Scotland, has 
 a charm which these often want. There is 
 one respect, at least, wherein it has a peculiar 
 interest. I know of few Scottish landscapes 
 so circumscribed in extent, yet into which are 
 crowded so many human associations of by- 
 gone limes. On the hill-tops that look down 
 upon us are the mouldering ramparts of the 
 earthen forts of the early races. From the 
 lower grounds the plow and harrow have long 
 effaced suca antique memorials ; but the tra- 
 ditions of the primitive people survive in the 
 very names of the hamlets and meadows. 
 From these names we learn of Culdee saints 
 to whom shrines were erected all down the 
 course of the Girvan. And we see how the 
 natives were Celtic, speaking the same lan- 
 guage that still survives in the Highlands, 
 and displaying the same nice discrimination 
 and poetic turn of thought in the choice of 
 names for their r vers, and crags, and hills. 
 The castles of feudal times have survived
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 better in this district of Ayrshire than in 
 most other parts of Scotland. There are the 
 remains of at least a dozen of them in the 
 lower sixteen miles of the Girvan valley. 
 Most of these, indeed, are ruinous ; but some 
 still form part of more modern mansions, and 
 at least one the old house of Killochan re- 
 mains nearly as it was some three hundred 
 years ago. Nor are these merely interesting 
 from their antiquity. Each is linked more or 
 less closely with the history of the district, 
 and sometimes not of the district only, but 
 of the kingdom at large. For the barons of 
 Carrick were a warlike race, ever at feud 
 either with each other or with their neigh- 
 bors in the adjoining sheriffdoms, and they 
 had power enough to make themselves of 
 consequence for good or ill to the govern- 
 ment of the realm. But of the barons more 
 anon. 
 
 Looking at the great size and weight of 
 the Stone of Killochan, one is tempted at the 
 very first to ask how so large a blojk came to 
 be where it now lies. It measures roughly 
 about 480 cubic feet, and must thus weigh 
 somewhere about thirty-seven tons. There 
 are no overhanging crags from which it could 
 have rolled. It stands high above the river, 
 and fully one hundred feet above the sea, so 
 that we can scarcely imagine it to have been 
 washed down by floods, even if its great size 
 did not forbid such a supposition. But our 
 surprise increases wh.n we find that this 
 great mass of rock consists entirely of a close- 
 grained granite. There is in the neighbor- 
 hood no granite hill f:om which it could have 
 been detached. Silurian grits, slates and 
 limestones, Old red sandstones and conglom- 
 erates, Carboniferous shales, freestones and 
 coals, form all the surrounding country ; but 
 there is no granite. Whence, then, came the 
 Baron's Stone? Perhaps a casual visitor 
 might be bold enough to imagine that it was 
 brought up from the coast by some of the 
 old barons, having been shipped across from 
 Arran. The size of the boulder, however, is 
 enough of itself to show the absurdity of such 
 a notion. Let the visitor step down to the 
 margin of the river and look at the blocks of 
 granite less, indeed, in size, but similar in 
 composition and form which are lying by 
 scores along the watercourse. Let him turn 
 eastward into the picturesque little dell, by the 
 side of which lies th, carriage-way to the 
 castle. In the bed of the rivulet he will see 
 another set of large granite boulders, one of 
 them containing about 200 cubic feet of stone. 
 Throughout the whole valley, in short, he 
 can hardly turn anywhere without encounter- 
 ing similar boulders. They have been mostly 
 cleared off the cultivated places, and may be 
 seen gathered into groups at the corners of 
 the fields. They crowd the bottom of all 
 the streamlets. The field fences are built of 
 them ; road walls, doorposts, lintels, even 
 entire cottages, have been made out of these 
 Widely-distributed stones. The old barons 
 
 would have had but a sorry time of it had 
 their days been spent in bringing granite 
 boulders from a distance to mar their own 
 fields and cumber their moors and hillsides, 
 already barren enough by nature. They could 
 then have enjoyed but little leisure for the 
 pastime of killing and maiming each other. 
 And yet all the barons of Carrick, with all 
 their vassals and retainers to boot, working 
 hard together for five hundred years, could 
 not have done a thousandth part of the wo:k. 
 So conspicuous a feature in the scenery of 
 the country could not well escape notice, es- 
 pecially in early times, when a supernatural 
 origin was easily found for what could not 
 otherwise be readily explained. I have not 
 yet been able to recover any of these tradi- 
 tional theories about the boulders in this part 
 of Scotland. They still exist, however, in 
 other districts ; and, as a good sample of the 
 class, especially in the way of showing the 
 dry humor which enters so largely into the 
 elfin legend north of the Tweed, I may quote 
 one which came under my own notice some 
 time ago in Clydesdale. Not many miles 
 I above the Falls of Clyde the river makes 
 some serpentine curves through a wide allu- 
 vial plain. One of these bends approaches 
 the village of Carnwath, and the stream has 
 there cut away part of a bank of soft clay 
 and sand, on which are scattered a number 
 of blocks of greenstone. An intelligent na- 
 tive of Carnwath, to \vnom I applied for 
 information about the former number of 
 boulders, told me that in his boyhood the 
 ground between the river and the Yelping 
 Craig, about two miles off, was literally 
 strewed over with blocks of all sizes, up to 
 masses six feet or more in height. So abund* 
 ant were they to the southwest of Carnwath, 
 that one tract was known as the ' ' Hell 
 Stanes Gate," i.e., road, and another as the 
 " Hell Stanes Loan." The stones have now 
 well-nigh disappeared under the sway of the 
 farmers, but the old legend of their origin 
 still remains. My informant, after pointing 
 out the graves of some of the larger boulders 
 and the broken remains of others, went on to 
 tell how, in old times, Michael Scott and the 
 devil had entered into a compact with a band 
 of witches to dam back the Clyde. It was 
 one ot the conditions of the agreement that 
 the na.ne of the Supreme Being shou d never 
 on any account be mentioned. All went well 
 for awhile ; some of the more stalwart spirits 
 having brought their burden of boulders to 
 within a few yards from the edge of the river, 
 when one of the younger members of the 
 company, staggering under the weight of a 
 huge block of greenstone, exclaimed, "O 
 Lord, but I'm tired." Instantly every boul- 
 der tumbled to the ground, nor could either 
 witch, warlock, or devil move a single stone 
 one step thereafter. And there the blocks 
 lay for many a long century, until the indus- 
 trious farmers quarried and blasted and 
 buried them.
 
 14 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 There can be little doubt that the elfins of 
 old were not less busy in Carrick, though the 
 records of their doings have faded from tra- 
 dition. It is still told, however, that one 
 witch, of more than ordinary audacity and 
 strength, lifted a great hill from the Ayrshire 
 uplands, and, putting it in her apron, made 
 off through the air for Ireland. But, as bad 
 luck would have it, the apron strings broke 
 on the passage, and the hill fell with a fear- 
 ful plunge into the Firth, where it still 
 remains, under the name of Ailsa Craig. The 
 only original account of the boulders of the 
 Girvan valley which has come under my no- 
 tice was that of a mason, who, when asked 
 his idea of the endless blocks of gr nite that 
 dot the fields and hillsides like flecks of 
 sheep, gravely remarked that "when the 
 Almichtie flang the warld out, He maun ha'e 
 putten thae stanes upon her to keep her 
 steady." 
 
 Supernatural agency failing us, we come 
 back again to the question, Whence came 
 the Baron's Stone of Killochan and all its 
 kindred boulders ? There is, as every tourist 
 knows, a great mass of granite in Arran. It 
 rises into the noble cone of Goatfell, and 
 forms the chains of jagged peaks that over- 
 shadow the defiles of Glen Rosa and Glen 
 Sannox. But this granite is not the same as 
 that of the Carrick boulders. It differs in 
 texture, partly also in composition, and in 
 certain rdineralogical peculiarities which need 
 not be specified here. There can, indeed, be 
 no doub. whatever that the boulders did not 
 come from Arran. Where, then, is their 
 source to be sought? Let us in imagination 
 make our way up the valley of the Girvan, 
 and note as we go such changes of scenery 
 and rock as may chance to throw light on the 
 matter. The lower or seaward portion of 
 the river's course runs along the northern 
 base of a tolerably steep line of hills, rising, 
 as I have said, to heights of over a thousand 
 feet, and sweeping away southward and east- 
 ward into the wild mountainous uplands of 
 Carrick and Galloway. After skirting these 
 hills for about sixteen miles, among woodlands 
 and pleasure-grounds, and past the remains 
 of ancient strongholds, toe course of the 
 stream bends round at nearly a right angle 
 toward the south, and enters the uplands 
 through a narrow and deep defile. Looking 
 up this straitened valley, the cultivated coun- 
 try lies all behind us, while in front are the 
 lonely hills. The change of scenery takes 
 place so suddenly that no sooner do we plunge 
 into the chain of hills than the rich woods 
 and cornfields disappear; steep, grassy and 
 rocky declivities descend abruptly upon the 
 narrowed strip of alluvial soil that borders 
 the river; trees occur only at intervals, and 
 chiefly down the watercourses; the herbage 
 p-ows more and more heathy, and traces of 
 cultivation more and more scanty, until, as 
 we wind up the valley, we at last take leave 
 of all signs of human habita ion, and enter 
 
 upon a region of wide, desolate, treeless 
 moorland, and gray craggy mountain. The 
 lower parts of the course of the Girvan lie 
 chiefly upon the various members of the 
 Carboniferous series of rocks. But the upper 
 portion, which winds through the highgrounds v 
 has been hollowed out of the northern margin 
 of the wide band of Silurian rocks stretching; 
 entirely across the south of Scotland from the 
 Irish Sea to the German Ocean. These Si- 
 lurian strata, bent and broken like crumpled- 
 parchments, presenting at the surface everjr 
 variety of crag and knoll, dingle and dell, 
 rounded hill, steep precipice, and rough, 
 ril ggcd mountain, form the whol of the 
 wide uplands of Carrick and Galloway, where 
 they mount to a height of more than 2,700- 
 feet above the sea. It is on the northern 
 flank of the highest chain f the great cen- 
 tral group of hills that the Girvan has its. 
 source. Following its course upward from 
 the lowland country, we find the same abund- 
 ance of boulders in the narrowed valley as in. 
 the more open parts toward the sea. Still 
 we fail to trace any granite forming a solid 
 part of a hill. Conglomerate, shale, grit, por- 
 phyry, and other kinds of rock, crop out 
 along the sides of the glens, but without 
 any symptoms of granite. And yet the gran- 
 ite boulders, gray and lichened, are strewed. 
 over these hillsides, just as they were seen far 
 down over the Carboniferous strata of the low 
 grounds. At a height of between 700 and- 
 800 feet above the sea there are some remark- 
 able mounds on our way, formed of loose 
 earth and clay, with abundance of boulders. 
 of various Silurian rocks, and here and there 
 with large blocks of granite strewed over their 
 surface. Similar mounds occur higher up, 
 and all the interval is studded as usual with 
 granite boulders. Still we can see no granite- 
 in place. Passing one or two small lakes or 
 lochans, which receive and discharge the 
 waters of the Girvan in an undulating mossy 
 tract of ground, we begin to be utterly amazed: 
 at the prodigious quantity as well as the great 
 size of the granite blocks. Gray and lichen- 
 crusted, or crumbling into sand, they are 
 scattered over the valley by thousands. They 
 lie on all manner of declivities, sometimes on 
 mounds of rubbish, sometimes on prominent 
 ridges of rocks, and sometimes half-buried in 
 peat-bogs, like groups of "laired" cattle. 
 Moreover, as we rise with this broken ground,, 
 our eyes are struck with the strange hum- 
 mocky shapes into which the hillsides have 
 been worn. The solid rock comes almost 
 everywhere to the daylight in the form of 
 rounded knolls and hollows, which, especially 
 where they have been preserved from the- 
 wear and tear of the weather by a coating of 
 turf or soil, have a singularly smooth and 
 polished appearance, which is rendered all 
 the more marked, seeing that the edges of 
 the vertical strata have been ground down, 
 into one common undulating surface. Oft 
 such rounded and polished bosses of rock the:
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 ne*er-failing granite boulders may be seen at 
 every turn. At length the valley narrows in 
 a scene of strange lonely giandeur. The 
 Drawling brook it no longer merits the title 
 of river throws its amber waters into foam 
 over endless boulders that choke up its chan- 
 nel. And then, where the torrent breaks 
 impatiently from the lower end of another 
 lochan, among hardened beds of Silurian grit 
 and shale, we enter upon a great mass of 
 granite, which forms the remaining mile of 
 the course of the Girvan, and rises high on 
 either hand into gray rugged hills. Crags of 
 granite of every size and form stand up 
 bleached and barren from the brown heath. 
 Blocks ot granite in endless varieties of bulk 
 and shape lie strewed about, beneath and 
 around the crags from which they have been 
 detached. The river issues from a little tarn, 
 called Loch Girvan Eye, filling a rock-basin 
 in the granite, 1,600 feet above the sea. 
 Round this sheet of water the rugged ground 
 is cumbered with blocks that seem just waiting 
 their turn to be borne away down to the lower 
 grounds. To the south, a high bleak moun- 
 tain ridge ascends to an elevation of 2,700 feet 
 above the sea, and 1,100 over the parent tarn 
 of the Girvan. Here, then, at last is the 
 source of the granite boulders of the valley. 
 It was from these lonely hillsides that the 
 Baron's Stone of Killochan was carried. 
 
 From these high grounds millions of 
 boulders of all sizes, up to masses weighing 
 at least thirty or forty tons, have been borne 
 seaward and strewed over the lower hills and 
 valleys of Carrick. What agency could trans- 
 port them ? It is plain that no flood of fresh 
 water could have scattered them, for they are 
 oft.n perched on the hill-tops 800 or 900 feet 
 above the valleys in which the streams are 
 running. Nor is it conceivable that at a 
 former time, when the level of the land was 
 much lower than it is now, any great ocean- 
 wave could have taken its rise within a limited 
 area of what is now the highest ground in the 
 south of Scotland, and carried with it in one 
 vast resistless debacle such enormous quanti- 
 ties of boulders, so as not merely to bring 
 them down into deep confined valleys, but 
 actually to sweep them up again'to the sum- 
 mits of the seaward hills. 
 
 Such work as this could have been done 
 by only one agency in nature that of ice. 
 
 When we once embrace the idea that the 
 transport of these endless heaps ot boulders 
 has been effected by ice, the difficulties which 
 previously seemed insuperable one by one 
 disappear. And the more we examine into 
 the facts of the case, the more firm becomes 
 our conviction that this, after all, is the true 
 theory. Looking at the Carrick hills with 
 an eye that has been trained in the study 
 of what are known as glacial phenomena, 
 the geologist sees at every turn traces of a time 
 when one wide mantle of ice and snow was 
 thrown far and wide over the hills and valleys. 
 The peculiarly-shaped hummocks and bosses 
 
 of rock, so shorn and smoothed, recall at 
 once the roches moutonn/es, or ice-worn rocks, 
 of Alpine valleys. The huge blocks of 
 granite strewed along the hillsides remind 
 one of the blocs perches that abound on the 
 flanks of the Swiss mountains, where they 
 have been left by the retreating glaciers. The 
 mounds of earth and rubbish, noted in the 
 ascent of the course of the Girvan, are quite 
 comparable with the moraines or rubbish- 
 heaps that are shed f-om the' ends of glaciers 
 at the present day. Indeed, the whole con- 
 tour of the ground, especially in the upper 
 parts of the Girvan valley, suggests at a 
 glance the former existence there of a mas- 
 sive sheet of ice which, descending cease- 
 lessly from the higher tracts toward the sea, 
 ground down and smoothed the surface of 
 the rocks over which it moved. I have no- 
 ticed in these uplands many examples of what 
 are known as ' ' dressed surfaces " on the 
 rocks, and they are well seen in many places 
 near the sea. These " dressings " are long 
 ruts, scratches, and fine striae, running in a 
 determinate line across the smoothed sur- 
 faces of the rocks. They look like what 
 might be artificially produced by pushing^ 
 sand, gravel, and stones, under enormous 
 pressure, along a polished plane of rock. 
 And there cannot be any doubt that it was 
 really by the attrition of such materials that 
 the scratches were made, and that the pres- 
 sure and onward movement were given by 
 the vast overlying bed of ice. Similar dress 
 ings are familiar features of the rocks in 
 Al.-ine valleys, where the trend of the striae- 
 runs in the same line as the valley that is, of 
 course, in the direction in which the glacier 
 has moved. 
 
 The water which percolates through the 
 I numerous joints and fissures of a rocky cliff 
 1 and freezes there in winter, widens by its 
 expansion the crevices it occupies. This 
 j operation being often repeated, there comes 
 ' at last a time when the wedges of ice have 
 j so effectually sundered a mass from its parent 
 I cliff that it falls headlong into the valley. 
 j Should a glacier occupy the bottom of the 
 valley below, the loosened rocks gather in 
 heaps on the surface of the ice. Once there, 
 they are slowly and steadily carried down t-ie 
 valley until unless some rent in the ice 
 should swallow them up by the way they 
 are thrown down at the end of the glacier, 
 perhaps many leagues from the cliffs whence 
 they originally came. In high northern lati- 
 | tudes the glaciers, instead of melting far in 
 | the interior of the country, as those of the 
 Alps do, actually push their way out to sea, 
 and break off in vast masses, which float 
 away seaward as icebergs. It is clear that, 
 if the surface of the glacier has been cum- 
 bered with boulders and rocky rubbish in the- 
 inland glens, it will carry this burden with it 
 as it moves down to the sea-level ; and the 
 masses of ice which break off from the end 
 of the glacier will, in like manner, bear their
 
 16 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 cargoes of earth and stones as they journey 
 over the ocean. And, as these ice-islands 
 melt away, their rocky cargoes must be scat- 
 tered far and wide over the bottom of the sea. 
 By this system of transport the ruins of many 
 an Arctic valley are strewn over the fjords 
 and sounds of Greenland. 
 
 At the time when the granite boulders of 
 Carrick were transported from their original 
 home among the hills, the land was so deeply 
 buried under snow and ice that a massive 
 ice-sheet crept down to the sea-level from the 
 mountains of Carrick and Galloway, filling 
 up the valleys and overriding the lower hills, 
 even up to a height of more than 1,000 feet 
 above the present sea-level. The more pre- 
 cipitous eminences of the uplands rose above 
 the surface of the ice on which they shed 
 their frost-broken boulders of granite. Not 
 improbably at tne time of extremest cold the 
 ice-sheet descended to the sea, and may have 
 advanced for some way into its waters, where 
 its margin bro^e up into fleets of bergs that 
 sailed away seaward, dropping over the sub- 
 merged land their freight of granite boulders. 
 As happens within the Arctic circle at the 
 present day, the cold may have been so in- 
 tense as to freeze the waters of the ocean 
 and invest the coast-line of that ancient 
 Scotland with a solid encrusting zone of ice. 
 Such an ice-cake would envelop many a 
 stone lying along the beach, and, when bro- 
 ken up by the storms of summer, would carry 
 its imprisoned boulders away to ssa, and 
 finally drop them on the bottom. It is far 
 from improbable that this process was also in 
 play during the long migration of the Carrick 
 boulders. There still exist, in abundance, 
 along some parts of the shores of the Clyde 
 estuary, the remains of the shells which ten- 
 anted the sea during this cold era in our 
 country's past history. Many of these shells 
 are still natives of the neighboring firth; 
 some, however, and these often the most 
 abundant, have long since died out in the 
 British seas, though they still flourish in the 
 waters of the Arctic Ocean. They are nat- 
 urally adapted to a cold climate; and their 
 abundance in the old sea-bottoms of the gla- 
 cial period that occur on the west coast, 
 affords a curious corroboration of the testi- 
 mony of the boulders that the climate of the 
 British Islands was once as severe as that of 
 modern Greenland. 
 
 So here at last is the history of the origin 
 of the Baron's Stone of Killochan. It once 
 formed part of a cliff, some 2,000 feet over 
 its present site, far away up among the lone- 
 ly mountains that look down upon Loch 
 Doon. And, when it occupied its place in 
 that cliff, the mountains around were cased 
 deep in snow, and the glens were clogged 
 wilh thick masses of ice which, with block- 
 covered surface, moved steadily seaward. 
 The granite cliff, like its representatives at 
 the present day, traversed in all directions 
 with joints and fissures, was liable to be 
 
 split up into large angular blocks. One of 
 these masses, weighing at least thirty-seven 
 tons, was loosened one day from its resting- 
 place and rolled down among the ruia of 
 boulders that lay heaped upon the glacier be- 
 low. With the ice in its steady seaward 
 progress, this granite boulder moved mil* 
 after mile over ice-buried hill and glen; re< 
 ceiving, doubtless, many a dint from brother 
 blocks hurried from their long silence in the 
 cliffs to join the rattle of the ice-borne heap) 
 beneath. Whether the transport was entire 
 ly done by the sheet of moving land-ice, oj 
 whether the last part of the journey was per, 
 formed upon a detached berg floating ofl 
 into the sea, may be matter of debate. But 
 this at least is certain, that, after traveling 
 some eighteen miles from its source, the 
 boulder was finally stranded on or near the 
 spot where it still remains. Many a shifting 
 scene has come over the face of the country 
 since then. The ice-fields have disappeared, 
 and with them the hairy elephants and woolly 
 rhinoceroses, reindeer and elks, which then 
 roamed over the land ; forests have sprung up 
 and departed; the river has worn its way 
 through cliffs of solid stone, and has rolled 
 out many a fair meadow; but there still 
 stands the granite boulder a silent memorial 
 of the long-vanished ice age. 
 
 But the Baron's Stone has another history, 
 and from this it takes its name. The granite 
 boulders of Carrick have served as an inex - 
 haustible quarry from the earliest times. 
 They may be seen forming a part of the ram- 
 parts of the hill forts of the early British 
 tribes. Set upright, they sometimes have 
 served as rough unchiseled monumental 
 stones. A rude carving may, indeed, be 
 traced on some of these monoliths. Thus, 
 on the eastern flanks of the Brown Carrick 
 Hill, a few miles south of the town of Ayr, 
 lies an oblong block of gray granite weighing 
 about two tons. It has evidently at one 
 time been upright, and on the original face, 
 which forms now the upper surface of the 
 stone, a rude cross has been carved, having 
 the same outline as the common monumental 
 crosses of the West Highlands. That the 
 stone served as a memorial of the dead can 
 hardly be doubted. So simple an explanation, 
 however, suited not the marvel-loving fancy 
 of the old Carrick men. Abercrummie, the 
 Episcopal curate of Maybo'.e, who was "out 
 ed" on the re-establishment of Presbyterian- 
 sm, wrote a "Description of Carrick" about 
 the close of the seventeenth century ; and, in 
 alluding to this sculptured stone, he calls it 
 ' 'a big whimstone, upon which there is the 
 dull figure of a Crosse ; which is alleged to 
 have been done by some venerable church- 
 man, who did mediat a pea e twixt the King 
 of the Picts and Scots ; and to give the more 
 authority to his proposall did in their sight, 
 by laying a crosse upon the stone, imprint 
 that figure thereon." Another legend repre- 
 sent-- the cross as the impression of Sir Will.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 17 
 
 Jam Wallace's sword, which, having been j short dumpy spire, like the cap of a pepper- 
 laid on the stone at nightfall, left its mold I box. Over the doorway is another indication 
 in the hard granite ere morning. A third of the advancing civilization of the time ; it 
 version of the story relates how Wallace is an inscription which runs thus : "This 
 fought single-handed against a host of Eng- work was begun the I of Marcbe 1586 Be 
 lishmen, and how his sword, happening to j Johne Cathcart of Carlton and He'ene Wai- 
 strike against the stone, cut its likeness i lace his ! 
 
 Spous. The name of the Lord is ane 
 strang tour and the rychteous in their trou- 
 blis rinnis into and findeth refuge. Prov 18 
 vers. lo." It is unnecessary to remark that 
 this is from an older translation of the Scrip- 
 tures than our authorized Version. The 
 house as appears from a curious set of carv- 
 ings inside, representing the founder with 
 his wife, and apparently his son and daugh- 
 ter took several years to build. It stands at 
 the edge of a flat strip of alluvial meadow 
 bordering the river, and is surrounded with 
 old trees and hedgerows, and a terraced 
 garden of the antique type. A year or two 
 after the completion of his architectural and 
 horticultural labors at Killochan, the Laird 
 was summoned to attend "the Leutennentis 
 Raid of Dumfreis." Like a great many 
 other lairds, he thought proper to stay away, 
 and was "delatit" in consequence. Next 
 year namely, at the close of 1601 he was 
 engaged, and his son with him, in one of the 
 most memorable feuds in Ayrshire. The 
 Laird of Bargany and the Eart of Cassilis, 
 both Kennedies, and both comparatively 
 young men, had long been at feud. Each 
 jealous of the other's power, they were ready 
 to fly to arms to avenge a real or fancied in- 
 sult, and it cost King James no little anxiety 
 to keep the peace between them. We find at 
 
 eluding the Laird himse'f, died on the field j one time the young Laird of Killochan sent 
 of Flodden. Alan, third Lord Cathcart, fell at by Bargany, his neighbor, to demand from 
 Pinkie. The son of the Flodden hero con- the Earl of Cassilis the origin of a calum- 
 trived to rouse the enmity of a branch of the | nious statement made by him. On another 
 Kennedies who had lands among the hills to occasion, when there was like to be blood 
 the south, and suffered the loss of his left j spilt between the rivals and their followers 
 hand, besides sundry cuttings and wound- j about the rents of certain fields near the sea, 
 ings about the face. His grandson makes a the old Laird Cathcart became surety for the 
 more notable figure in the history Choos- j peaceable settlement of the dispute. But 
 ing a pretty reach of the Girvan, a few hun- | these repeated quarrels, though quieted for a 
 dred yards east from the Baron's stone, where j time, left their dark sediment of malice and 
 possibly an older castle stood, he built a revenge in the breasts of both the chieftains. 
 quaint mansion on the banks of the river, "The King gart thame schaik handis," says 
 which still stands, and is known as the old the old chronicler of these feuds, "but not 
 House or Castle of Killochan. It is a char- with their hairttis." At last, at the end of 
 acteristic specimen of the Scottish architect- the year 1601, the Earl hearing that Bargany, 
 ure of the period a sort of passage from the j with a small band of friends and retainers, 
 old feudal keep or tower to the more recent I was on his way south from Ayr, assembled a 
 mansion-house. The need of a strongly- large armed force to waylay him. The two 
 fortified retreat, with loopholes and port- I parties met near Maybole ; Bargany, seeing 
 cullis, had ceased to exist ; but the builders ! the enormous disparity of numbers, tried to 
 still made their walls four or five feet thick, j avoid a combat, and rode on with one part of 
 and, though they were no longer afraid to j his horsemen, while the young Cathcart fol- 
 open out windows, they kept such openings j lowed at the head of the rest. But the Earl 
 
 thereon by the blow! 
 
 The barons of Carrick found the boulders 
 too hard to be dressed for the walls of their 
 castles ; but they used them with great effect 
 to form the foundations, as in the stately 
 castle of Dalquharran, on the banks of the 
 Girvan. In recent times, as already said, 
 they have been built into stone fences, cut 
 into gateposts, and squared into blocks, of 
 which tombstones and obelisks have been 
 made. 
 
 The Baron's Stone of Killochan, however, 
 does not seem ever to have had a tool upon 
 it, until, some years ago, the proprietor had 
 its name carved on its side to mark it as sa- 
 cred from the hands of the relentless farmer 
 Tradition tells that it served as the judgment 
 seat of the old barons of Killochan, where 
 they mustered their men, planned their raids, 
 shared the booty, and hanged or cut off the 
 heads of refractory prisoners. The family 
 name is Cathcart, and the property still re- 
 mains in their hands. They are said to trace 
 their genealogy back to the days of the Bruce, 
 a charter from whom still exists among the 
 family archives. Though overshadowed by 
 the power and influence of the Kennedies, 
 the Cathcarts played their parts in the troub- 
 lous history of Carrick. Three brothers, in- 
 
 as small as might be. They had been build- 
 ing flanking-towers so long, too, that they 
 could not but add one or two to the corners 
 of the house. Moreover, they must needs 
 cut the coping into embrasures, but instead 
 of leaving them free for harquebuss or cross- 
 bow, they peaceably surmounted each with a 
 
 and his company were determined to use 
 their advantage, and began to fire across the 
 valley. Bargany's men being now in danger, 
 he boldly rode forward with only two or three 
 friends, and, pushing into the heart of his 
 enemies, called out loudly for the Earl. 
 Fighting his way onward, he sooa had a host
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 before and behind him. After a brave resist- 
 ance, he was mortally wounded ; but his 
 horse bore him back to his own men, among 
 whom he died soon after. The chronicler 
 does not say what part the young Liird of 
 Killochan took in the fight. He mentions 
 the names of four comrades who dashed with 
 Bargany into the ranks of the enemy, but 
 Cathcart is not among them. 
 
 The next hundred years saw the reign of 
 the Charleses and thf Revolution, with the 
 weary warfare of religious intolerance be- 
 tween Presbytery and Episcopacy. Ayrshire 
 was a stronghold of the Presbyterians, and 
 its remoter hills served as a favorite retreat 
 from the authority of the Government The 
 old laird who built the house of Killochan 
 must have witnessed the earlier scene of that 
 long strife, for he was alive toward the close 
 of 1612. and in October of that year, "being 
 sick in bodie, but haill in mynd," he made 
 his will. He seems to have been in old age 
 imbued with a large measure of the re'igious 
 fervor of the period, if the words of Wodrow 
 as is probable, are to be referred to this indi- 
 vidual. "The old laird of Carltoun was ex- 
 traordinary at solving of cases of conscience," 
 says Wodrow, and he gives an instance of 
 how Dickson, who afterwards became a lead- 
 er among the Presbyterians, had his doubts 
 and fears as a student cleared away by the 
 graphic exhortations of the old laird to whom 
 he applied for relief. "The said Laird of 
 Carltoun," he adds, "was wonderfully holy 
 and heavenly in his family.and he had this pe- 
 culiar way: He retired awhile his lone, be with 
 him who would, before family worship, which 
 ordinarily was before dinner, and came direct- 
 ly out of his closet to worship ; and, be in the 
 family who would, he retired immediately 
 after worship to his closet till the meat was 
 et on the table, and then he came to dinner 
 nd was extremely pleasant, for ordinary, to 
 jis conversation." 
 
 Some of the latter lairds of Killochan have 
 been in the army ; but, though they have 
 lived very little on their estates in this part of 
 Scotland, they have, with praiseworthy rev- 
 erence, maintained the old house in its origi- 
 nal condition. The wainscot fittings, thick 
 mullioned windows, old-fashioned grates, 
 chairs, and cabinets, antique four-post beds 
 and faded hangings, with the quaint group- 
 ings of tree and terrace, and mossy lawn 
 round the building, still remain much as they 
 were during the lifetime of the builder. Nor 
 have they with less care guarded the oldest 
 of all their heirlooms ; and so, w tile 
 the progress of agriculture has ploughed 
 the fields, and swept away thousands 
 of the huge granite boulders which of 
 old cumbered the ground, the gentle 
 green slope that looks down on the 
 Girvan, and far away over to Ireland, 
 still keeps its memories of the past, 
 and its gray shattered Baron's Stone of 
 Killochan. 
 
 THE COLLIERS OF CARRICK. 
 
 Comparatively few of the many hundreds 
 of tourists who flock every summer to that 
 part of Scotland which the guide-books have 
 styled " The Land of Burns " find their way 
 farther south than "Alloway's auld haunted 
 kirk " and the famous "brig" which lay so 
 opportunely in Tarn o" Shant r's line of re- 
 treat. When the weather is clear they get a 
 distant view of the hills, which rise beyond 
 the Doon into a background that has neither 
 any striking outlines nor sufficient loftiness 
 to form a notable feature in the remoter land- 
 scape. And yet if the visitor whose tirae anc! 
 route are at his own disposal will bravely 
 penetrate these far uplands, he will find much, 
 both in the way of scenery and of historic and 
 legendary interest, to reward his enterprise. 
 It is a lonely pastoral region, deeply trenched 
 with long and narrow valleys, the seaward 
 portions of which are often well wooded and 
 contrast with the singularly bare though ver 
 dant aspect of the high grounds on either 
 side. The whole of that district was called 
 in old times Carrick a Celtic name still in 
 use among the people, and descriptive of the 
 rugged, rocky character of most of the sur- 
 face. The bones of the country seem indeed 
 everywhere to be sticking through the scanty 
 skin of soil and turf ; and yet the abundant 
 droves of black-faced sheep and black cattle, 
 and the stores of excellent butter and cheese 
 which every year come out of these hills to 
 the great markets, bear witness to the quality 
 of the pasture. It might have been hoped 
 that in so rocky a tract minerals of some sort 
 would be found to compensate for the com- 
 parative poorness of the surface. Many a 
 viewer and "prospector" has scoured the 
 sides of the hills and valleys. Copper, lead, 
 and iron in small quantities have been found; 
 but there seems no probability that the pas- 
 toral character of the country will ever be to 
 any serious extent disturbed by mining oper- 
 ations. And yet, curiously enough, in one 
 of the deep valleys on the northern margin of 
 the hilly tracts of Carrick a small coal-field 
 exists a little bit of the great Scottish coal- 
 field, which by some ancient terrestrial revo- 
 ution has got detached from the rest, and 
 become, as it were, jammed in between the 
 two steep sides of the valley of the Girvan. 
 
 The colliers of Scotland have been in all 
 time a distinct and superstitious population. 
 For many a long century they and the makers 
 of salt were slaves, bought and sold with the 
 and on which they were born, and from 
 which they had no more right to remove 
 :hemselves than if they had been of African 
 descent, and born in Carolina. Customs and 
 seliefs which had gradually died out elsewhere 
 naturally lingered for a time among- the co 1 - 
 iers ; and indeed until the general use of 
 steam machinery and the invasion of an Irish
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 19 
 
 laboring population, the Scottish miners 
 maintained much of their singularity. Down 
 in the little coal-field of Carrick, however, 
 shut out from the rest of the mining dis- 
 tricts, and even in no >mall degree from the 
 country at large, the colliers preserved until 
 only a few years ago many traits which we 
 are accustomed to think had died out several 
 generations before. No railway came near the 
 place ; no highway led through it. Lying near 
 the sea, it yet could boast of no good harbor 
 within reach to stimulate the coal industry. 
 Even the local demand for coal was too small 
 to admit of any extensive workings ; and so 
 the mining population continued the same 
 quaint old ways which it had been used to for 
 a century or two, keeping up, among other 
 things, many of 
 stitions. 
 
 its characteristic super- 
 
 Some years ago, on geological errand bent, 
 I had occasion to pass a number of months 
 in that sequestered locality, and to mingle 
 with the colliers themselves, as well as their 
 employers. In this way I was led to glean 
 reminiscences of habits and beliefs, now 
 nearly as extinct as the fossils in tho rocks 
 which were the more special objects of re- 
 search. These gleanings, as illustrating 
 former phases of our rural population, are 
 perhaps not unworthy of record I propose, 
 therefore, in the present paper to relate an 
 incident, peihaps one of the most striking in. 
 the history of coal-mining in this country, 
 which occurred in this little Girvan coal-field, 
 
 Much of my information was derived from 
 an old collier who was one of the survivors. 
 His narrative and that of the other contem- 
 poraries of the event brought out in a strong 
 light the superstition of the colliers, and fur- 
 nished additional evidence as to one of the 
 longest survivals without food of which au- 
 thentic record exists. 
 
 On the 6th October, 1835, in a remote 
 part of the old coal-mine of Kilgrammie, 
 near Dailly, John Brown, the hero of this 
 tragedy, was at work alone. Sixty-six 
 years of age, but hale in body and fond of 
 fun, he had long been a favorite with 
 his fellow- workmen, more especially with the 
 younger colliers, whom his humor and story- 
 telling used to bring to his side when their 
 own term of work was done. Many a time 
 would they take his pick from him and finish 
 his remaining task, while he sat on the floor 
 of the mine, and gave them his racy chat in 
 return. On the day in question he was apart 
 from the others, at the far end of a roadway. 
 While there an empty wagon came rumbling 
 along the rails, and stopped within a foot of 
 the edge of the hole in which his work lay. 
 Had it gone a few inches farther, it would 
 have fal en upon him and deprived him either 
 of limb or life. There seemed something so 
 thoughtless in such an act as the pushing of 
 a wagon upon him that he came up to see 
 which of his fellow workmen could have been 
 guilty of it. But nobody was there. He 
 shouted along the dark mine, but no sound 
 
 and which furnishes examples of several of j came back, save the echo of his own voice. 
 the more characteristic features of the old That evening when the men had gathered 
 
 Scottish collier. 
 
 In the quiet churchyard of Dailly, within 
 hearing of the gurgle of the Girvan and the 
 sough of the old pines of Dalquharran, lie 
 the unmarked graves of generations of col- 
 liers ; but among them is one with a tomb- 
 stone bearing the following inscription : 
 
 JOHN BRUVVN, COLLIER. 
 
 who was enclosed in 
 Kilgrammie Coal-pit, by a portion of it having 
 
 fallen in, 
 
 Oct. 8th, 1835, 
 
 and was taken out alive, 
 
 and in full possession of his mental faculties, 
 
 but in a very exhausted state, 
 
 Oct. 3ist, 
 
 having been twenty-three days in utter seclusion 
 from the world, and without a particle of food. 
 
 He lived for three days after, 
 having quietly expired on the evening of 
 
 Nov. 3rd, 
 Aged 66 years. 
 
 Three weeks without food in the depths of 
 the earth ! It seemed hardly credible, and I 
 set myself to gather such recollections as 
 might still remain. I discovered that a nar- 
 rative of the circumstances had been pub- 
 lished shortly after the date of their occur- 
 rence ; but I was fortunate enough to make 
 the acquaintance of people who were resident 
 in the district during the calamity, and from 
 whom I obtained details which do not seem 
 
 round the village fires, the incident of the 
 wagon was matter of earnest talk. Every- 
 body scorned the imputation of having, even 
 in mere thoughtlessness, risk', da life in the 
 pit. Besides, nobody had been in that part 
 of the workings except Brown himself. He 
 fully acquitted them, having an explanation 
 of his own to account for the movements of 
 the wagon. He had known such things hap- 
 pen before, he said, and was persuaded that 
 it could only be the devil, who seemed much 
 more ready to push along empty hutches, 
 and so endanger men's lives, than to give 
 any miner help in pushing them when full. 
 
 In truth, this story of the wagon came in 
 the end to have a significance little dreamt of 
 at the time. It proved to have been the first 
 indication of a "crush" in the pit that is, a 
 falling in of the roof. The coal-seam was a 
 thick one, and in extracting it massive pil- 
 lars, some sixteen or seventeen feet broad 
 and forty to fifty feet long, were left to keep 
 the roof up. At first, half of the coal only 
 was taken out, but after some progress had 
 been made the pillars w Te reduced in size, so 
 as to let a third more ol the seam be removed. 
 This, of course, was a delicate operation, 
 since the desire to get as much coal out of 
 the mine as possible led to the risk of paring 
 down the pillars so far as to make them too 
 ever to have found their way into print. ' weak for the enormous weight they had to
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 bear. Such a failure of support leads to a 
 "crush." The weakened pillars are crushed 
 to fragments, and at the same time the floor 
 of the pit, under the enormous and unequal 
 pressure, is here and there squeezed up even 
 to the roof. Such was the disaster that now 
 befell the coal-pit of Kilgrammie. It had 
 been the early disturbance of level heralding 
 the final catastrophe that sent the empty 
 wage n along the roadway. 
 
 For a couple of days cracks and grinding 
 noises went on continuously in the pit, the 
 levels of the rails got more and more altered, 
 and though the men remained at work, it be- 
 came hourly more clear that part of the 
 workings would now need to be abandoned. 
 At last, on the 8th October, the final crash 
 came suddenly and violently. The huge 
 weight of rock under which the galleries ran 
 settled down solidly on them with a noise 
 and shock which, spreading for a mile or two 
 up and down the quiet vale ot the Girvan, 
 were set down at the time as the passing of 
 an earthquake. Over the site of the mine it- 
 self the ground was split open into huge rents 
 for a space of several acres, the dam of a pond ( 
 
 he had left his jacket behind. In vain they 
 tried to drag him along. " The jacket was 
 a new one," he said; " and as for the pit, he 
 had been at a crush before now, and would 
 win through it this time too." So, with a 
 spring backwards, he tore himseif away from 
 them, and dived into the darkness of the 
 mine in search of his valued garment. 
 Hardly, however, had he parted from them 
 when the roof between him and them came 
 down with a crash. They managed to rejoin 
 their comrades; John Brown was sealed up 
 within the mine, most probably, as they 
 thought, crushed to death between the ruins 
 of the roof and floor. 
 
 fer by any chance peeped 
 th of the day-level of a 
 
 Those who have ever b 
 into the sombre mout 
 coal-pit will realize what the colliers had now 
 to do to make good their escape. The tunnel 
 as a drain; dark water 
 
 simply 
 I it air 
 
 had been cut 
 
 and mud filled it almost to the roof For 
 more than half-a-mile they had to walk, or 
 rather to crouch along in a stooping posture 
 through this conduit, the water often up to 
 their shoulders, sometimes, indeed, with 
 barely room for theii heads to pass between 
 
 gave way, and the water strea~red off, while j the surface of the slimy water and the rough 
 the horses at the mouth of the pit took fright roof above. But at length they reached the 
 
 and came scampering, masterless and in ter- 
 ror, into the little village, the inhabitants of 
 which rushed out of doors, and were stand- 
 ing in wonderment as to what had happened. 
 
 bright daylight as it streamed over the green 
 holms and autumn woods of the Girvan, no 
 man missing save him whom they had done 
 their best to rescue. They were the first to 
 
 . 11,,,.. UMI. ,. i^o^.u^. j. iivj wtlt lilt 11131 iw 
 
 But the disasters above f. round were only bring the tidings of their escape to the terri- 
 a feeble indication of the terrors underneath, fied village. 
 
 Constant exposure to risk hardens a man 
 against an appreciation of his dangers, and 
 even makes him, it may be, foolhardy. The 
 Kilgrammie colliers had continued their work 
 with reckless disregard of consequences, until 
 at last the cry arose among them that the 
 roof was settling down. First they made a 
 rush to the bottom of the shaft, in hopes of 
 
 being pulled up b 
 time the shaft h 
 
 y the engine. But by this 
 
 had become involved in the 
 ruin of the roof. A second shaft stood at a 
 little distance; but this too they found to be 
 dosed. Every avenue of escape cut off, and 
 amid the hideous groanings and grindings of 
 the sinking ground, the colliers had retreated 
 to a part of the workings where the pillars yet 
 stood firm. Fortunately, one of them re- 
 membered an old tunnel or " day-level," run- 
 ning from the mine for more than half-a- 
 mile to the Brunston Holm, on the banks of 
 the Girvan, and made originally to carry off 
 the underground water. They were starting 
 to find the entrance to this tunnel when they 
 noticed, for the first time, that John Brown 
 was not among them. Two of the younger 
 men (one of whom told me the story) started 
 
 No attempt could at first be made to save 
 the poor prisoner. As the colliers themselves 
 said, not even a creel or little coal-basket 
 could get down the crushed shaft of the pit. 
 The catastrophe happened on a Wednesday, 
 and when Sunday came the parish minister, 
 Dr. Hill afterward a conspicuous man in 
 the Church of Scotland made it the subject 
 of a powerful appeal to his people. In the 
 words of a lady, who was then, and is still, 
 resident in the neighborhood, "he made us 
 feel deeply the horror of knowing that a hu- 
 man being was living beneath our feet, dying 
 a most fearful death. On the Sunday follow- 
 ing, we met with the conviction that whatever 
 the man's sufferings had been, they were at 
 la t over, and that he had been dead some 
 days. On the third Sunday, the event had 
 begun to pass away." 
 
 After the lapse of some days the cracking 
 and groaning of the broken roof had so far 
 abated that it became possible once more to 
 get down into the pit. The first efforts were, 
 of course, directed toward that part of the 
 workings where the body was believed to be 
 lying. But the former roadways were found 
 
 back through the falling part of the workings, to be so completely blocked up that no ap- 
 and found the old man at his post, working j proach to the place could be had save by 
 
 as unconcernedly as if he had been diggin 
 potatoes in his own garden. With some dif- 
 fic-.lty they persuaded him 1o return with 
 them, and were in the act of hurrying him 
 
 cutting a new tunnel through the runs. 
 This proved to be a work of great labor and 
 difficulty ; for not only were the materials 
 extremely hard through which the new pass- 
 
 along, when he remembered that in his haste ' age must be cut, but an obstacle of another
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 kind interrupted the operations a dead body 
 lay in the pit, and awakened all the supersti- 
 tion of the colliers. At times they would 
 work well, but their ears were ever on the 
 alert for strange weird noises, and often would 
 they come rushing out from the working in 
 terror at the unearthly gibberings which ever 
 and anon would go southing through the 
 mine. 
 
 A fortnight had passed away. The lessee, 
 like the rest of the inhabitants, believed poor 
 Brown to be already dead, and brought a 
 gang of colliers from anot er part of the 
 county to help in clearing out and re-open- 
 ing his coal-pit. But a party of the men 
 continued at work upon the tunnel that was 
 to lead to the body. They cut through the 
 hard crushed roof a long passage, just wide 
 enough to let a man crawl along it upon his 
 elbows ; and at last, i arly on the morning of 
 the t enty-third day after the accident, they 
 struck through the last part of the ruined 
 mass into the open workings beyond. The 
 rush of foul air from these workings put out 
 their lights and compelled them to retreat. 
 One of their number was despatched to upper 
 air for a couple of boards, or corn-sieves, or 
 any broad flat thing he could lay hands upon, 
 with which they might advance into the 
 workings and waft the air about, so as to 
 mix it and make it more breathable. Soms 
 time had to elapse before the messenger could 
 make the circuitous journey, and meanwhile 
 the foulness of the air had probably lessened. 
 When the sieves came one of the miners 
 agreed to advance into the darkness, and try 
 to create a current of air ; the rest were to 
 follow. In a minute or two, howeyer, he re- 
 joined them, almost speech. ess with fright. 
 In winnowing the air with his arms he had 
 struck against a wagon standing on the road- 
 way, and the noise he had made was followed 
 by a distinct groan. A younger member of 
 the gang volunteered to return with him. 
 Advancing as before, the same wagon stop- 
 ped them as their sieves came against the 
 end of it, and again there rose from out of 
 the darkness of the mine a but faint audible 
 groan. Could it be the poor castaway, or 
 was it only another wile of the arch enemy to 
 lure two colliers more to their fate ? Gather- 
 ing up all the courage that was left in him, 
 one of them broke the awful silence of the 
 place by solemnly demanding, "If that'syour 
 ain groan, John Brown, in lh^ name o' God 
 gi'e anither." They listened, and after the 
 echoes of his voice had ceased they heard 
 another groan, coming apparently from the 
 roadway only a few yards ahead. They 
 crept forward, and found their companion 
 alive. 
 
 In a few seconds the other colliers, who 
 had been anxiously awaiting the result, were 
 also beside the body of John Brown. They 
 could not see it, for they had not yet ven- 
 tured to rekindle their lights ; but they could 
 feel that it had the death-like chill of a corpse. 
 
 Stripping off their jackets and shirts, they 
 lay with their naked backs next to him, trying 
 to restore a little warmth to his hardly living 
 frame. His first words, uttered in a scarcely 
 audible whisper, were, "Gi'e me a drink." 
 Fearful of endangering the life which they 
 had been the means of so marvellously sav- 
 ing, they only complied so far with his wish 
 as to dip the sleeve of a coat in one of the 
 little runnels which were trickling down the 
 walls of the mine, and to moisten his lips 
 with it. He pushed it from him, asking them 
 "no to mak' a fule o' him." A little water 
 refreshed him, and then, in the same strangely 
 sepulchral whisper, he said, " Eh, boys, but 
 ye've been lang o' coming." 
 
 Word was now sent to the outer world that 
 John Brown had been found, and was yet 
 living. The lessee came down, the doctor 
 was sent for, and preparations were made to 
 have the sufferer taken up to daylight again. 
 And here it may be mentioned that upon the 
 decayed timber props and old wooden board- 
 ings of a coal-pit an unseemly growth of a 
 white and yellow fungus often takes root, 
 hanging in tufts and bunches from the sides 
 or roofs wherever the wood is decaying. 
 After being cautiously pushed through the 
 newly-cut passage, John Brown was placed 
 on the lessee's knees on the cage in which 
 they were to be pulled up by the engine. As 
 they rose into daylight, a sight which had 
 only been faintly visible in the feeble lamp- 
 light below presented itself, never seen be- 
 fore and never to be forgotten. That coal- 
 mine fungus had spread over the poor collier's 
 body as it would have done over a rotten log. 
 His beard had grown bristly during his con- 
 finement, and all through the hairs this white 
 fungus had taken root. His master, as the 
 approaching daylight made the growth more 
 visible, began to pull off the fungus threads, 
 but (as he told me himself) his hand was 
 pushed aside by John, who asked him, "Na, 
 noo, wad ye kittle [tickle] me ?" 
 
 By nine o'clock on that Friday morning, 
 three-and-twenty days after he had walked 
 out of his cottage for the last time, John 
 Brown was once more resting on his own 
 bed. A more ghastly figure could hardly be 
 pictured. His face had not the pallor of a 
 fainting fit or of death, but wore a strange 
 sallow hue like that of a mummy. His flesh 
 seemed entirely gone, nothing left but the 
 bones, under a thin covering of leather-like 
 skin. This was specially marked about his 
 face, where, in spite of the growth of hair, 
 every bone looked as if it were coming 
 through the skin, and his eyes, brightened 
 into unnatural lustre, were sunk far into his 
 skull. The late Dr. Sloan, of Ayr, who vis- 
 ited him, told me that to such a degree was 
 the body wasted that, in putting the hand 
 over the pit of the stomach, one could dis- 
 tinctly feel the inner surface of the backbone. 
 Every atom of fatty matter in the body seems 
 to have been consumed.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 Light food was sparingly administered, 
 and he appeared to revive, and would insist 
 on being allowed to speak and tell of his 
 experiences in the pit. He had no food with 
 him all the time of his confinement. Once 
 before, when locked up underground by a 
 similar accident, he had drunk the oil from 
 his lamp and had thereby sickened himself ; 
 so that this time, though he had both oil and 
 tobacco with him, he had tasted neither 
 For some days he was able to walk about in 
 the open uncrushed part of the mine, where 
 too he succeeded in supplying himself with 
 water to drink. But in the end, as he grew 
 weaker, he had stumbled across the roadway 
 and fallen into the position in which he was 
 found. The trickle of water ran down the 
 mine close to him, and was for a time the 
 only sound he could hear, but he could not 
 reach it. When asked if he had not de- 
 spaired of ever being restored to the upper 
 *ir, he assured his questioners that he had 
 never for a moment lost the belief that he 
 v/ould be rescued. He had heard them 
 working towards him, and from the intervals 
 of silence and sound he was able, after a 
 fashion, to measure the passing of time. It 
 would stem, too, that he had been subject 
 either to vivid dreams or to a wandering of 
 the mind when awake, for again and again 
 he thanked the sister of his master for her 
 great kindness in visiting him in the pit and 
 cheering him up as she did. 
 
 On the Sunday afternoon, when some of 
 his old comrades were sitting round the bed- 
 side, he turned to them with an anxious, puz- 
 zled look and said, "Ah, boys, when I win 
 through this, I've a queer story to tell ye." 
 But that was not to be. His constitution had 
 received such a shake as even its uncommon 
 strength could not overcome. That evening 
 it became only too plain that the apparent 
 recovery of appetite and spirits had been but 
 the last flicker of the lamp of lif . Later in 
 the night he died. 
 
 So strange a tragedy made a deep impres- 
 sion on the people of that sequestered dis- 
 trict. Everybody who could made his way 
 into the little cottage to see a man who, as it 
 were, had risen from the dead; and no doubt 
 this natural craving led to an amount of 
 noise and excitement in the room by no means 
 very favorable to the recovery of the sufferer. 
 But this was not all. A new impetus was 
 given to the fading superstitions of the col- 
 liery population. Not a few of his old work- 
 fellows, though they saw him in bodily 
 presence lying in his own bed and chatting 
 as he used to do, nay, even though they fol- 
 lowed him to the grave, refused to believe 
 that what they saw was John Brown's body 
 at all, or at least that it was his soul which 
 animated it. They had seen so many wiles 
 of the devil below ground, and had so often 
 narrowly escaped with their lives from his 
 treachery, that they shrewdly suspected this j 
 to be some uew snare of his for the purpose 
 
 of entrapping and carrying off some of theiff 
 number. 
 
 A post-mortem examination followed. But 
 even that sad evidence of mortality failed to 
 convince some of the more stubbornly super- 
 stitious. The late Dr. Sloan, who took part 
 in the examination, told me that after it was 
 over, and when he emerged from the little 
 cottage, a group of old colliers who had been 
 patiently waiting the result outside came up 
 to him with the inquiry, "Doctor, did ye fin" 
 his feet?" It certainly had not occurred to 
 him to make any special investigation of 
 the extremities, and he confessed that he had 
 not, though surprised at the oddity of the 
 question. He inquired in turn why they 
 should have wished the feet particularly 
 looked to. A grave shake of the head was 
 the only reply he could get at the time; but 
 he soon found out that had he examined the 
 feet, he would have found them not to be 
 human extremities at all, but bearing that 
 cloven character which Scottish tradition has 
 steadily held to be one of the characteristic 
 and ineffaceable features of the "deil," no 
 matter under what disguise he may be pleased 
 to appear. 
 
 And even when the grave had closed over 
 the wasted remains of the poor sufferer, people 
 were still seeing visions and getting warnings. 
 His ghost haunted the place for a time, until 
 at last the erection of a tombstone by the 
 parishioners with the inscription already 
 quoted, written by the parish minister, 
 slowly brought conviction to the minds of 
 the incredulous. Many a story, however, 
 still lingers of the kind of sights and sounds 
 seen and heaid as portents after this sad 
 tragedy. I shall give only one, told to me 
 by an old collier, whose grandmother was a 
 well-known witch, and who himself retained 
 evidently more belief in her powers than he 
 cared to acknowledge in words. Not long 
 after John Brown's death, one of the miners 
 returned unexpectedly from his work in the 
 forenoon, and to the surprise of his wife ap- 
 peared in front of their cottage. She was in 
 the habit, unknown to him, ot solacing her- 
 self in the early part of the day with a bottle 
 of porter. On the occasion in question the 
 bottle stood toasting pleasantly before the fire 
 when the form of the "gudeman" came in 
 sight. In a moment she had driven in the 
 cork and thrust the bottle und.rneath the 
 blankets of the box-bed, when he entered, 
 and, seating himself by the fire, began to 
 light his pipe. In a little while the warmed 
 porter managed to expel the cork, and to es- 
 c pe in a series of very ominous guggles 
 from underneath the clothes. The poor fel- 
 low was outside in an instant crying, ' ' Anither 
 warning, Meg! Rin, rin, the house is fa'ing." 
 But Meg "kenn'd what was what fu'brawly," 
 and made for the bed in time to save only the 
 last dregs of her intended potation. 
 
 Most of the actors in the sad story have 
 passed away, and now rest beneath the same
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 23 
 
 green sod which covers the remains of John 
 Brown. With the last generation, too, has 
 died out much of the hereditary superstition. 
 For a railway now runs through the coal 
 field. Strangers come and settle in the dis- 
 trict. An increasing Irish element appears 
 in the population, and thus the old manntrs 
 and customs are rapidly becoming mere tradi- 
 tions in the place. Even grandsons and great- 
 grandsons of the old women who " kept the 
 country-side in fear,'' affect to hold lightly the 
 powers and doings of their progenitors, 
 though there are still a few who, while seem- 
 ingly half-ashamed to claim supernatural 
 power for their "grannies," gravely assert 
 that the latter had means of finding things 
 out, and, though bedridden, of getting their 
 wishes fulfilled, which, to say the least, were 
 very inexplicable. 
 
 V. 
 
 AMONG THE VOLCANOES OF CEN- 
 TRAL FRANCE. 
 
 It had been my good fortune to spend sev- 
 eral years in a more or less continuous exam- 
 ination of those volcanic hills and crags 
 which form so characteristic a feature in the 
 scenery of the great central valley of Scot- 
 land. I had traced them over many hundreds 
 of square miles, sometimes underneath the 
 very streets and squares of a' town, sometimes 
 across richly-cultivated fields, and some- 
 times far inland among lonely moon, and 
 mosses. I had studied their association 
 with the stratified rocks of that old 
 era of this country's history known as 
 the Carboniferous Period ; I had thus been 
 enabled, in some measure, to realize the 
 scenery of that ancient time its wide jun- 
 gles and lagoons, crowded with graceful 
 trees, and dotted here and there with dark 
 pine-clothed volcanic cones that sent out 
 their columns of steam and showers of ashes, 
 or rolled their streams of lava into the shal- 
 low waters. My restorations of the Carbon- 
 iferous landscapes, however, could not but be 
 incomplete and unsatisfactory. They want- 
 ed spirit and life, even more than the plaster 
 model of some extinct monster constructed 
 from the hints that may be suggested by a 
 tooth and a few bones. They needed com- 
 parison with some region of recent volcanoes, 
 where, like the dry bones in the field of old, 
 they might straightway be touched into life. 
 
 As the Scottish volcanoes had been of 
 small extent, as well as eminently sporadic in 
 their distribution, it seemed to promise more 
 success to compare them with a district where 
 similar local phenomena had been manifest- 
 ed, than with such regions as those of yEtna 
 or Vesuvius, wh<re the eruptions had been 
 on a larger scale, and had proceeded from 
 the different vents of one great volcano. 
 There were two districts in Europe that ap- 
 
 peared likely to throw light on the subject- 
 one of these lay in the Eifel, the other in the 
 high grounds of Auvergne and the Haute- 
 Loire. The latter covers a much greater 
 area than the German tract, and presents be- 
 sides a more extensive variety of volcanic 
 phenomena. It had been described in detail 
 in the admirable volume of Mr. Poulett 1 
 Scrope, as well as in several other works and 
 memoirs by able geologists in France and 
 England. These writings did not, indeed, 
 treat the geological structure of the country 
 from the particular point of view which 
 chiefly interested me at the time, but they 
 formed an invaluable guide to one who wished 
 to acquire as rapidly as possible a general 
 knowledge of the region. So it was resolved 
 by an old comrade and myself to go to 
 Auvergne, and enlarge our ideas in one de- 
 partment of British geology. Between two 
 countries once so closely linked together in 
 peace and war, it seemed as if there might be 
 another relationship than that of mere State 
 policy ; and so with some such fanciful no- 
 tion we set out to see how far we could suc- 
 ceed in establishing a geological connection 
 between Central Scotland and Central France. 
 Not many years ago it was a matter of no 
 little discomfort to reach the high grounds of 
 the Puy de Dome and the other departments 
 in the interior of France. Several days of 
 diligence traveling, and inns none of the 
 best, were hindrances seldom surmounted 
 save by enthusiastic geologists or by valetudi- 
 narians who risked all peril to spend a few 
 weeks at the Baths of Mont Dore. Now, 
 however, this state of things has changed. 
 Railways penetrate far into the upland dis- 
 tricts, and although this part of France is 
 still comparatively little known to English 
 tourists, :t can be visited with even more ease 
 and in a shorter time than the remoter parts 
 of Scotland. Dining on a summer evening 
 in London, one may take one's seat in the 
 Dover express about nine o'clock, and next 
 evening at the same hour may see the sun set 
 behind the long chain of puys that dot the 
 granitic plateau of Auvergne. The journey 
 from Paris southward, indeed, is a dreary and 
 monotonous one, even if you make it at the 
 rate of thirty-five or forty miles an hour. 
 Wide uninteresting plains occupy hundreds 
 of square miles, and it is not until toward 
 the close of the day, as you approach the de- 
 partment of Allier, that the grounds begin to 
 undulate, amid hedgerows of acacias and 
 patches of woodland. From the quaint old 
 town of Moulins the scenery becomes hourly 
 more interesting. A vast, richly-cultivated 
 plain, several miles broad, and known as the 
 Limagne d' Auvergne, widens out southward 
 and stretches as far in that direction as the 
 eye can reach. On the east lies the chain of 
 granite hills which separates the plain of the 
 Allier from the basin of the Loire, while to 
 the west the eye rests with increasing wonder 
 upon a long line of conical hills, sometimes
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 bare and gray, sometimes dark with foliage, 
 and grouped like a series of colossal forts 
 and earthworks along the summit of a long 
 ridge. Beyond these, and seemingly rising 
 out of them, towers the grand cone of the 
 Puy de D6me, now flushed, perhaps, with 
 the last rays of the sinking sun. As the train 
 advances southward these cones become still 
 more defined, standing up dark and clear 
 against the evening sky, until, halting at last 
 at Clermont, we seem to rest almost at the 
 feet of the giant Puy. 
 
 The ancient province of Auvergne now 
 parceled out into the departments of Cantal, 
 Puy de Dflme, and Haute-Loire comprises 
 a considerable part of the high ground in 
 Central France, and from the variety of its 
 geological structure contains a diversity of 
 outline that contrasts well with the monoto- 
 nous scenery of so much of the lower parts of 
 the country. Granite and other crystalline 
 rocks rise from under encircling plains of 
 Secondary and Tertiary strata, and form an 
 elevated tableland in the central districts, 
 through which run the valleys of the Loire, 
 the Allier, the Dore, the Sioule, and other 
 minor rivers. 
 
 At a comparatively recent geological period 
 there were some large lakes in these uplands, 
 one of them extending over the modern 
 Limagne d'Auvergne in a north and south 
 direction, between granitic hills, for a distance 
 of fully forty miles, and with a breadth of 
 sometimes twenty. But the lakes have long 
 since disappeared, though their site is still 
 marked by broad plains formed of lacustrine 
 strata, often composed of the remains of the 
 shells that lived in these inland waters. It 
 was in this region of high ground, among 
 hills of granite, gneiss and schist, watered 
 by large rivers and by broad lakes, that those 
 volcanic eruptions broke forth, to some of 
 whose features it is the object of the present 
 paper to direct attention. To such protrusions 
 of igneous matter the great altitude of some 
 parts of the district is due. Lava and ashes 
 have been thrown out upon the granitic hills, 
 so as to rise even into great mountains, 
 where, as in the higher and deeper recesses 
 of Mont Dore, snow may be seen gleaming 
 white among the crags under the glare of 
 a July sun. 
 
 The easiest point from which to begin the 
 examination of this region is probably Cler- 
 mont, the chief town of the department of 
 Puy de Dome. Built round a small hill on 
 the west side of the Limagne, where that 
 broad valley attains its greatest width, Cler- 
 mont rises conspicuously above the general 
 level of the plain (which is about 1,200 feet 
 above the sea-level), and seems to nestle at 
 the base of the long granitic ridge that sup- 
 ports the chain of puys. The hill on which 
 the town is placed is of volcanic origin; so, 
 too, are similar gentle eminences that rise 
 above the level country toward the east; 
 north and south, at the distance of a mile or 
 
 two, are remnants of ancient lava-beds, now 
 forming flat-topped hills; while to the west, 
 down some of the narrow gullies that descend 
 through the granitic ridge, currents of lava 
 have forced their way from the volcanic vents 
 of the puys almost to the very site of the 
 town. Here, then, the traveler may rest for 
 a while, with plenty of geological interest 
 around him if he care to ply his hammer, 
 and with not less of varied and curious scen- 
 ery if he be only in search of the novel and 
 picturesque. Let no man, however, whether 
 geologist or not, visit Auvergne in July, un- 
 less fully prepared to eat, drink, and be 
 merry, with the thermometer at 82 or more 
 in the shade. 
 
 Our first geological ramble was begun soon 
 after sunrise. Passing through a labyrinth 
 of lanes and byways, we succeeded in reach- 
 ing the base of the hills, and began to wind 
 upward among the vineyards that cluster 
 along the slopes and look down upon the rich 
 plains of the Limagne. It was a glorious 
 morning. A light mist hung over the valley, 
 concealing its features as completely as if the 
 lake which once filled it had been again re- 
 stored ; while some twenty miles to the east- 
 ward, on the farther side of this sheet of phan- 
 tom water, rose the purple hills of the Forcz 
 that separate the basins of the Allier and the 
 Loire. Behind us, as we looked across the 
 plain, lay the great granitic ridge or plateau, 
 rising to a height of somewhere about 1,600 
 feet above the plain, and nearly 3,000 feet 
 above the sea. Its base, up which we were 
 slowly ascending, had a varied mantle of 
 cornfields and vineyards ; narrow, well- 
 wooded valleys had been cut by streamlets 
 down its flanks, but the higher slopes became 
 barer by degrees as they approached the range 
 of volcanic cones that crowns the summit of 
 the ridge. It was with no slight interest 
 that, among the little runnels and cart-tracks 
 which were crossed in the ascent, we watched 
 for indications of the nature of the rocks 
 below. Sometimes a chalky lacustrine marl 
 was noticed ; and, as we drew nearer to the 
 granite, we found ourselves upon pebbly 
 sandstone that had evidently been formed out 
 of the waste of the granite hills. But how 
 could the formation of such a deposit have 
 been effected here? Foot by foot as we 
 crept up the acclivity this sandstone accom- 
 panied us, until at last, at a height of prob- 
 ably not less than a thousand feet above the 
 level of the plain, we reached the granite. 
 The gravel and sand, out of which this sand- 
 stone had been made, must have been de- 
 posited in a lake the old lake, in short, 
 which once occupied the site of the Limagne. 
 The water must therefore have reached up as 
 Far as to the point to which we had traced 
 :he sandstone ; and thus, in the course of an 
 tiour's ramble, we ascertained for ourselves 
 the somewhat startling fact that, unless later 
 subterranean movements had altered the rela- 
 tive levels, the fertile plain below was for-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 merly covered by a lake at least a thousand 
 feet deep. Once on the granite we were free 
 from the entanglements of enclosures and 
 fences. As this rock crumbles away with 
 rapidity, its surface is smooth, without those 
 rugged features which mark the surrounding 
 basaltic rocks. It is coated with a short 
 scrubby grass, save in those places where the 
 amount of waste is too great and rapid to 
 allow the vegetation to take root. Crossing 
 a short interval of this ground, at the height 
 of about 2,400 feet above the sea, we arrived 
 at the basalt that caps the ridge of Pradelle. 
 
 From this height we commanded a wide 
 view of the Limagne, from which the morn- 
 ing sun had now dispelled the floating mists ; 
 we could judge better of the disposition of 
 the volcanic cones, or puys, and of the aspect 
 of some of the basaltic plateaux and lava- 
 streams. But the most impressive part of 
 the scene was not in the traces of old igneous 
 eruptions, but in the evidence of the power 
 of running water. I had wandered long 
 among the basalt hills of the Hebrides, and 
 now recognized the repetition of many feat- 
 ures of their landscapes ; but nothing I had 
 seen or read of had prepared me for such a 
 stupendous manifestation of the power of 
 rain and rivers. No one, indeed, whose ob- 
 servations have been confined to a country 
 which has been above the sea only since the 
 glacial period, or the contours of which have 
 been smoothed over by the ice-sheets of that 
 time, can readily form an adequate idea of 
 the denuding effect of water flowing over the 
 surface of the land. Standing on the pla- 
 teau of Pradelle, with its remnant of a lava- 
 current, and looking down into the valley of 
 Villar a deep gorge, exvavated by a rivulet 
 through that lava current, and partially 
 choked ur> by a later coulee of lava which the 
 stream is now wearing away I received a 
 kind of new revelation, so utterly above 
 and beyond all my previous conceptions 
 was the impression which the sight of this 
 landscape now conveyed. The ridge of 
 Pradelle is a narrow promontory of granite, 
 extending eastward from the main granitic 
 chain, and cut down on either side, but more 
 especially to the south, by a deep ravine. It 
 is capped with a cake of columnar basalt, 
 which of course was once in a melted state, 
 and, like all lava-streams, rolled along the 
 ground ever seeking its lowest levels. A first 
 glance is enough to convince us that this ba 
 saltic cake is a mere fragment, that its eastern 
 and southern edges have been largely cut 
 away, and that it once extended southward 
 across what is now the deep gorge of Villar. 
 Since the eruption of the basalt, therefore, the 
 whole of this gorge has been excavated. But 
 what agent could have worked so mighty a 
 change? We bethink us,perhaps,of the sea, and 
 picture the breakers working their way stead- 
 ily inland through the softer granite. But 
 this supposition is untenable, for it can be 
 shown on good grounds that, since the vol- 
 
 canic eruptions of this district began, the 
 country has never been below the sea. It is 
 with a feeling almost of reluctance that we 
 are compelled to admit, in default of any- 
 other possible explanation, that the erosion of 
 the valley has been the work of the stream 
 that seems to run in a mere rut at the foot of 
 the slopes. How tardy must be the working 
 of such an agent, and how immeasurably far 
 into the past does the contemplation of such 
 an operation carry us ! The illustration of 
 the power of running water, however, though, 
 I the first, was by no means the most striking 
 i which occurred in the course of my rambles 
 in Auvergne. The same fact stood out with 
 a kind of oppressive reality in the Haute- 
 Loire, to which reference will be made on a 
 subsequent page. 
 
 The basalt of Pradelle recalled many of the 
 basaltic hills in various parts of Scotland. I 
 could have supposed myself under one of the 
 cliffs that look out upon the deep fjords of 
 Skye, or below the range of crags on the 
 shores of the Forth, over which Alexander 
 III. lost his life, or even among some of the 
 ridges that form the eastern part of Arthur's 
 Seat, at Edinburgh. The French basalt had,, 
 indeed, a grayer color and a finely cavernous 
 structure, which distinguished it from the 
 hard, black, compact rock which is known as 
 basalt in Scotland; but they were columned 
 both in the same way, traversed by similar 
 transverse joints, and, above all, resembled 
 each other in their mode of yielding to the 
 weather, and in their general aspect in the 
 landscape. 
 
 Quitting this ridge and walking westward 
 toward the Puy de Dome, we reached the 
 hostelry of Bonabry, where the road splits 
 into two, one branch crossing the hilly ground 
 for Pont Gibaud, the other turning southwest 
 for Mont Dore. Here, finding the morning 
 too far advanced for further breakfastless ex- 
 ploration, we struck down for the valley df 
 Villar, with the view of examining more nar- 
 rowly a later current of lava in the bottom of 
 the ravine a barren expanse of black, rugged 
 scorias rising into the most fantastic forms, 
 and nearly destitute of vegetation. This lava 
 current must be greatly more recent than that 
 of Pradelle, for it has been erupted after 
 the excavation of the valley. Few walks in 
 Auvergne are in their way more instructive 
 than this. The valley itself, with its impres- 
 sive lesson of river action, becomes still mere 
 striking when seen from below. The Pra- 
 delle basalt hanging over the ravine stands as 
 a silent witness at once of the antiquity of 
 the earlier volcanic eruptions and of the 
 changes of after time. The great river of 
 younger lava below, too, is an object of un- 
 ceasing interest to the geological eye, wind- 
 ing as it does with all thecurvingsof the val- 
 ley, now sinking down beneath a mass of tan- 
 gled copsewood, and now rising up into 
 black, craggy masses, where some projecting' 
 boss of granite had formed a temporary im-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 pt-diment to its course. The rivulet has 
 actually cut in places a second narrow gorge 
 through the lava, sometimes of considerable 
 depth. But part of the stream still appears 
 to flow down the old channel beneath the 
 lava by which that channel has been usurped, 
 for at the abrupt termination of the lava cur- 
 rent an abundant gush of water issues from 
 under the black rugged c-ags. 
 
 In the town of Clermont itself there is not 
 much of interest. It is built round the sides 
 of the gently-sloping hill, and thus the 
 towers of the old church, rising to a consid- 
 able height above the surrounding- plain, can 
 be seen from a great distance. This church, 
 like most of the rest of the town, is built of 
 a dark, compact lava, that gives a somewhat 
 sombre hue to the building. The same tone 
 of coloring would also characterize the street 
 architecture but for a plentiful use oi white- 
 wash. One cannot but admire the sharpness 
 with which this lava has retained for cen- 
 uries its chisel-marks and sculpturings; even 
 staircases, that have been trodden so long 
 day after day, seem well-nigh as fresh as 
 ever. So black and dingy, indeed, and so 
 sharp in outline, are some of the tall pillars, 
 that they might readily be mistaken for so 
 many shafts of cast-iron. Along the road- 
 sides, too, you constantly pass crosses made 
 of the same material black, sombre things, 
 rising sometimes from the edge of a vineyard, 
 sometimes standing up alone in a solitary 
 part of the way, among broken walls and 
 thickets of brushwood. It was not uninter- 
 esting to remember that some three hundred 
 years ago the roadsides at home were studded 
 with similar crosses, of which .the pedestals 
 and parts of the stems may still, here and 
 there, be seen ; and that these were in many 
 cases made of an old lava, just as in Au- I 
 vergne. The Scottish rock, however, had 
 been erupted many a long geological period 
 ere the Auvergne volcanoes broke forth; and 
 though the crosses hewn out of it may not 
 have dated further back than some of these 
 French ones, yet Nature has dealt kindlier 
 with them, crusting them over with lichen 
 and moss, and making them look as crumb- 
 ling and venerable as the crags and hillsides 
 that rise around them. The Auvergne lava, 
 on the other hand, is a singularly barren 
 stone ; it gives no harborage to vegetation, 
 and its chiseled surfaces stand up now as 
 bare and blank as they have done for cen- 
 turies. 
 
 No one should leave Clermont without 
 looking at the baths of Saint Alyre. A 
 spring, highly charged with carbonate of 
 lime, issues from the side of the hill of Cler- 
 mont, and deposits along its course a con- 
 stantly-increasing mass of white travertin. 
 In this way it has formed for itself a natural 
 aqueduct, running for a considerable dis- 
 tance, and terminating in a rude but pictur 
 esque arch of the same material, below which 
 flows a small stream. The water that trickles 
 
 over this bridge evaporates, and leaves be- 
 hind a thin pellicle of carbonate of lime, 
 which gathers into rugged masses, or hangs 
 down in long stone icicles or stalactites. Such 
 a fontaine ptttifiante could not remain a 
 mere curiosity : it has teen turned into a 
 source of considerable profit, and manufac- 
 tures for the visitors an endless stock of 
 brooches, casts, alto-relievos, basso-relievos, 
 baskets, birds' nests, groups of flowers, 
 leaves, fruit, and suchlike. A portion of the 
 water is diverted into a series of sheds, where 
 it is made to run over flights of narrow 
 steps, on which are placed the objects to be 
 "petrified." By varying the position of these 
 objects, and removing them farther and 
 farther from the first dash of the water, they 
 become uniformly coated over with a fine 
 hard crust of white carbonate of lime, which 
 retains all the inequalities of the surface on 
 which it is deposited. There is here, of 
 course, no real petrification ; the substances 
 operated upon retain all their original struc- 
 ture, and are only incrusted with the calcare- 
 ous sediment. When once covered with this 
 stony crust, they may remain unchanged for a 
 long period, being thus hermetically sealed 
 and protected from the influences of the air. 
 Let the reader suppose himself on the top 
 of the Puy de Dome, four thousand eight 
 hundred and forty-two feet above the sea- 
 level. Seated on the greensward which cov- 
 ers that elevated cone, he has the volcanic 
 district spread out as in a map below him 
 cones, craters, and lava currents clear and 
 distinct for many miles to the north and 
 south. The Puy de D6me, placed about 
 midway between the northern and southern 
 ends of the chain of the puys, rises out of 
 the centre of the long grani'.ic ridge or 
 plateau on the western edge of the valley 
 of the Allier. Its position, therefore, is 
 eminently favorable for obtain ng a birdseye 
 view of the country. Below us, to the east- 
 ward, lies the broad plain of the Limagne 
 like a vast garden, dotted here and there with 
 hamlets and villages and towns. Yonder, 
 for instance, are the sloping streets of Cler- 
 mont, with their dingy red tiled houses, and 
 the sombre spires of the old church ; farther 
 eastward is- Montferrand, and other; of lesser 
 note lie in the district beyond. The eastern 
 horizon is bounded by the range of the gran- 
 itic hills of the Forez, which have been al- 
 ready referred to as rising from the level of 
 the Limagne on the one side, and descending 
 into the basin of the Loire on the other. 
 They look gray and parched in the glare of 
 the summer afternoon, though softened a 
 little by the purple light of distance, till treir 
 base seems to melt into the subdued verdure 
 of the valley. Westward, the eye wanders 
 over a dreary region of broken and barren 
 ground which stretches far to the n<~rth, while 
 southward, some fifteen or twenty miles away, 
 it sweeps round into the mountains of Mont 
 Dore that terminate the southern landscape.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 It is the nearer prospect, however, which 
 forms the chief scurce of wonder as we look 
 from the summit of the Puy de D&me. Be- 
 tween us and the great plain of the Limagne 
 lies a strip of the elevated granitic plateau 
 a tract of bare uneven ground, traversed by 
 :some deep valleys that descend toward the 
 east. On this plateau rises a ch tin of iso- 
 lated conical hills, stretching due north and 
 south from the Puy de Dome, which is the 
 highest point in the district Unconnected 
 by ridges and watersheds into a regular chain, 
 like a common range of hills, they shoot up 
 from a dark sombre kind of tableland, at a 
 steep angle, into cones which seem to be 
 completely separated from each other. Cone 
 behind cone, from a mere hillock up to a good 
 hill, rises from the brown waste for some 
 twenty miles to the north and south of the 
 great Puy. Some of them are partially 
 clothed with beech .\oods, but most have a 
 coating of coarse grass and heath, inter- 
 mingled here and there with numerous wild 
 flowers. Where devoid of vegetation, their 
 slopes consist of loose dust and stones, like 
 par s of the tableland on which they stand. 
 Wolves still harbor in their solitudes, among 
 the dense woods that clothe some of the 
 slopes, and the shepherds have to keep a 
 good look-out after their flocks. At the top 
 of the Puy de Dome I found a boy, of ten or 
 twelve years, armed with a club-headed staff, 
 which he told me was used against the auda- 
 cious wolves, and h ' pointed to a thick forest 
 on a neighboring hill whence the animals 
 made their forays. 
 
 Not the least singular feature of these con- 
 ical hills is that nearly all of them look as if 
 they had had their tops shaved off. Nay, 
 they even seem in the distance to have been 
 more or less scooped out, as if some old Titan 
 had taken a huge spadeful out of the summit 
 of each hill. The reason of this structure 
 may be guessed, but it becomes strikingly 
 apparent on a closer inspection of the ground 
 Each cone, with four or five exceptions, is 
 found on examination to be an actual vol- 
 cano, extinct indeed, but still well-nigh as 
 fresh as if the internal fires had burnt out 
 only yesterday. The truncated, hollowed 
 summit thus turns out to be a true crater 
 the vent, in short, whence the materials of 
 the hill were erupted. Upward of fifty 
 such volcanoes dot the ridge to the north and 
 south of the Puy de D6me, each formed from 
 an independent prifice, and scmetimes ccn- 
 taining.as in the Puy de Montchi6, no fewer 
 than four sepa/ate craters in one hill. They 
 consist of loose ashes, dust, and scoriae, still so 
 lightly aggregated that, where the rain has 
 bared off long strips of the grassy covering, 
 one may slide rapidly ankle-deep in debris 
 from the top of a cone to its-base. Many of 
 the cones have had one of their sides re- 
 moved, and from the broken part a current of 
 basaltic lava has issued, flowing out over the 
 table-land, sometimes for several miles, and 
 
 even descending tlie valleys thatslooe into the 
 Limagne. The main mass of lava, in many 
 different streams, has gone down the western 
 side of the chain toward the valley of the 
 Sioule, and hence the strange, sombre, arid 
 aspect of that tract. From the summit of 
 the Puy de Dome you can trace some of the 
 lava-streams, marking whence they issued, 
 and how they flowed across the country. 
 That of the Villar valley, already described, 
 is especially noticeable, breaking from the 
 Puy de Pariou, and descending toward the 
 east in a black rugged current, like a river of 
 frozen icebergs. 
 
 Such, then, is the general landscape that 
 stretches around the great Puy de D6me. It 
 is eminently dreary and desolate in the nearer 
 parts, while in the eastern distance the eye 
 rests on the bright, corn-clad Limagne. The 
 long line of volcanic cones stretching to the 
 north and south affords every facility to the 
 geologist, and presents him, moreover, with a 
 class of phenomena not found round the larger 
 active volcanoes of Europe. The independ- 
 ence, small extent, number, and local dis- 
 tribution of the cones are features that throw 
 light on what must have been the character 
 and aspect of the Carboniferous volcanoes of 
 Central Scotland, to illustrate which had 
 been the object of my visit to Auvergne. A 
 closer examination of these cones brings out 
 a further parallelism with the more ancient 
 vents. The Puy de Pariou, for example 
 one of the most accessible, and at the same 
 time one of the most perfect, cones of the 
 chain lies : omewhat more than a mile due 
 north of the Puy de D6me. It consists, in 
 reality, of two craters, but only a portion of 
 the northern rim of the older one is now 
 visible, the rest being occupied by the newer 
 crate r , which is stil^ in a perfect state of pre- 
 servation. Ascending, as is usnal, from the 
 east side, the visitor first passes over a lava- 
 current. From the foot of the cone the as- 
 cent is tolerably steep, among coarse grass, 
 violets, martagon lilies, yellow gentians, and 
 many other flowers, until the top of the older 
 cone is reached, whence he looks down intc 
 the first crater, with the gap which the lava- 
 current has made in it. -Walking southward 
 along its rim, he sees it passing under a later 
 cone, which reaches a height of 738 feet above 
 the plateau from which the southern side of the 
 hill rises. After a second ascent, he arrives at 
 last at the top of the Puy, and finds that the 
 newer cone has been erupted over the southern 
 half of the older one, and that it contains a 
 beautifully perfect crater. Hence, from the 
 top of the Puy there is on the south side 
 an unbroken declivity, sloping at ibout 35 
 down to the surf ce of the table-land, 
 while on the north side the inner cone de- 
 scends first into the older crater, which half 
 encircles it. The last formed crater measures 
 3,000 feet in circumference. It is an inverted 
 cone; its sides are smooth and grassy, and 
 shelve steeply down to a depth of 800 feet.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 They have been indented by a series of cattle- 
 tracks, rising in successive steps above each 
 other, which Mr. Scrope aptly compares to 
 the seats of an amphitheater. Nothing can 
 be more complete or regular than this part of 
 the Puy. While ascending the outer slopes, 
 one looks forward to reach a broad flat table- 
 land on the top. carpeted perchance with the 
 same coarse heather and wild flowers as clothe 
 the sides of the hill; but, instead of level 
 ground, one gazes down into a deep, round, 
 smooth-sided crater covered with grass to 
 the bottom. Between the inward slope of 
 this hollow and ihe outward declivities of the 
 Puy, the rim is at times so narrow that you 
 may almost sit astride on it, one foot dang- 
 ling into the crater, the other pointing down 
 to the plateau from which the hill rises. And 
 there with wild flowers clustering around, 
 butterflies hovering past, cattle browsing 
 leisurely down the sides of the crater below, 
 while the tinkle of the sheep bells ever and 
 anon comes up with the scented breeze from 
 the outer slopes of the Puy, one cannot with 
 out an effort picture the turmoil and violence 
 to which the Puy owes its rise, when the 
 ground was rent by subterranean explosions, 
 and when showers of dust aud stones were 
 thrown out from the orifice. 
 
 From the older crater, now more than half 
 filled up by the last eruptions, a stream of 
 lava passes out northward, through a great 
 gap in the cone, trending -.t c nee to the east, 
 over the plateau and down the valley of 
 Villar. Here the history of th whole Puy is 
 at once apparent. First of all, after some 
 underground movements.a fracture was made, 
 through which gas, steam, ashes, and scoriae 
 were vomited forth. The ejected material 
 fell back again, partly into the vent, partly 
 round its margin, gathering by degrees 
 into a cone with a crater in its centre. A 
 column of lava rose in the vent, began to fill 
 the bowl-like cavity of the crater, and con- 
 tinued to well upward until the loosely com- 
 pacted sides of the hill were no longer able 
 to withstand the pressure of the increasing 
 mass of melted rock. The northern side, be- 
 ing probably the weakest, gave way, and 
 then the lava burst out into the plain below. 
 Taking at once an easterly course, owing to 
 the general slope of the ground, it descended 
 in a sheet of dark rugged rock now swelling 
 up against ridges that opposed its progress, 
 and then sweeping past them until it reached 
 the beginning of the hill of Pradelle already 
 noticed. Here, in a^scene of singular <nfu 
 sion, it broke into two streams, one leaping 
 like a torrent down the valley of Villar, the 
 other plunging into the valley of Gresinier. 
 But the emission of this vast body of melted 
 rock did not conclude the eruptions of the 
 Puy de Pariou. When the lava had perhaps 
 ceased to flow, the vapor and gases still 
 continued to escape with violence. By their 
 means another cone was in time produced, 
 not quite on the former site, but, as so often 
 
 happens, a little to o e side, so as to cover 
 the southern half of the older cone, and leave 
 visible that northern segment of it from which 
 the lava issued. Thus arose the later cone 
 of Pariou. No subsequent eruptions have 
 disturbed its regularity or filled up its crater. 
 The hand of time has not effaced its smooth 
 curves and slopes, but has covered them with 
 vegetation, whereby the loose dust and scoria; 
 are protected from the destructive effects of 
 heavy rains. After the lapse of many a long 
 century this little volcano is still nearly as 
 perfect as when the last shower of ashes fell 
 over its sides, and it promises to remain so 
 for centuries to come. 
 
 The Puy de Pariou is only one of a series 
 of similar cones. Some have but one crater, 
 others have two, three, or even, as in the in- 
 stance already cited, four. Each crater is of 
 course the product of a different eruption or 
 series of eruptions, as the Puy de Pariou so 
 well explains. Several striking examples of 
 the bursting of the side of a cone by the 
 pre sure of the uprising column of lava with- 
 in it, occur among the cones to the south of 
 tne Puy de D&me, as in the Puy de las Solas 
 and the Puy de la Vache. These two hills, 
 when seen from the south, look like the 
 mouths of iwo yawning chasms. Their 
 southern sides have been swept away by a 
 black rugged river of lava, which, issuing 
 from the bottom of each crater, flows east- 
 ward in a united stream for twelve miles 
 down a deep, narrow valley. The scenery 
 round these hills is even more desolate than 
 among those to the north of the Puy de 
 D6me. The cones and craters are in many 
 places devoid of all verdure, and have still 
 much of the blackened and burnt aspect of 
 active volcanoes. The lava, too, which has 
 spread out over most of the intermediate 
 ground, is dark, bristling, and sterile. The 
 whole landscape leaves an impression, not 
 easily effaced, of the vigor of volcanic 
 agency, and of its power to modify, and 
 even altogether change the general aspect of 
 a district. 
 
 To one who had been at work for some 
 years among a set of old and fragmentary 
 | volcanic rocks, trying to piece together por- 
 I phyrites, dolerites, basalts, and tuffs, the 
 j sight of those puys, with their fresh cones and 
 I craters of ashes and scoriae, and their still per- 
 : feet floods of lava, was inexpressibly instruc- 
 tive. M erely to cast the eye over the landscape 
 ! was of itself a memorable lesson. The scene 
 was exactly what was needed to enable one tc 
 | realize the character of those old British Car- 
 I boniferous volcanoes of which only such 
 .1 mere fragments now remain. High among 
 I the uplands of Central France my eye was 
 ever instinctively recalling the hills and val- 
 i leys of Central Scotland, and picturing their 
 ! original scenery by transferring to them some 
 ! of the main features in the landscapes of Au- 
 I vergne. The imagination easily tilled again 
 1 with a sheet of deep blue water the broad ex-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 panse of yonder Limagne. Vines, and 
 acacias, and mulberry trees, seemed to melt 
 of their own accord into stately sigillana-, 
 lepidodcndra, or catamites ; the orchards and 
 cornfields along the slopes began to wave 
 with a dense underwood of ferns and shrubby 
 vegetation; some of the cones rose fresh and 
 bare, others were dark with a growth of arau 
 carian conifer-:, and there, with but little fur- 
 ther change, lay a landscape in the central 
 valley of Scotland during an early part of the 
 great Carboniferous Period. Nor did a more 
 extended examination of other parts of the 
 Volcanic District weaken this comparison, 
 for the general outward resemblance of the 
 present volcanic rocks of France to what 
 must have been the original aspect of those 
 of Scotland at the geological era just named, 
 holds good, even when traced into detail. 
 
 One of the most interesting excursions 
 from Clermont is to the hill of Gergovia, 
 about six miles to the south. We started 
 off early one morning, while, the sky, which 
 had been remarkably clear for some days, 
 began to grow dusky with heavy clouds that 
 kept trooping up from the southwest. Puy 
 de Dome had his head wrapped in mist, and 
 giant shadows chased each other across the 
 range of puys until, as the clouds thickened, 
 all the uplands were shrouded in an ominous 
 gloom. Rain at last began to fall in large round 
 drops, and a distant muttering of thunder 
 was heard rolling away northward. But the 
 morning being fresh and cool, even at the 
 risk of a good drenching we persevered. 
 The road, like all the French military high- 
 ways, excellently made and well kept, passes 
 through endless vineyards, many of which 
 lie among the broken ruins of lava-flows that 
 have descended from the heights to the 
 westward. At one point it has even been 
 cut through a part of one of these lavas. 
 
 The hill of Gergovia is famous in history 
 as the site of a town long and successfully 
 defended by the Arverni (people of Au- 
 vergne) against Caesar's legions. Some in- 
 teresting antiquarian remains had been found 
 shortly before our visit, and we learnt that 
 excavations were about to be renewed in 
 search of more. But the hill is not less in- 
 teresting to the geologist than to the anti- 
 quary. Seen from the east, it looks like a 
 broad truncated cone; but it differs alto- 
 gether in appearance and origin from the 
 true volcanic cones of the puys. It consists, 
 in fact, of horizontal strata of marl and lime- 
 stone; about two-thirds of the way up lies a 
 bed of basalt, which forms a marked feature 
 along the hillside; some calcareous and ashy 
 strata next occur, while the summit is formed 
 by a capping of basalt. These marls and 
 limestones are of lacustrine origin, as is 
 shown by their fresh-water shells, and by the 
 caddis-worm cases which they contain. Form 
 ing parts of the deposits of the old lake of 
 the Limagne, they attain in this hill a thick- 
 ness of probably not less than 1,200 or 1,500 
 
 feet. Ascending one of the ravines which deep- 
 ly furrow the e st side of the hill, we passed 
 over these thinly-laminated strata, piled over 
 each other in successive layers, and crumb- 
 ling away like chalk. Every yard of the 
 steep ascent deepened the impression of the 
 exceedingly slow rate at which these sedi- 
 ments must have been formed, and there- 
 fore of the prodigious laj se of time which their 
 eitire thickness represents. The morning, 
 after clearing up for a brief space, had again 
 become overcast, and rain began to fall 
 as heavily as before. We sought shelter 
 for a little under the lower basalt. Had 
 we been suddenly spirited away unawares 
 from some of the Scottish glens, and set 
 down at the side of this rock, we should 
 hardly have recognized the change of 
 scene. The basalt is a true bed, some 
 thirty or forty feet thick, and is scarcely dis~ 
 tinguishable from certain Carboniferous 
 basalts of the Lothians. It is a hard, dark, 
 compact rock, somewhat rough and scori- 
 aceous toward the bottom, like the basalts 
 along the magnificent coast section near 
 Kinghorn in Fife. But what especially in- 
 terested me was to find that the upper surface 
 of the bed was even and smo> th, and that the 
 marls rested on it unaltered, the line of de- 
 markation being sharp and clear. The basalt 
 had undoubtedly rolled over the bottom of 
 the old lake ; it rested on lacustrine marls, 
 and strata of the same kind covered it. But 
 its upper surface, so far from rising up into 
 black bristling masses, like the subaerial cur- 
 rents of the puys, was smooth and even, like 
 the top of a bed of sandstone or limestone, 
 and the marls which succeeded gave no sign 
 of alteration or disturbance. I therefore in- 
 ferred that the evenn ss of the upper surface 
 of many Palaeozoic and Tertiary basalts in 
 Scotland offered no valid objection to their 
 being of the nature of true lava-currents, 
 poured out at the surface, and not injected at 
 some depth beneath it. 
 
 Ascending beyond the prominent zone of 
 basalt, we soon reached a bed of calcareous 
 peperino, or tuff, that at once recalled some 
 of the tuffs associated with parts of the Car- 
 boniferous Limestone of Linlithgowshire and 
 Fife, its stratification being confused, some- 
 times highly inclined, changing its direction, 
 or even disappearing altogether. Similar 
 ashy materials, mingled with calcareous mat- 
 ter, occupy tl.3 remainder of the hill up to 
 the cake of basalt which crowns the summit, 
 and show how among the fine sediments of 
 the ancient lake volcanic ejections were occa- 
 sionally thrown down. 
 
 We intended to make a circuit of Gergovia, 
 descending on the northwest side toward the 
 strange isolated castle-crowned crag of Mont- 
 rognon. But the rain, which had fallen 
 with scarcely an intermission since we began 
 the ascent, now came down in torrents. We 
 took refuge in a little cave in the calcareous 
 peperino, which looked eastward across the
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 Limagne to the distant mountains of the 
 Loire and southward to the volcanic heights 
 of the Velay. But the landscape was blotted 
 out in so thick a veil of falling water that we 
 could hardly distinguish the form of the trees 
 at a short distance down the slopes. It was 
 an instructive lesson in denudation to sit at 
 the mouth of the cave and watch the increase 
 of the runnels. Over ground which in the 
 morning was as dry and parched as a drought 
 of some weeks' duration could make it, water 
 now poured in hundreds of rivulets, acquiring 
 a milky color from the marl debris which it 
 swept away in its descent. One could see 
 how rapid must be the waste of these soft 
 calcareous rocks. Baked and cracked by the 
 fierce heat of summer, their surface crumbles 
 down. Every shower loosens and removes 
 portions of this disintegrated surface and 
 prepares the way for the action of the shower 
 that succeeds. It is by these means, joined 
 with the undermining agency of rivers, that 
 the d^ep and wide valleys of these districts 
 have been excavated. 
 
 Sitting in the cave while the deluge con- 
 tinued outside, we had leisure to reflect on 
 the geological history of the hill. Its strata 
 were elaborated at the bottom of the lake that 
 filled the broad valley of the Limagne. Leaf af- 
 ter leaf, and layer after layer of marl 1 and lime- 
 stone were slowly laid down, derived mainly 
 from the crumbling remains of shells, cyprids, 
 and other living creatures that tenanted the 
 water. The rate of growth of these tranquil 
 deposits must have been remarkably slow. 
 When a thickness of at least a thousand feet 
 of them had been formed, a volcano sprang 
 up in the neighborhood, and rolled into the 
 lake the stream of lava represented by the 
 lower bed of basalt. Fine calcareous sedi- 
 ment, however, began to be deposited anew 
 over the floor of lava, yet the volcanic forces 
 had not become wholly quiescent, for from 
 time to time showers of ashes were thrown 
 out, which, falling into the lake, gave rise to 
 those beds of pepenno, in one of which w 
 were now taking refuge from the storm. Af- 
 terward, another stream of lava was erupted, 
 forming the present summit of the hill. How 
 much farther the series may have originally 
 extended cannot now be discovered, since if 
 anything was deposited on the surface of the 
 second basalt it has been subsequently worn 
 away. The rain at last ceasing, we de- 
 scended by an endless series of turnings and 
 windings tq a.- tree-shaded road that led 
 through cornfields, now heavy with their 
 golden crop. Away to the left we could see 
 the Chateau de Montrognon, a ruined fortal- 
 ice perched on the summit of a nanow and 
 precipitous basaltic hill. Farther over lay 
 the high ground of the puys, with the rain- 
 clouds still floating over it. As we advanced, 
 however, the sky began to clear, patches of 
 deep blue now and then appeared through 
 gaps in the driving clouds, until the last 
 mist-wreath rose from the great Puy de 
 
 Dome, and, amid gleams of bright sunshine^ 
 we re-entered Clermont about noon. 
 
 The journey to Mont Dore, being uphill 
 nearly all the way, takes the greater part of 
 a dav. The first half of the road winding up- 
 the side of the granitic plateau crosses sev- 
 eral of the lava-streams which have descended 
 the valleys, like that from the cone of Pariou, 
 and at last reaches the desolate table-land on 
 which runs the chain of the puys. A good 
 view is obtained of several of the cones on 
 the south side of the Puy de Dflme, the 
 ruined yawning craters of the Puy de las 
 Solas and the Puy de la Vache being espe- 
 cially noticeable, with their now silent rivers, 
 of black rugged lava. From the half-way- 
 house, the road runs southward over the un- 
 dulating surf ace of the plateau, until it begins 
 the ascent of the Mont Dore hills. These 
 heights, in their lower portions, are tolerably 
 green, and constantly recall to my memory 
 parts of the basaltic scenery of Skye and 
 Mull. Numerous blocks of basalt, some- 
 times of considerable size, are scattered over 
 the surface, and often lie in such positions 
 that it is difficult to see how the action of the 
 atmosphere, or of running water, could have 
 placed them there. I kept an eye on the 
 alert to detect a striated or polished surface; 
 but there is little rock exposed in places 
 along the road, and I was unsuccessful. It 
 seemed at the time, however, to be far from 
 unlikely that some of these great blocks of 
 stone had been ice-borne. When the glaciers 
 of the Alps filled the valley of the Lake of 
 Geneva, at a height of no more than twelve 
 hundred fe.t above the sea, there seems no 
 reason why glaciers should not have descended, 
 from the Mont Dore mountains, which now 
 form the highest ground in Central France, 
 rising in the Pic de Sancy to a height of sir 
 thousand two hundred and seventeen feet. 
 At this day, indeed, snow remains unmelted 
 in the higher recesses of these mountains 
 even in midsummer. I am not aware, how- 
 ever, that the existence of glaciers has ever 
 been recognized here, and I had no time even 
 to make any attempt to solve the question for 
 myself. The occurrence of the scattered 
 blocks, and of some coarse unstratified de- 
 tritus, in the steep defile that descends from 
 the east into the valley of the Dordogne, was 
 at least sufficient to suggest the possibility of 
 a partially glacial origin for some of the deep> 
 valleys of the Mont Dore. 
 
 The Baths lie in a valley of surpassing; 
 loveliness, hemmed in by lofty mountains 
 and huge precipices. The climate is delicious 
 as a contrast to the scorching sultriness of 
 the lower plains, and hence the locality has 
 been a watering-place since the days of the 
 Roman occupation of Gaul. We had time 
 only to get a peep at the conglomerates and 
 trachytes of this great volcanic district. 
 Everything is on a scale so much vaster tha 
 n the country of the Puy de D&me, that the 
 first impression of the geologist is one of be-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 31 
 
 wilderment. We did not remain " ,^ enough : agent in scooping out this great indentation 
 to g.t rid of this feeling, and at this moment in the flanks of Mont Dore. Here and 
 I have a confused remembrance of vast irreg- there, in the center of the valley, it has left 
 ular sheets of trachytic lava, separated by isolated patches of the beds of rock that oc- 
 piles of volcanic ash and conglomerate, the ' cur on either side, such as the picturesque 
 whole thrown together in a way which at the conical crag on which stands the ruinous 
 time it seemed hopeless to attempt to un- j castle of Murol. These outliers are si.ent 
 ravel ; of dykes and veins of basalt, and j witnesses of the reality of the erosion. The 
 currents of lava, belonging to much more ' lava-current at the bottom of the valley has 
 recent eruptions t.iat flowed down the deep certainly not been erupted since the time ot 
 valleys which had been excavated out oi the the Romans. It must, therefore, be at least 
 ancient lavas. 2,000 years old, and may, for aught we can 
 
 Contenting ourselves with a mere survey tell, be ten or a hundred times older. Yet 
 of its external features, we left the Mont since its eruption, the action of the river, 
 Dore district by the road which, on re-ascend- J though here and there bisecting the lava, has 
 ing from the villey of the Dordogne, strikes | nevertheless been, on the whole, but trifling; 
 toward the east and then sweeps down into , indeed the amount of excavation effected 
 the valley of Chambon. The Baths, after ' since the eruption of this lava probably falls 
 
 lying for some hou -s under the shade of the 
 great hills, were bathed in sunlight, and full 
 of bustle, as we drove through the streets. 
 Invalids, valetudinarians, and fashionable 
 visitors may be seen passing to and fro be- 
 tween the hotels and the central building 
 where the waters are dispensed. Some are 
 borne in sedan-chairs, but the greater num- 
 
 far short of a thousandth part of the general 
 erosion of the valley. Yet the excavation of 
 the valley of Chambon is the latest and per- 
 haps the shortest of all the stages which the 
 geology of the district indicates. How vast 
 must have been that earlier period wherein 
 were deposited those fine alternations of lime 
 and clay which form hills, such as Mont 
 
 ber perform the short journey on foot. Men | Perrier, several hundred feet in height, 
 and women, as soon as they imbibe their ! divisible into distinct zones, each character- 
 draught, hurry home holding their mouths ized by peculiar assemblages cf fossils. It 
 a sight whic'.x. is now and then irresistibly ] is only by thus advancing, step by step, back- 
 comic as where a portly priest, perhaps of j ward into the remote past, that we begin to 
 same threescore, shuffles back to his hotel ' appreciate the antiquity c f the Tertiary 
 with the ends of his dress muffled round his groups of strata, and to icalize, in some 
 mouth and nose. On inquiry we learnt that measure, the extent of that long history of 
 
 this proceeding is meant to prevent the gas 
 from escaping after the morning dose of 
 
 physical and organic change of which these 
 strata contain only the last chapters. 
 
 water a precaution without which k is held We hurried onward from Issoire up the 
 impossible to derive the full benefits of les , plain of the Allier, catching a g impse of the 
 eaux mindrales. \ little contorted coal-field of Brassac an out- 
 
 The journey from Mont Dore les Bains to j let of true Carboniferous strata, resting in a 
 the plain of the Allier at Issoire is probably | hollow of the crystalline schists, and over- 
 one of the most interesting in Central France, i lapped by Tertiary marls and limestones 
 
 From the summit level of the road the eye 
 wanders over a wide sweep of mountains of 
 volcanic origin, traversed by wide valleys and 
 narrow gorges. Southward, in the dark 
 shady rifts of the higher peaks, lie gleaming 
 patches of snow, and the breeze that plays 
 about these uplands, even in the bright sun- 
 shine, is cool and refreshing. In the course 
 of the descent we again observed evidence of 
 lava-flows of several distinct ages, some of 
 them high up along the sides of valleys which 
 had since been excavated through them ; old 
 river gravels, too, far above the channels of 
 the present streams; and in the bottom of the 
 valley, following all its curves like a river, a 
 current of black rugged lava, which in one or 
 two places rose up into the most fantastic 
 masses. The impression of the immense 
 lapse of time represented by these Tertiary 
 formations and their subsequent denudation 
 was deepened tenfold as we threaded this 
 valley of Chambon. The stream which 
 meanders through the broader meadow- 
 lands, and leaps down the narrower 
 defiles, has undoubtedly been the main 
 
 which stretch southward from the Limagne. 
 Here and there in the valley were volcanic 
 mounds, sometimes capped with little towns, 
 so that, although we had quitted the district 
 of great lava-streams, we were far from hav- 
 ing reached the limits of the volcanic dis- 
 trict. The town of Brioude lies at the south- 
 ern extremity of that great lacustrine deposit 
 of the valley of the Allier, so conspicuously 
 displayed in the Limagne d'Auvergne. The 
 granitic hills close in upon the river, and 
 thence swell southward into the mountains 
 of La Margeride and the uplands of the 
 Haute-Loire. Of Brioude itself I have a 
 pleasant recollection as a quaint rambling 
 town wita some large decayed houses that 
 seem to have once been tenanted by a better 
 class of inmates. The hotel at which we 
 stayed was one of these. From a retired 
 street we entered a low archway, and found 
 ourselves in a dark room with a large fire- 
 place, now used as a kitchen. A number of 
 doors opened out of the farther side of the 
 room, and through one of them we were 
 ushered into a lobby with broad staircase
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 and carved banisters. Up and down, through 
 one passage into another, we at last halted 
 at a recess on one of the landings, and were 
 shown into a large wainscoted bedroom. Its 
 tarnished mirrors, faded green-velvet chaiis, 
 old-fashioned cabinets and tables, were cer- 
 tainly not the kind of furniture one would 
 have expected to see in a quiet hotel in a re- 
 mote little town. There was a taste and 
 harmony about the whole, and they fitted so 
 well with the character of the rest of the 
 house, as to suggest that the place had been 
 the residence of some decayed family, and 
 that not many years could have elapsed since 
 it passed into the hands of an innkeeper. 
 
 Crossing the Allier by the fine bridge at 
 Old Brioude, and bidding adieu to that noble 
 river, we started for Le Puy. Our course 
 lay toward the southeast, up a range of 
 granitic heights, traversed by numerous nar- 
 row and deep, but often thickly-wooded 
 ravines, and with fragments of ancient basalt 
 now and then protruding by the roadside, 
 or along the upper edge of a steep bank. 
 The country, however, remains somewhat 
 bare and uninteresting; nor until one begins 
 to descend toward the basin of the Loire, 
 and catches sight of the range of volcanic 
 hills and cones that encircle Le Puy, does its 
 interest revive. 
 
 Le Puy is one 'of the most picturesque 
 towns in France, built round a conical hill, 
 which rises in the valley between the River 
 Borne and another tributary of the Loire. 
 An abrupt crag of breccia, crowned with a 
 bronze statue of the Virgin, overhangs it on 
 the north; while lower down in the plain a 
 tall massive column of the same rock sup- 
 ports the small and seemingly inaccessible 
 church of St. Michel. The country rises 
 rapidly on all sides, so that Le Puy lies em- 
 bosomed among hills vast piles of lava, and 
 cones of ash formed by many different erup- 
 tions, sweeping away south into the heights 
 of Mont Mezen and the long plateau which 
 here separates the waters of the Allier from 
 those of the Loire. 
 
 The geologist could hardly pitch upon a 
 locality where more may be learned in so 
 narrow a compass. Le Puy lies in the center 
 of another Tertiary lake, some twenty miles 
 long and twelve or fourteen broad. This 
 lake occupied a hollow in the great granitic 
 framework of the country, and, like the 
 Limagne d'Auvergne, gave rise to the slow 
 accumulation of fine marls, limestones, and 
 sandstones, which attained a united thickness 
 of hundreds of feet. Over the top of these 
 horizontal strata, lavas and ashes were 
 erupted to a depth of three or four hundred 
 feet, so as wholly to cover up the lacustrine 
 deposits, and obliterate the site of the lake. 
 Since these events, the Loire and its tribu- 
 taries have been ceaselessly at work in deep- 
 ening and widening their channels. And 
 now, incredible as it may seem, these streams 
 have actually cut their way down through 
 
 the solid basalt, and a great part of the old 
 lake formations. They have, in short, ex- 
 cavated a series of valleys, several hundred 
 feet deep, and sometimes of considerable 
 width, along the sides of which are exposed 
 the remaining edges of the strata that have 
 been worn away. Standing on the summit 
 of the Montagne de Denise, and looking 
 round upon the valleys and ravines on every 
 side, each traversed by what seemed such an 
 insignificant stream, I felt as if a new geo- 
 logical agent were for the first time made 
 known to me. Striking as are the proofs of 
 erosion in the country of the Limagne, they 
 fall far short of these in the Haute-Loire. 
 To be actually realized, such a scene must be 
 visited in person. No amount of verbal de- 
 scription, not even t! e most careful drawings, 
 will convey a full sense of the magnitude of 
 the changes to one who is acquainted only 
 with the rivers of a glaciated country such as 
 Britain. The first impression received from 
 a landscape like that round Le Puy is rather 
 one of utter bewilderment. The upsetting 
 of all one's previous estimates of the power 
 of rain and rivers is sudden and complete. 
 It is not without an effort, and after having 
 analyzed the scene, feature by feature, that 
 the geologist can take it all in. But when 
 he has done so, his views of the effects of 
 subaerial disintegration become permanently 
 altered, and he quits the district with a rooted 
 conviction that there is almost no amount of 
 waste and erosion of the solid framework of 
 the land which may not be brought about in 
 time by the combined influence of springs, 
 frost, rain, and rivers. 
 
 The volcanic phenomena of the neighbor- 
 hood of Le Puy are likewise full of interest, 
 and, owing to the numerous deep ravines, 
 they can be easily studied in admirable natural 
 sections. The sheets of lava, often beauti- 
 fully columnar, recall many of the basalts of 
 Scotland. The beds of peperino, or tuff, 
 likewise bear the strongest resemblance to 
 some of the Carboniferous tuffs of the Loth- 
 ians. Indeed, many parts of the scenery 
 differ but little from some of the Scottish 
 volcanic districts. We found the cones of 
 scoriae more numerous, but less perfect than 
 round the Puy de D6me ; as if they belonged 
 to an earlier era, and had consequently been 
 longer exposed to the wasting effects of time. 
 But this greater antiquity is occasionally pro- 
 ductive of much advantage to the geologist, 
 for it presents him with chasms and cliffs, 
 without which he would miss many incidents 
 in the geological history of the district. 
 Thus, near Le Puy, the volcanic cone of 
 Mont Denise, so well known for the interest- 
 ing fossils which have been found in its un- 
 derlying gravels, has had its western front 
 exposed partly by nature and partly by man. 
 By this means are laid bare the strata of vol- 
 canic breccia that rest on the marls 01 the old 
 lake ; on a worn surface of the breccia comes 
 a band of true river gravel now several bun-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 33 
 
 dred feet above the present bed of the Borne, 
 while associated with this gravel there is 
 sometimes a newer volcanic tuff. Through 
 these various deposits the volcano of Mont 
 Denise broke out, piling up the mound of 
 loose scoriae and ashes that form the hill, 
 Here we saw, what it had not been our good 
 fortune to meet with in the Puy de D5me 
 the actual section of a volcanic vent. The 
 sides were smooth and worn, and the bed of 
 hard breccia, which had been perforated 
 nearly vertically, still retained the grooving 
 and polishing produced by the friction of the 
 ejected scorice. The vent was filled up with 
 a black scoriaceous lava, while several lava 
 fintlJi's that had rolied down the hillside now 
 formed dark masses of prominent crag and 
 cliff. This little volcano bore a close resem- 
 blance to the upper part of Arthur's Seat at 
 Edinburgh. In each case a column of lava 
 is surrounded by an outer envelope of loose 
 ashes, over which various currents of lava 
 have rolled down from the crater. 
 
 With no little reluctance, and not until the 
 sun had dipped behind the western hills, did 
 we quit the slopes of Mont Denise. The 
 evening, after a day of mingled storm and 
 sunshine, was beautiful, and the whole of that 
 wondrous landscape lay bright and clear 
 around. It was the last evening, too, which 
 we had to spend in the volcanic region of 
 Central France ; nor could we have secured 
 a more auspicious sky or a more favorable 
 locality for taking a last view of the scenery 
 and summing up the results of the journey. 
 Sitting on a pile of loose cinders on the top 
 of the hill, we watched the level rays lighting 
 up the vast basalt plateau that stretched away 
 for miles to the west, while each of the many 
 cones that dotted the plain cast its long 
 shadow toward us. With undiminished won- 
 der we gazed again at the deep ravines and 
 valleys by which the plateau is broken up, 
 each with its streamlet meandering like a sil- 
 ver thread between the slopes. The sunlight 
 lay warm and bright on the town of Le Puy 
 in the valley below, with its isolated crag of 
 La Vierge, and its church crowned pinnacle 
 of St. Michel two rocks that remain to 
 record the enormous erosion of these valleys. 
 The castle of Polignac built on another out- 
 lying crag farther down the plain stood up 
 in the deep shadow of Mont Denise. East- 
 ward, the gorges that open into the Loire 
 gleamed white as the sunset fell along their 
 bars of pale marls and limestones, and their 
 capping of basalt. Beyond these, cone rose 
 behind cone, amid piles of lava-currents of 
 many different ages ; each sunward slope and 
 crest was now flushed with a rosy hue deepen- 
 ing into purple in the distance, until, far away 
 as the eye could reach, the mountains of 
 Mont Mezen were steeped in the softest 
 violet, that melted into the twilight *>f the 
 eastern sky. 
 
 And here we take leave of the volcanoes of 
 Central France. Coming as learners to a 
 
 district which had been already often and 
 carefully explored, we gained such a vivid 
 impression of the phenomena of the country 
 as can only be obtained from an actual visit. 
 We were now able to realize, with a clearness 
 till then unlocked for, the original features of 
 those ancient Scottish igneous rocks, among 
 whose fragmentary relics we had been at 
 work for years. In the form of their cones, 
 their distribution, their aspect in the land- 
 scape, the limited extension of their ashes, 
 ihe form and disposition of their lava-cur- 
 rents, the structure of their craters, and their 
 relation to the underlying and to the con- 
 temporaneous stratified deposits, these extinct 
 Tertiary volcanoes of France cast a flood of 
 what to me was new light upon the long- 
 extinct Carboniferous volcanoes of Scotland. 
 I seemed no longer to be dealing with con- 
 jectures, but with sober truths. To th: his- 
 tory of the igneous rocks of my own country 
 there was now imparted a freshness and real- 
 ity such as it did not possess before. More 
 than ever did these rocks stand forti, not as 
 mere mineral masses, to be described in text- 
 books as occupying definite areas of ground, 
 or to be arranged by hand-specimens in a 
 museum as so many mineralogical compounds, 
 but as the records of a long geological aistory 
 which they would unfold if only questioned 
 in the right way. And the main resul ' of 
 our wanderings in the Auvergne and the 
 Velay was to show us how this question 
 should be carried on. 
 
 Nor did we value less the new and enlarged 
 news which those rambles gave us of the po- 
 tency of rain, rivers, and other atmospheric 
 agencies, in effecting the degradation of the 
 land. Nothing we had read in geological 
 literature, not even Mr. Scrope's classic de- 
 scriptions of this very region, had prepared 
 us for the contemplation of changes so stu- 
 pendous as those of the erosion of the ravines 
 and valleys of Le Puy. To look upon them 
 for the first time was, as I have said, like a 
 new revelation, which in an instant uprooted 
 a host of narrow long-cherished conceptions, 
 and supplanted them with a profound respect 
 for the power of the terrestrial agencies of 
 waste. Broader, and truer, and fresher views 
 of nature art? worth the trouble of a long 
 journey, and in gaining them we felt our- 
 selves abundantly repaid for our toil under a 
 fierce sun among the uplands of Central 
 France. 
 
 VI. 
 
 THE OLD GLACIERS OF NORWAY 
 AND SCOTLAND. 
 
 In the course of the detailed investigations 
 of the history of the glacial period in Britain, 
 which, during the past six or seven years,
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 have been carried on by the Geological Sur- 
 vey, the desire naturally arose to compare the 
 phenomena of glaciation now familiar in this 
 country with those of some other region 
 where they might be linked with the action 
 of still existing glaciers. No other part of 
 Europe offered so many facilities for such a 
 comparison as were to be found in Scandi- 
 navia. In the first place, the rocks of the 
 two regions were known to present many 
 points of resemblance in structure and scen- 
 ery. It was further evident from the pub- 
 lished accounts that the Norwegian coast 
 possessed the ice-worn aspect so characteris- 
 tic of the West of Scotland. 
 
 The objects proposed to be accomplished 
 in this excursion were to compare, as mi- 
 nutely as time would allow, the ice-marks on 
 the rocks of Scotland with those on the rocks 
 of Scandinavia ; to ascertain, from personal 
 exploration, how far the glaciation of the 
 Norwegian coasts and fjords could be traced 
 to the action of land-ice or of floating bergs ; 
 to trace, if possible, the connection between 
 the ancient ice-work and the work of living 
 glaciers; and, generally, to seek for any facts 
 that might help to throw light upon the 
 history of the glacial period of the British 
 Isles. Having only a few weeks at our dis- 
 posal, we were far from aiming at origin \\ 
 discovery in Norwegian geology. The main 
 features of the disposition of the snow-fields 
 and glaciers had already been given in the 
 masterly sketch by Principal Forbes a work 
 which was of inestimable value to us. More 
 detailed descriptions of parts of the glaciation 
 of Norway had been published by Scandi- 
 navian geologists Esmark, Horbye, Kjerulf, 
 Sexe, and others. Yet I was not without the 
 hope that, besides adding 10 our own experi- 
 ence, we might also be fortunate enough to 
 find in the Norwegian fjords materials for 
 making still more clear the geological history 
 of our own western sea-lochs. 
 
 The close resemblance between the general 
 outline of Scotland and that of Scandinavia is 
 too well known to need more than a passing 
 allusion. The numerous deep and intricate 
 indentations, the endless islands and sker- 
 ries, the mountainous shores, the host of 
 short independent streams on the western 
 coast; and on the eastern side, the broad, 
 undulating lowlands, sending their collected 
 drainage into large rivers, which enter the sea 
 along a comparatively little embayed coast- 
 line, are familiar features on the maps of both 
 countries. This general outward resemblance, 
 which at once arrests the attention of every 
 traveler in Norway to whom the scenery of 
 the Western Highlands is familiar, depends 
 upon a close similarity in the geological struc- 
 ture of the rocks, and a coincidence in the 
 geological history of the surface of the two 
 regions. Norway, from south to north, is 
 almost wholly made up of crystalline and 
 schistose rocks, not all of the same age, yet 
 possessing a general similarity of character. 
 
 In like manner, the West of Scotland, from 
 the Mull of Cantyre to Cape Wrath, is in 
 great measure built up of gneisses, schists, 
 slates, quartzites, granites, and other rocks, 
 quite comparable with those of Norway. 
 
 Besides the external resemblance due to 
 the lithological nature of the rocks beneath, 
 there is a still further likeness dependent 
 upon similarity, partly of geological struc- 
 ture, and partly of denudation. Most of the 
 Scottish sea-lochs have had their trend deter- 
 mined by lines of strike or of anticlinal axis, 
 and the same result seems to have taken place 
 in Norway. But the lochs and the glens of one 
 country, and the fjords and valleys of the 
 other, whether or not their site and direction 
 have been determined by geological structure, 
 unquestionably owe their excavation to the 
 great process of denudation which has 
 brought the surface of the land to its present 
 form. In short, Norway and the Scottish 
 Highlands seem to be but parts of one long 
 table-land of erosion composed of palaeozoic 
 (Chiefly metamorphic) rocks. This table-land 
 must be of venerable antiquity; for it seems 
 to have been in existence, at least in part, as 
 far back as the Lower Old Red Sandstone. 
 Since that time it nas been sorely defaced by 
 long cycles of geological revolution; rains, 
 rivers, ice, and general atmospheric waste 
 have carved out of it tiie present valleys, and 
 to all this surface change must be added the 
 results of dislocations, as well as unequal up- 
 heavals and depressions of the crust of the 
 earth beneath. Nevertheless.it still survives in 
 extensive fragments in Norway, where it serves 
 as a platform for the great snow-fields, while 
 it can even yet be traced along the undulat- 
 ing summits of the mountains of toe Scottish 
 Highlands. One of its latest great revolu- 
 tions was a submergence toward the west, 
 
 which, extending from the coasts of Ireland 
 to the north of Norway, has given rise to 
 some of the most distinctive features of that 
 part of Europe. No one can attentively 
 compare the maps of the land with the charts 
 of the sea-bottom in the region between the 
 headlands of Connaught and the North Cape, 
 without being convinced that the endless 
 ramifying sea-lochs and fjords, kyles and 
 sounds, were once land-valleys. Each loch 
 and fjord is the submerged part of a valley, 
 of which we still see the uppor portion above 
 water, and the sunken rocks and skerries, is- 
 lets and islands, are all so many relics of f he 
 uneven surface of the old land before its 
 submergence. The indented form of the 
 coastline of the west of Scotland and of 
 Norway is not evidence of the unequal en- 
 croachment of the sea, as is often, perhaps 
 generally, supposed, but is due to a general 
 submergence of the west side of the two 
 countries, whereby the tides have been sent 
 far inland, filling from side to side ancient 
 valleys and lakes. Subsequent re elevations, 
 or rather, stationary intervals during a long 
 period of elevation, are marked along both
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 35 
 
 the Norwegian and Scottish shores by suc- 
 cessive terraces or raised beaches. 
 
 But to one who has sailed or boated among 
 the sea-lochs of Scotland, no feature of the 
 Norwegian coast is at once so striking and so 
 familiar as the universal smoothing and 
 rounding of the rocks, which is now recog- 
 nized as the result of the abrading power of 
 ice. Every skerry and islet among the count- 
 less thousands of that coast-line is either one 
 smooth boss of rock, like the back of a whale 
 or dolphin, or a succession of such bosses 
 rising and sinking in gentle undulations into 
 each other. Such, too, is the nature of the 
 rocky shore of every fjord ; the smoothed 
 surface growing gradually rougher, indeed, 
 as we trace it upward from th sea-level, yet 
 continuing to show itself, until at a height of 
 many hundred feet it merges into the broken, 
 scarped outlines of the higher mountain sides 
 and summits. In short, as is now well known, 
 the whole of the surface of the country, for 
 many hundred feet above the sea, has been 
 ground down and smoothed by ice. 
 
 We sailed along the coast of Norway, be- 
 tween Bergen and Hammerfest, by the 
 usual steamboat route, touching at many sta- 
 tions by the way, threading the narrow kyles 
 and sounds that lie among the innumerable 
 islands, and now and then running inland 
 up some fjord far into the heart of the 
 country. We halted here and there to spend 
 a. few days at a time in exploring some of the 
 fjords and glaciers. What can be s"en from 
 the steamer on the coasting voyage is now 
 familiar from the numerous descriptions 
 which have been given of it in recent years. 
 I shall therefore content myself with offering 
 an account of two excursions to points at 
 some distance from the ordinary route. 
 
 A little to the north of the Arctic Circle 
 lies the island of Melo, one of many which 
 are here crowded together along the coast. 
 It is only noticeable, inasmuch as it is a sta- 
 tion at which the steamers call, and from 
 which the great snow-fields of the Svartisen 
 or Fondalen may be most easily visited. 
 Here, as along all the Norwegian coasts, we 
 find ourselves among bare bossy hummocks of 
 rock thoroughly ice-worn. From the higher 
 eminences the eye sweeps over the count- 
 less islets and skerries, and far across the 
 Vest Fjord to the serrated peaks of the Lo- 
 fodden Islands, which in the distance seem 
 deep sunk in the northwestern sea. The 
 whole of the lower grounds is one labyrinth 
 of roches moutonnefo, raising their smooth 
 backs like so many porpoises out of the sea, 
 as well as peering out of a flat expanse of 
 green pasture and dark bog which here 
 covers an old sea-bottom. The striations 
 and groovings are still fresh on many of the 
 smoothed surfaces of gneiss, and invariably 
 run straight out to sea in the line of the long 
 valley up which the sea winds inland among 
 the snowy mountains. It cannot be doubted 
 that a vast mass of ice has come seaward 
 
 down this valley, and that all these ice-worn 
 hummocks of rock were ground down by it. 
 The wide opening at Melo is formed by the 
 converging mouths of a number of narrow 
 fjords. Of these the most northerly is the 
 Glommens Fjord, which is bounded along 
 its northerly side by a range of high moun- 
 tains, with a serrated crest and abundant 
 snowy clefts and corries. Southward lies a 
 belt of lower ice-worn hills, cut lengthwise by 
 the Bjerangs Fjord, and bounded on the south 
 by the Holands Fjord, on the south of which 
 rises another range of scarped snow-covered 
 mountains. 
 
 From the gaard of Melo we boated east- 
 ward among various small islets and chan- 
 nels, passing soon into the Holands Fjord, 
 up which we continued until we rested un- 
 derneath the great snow-field and glaciers of 
 Svartisen. In this excursion we started 
 from the coast, amid islands, all molded, 
 like those of the West of Scotland, by the 
 ice of the glacial period, and in the evening 
 we reached rocks on which the present gla- 
 ciers are inscribing precisely the same mark- 
 ings. One of the first features whic i arrested 
 attention was the contrast between the 
 smoothed, ice-worn surface of the lower 
 grounds and the craggy, scarped outlines of 
 the mountain crests. This was especially 
 marked along the northern side of the Glom- 
 mens Fjord, where the ice worn rocks 
 form a distinct zone along the side of the 
 rough, craggy hills. To the north of Melo- 
 vaer this ice-worn belt was estimated to rise 
 about 200 feet above the sea. Its smoothed 
 rocks are abundantly rent along lines of joint 
 and other divisional planes; their ice- worn 
 aspect must thus be imperceptibly fading 
 away. The rough rocks above them some- 
 times show traces of smoothed surfaces, as 
 if they had suffered from an older glaciation, 
 of which the records are now all but obliter- 
 ated. The line of division between the belt 
 of rocks which have been smoothed by ice, 
 and tho e which have been roughened and 
 scarped by atmospheric waste, slopes gently 
 upward in the direction of the central snow- 
 fields of the interior. While at Melovaer it 
 seemed to rise only about 200 feet above the 
 sea; at Fondalen, twenty-five or thirty miles 
 inland, it mounts to a height of fully 1,500 
 feet. A tract of bare hills, lying between 
 the Glommens and the Holands Fjords, and 
 rising eastward into the snow-covered table- 
 land, is well smoothed in the direction of 
 these fjords. In short, the whole of the 
 broad depression between the two fjords has 
 been filled with ice, moving steadily down- 
 wards from the snow-fields to the sea. 
 
 It was interesting to watch, on every little 
 islet and promontory under which we 
 passed, even the same details of glaciations 
 so familiar along the margin of our Scottish 
 fjords. The rocks, smoothed into flowing 
 lines, slip sharply and cleanly into the water, 
 and are well grooved and striated. More-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 over, it was easy to see that the ice which had 
 graven these lines must have moved down 
 t e fjord, for the lee or rougher side of the 
 crags looks seaward. It was likewise clear 
 that the scorings were not the work of drift- 
 ing bergs or coast ice, for they could often be 
 seen mounting over projecting parts of the 
 banks, yet retaining all the while their sharp- 
 ness, parallelism, and persistent trend. An- 
 other point of similarity to West Highland 
 Scenery was found in the strange scarcity or 
 absence of drift an:i boulders. 1 do not mean 
 to assert that these are not to be met with at 
 all, but they do not exist so prominently as 
 to catch the eye even of one who is on the 
 outlook for them. The rock everywhere 
 raises its bare knolls to the sun as it does on 
 the coasts of Inverness and Argyll. To com- 
 plete the resemblanc;, the Norwegian fjord 
 has its sides marked by the line of a former 
 sea-margin, about 250 feet above the present. 
 This terrace winds out and in among all the 
 ramifications and curves of the fjord, remain- 
 ing fresher and more distinct than the raised 
 beaches of the West Highlands usually are, 
 and even rivaling one of the parallel roads of 
 Lochaber. 
 
 We rested for a week at the hamlet of 
 Fondalen, on the south side of the Holands 
 Fjord. It stands at the mouth of a deep 
 narrow valley on the line of the terrace, 
 which here runs along the crest of a steep 
 bank of rubbish covered with enormous 
 blocks (>f rock an old moraine thrown 
 across the end of the valley. There seems 
 to have been at one time a lake behind this 
 bank, formed by the ponding back of the 
 drainage of the valley, and gradually emptied 
 as the outflow-stream deepened its channel 
 through the moraine. At the head of the 
 valley a small glacier descends from the snow- 
 field of Svartisen. There could be no better 
 locality for studying the gradual diminution 
 of the glaciers, and for learning that it was 
 land-ice that filled the Norwegian fjords, 
 overrode the lower hills, and went out boldly 
 into the Atlantic and Arctic Sea. The Ho- 
 lands Fjord runs, as I have said, approxi- 
 mately east and west, and this short narrow 
 valley descends from the south. The fjord 
 was formerly filled with ice, and is therefore 
 polished and striated along the line of its 
 main trend. The valley of Fondalen was 
 likewise filled with ice, moving down to join 
 the mass in the fjord; and its rocks, too, are 
 striated in the length of the valley, or from 
 south to north. The moraine of Fondalen 
 is a proof that a glacier once descended to 
 the Holands Fjord at that point. Further 
 evidence is found in the fact, that the sides 
 of the valley are ground and striated for 
 seven hundred feet and more above its bot- 
 tom. Moreover, these polished and scored 
 locks can be traced up to and underneath the 
 glacier. I crept tor some yards under the 
 ice, and found the floor of gneiss on which 
 it rested smoothly polished and covered with 
 
 scorings of all sizts, exactly the same in 
 
 every respect as those high on the sides of 
 
 ! the valley, in the fjord below, and away on 
 
 I the outer islands and skerries. Over this 
 
 polished surface trickled the water of the 
 
 melted ice, washing out sand and small 
 
 stones -from- under the glacier. 
 
 We climbed the steep eastern side of the 
 valley above the foot of the glacier, and 
 found the hummocks of gneiss wonderfully 
 glaciated up to a height of fully 700 feet. 
 The gnarled crystalline rock has been ground 
 away smoothly and sharply, so as to show its 
 twisted foliation as well as the patterns of a 
 marble are displayed on a polished chimney- 
 piece. Even vertical or overhanging faces of 
 rock are equally smoothed and striated. 
 Many of the roches moutonnees are loaded 
 with perched blocks of all sizes, up to masses 
 thirty or forty feet long. Above the limit to 
 which we traced the work of the ice the 
 rocks begin to wear a more rugged surface, 
 until along the summit of the ridges they rise 
 into serrated crests and pinnacles. This 
 rougher outline is of course the result of 
 atmospheric waste, guided by the geological 
 structure and chemical composition of the 
 rocks. 
 
 The glacier descends from the snow-field, 
 which we guessed to have there an elevation 
 of about 3,500 feet, to a point in the valley 
 about 400 feet above the sea. The distance 
 from the snow field to the foot of the glacier 
 looks not much more than one English mile 
 at least it is but short compared with the 
 rapidity of descent. Hence the glacier is 
 iteep, and in some places much crevassed. 
 Issuing from the upper snow in a steep, bro- 
 ken, and jagged slope of blue ice, it descends 
 by a series of steps, till, getting compacted 
 again in the valley below, it passes into a 
 solid, firm glacier, with a tolerably smooth 
 surface, forming a declivity of 12 or 15. 
 At a point about half a mile or less from the 
 foot of the glacier the valley suddenly con- 
 tracts, and the glacier, much narrowed and 
 compressed, tumbles over a second steep de- 
 clivity in a mass of broken ice. The cre- 
 vasses speedily unite, and after another 
 descent of 300 or 400 yards at an angle of 
 25, the glacier comes to an end. At the 
 point where the strangulation takes place the 
 glacier lies in a kind of basin, of which the 
 ower lip presents proofs of the most intense 
 erosion. On the western bank, in particular, 
 a mass of the mountain side whicn projects 
 "nto the ice has been ground away, and 
 shows plainly enough by its form and striae, 
 that the glacier, ascending from the basin, 
 lias climbed up and over this barrier, so as to 
 tumble down its northern or seaward side. 
 
 The course of this little glacier is now too 
 short to admit of the formation of moraines. 
 Yet there are large heaps of rubbish and 
 enormous messes of rock scattered over the 
 valley below; and the moraine at Fondalen is 
 a further proof that, when the ice formerly
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 37 
 
 filled the valley, its surface received abund- 
 ant detritus from the mountain slopes on 
 either side 
 
 Opposite Fondalen, the Holands Fjord, 
 passing through a deep and narrow channel 
 on its northern bank, trends in an east- 
 northeasterly direction; bu. just befoie 
 taking this course it sends eastward a bay 
 which terminates at the mouth of a valley 
 about a mile above the hamlet. This valley 
 is considerably larger than that just described, 
 and it is occupied by a much longer and 
 larger glacier. To one who looks up the valley 
 from the opposite side of the fjord, it seems 
 as if the ample glacier which fills up the bot- 
 tom sweeps down from the snow-field in a 
 rapid descent to the very edge of the sea. 
 On a visit to the locality, however, it is found 
 that between the foot of the glacier and the 
 sea-margin there lies a plain of shingle and 
 alluvium, partly covered with a brushwood of 
 birch, and partly with a scanty pasturage. 
 Near the ice the ground rises into ridges and 
 hummocks, which increase in size toward 
 the glacier. These are true moraine mounds, 
 rising often sixty or seventy feet above 
 their base, consisting of earth and stones, 
 and strewn with large blocks of gneiss, por- 
 phyry, limestone, and other crystalline rocks. 
 About a quarter of a mile from the margin of 
 the fjord, along the eastern half ot the 
 breadth of the valley, these mounds come 
 in contact witrf the foot of the glacier, 
 which is there pushed in a long tongue 
 
 and angular rubbish. Here, as at every gla- 
 cier we visited, the glaciation of the rocks, 
 down to the minutest detail, was exactly sim- 
 ilar to that of the coast and outer islets, as 
 well as to that of the Scottish glens and sea- 
 lochs. 
 
 But the feature which most interested us 
 was the relation of this large glacier of Fon- 
 dalen to the marine deposits of the locality. 
 The high terrace so marked along the sides 
 of the Holands Fjord enters this valley, and 
 extends on the mountain sides, as far as, at 
 least, the foot of the glacier. Hence the 
 gravelly plain and the moraine mounds that 
 separate the glacier from the fjord are over- 
 looked on either side by a raised sea-beach. 
 In examining attentively the nature of the 
 material of whi.h the mounds nearest the gla- 
 cier were composed, we were struck with the 
 difference between it and the loose, coarse 
 character of the ordinary moraine rubbish, 
 and its resemblance to the upper boulder- 
 clay of Scotland. The glacier is pushing 
 great noses of ice into and over these mounds, 
 so that freshly-exposed sections are abundant. 
 The deposit is a loose sandy clay or earth 
 full of stones, among which the percentage 
 of striated specimens is not large. The larger 
 blocks of gneiss and schist appeared to us 
 not to occur in this clay, but to be tumbled 
 down upon it from the surface of the glacier. 
 We had hardly begun to look over a surface 
 of the clay ere we found fragments of shells, 
 and in the course of a few minutes we picked 
 
 down the valky. The ice overrides the up several handfuls, chierly of broken pieces 
 moraine heaps, ploughing them and push- j of Cyptina Islandica, but including also single 
 ing them over. On the west side of this pro- valves of Astarte compressa, etc. We even 
 longation of the glacier the ice is separated j took out two or three fragments which were 
 from the moraine mound by a small lake, of j sticking in the ice of the glacier. These 
 which the surplus waters find their way sea- j shells were not peculiar to one spot, but oc- 
 ward by cutting through the moraine. Like \ curred more or less abundantly across the 
 
 many lakes still existing in Britain, this sheet 
 of water is formed by the dam of rubbish 
 thrown down by the glacier across the valley. 
 It is full cf fragments of ice, which break off 
 from the parent mass, and float across to the 
 north or lower side, where they strand on the 
 moraine heaps, and gradually melt away. 
 The smaller pieces, however, often find their 
 way into the stream by which the lake dis- 
 charges itself, and are then carried downiuto 
 the fjord. From the mean of several obser- 
 
 the surface of this lake to be about twenty- 
 five feet above the level of high water in the 
 fjorrf. We had no means of measuring its 
 depth, yet, from the slope of the glacier, it 
 
 valley. 
 
 From the nature of* the material of which 
 these mounds consist, and from the occur- 
 rence of marine shel's, it was evident that we 
 were looking not merely upon ordinary mo- 
 raine heaps the detritus carried down on the 
 surface of the ice and discharged upon the 
 bottom of the valley. The glacier was en- 
 gaged in ploughing up the marine sediment 
 which had been formerly deposited upon the 
 submerged floor of the valley, and on the 
 
 ations taken with the aneroid, I estimated heaps of earth and clay now torn up were 
 
 ' thrown the gravel and blocks brought down 
 
 by the present glacier. In short, we saw 
 here actually at work a process of excavation, 
 by which it had been conjectured that the 
 
 may be inferred that the bottom of the ice j marine drift was removed from certain valleys 
 is probably lower than the level of the sea. | in the British Isles. 
 
 Proofs that the glacier was once much 
 larger than it is now may be well seen on the 
 west side of the valley, a little above the lake. 
 The shelving slopes of the mountain for 
 
 We made two attempts, both unsuccessful, 
 to climb to the vast table-land of snow 
 from which these glaciers are fed. But we 
 succeeded in reaching a point from which a 
 
 several hundred feet upward have been shorn I good view of the seemingly boundless undu- 
 
 smooth, grooved, and striated, and every 
 polished hummock of rock is loaded with 
 huge fragments of stone and heaps of earth 
 
 lating plain of smooth snow could be ob- 
 tained. We ascended the ridge that sepa- 
 rates the two glacier valleys just described.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 After leaving the raised beach of Fondalen, 
 with its massive erratics, we climbed a steep 
 slope, clothed with a thick brushwood of 
 birch, mountain-ash, and dwarf-willow, and 
 luxuriant masses of ferns, bilberries, cloud- 
 berries, juniper, rock-geranium, lychnis, etc. 
 The beech trees are often a foot or a foot and 
 a half in diameter at the base, and are the 
 building material used at the hamlet of 
 Fondalen below. These trees, at the height 
 of 1,320 above the sea, still often measure a 
 foot across near the root, and fifteen or 
 twenty feet in height. At this elevation, and 
 even considerably lower, there were large 
 sheets of snow on the I2th of July, and these 
 increased in number and depth as we as- 
 cended. The birch trees grow smaller and 
 more stunted as they struggle up the bare 
 mountain ridge, until they become mere 
 bushes. The willows, in like manner, 
 dwindle down till they look like straggling 
 tufts of heather, though still bearing their 
 full formed catkins. At a height of 1,690 
 feet, these stunted bushes at last give place 
 to a scrub of bilberry, mosses, and lycopods. 
 The mountain consists of gneiss, sometimes 
 massive and jointed sometimes fissile 
 and flaggy, with a striki toward W., 15 
 S. 1 he extent to which the higher rocky 
 scarps have suffered from the disintegrating 
 effects of the weather arrests attention ; for 
 the gneiss is split up along its joints into 
 large blocks, which lie piled upon each other 
 in heaps of angular ruin. We noticed one or 
 two masses, differing in lithological character 
 from the rocks around, and possibly ice-borne 
 from some of the neighboring eminences. 
 On reaching a point 2,700 feet above the 
 fjord, our farther passage was arrested by a 
 narrow, shattered, knife-edge of gneiss, 
 along which, without suitable climbing gear, 
 it was impossible to advance. But from this 
 elevated point we could judge of the general 
 aspect of the great snowy table-land of the 
 Svartisen, which was sloping toward us, 
 while the two glaciers were spread out in 
 plan beneath. 
 
 The branch of the Holands Fjord which, 
 opposite to the hamlet of Fondalen, strikes 
 off to the northeast for seven or eight miles, 
 is bordered on the south side, and closed in 
 at its farther end by a range of steep, almost 
 precipitous, walls of rock, the summits of 
 which are on a level with, and indeed form 
 part of the great table-land. Here, as in so 
 many other parts of Norway, we are reminded 
 that the fjords are, after all, mere long sinu- 
 ous trenches, dug deeply out of the edge of a 
 series of elevated plateaux. And, looking up to 
 the crest of these dark precipices, we see the 
 edge of the high snow-plain peering over, and 
 sending a stream of blue glacier ice down 
 every available hollow. We counted seven 
 of these tiny glaciers exuding from under 
 the snow, and creeping downward under tne 
 sombre cliffs of gneiss. Not one of them 
 comes much below the snow line, and none, 
 
 of course, reaches the sea. The largest of 
 them is near the end of the fjord, and ap- 
 pears as a broken, crevassed mass of ice, 
 molded as it were over the steep hillside, 
 and, when seen from below, seeming about 
 to slip off and plunsje into the fjord. Frag- 
 ments of it are continually breaking away, 
 and rolling, with the noise of thunder and 
 clouds of icy dust, down the shelving sides 
 of the mountains. These glaciers are, for 
 the most part, continuous with the snow- 
 field, of which they are the icy drainage. 
 One or two, however, lie in corries, quite de- 
 tached from the main snow-field, though 
 connected with it by continuous snow in 
 winter. 
 
 The bright sunny Arctic nights led us not 
 unfrequently and almost unconsciously to 
 prolong the work of one day into the next. 
 Once, at midnight, while sketching at Fon- 
 dalen, I was amused by the loud and persist- 
 ent call of a cuckoo perched on one of the 
 neighboring trees. The native non-migratory 
 birds are evidently used to the ways of the 
 sun in the Arctic summer, and, like the 
 human population, know when to go to rest. 
 But the tourist cuckoo was evidently quite 
 unaware of the lateness of the hour, and con- 
 tinued his "two-fold shout " as lustily as if it 
 had been midday. 
 
 We left this delightful fjord not without 
 regret, and catching again the coasting 
 steamer at Melovaer, proceeded northward. 
 Between Melovaer and Bodo, the higher 
 mountains have wonderfully craggy and 
 spiry outlines, only their lower parts show- 
 ing the smoothed contour of glaciation. But 
 wnere the cdast hills sink, as toward a fjord 
 or bay, the ice- molded forms can be traced 
 to a greater height. To the north of Bodo, 
 the contrast between the sharp weather-worn 
 peaks above and the flowing ice-worn hum- 
 mocks and hillsides below is singularly start- 
 ling. Principal Forbes, who gave a charac- 
 teristically faithful drawing to illustrate this 
 feature, places the upper limit of glaciation 
 at from 1,500 to 2,000 feet. We should have 
 estimated it to be considerably lower. 
 Through narrow kyles and intricate sounds, 
 reminding one at every turn of detached 
 portions of West Highland or Hebridean 
 scenery, the steamer slowly wound its way, 
 and then across the Vest Fjord to the Lofod- 
 den Islands. The weather now unfortunately 
 proved unfavorable for geological observa- 
 tion. In sailing through the Raft Sund we 
 saw what looked like moraines at the mouths 
 of some of the valleys, and the lines of mo- 
 raine terraces continued as marked as ever. 
 Rocks well ice-worn were also observed at 
 the openings of some of the valleys, but we 
 were rather impressed with the general rug- 
 gedness and absence of glaciation among the 
 Lofoddens. 
 
 To the north of Troms3 lies the island of 
 Ringvatso, noticed by Mr. R. Chambers. 
 The moraine which he describes as damming
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 np the circular sheet ot water, whence the 
 island takes its name, really coincides with 
 the line of the higher of the two strongly- 
 marked terraces or sea-margins of this part 
 of the Norwegian coast. It thus illustrates 
 the history of the moraine and terrace below 
 the smaller glacier at Fondaien. It was 
 farther interesting to mark that the glacier at 
 Ringvatso, partially hidden under snow, lies 
 in a hollow or corry surrounded with preci- 
 pices, and quite cut off from any snow-field. 
 The accumulation of snow in the corry itself 
 must thus be sufficient to give rise to the 
 glacier. In looking at this island, I was 
 Forcibly reminded of the history of the gla 
 
 Norwegian coast, even (as in the Jokuls 
 Fjord) in sheltered places where wave action 
 cannot be supposed ever to have been very 
 strong. As the date of these rock-terraces 
 probably goes back into the glacial period, it 
 occurred to me that they may have been due 
 in large measure to the effects of the freez- 
 ings and thawings along the old "ice-foot," 
 and to the rasping and grating of coast ice. 
 Such, too, may have been the origin of the 
 higher horizontal rock-terraces of Scotland. 
 
 At the head of the fjord the terrace- dis- 
 appear along the steep bare sides of the 
 mountains. A moraine mound of loose rub- 
 bish and large blocks lies on the west side, and 
 
 ciers of Tweedsmuir and Loch Skene in i extends a little way into the fjord, pointing 
 
 Peebleshire and other old glacier grounds in 
 Scotland, where, on dimples of the hill-tops, 
 and in deep cliff-encircled recesses, snow 
 
 toward a similar ridge on the opposite side, 
 as if both were parts of a curved terminal 
 moraine. The view from this ridge is singu- 
 
 enough gathered to form streams of ice, | larly imposing. The sombre precipitous 
 which caught and carried on their surface I mountains sweep upward from the edge of 
 piles of rubbish and huge blocks of rock, the water, seamed everywhere with streaks 
 
 A large snow-field is not necessary for the 
 
 and sheets of snow. Down even to the 
 
 production of a glacier that may form com- beach these snow-drifts lie; and it gives a . 
 
 paratively extensive moraines. 
 
 The southwestern side of the Lyngen Fjord 
 is formed by a mass of high ground, which 
 shoots up steeply f.om the sea to a height of 
 four thousand feet or more. Every hollow 
 and cliff is smothered with snow, which 
 
 vivid impression of the high latitude of the 
 place, that even in July there should be deep 
 masses of snow overhanging tangle-covered 
 rocks, and undermined by the wash of the 
 waves. Over the crest of the mountains, 
 at the head of the fjord, we see the 
 
 descends in straggling streaks and patches edge of the great snow-field of the Jokuls 
 almost to the edge of the water. We sailed Fjeld, and stealing down from underneath 
 
 up 
 
 the fjord for some miles, and had a full 
 
 view of this truly magnificent coast-line. We 
 counted from ten to twelve small glaciers 
 nestling in separate corries, and also two or 
 three on the northeastern side. There was 
 here the same evidence of the formation of 
 glaciers in small independent hollows of the 
 
 mountains, quite detached, at least 
 summer, from any large snow-field. 
 
 the 
 
 We halted at the island of Skjaervo (lat. 
 
 the snow comes a broken, shattered mass 
 of glacier ice, broadest at the top, and 
 
 narrowing downward 
 
 its point dis- 
 
 appears in a deep cleft or ravine, perhaps a 
 third of the way from the surface of the 
 snow-field to the sea. The eastern part of 
 this glacLr seems plastered, as it were, over 
 the forehead of the mountain, and is ever 
 sending off fragments down the dark preci- 
 pice below. Indeed, the whole glacier is in 
 
 70) for the purpose of making an excursion constant commotion, cracking and crashing 
 across the Kvenangen Fjord and up the | and discharging masses of ice and snow, 
 Jokuls Fjord, to see the glacier which was ' which pour over the black rocks in sheets of 
 said to reach the level of the sea. The white dust, with a noise like the unintermit- 
 metamorphic rocks among which the Jokuls ted thunder of a battle. These ice-falls are 
 Fjord lies are for the most part of a flaggy : in large measure intercepted at the point 
 quartzose character. Sometimes, especially | where the glacier disappears behind the side 
 where most fissile, they are violently crum- i of the ravine. They seemed, indeed, to col- 
 pled. Parts of them pass into hornblende lect in the ravine, and to slide down through 
 rock and actinolite schist. Their average it ; for at its lower end a second glacier be- 
 strike s on an east and west line. They are gins, and expands with the expansion of the 
 much jointed, and yield freely to the action hollow in which it lies, till it reaches the edge 
 of the weather. Hence, a rough and angular of the fjord, where it may be a quarter of a 
 surface hag very generally replaced the ice- mile broad. This lower glacier appeared to 
 molded outlines, though these still here me not connected with the snow-field, but a 
 and there remain. Numerous ancient marine true glacier remanitf, deriving its materials 
 terraces, especially the same two prominent entirely from the avalanches of snow and ice 
 ones already mentioned, may be traced along that pour down upon its surface from the 
 the sides of the Jokuls Fjord. The lower of precipices overhead. It has a white, or dull 
 these runs at a level of about sixty feet, the greenish white color, varied with well-marked 
 higher at about one hundred and fifty-two dirt- bands. The slope of its surface was 
 feet (aneroid measurement) above high-water judged to be fully 20 or 25. A few longi- 
 mark. The upper is especially marked, often | tudinal crevasses make their appearance 
 running as a shelf cut out of the rock. This j along the middle of the glacier, and a little 
 feature was noticed along many parts of the < farther down the transverse crevasses increase
 
 40 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 in number and size, until at its foot the gla- 
 cier, broken by large semicircular rents, be- 
 comes a tumbled mass of ruin. These cliffs 
 of granular loose-textured ice were observed 
 in some places to overhang the waves. But 
 the dark rock was likewise seen peering out 
 along the water's edge, underneath the ice, 
 which does not push its way out to sea in a 
 mass, but ends abruptly where it meets the 
 water. From these icy walls small fragments 
 and large slices break off, and fall either on 
 the margin of rock or into the fjord, which is 
 thus covered with hundreds of miniature ice- 
 bergs, slowly drifted downward against wind 
 and tide, by the surface current of fresh 
 water. This process is called "calving " by 
 the natives, and so great is the commotion 
 sometimes produced that, according to the in- 
 formation collected by Von Buch, the Lapp 
 huts along the margin of the fjord are some- 
 times inundated by the waves propagated 
 outward from the falling masses. The 
 floating fragments of ice look like little models 
 of Arctic bergs, with forms often singularly 
 fantastic. They may be seen shifting their 
 position, and even capsizing, as their sub- 
 merged parts melt away ; some of them carry 
 stones and earth on their surface, while 
 many, aground along the margin of the fjord, 
 rise and fall with the tide or with the ripple 
 of the waves. We passed two or three which 
 were from 8 to 10 feet long.and rose from 3 to 
 4 feet out of the fjord. Our boat grated against 
 several which seemed only a foot or two in 
 size, yet the shock of the collision showed how 
 much larger was the portion concealed under 
 water. 
 
 To the east of the upper glacier the snow- 
 field sends another icy stream down the 
 face of the shelving precipices which de- 
 scend into a higher valley. We could hear 
 the roar of the avalanches even when 
 the glacier itself was hidden behind 
 the intervening mountain-spur. From the 
 rocky declivities of the Jokuls Fjord also 
 stones were heard and seen bounding from 
 point to point in their descent toward the 
 long heaps of debris at the bottom. In short, 
 in this lonelv, uninhabited spot, the activity 
 and ceaselessness of the wasting powers of 
 nature come before the traveler with a mem 
 orable impressiveness. The wide snow-field 
 that seems to lie so sluggish and still among 
 the distant mists, is yet seen to be in slow 
 but constant motion, pushing its ice-streams 
 toward the valleys, and grinding down the 
 hard rocks over which it moves. Frosts, rain, 
 and springs have scarped the shoulders of 
 every mountain, and poured long trains of 
 rubbish down its sides. And if this can be 
 now done under the present climate of Nor- 
 way.how much more powerful must the abra- 
 sion have been when the ice, instead of be- 
 ing arrested on the brow of the mountain, 
 filled up the fjord, and pushed its way into 
 the Arctic Sea ! 
 
 From the open mouth of the Kvenangs 
 
 Fjord, in the passage between Skjaervo and 
 the Jokul, the outline of the neighboring land 
 is well seen. The steep, serrated ridge of 
 the Kvenangs Tinderne shows iis tiny glaciers 
 nestling in corries both on its northern and 
 southern slopes. The sides of the Kvenangs 
 Fjord are ice-molded and striated in the di- 
 rection of the inlet, and the islands are only 
 large rockes moutonn^es. In looking back at 
 the mountainous track of the Jokuls Fjeld, 
 we see that it is another snowy table-land jut- 
 ting out as a promontory into the Arctic Sea, 
 deeply trenched with long, narrow fjords, and 
 pushing glaciers down every glen and hollow 
 that descends from the plateau of snow. I 
 sketched these scenes at midnight, when the 
 sun, after gathering round him the crimson 
 and orange glories of his setting, lingers 
 along the northern horizon, and then spreads 
 over the sky the tender hues of sunrise a 
 blending of sunset and dawn which is one of 
 the most memorable experiences of travel in 
 the north. 
 
 We visited the northwestern and northern 
 sides of this snow-field, boating up the Bergs 
 Fjord, to the hamlet of that name, and after 
 ascending to its glaciers, continuing our ex- 
 cursion by boat into the Nus Fjord. In as- 
 cending the South Bergs Fjord, we found the 
 gneissic and schistose rocks polished and 
 striated from east to west, which is the direc- 
 tion of the inlet, and in turning into the 
 North Bergs Fjord, which runs nearly at a 
 right angle to the other, the striae were seen 
 to turn out of the Lang Fjord and bend 
 northward through the northern limb 
 of the Bergs Fjord. At the hamlet of 
 Bergsfjord these ice moldings are espe- 
 cially well shown, and there, as well as along 
 many parts of the fjord, occur lines of rock- 
 terrace, often strewed with quantities of an- 
 gular blocks. Two of the most marked of 
 these horizontal bars have an elevation of 
 about 50 and 150 feet respectively. Be- 
 hind the hamlet the ground slopes up to a 
 point about 250 feet above the sea, beyond 
 which lies the mouth of a valley that runs up 
 into the heart of the mountains. We climbed 
 the terraced slope leading to this recess and 
 found that the lower half of the valley is oc- 
 cupied by a lake about a mile long, and said 
 to be 30 fathoms deep. It lies in a rock basin, 
 and the rocks around its margin show that 
 they have been powerfully abraded by ice. 
 We were told that three weeks before our 
 visit this lake was solidly frozen over; great 
 sheets of snow, indeed, still descended to the 
 water's edge, and were melting away under 
 the glare of a fierce July sun. At "the far 
 end of the valley mounds^of angular rubbish, 
 cumbered with huge blocks of stone, stretched 
 from side to side, while overhead two glaciers 
 came out of the edge of the snow-field, and 
 hung down the mountain side the longer 
 one almost reaching the bottom of the valley. 
 We started a small herd of reindeer pasturing 
 among the moraine heaps. The animais
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 41 
 
 bounded over the snow-wreaths, always 
 choosing the firmest portions which stretched 
 as natural bridges across the stream that 
 worked its way underneath. Here, too, the 
 ice was ever breaking up, and crashing down 
 the precipices in clouds of snowy dust. The 
 debris of ice gathered into talus heaps below, 
 like the cones de dejection at the foot of a win- 
 ter torrent. 
 
 From Bergsf jord we continued our boating 
 voyage down the fjord, and found fresn 
 proofs that a vast body of ice, descending 
 from the lofty JSkuls Fjeld, had moved 
 northward along the length of the inlet. 
 Every promontory was beautifully smoothed 
 and polished ; while the grooves and striae 
 slanted up and over the projecting bosses of 
 rock, as they do in Loch Fyne and the other 
 western sea lochs of Scotland. Round the 
 headland at the mouth of the Bergs Fjord we 
 turned eastward, and soon passed the mouth 
 of the Ulf jord. We could see that, at the far 
 end of that inlet, the snow of the great 
 table-land moves outward to the edge of the 
 dark precipices which encircle the Ulfjord, 
 and actually forms on the crest of these 
 precipices a white cliff, from which, of 
 course, avalanches are constantly falling 
 Yet the under part of this snowy cliff is not 
 snow, but ice, as shown by its blue color 
 contrasting with the whiteness of the upper 
 layer, which is snow or neve". At the foot of 
 the precipice a glacier, derived probably in 
 part, like that of Jokuls Fjord, from the ice- 
 falls from above, creeps toward, but does not 
 reach, the bottom of the valley. Continuing 
 our eastward journey, we saw the same ter- 
 races, still skirting the hillsides, now as green 
 platforms of detritus loaded with angular 
 blocks, and now as sharp horizontal notches 
 in the bare rocks. We were likewise struck 
 here, as in other parts of the Norwegian 
 coast, with the greater freshness of the ice- 
 markings near the sea-level, when compared 
 with those higher up a difference which is 
 likewise very noticeable in the West of Scot- 
 land. 
 
 An incident occurred in this part of the 
 journey which helped to strengthen the par- 
 allelism I had been tracing between the old 
 glacial conditions of Scotland and those now 
 existing in Arctic Norway. In one of the 
 hospitable and solitary merchants' houses I 
 found a little girl playing with valves of the 
 red Iceland scallop (Pecten Islandicus) or 
 " rode heste," red horses, as she called them. 
 They were evidently recent, and not fossil 
 shells, and I found them strewn plentifully 
 on the beach. This species once lived abund- 
 antly among the western fjords of Scotland, 
 and its valves are there plentiful in the up- 
 raised sea-floor of the glacial period. But it 
 still flourishes in the fjords of Norway. 
 
 The Nus Fjord is about six miles long, 
 and lies between the Ulfjord and Oxfjord. 
 Its margin is terraced by the same horizon- 
 tal lines so constant in this region. Its south- 
 
 western side presents a singularly Arctic 
 scene. A range of deeply cleft and embayed 
 crags and precipices, plentifully streaked 
 with snow, rises up to the edge of the snow- 
 field, which, as usual, sends down into every 
 larger valley a stream of blue ice. Eight or 
 ten distinct glaciers may be counted, of 
 which at least three descend from the snow- 
 field. The others lie in corries detached from 
 the snow-field, though in some cases connected 
 with it by nearly perpendicular streaks of snow. 
 Here, as in the Ulfjord, the edge of the great 
 sheet of snow which covers the table-land 
 may be seen ending off abruptly as a cliff 
 upon the crest of a dark precipice of rock, 
 and from the color of the lower part of the 
 cliff it is plain that, from pressure and mo- 
 tion, the under portion of the snow -sheet is 
 converted into ice, and as ice reaches the 
 verge of the table-land, where it breaks sharp- 
 ly ofl, and sends its ruins to the bottom of 
 the precipice underneath. There the debris, 
 mingled with the winter snow, is anew con- 
 verted into solid ice, and creeps downward 
 as a glacier. 
 
 At the head of the fjord, on the southeast 
 side, the mouth of a valley which terminates 
 inland at the foot of a glacier is blocked up 
 by an old moraine. Behind this rampart of 
 detritus the valley spreads out as an alluvial 
 plain, evidently at one time a lake formed by 
 the moraine barrier at the foot. The mo- 
 raine itself is strewed with enormous angular 
 blocks of rock, beside which the huts of a 
 miserable Lapp encampment look like mere 
 pebbles. The side of this moraine facing 
 the fjord is cut by the fifty-foot beach. On 
 the opposite side of the fjord a valley, at the 
 head of which a glacier comes down from 
 the Sneefond, opens upon the shore, and is 
 curtained across by a terrace, the surface of 
 which is mottled with a number of irregular 
 concentric mounds. We had no opportunity 
 of examining these, but they seemed to be 
 moraine heaps left by the glacier when it 
 came down to the fjord. They vividly re- 
 called the singular concentric mounds that 
 overlie the terrace at the mouth of the old 
 glacier valley of the Brora in Sutherland- 
 shire. 
 
 We walked along the northeast side of the 
 fjord, and found the rocky declivity terraced 
 with old sea-margins, which run along like 
 ancientand ruined roadways. They occur up 
 to perhaps 200 or 25ofett above the sea-level, 
 and are cut in the hard rock. They are 
 covered with loose blocks, partly derived 
 from the rocks around, but probably in part 
 also transported from a higher part of the 
 valley. On the beach we met with well ice- 
 worn bosses of gneiss, slipping beneath a 
 gray sandy clay full of Arctic shells a con- 
 junction which is closely paralleled by one on 
 the shores of Loch Fyne. Beth in the Nor- 
 wegian and Scottish examples the rocks 
 underneath are beautifully smoothed and 
 grooved, showing that in each case the ice
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 which molded them moved down the length i tween antiquity and decay is manifest on 
 of the inlet. To the north and east of the j every side. An ancient building is expected 
 
 Jokuls Fjeld the ground becomes lower, and 
 descends wholly below the snow-line. The 
 hills that bound the Alten Fjord, instead of 
 rising into serrated peaks, like the higher 
 
 to look more or less decayed ; if we find it to 
 look fresh, we immediately, and as it were, 
 instinctively, doubt its antiquity. 
 
 The change which in course of time res-.ilts 
 
 tracts to the south, have a well ice-worn as- j in producing the crumbling, venerable aspect 
 pect. and recall the hills of Cantyre, or the j of a piece of old human architecture is but 
 scenery of parts of the Hebrides. Indeed, part of the continual change in progress upon 
 the whole of this northern district of Norway, I natural surfaces of rock all over the world. 
 from the Alten Fjord to beyond the North The cliffs of a mountain-side or sea-shors 
 
 Cape, has the smoothed outline which farther 
 southward is found only on the lower zone of 
 the mountains. It seems as if a sheet o'f ice, 
 descending from the south, had overriden all 
 
 reveal piecisely the same alteration, but in a 
 higher degree, for they rise on a more stu- 
 pendous scale and have been exposed to the 
 weather for an enormously longer time than 
 
 the fjords here and the comparatively low even the oldest of human erections. 
 
 i. ill* between them, and had advanced north- This kind of decay is briefly described as 
 
 ward into the Arctic Sea. 
 
 In fine, this short excursion into the north- 
 ern part of Scandinavia furnished us with 
 abundant proofs that the glaciation of the 
 west of Norway was produced by a mass of 
 land- ice, of which the present glaciers are 
 the representatives. It likewise confirmed, 
 in a most impressive way, the conclusion 
 which has gained ground so rapidly within 
 the last few vears. that the glaciation of the 
 Scottish Highlands.as well as of the rest of the 
 British Isles, is in the main the work, not of 
 floating bergs, but of la::d-ice. This conclu- 
 sion may, indeed, be regarded as demon- 
 strated beyond all cavil by the ice-marks of 
 Norway. Much good work might be done 
 by trying to work out a detailed comparison 
 
 weathering." It is a complex process, 
 however, or rather a series cf processes, de- 
 pending on the one hand upon the relative 
 efficiency of changes of temperature, wind, 
 rain, and frost ; on the other hand, upon the 
 composition and textur ; of the stone itself. 
 Apart from the problem of the nature of the 
 change lies the question of its rate. Actual 
 time-measures are as yet so few in geological 
 inquiry that any attempt may be welcomed 
 which promises to supply one. The rate o 
 weathering of rocks appears to be a question 
 in which precise measurement should not be 
 by any means unattainable. Comparatively 
 little, however, has yet been done to deter- 
 mine with precision, or even approximately, 
 the rate at which the exposed surfaces of dif- 
 
 of the glaciation of the Scandinavian penin- j ferent kinds of rock decay. A few years 
 
 sula with that of Scotland. More espe- 
 cially would it be of importance to ascertain 
 how far the glacial deposits of the two coun- 
 tries can be compared. Doubtless the drift- 
 covered slopes of Sweden, and those of the 
 cast and center of Scotland, must have many 
 
 feological features in common. It will per- 
 ps be found that some of the difficulties 
 which our Scottish drift presents are ex 
 plained by the more extensive deposits of the 
 north, while the latter may likewise suggest 
 new explanations of phenomena supposed to 
 be already sufficiently intelligible. 
 
 VII. 
 
 ROCK-WEATHERING MEASURED BY 
 THE DECAY OF TOMBSTONES. 
 
 A building or other object having an an- 
 t que aspect is called "age-worn" or "time- 
 eaten," or is described by some other phrase 
 -which implies that during a long course of 
 years the object in question had been suffer- 
 ing from some slow kind of change. We 
 speak of "the gnawing tooth of time," as if 
 time were a material form, or at least a force 
 or energy endowed with certain powers of 
 destructiveness, though obviously mere lapse 
 of time can have no such influence. That 
 there is some close connection, however, be- 
 
 ago, some experiments were instituted by 
 Professor Pfaff, of Erlangen, to obtain more 
 definite information on this subject. He ex- 
 posed to ordinary atmospheric influences 
 carefully measured and weighed pieces of 
 Solenhofen limestone, syenite, granite (both 
 rough and polished), and bone. At the end 
 of three years he found that the loss from the 
 limestone was equivalent to the removal of a 
 uniform layer 0*04 mm. in thickness from its 
 general surface. The stone had become 
 quite dull and earthy, while on parts of its 
 surface fine cracks and incipient exfoliation 
 had appeared. The time during which the 
 observations were continued was, however, 
 too brief to allow any general deductions tc 
 be drawn from therti as to the real average 
 rate of disintegration. Professor Pfaff re- 
 lates that during the period a severe hail- 
 storm broke one of the plates of stone. An 
 exceptionally powerful cause of this nature 
 might make the loss during a short interval 
 considerably greater than the true average of 
 a longer period. 
 
 It occurred to me recently that data of at 
 least a provisional value might be obtained 
 from an examination of tombstones freely 
 exposed to the air in graveyards, in cases 
 where their dates remained still legible or 
 might be otherwise ascertained. I have ac- 
 cordin 
 groun 
 
 gly paid attention to the older burial- 
 ds in Edinburgh, and have gathered to
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 43 
 
 gether some facts which have, perhaps, suf- 
 ficient interest and novelty to be worthy of 
 publication. 
 
 At the outset it is of course obvious that 
 in seeking for data bearing on the general 
 question of rock-weathering, we must admit 
 the kind and amount of such weathering vis- 
 ible in a town to be in some measure differ- 
 ent from what is normal in nature. So far as 
 the disintegration of rock-surfaces is affected 
 by mineral acids, for example, there must be 
 a good deal more of such chemical change 
 where sulphuric acid is copiously evolved in- 
 to the atmosphere from thousands of chim 
 neys than in the pure air of country districts. 
 In these respects we may regard the disin- 
 tegration in towns as an exaggeration of the 
 normal rate. Still, the difference between 
 town and country may be less than might be 
 supposed. Surfaces of stone are apt to get 
 begrimed with dust and smoke, and the 
 crust of organic and inorganic matter deposit- 
 ed upon them may in no small measure pro- 
 tect them from the greater chemical activity 
 of the more acid town rain. In regard to 
 daily or seasonal changes of temperature, on 
 the other hand, which unquestionably exert 
 a powerful influence in the disintegration of 
 rock-surfaces, any difference between town 
 and country may not impossibly be in favor 
 of the town. Owing, probably, to the influ- 
 ence of smoke in retarding radiation, ther- 
 mometers placed in open spaces in town 
 commonly mark an extreme nocturnal tem- 
 perature not quite so low as those similarly 
 placed in the suburbs, while they show a 
 maximum day temperature not quite so high. 
 
 The illustrations of rock-weathering pre- 
 sented by city graveyards are necessarily 
 limited to the few kinds of rock employed 
 for monumental purposes. Around Edin- 
 burgh the materials used are of three kinds 
 ist, Calcareous, including rmrbles and lime- 
 stones; 2d, sandstones and flagstones; 3d, 
 granites. 
 
 I. CALCAREOUS. With extremely rare ex- 
 ceptions, the calcareous tombstones in our 
 graveyards are constructed of ordinary white 
 saccharoid Italian marble. I have also ob- 
 served a pink Italian shell-marble, and a 
 finely fossiliferous limestone, containing 
 fragments of shells, for.^minifera, etc. 
 
 In a few cases the white marble has been 
 employed by itself as a monolith in the shape 
 of an obelisk, urn, or other device; but most 
 commonly it occurs in slabs which have been 
 tightly fixed in a frar.ework of sandstone. 
 These slabs, from less than one to fully two 
 inches thick, are generally placed vertically; 
 in one or two examples they have been in- 
 serted in large horizontal sandstone slabs or 
 "through-stanes." The form into which 
 the stone has been cut, and the position in 
 which it has been erected, have had consid- 
 erable influence on its weathering. 
 
 A specimen of the common white marble 
 employed for monumental purposes was ob- 
 
 tained from one of the marble works of the 
 city, and examined microscopically. It pre- 
 sented the well-known granular character of 
 true saccharoid marble, consisting of round- 
 ed granules of clear transparent calcite, aver- 
 aging about i-iooth of an inch in diameter. 
 Each granule has its own system of twin lam- 
 ellation, and interference color-bands. The 
 fundamental rhombohedral cleavage is every- 
 where well developed. Not a trace exists of any 
 amorphous granular matrix or base holding 
 the crystalline grains together. These seem 
 molded into each other, but have evidently 
 no extraordinary cohesion. A small frag- 
 ment placed in dilute acid was entirely dis- 
 solved. There can be no doubt that this 
 marble must be very nearly pure carbonate of 
 lime. 
 
 The process of weathering in the case of 
 this white marble presents three phases, 
 sometimes to be observed on the same slab, 
 namely, superficial solution, internal disin- 
 tegration, and curvature with fracture. 
 
 (i.) Superficial Solution is effected by the 
 carbonic acid, and partly by the sulphuric 
 acid of town rain. When the marble is first 
 erected it possesses a well-polished surface, 
 capable of affording a distinct reflection of 
 objects placed in front of it. Exposure for 
 not more than a year or two to our prevalent 
 westerly rains suffices to remove this polish, 
 and to give the surface a rough granular 
 character. The granules which have been 
 cut across or bruised in the cutting and 
 polishing process are first attacked and re- 
 moved in solution, or drop out of the stone. 
 An obelisk in Greyfnars Churchyard, erected 
 in memory of a lady who died in 1864, has 
 so rough and granular a surface that it might 
 rea>'ily be taken for a sandstone. So loosely 
 are the grains held together that a slight 
 motion of the finger will rub them off. In 
 the course of solution and removal, the in- 
 ternal structure of the marble begins to 
 reveal itself. Its harder nests and veinings 
 of calcite and other minerals project above 
 the surrounding surface, and may be traced 
 as prominent ribs and excrescences running 
 across the faint or illegible inscriptions. On 
 the other hand, some portions of the marble 
 are more rapidly removed than other-. Ir- 
 regular channels, dependent partly on the 
 direction given to trickling rain by the form 
 of the monumental carving, but chiefly on 
 original differences in the internal structure 
 of the stone, are gradually hollowed out. In 
 this way the former artificial surface of the 
 marble disappears, and is changed into one 
 that rather recalls the bare bleached rocks of 
 some mountain-side. 
 
 The rate at which the transformation talces 
 place seems to depend primarily on the ex- 
 tent to which the marble is exposed to rain. 
 Slabs which have been placed facing to the 
 northeast, and with a sufficiently projecting 
 architrave to keep off much of tne rainfall, 
 retain their inscriptions legible for a century
 
 44 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 or longer. But even in these cases the pro- 
 gress of internal disintegration is distinctly 
 visible. Where the marble has been less 
 screened from rain the rapidity of waste 
 has been sometimes very marked. A good 
 illustration is supplied by the tablet on the 
 south side of Greyfriars Churchyard, erected 
 
 in memory of G G , who died in 
 
 1785. This monument had become so far de- 
 cayed as to require restoration in 1803. It 
 is now, and has been for some years, for the 
 most part utterly illegible. The marble has 
 been dissolved away over the' center of the 
 slab to a depth of about a quarter of an inch. 
 Yet this monument is by no means in an ex- 
 posed situation. It faces eastward in a 
 rather sheltered corner, where, however, the 
 wind eddies in such a way as to throw the 
 rain against the part of the stone which has 
 been most corroded. 
 
 In the majority of cases superficial solution 
 has been retarded by the formation of a pe- 
 culiar gray or begrimed crust, to be imme- 
 diately described The marble employed 
 here for monumental slabs appears to be pe- 
 culiarly liable to the development of this 
 crust. Another kind of white marble, some- 
 times employed for sculptured ornaments on 
 tombstones, dissolves without crust. It is 
 snowy white and more translucent than the 
 ordinary marble. So far as the few weathered 
 specimens I have seen enable me to judge, 
 it appears to be either Carrara marble, or one 
 of the strongly saccharoid, somewhat trans- 
 lucent, varieties employed instead of it. 
 This stone, however, though it forms no 
 crust, suffers marked superficial solution. 
 But it escapes the internal disintegration, 
 which, so far as I have observed, is always 
 an accompaniment of the crust.' Yet the few 
 examples of it I have met with hardly suffice 
 for any comparison between the varieties. 
 
 (2.) Internal Disintegration. Many of the 
 marble monuments in our older churchyards 
 are covered with a dirty crust, beneath 
 which the stone is found on examination to 
 be merely a loose crumbling sand, of inco- 
 herent calcite granules. This crust seems to 
 form chiefly where superficial solution is 
 feeble. It may be observed to crack into 
 * polygonal network, the individual polygons 
 occasionally curling up so as to reveal the 
 yellowish white crumbling material under- 
 neath. It also rises in blisters which, when 
 they break, expose the interior to rapid dis- 
 integration. 
 
 So long as this begrimed film lasts un- 
 broken the smooth face of the marble slab re- 
 mains with apparently little modification. 
 The inscription may be perfectly legible, and 
 one would not readily believe the stone to be 
 decayed at all. The moment the crust is 
 broken up, however, the decay of the stone is 
 rapid. For we then see that beneath the 
 smooth, coherent surface film the cohesion of 
 ehe individual crystalline granules of the 
 4narble has already been destroyed, and that 
 
 the merest touch causes them to crumble into 
 a loose sand. 
 
 It appears, therefore, that two changes take 
 place in upright marble slabs freely exposed 
 to rain in our burial grounds a superficial, 
 more or less firm crust is formed, and the co- 
 hesion of the particles beneath is destroyed. 
 
 The crust varies in color from a dirty gray 
 to a deep brown-black, and in thickness from 
 that of writing-paper up to sometimes at least 
 a milimetre. One of the most characteristic 
 examples of it was obtained from an utterly 
 decayed tomb (erected in the year 1792)00 
 the east side of Canongate Churchyard. No 
 one would suppose that the pieces of flat 
 dark stone lying there on the sandstone plinth 
 were once portions of white marble. Yet a 
 mere touch suffices to break the black crust, 
 and the stone at once crumbles to powder. 
 Nevertheless the two opposite faces of the 
 original polished slab have been preserved, 
 and I even found the sharply-chiseled socket- 
 hole of one of the retaining-nails. The speci- 
 men was can fully removed and soaked in a 
 solution of gum, so as to preserve it from dis- 
 integration. On submitting the crust of this 
 marble to microscopic investigation, I found it 
 to consist of particles of coal and soot, grains 
 of quartz-sand, angular pieces of broken glass,' 
 fragments of red brick or tile, and organic 
 fibres. This miscellaneous collection of town 
 ! dust was held together by some amorphous 
 j cement, which was not dissolved by hydro- 
 chloric acid. At my request my friend, Mr. 
 B. N. Peach, tested it with soda on charcoal, 
 and at once obtained a strong sulphur reaction. 
 There can be little doubt that it is mainly sul- 
 phate of lime. The crust which forms upon 
 our marble tombstones is thus a product of 
 the reaction of the sulphuric acid <Jf the town 
 rain upon the calcium carbonate of the stone. 
 A pellicle of amorphous gypsum is deposited 
 upon the marble, and encloses the particles 
 of dust \ hich give the characteristic sooty 
 aspect to the stone. This pellicle, when once 
 formed, seems to be comparatively little af- 
 fected by the chemical activity of rain water. 
 Hence the conservation of the even surface 
 of the marble. It is liable, however, to be 
 cracked by an internal expansion of the stone, 
 to which I shall immediately refer, and also 
 to rise in small blisters, and, as, I have said, 
 its rupture leads at once to the rapid disin- 
 tegration of the stone. 
 
 The cause of this disintegration is the next 
 point for consideration. Chemical examina- 
 tion revealed the presence of a slight amount 
 of sulphate in the heart of the crumbling 
 marble ; but the quantity appeared to me to 
 be too small seriously to affect the cohesion 
 of the stone. I submitted to microscopic 
 examination a portion of a crumbling urn of 
 white marble in Canongate Churchyard. 
 The tomb bears a perfectly fresh date of 
 1792 cut in sandstone over the top ; but the 
 marble portions are crumbling into sand, 
 though the structure faces the east, and is
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 protected from vertical rain by arching mason- 
 work. A small portion of the marble retain- 
 ing its crust was boiled in Canada balsam, 
 and was then sliced at a right angle to its 
 original polished surface. By this means a 
 section of the crumbled marble was obtained, 
 which could be compared with one of the 
 perfectly fresh stone. From the dark outer 
 amorphous crust, with its carbonaceous and 
 other miscellaneous particles, fine rifts could 
 be seen passing down between the separated 
 calcite granules, which in many cases were 
 quite isolated. The black crust descends 
 into these rifts, and likewise passes along the 
 cleavage planes of the granules. Toward 
 the outer surface of the stone, immediately 
 beneath the crust, the fissures are chiefly 
 tilled with a yellowish, structureless substance, 
 which gave a feeble glimmering reac- 
 tion with polar.zed light, and enclosed 
 minute amorphous aggn gates like portions 
 of the crust. It probaoly co-. ists chiefly of 
 sulphate of lime. But the must remarkable 
 feature in the slide was the way in which the 
 calcite granules had been corroded. Seen 
 with reflected light they resembled those sur- 
 faces of spar which have been placed in weak 
 hydrochloric acid to lay bare enclosed crystals 
 of zeolites. The solution had taken place 
 partly along the outer surfaces, so as to pro- 
 duce the fine passages or rifts, and partly 
 along the cleavage. Deep cavities, defined 
 by intersecting cleavage planes, appeared to 
 descend into the heart of borne of the gran- 
 ules. In no case did I observe any white pel- 
 licle such as might indicate a redeposit of 
 lime from the dissolved carbonate. Except 
 for the veinings of probable sulphate just re- 
 ferred to, the lime, when once dissolved, had 
 apparently been wholly removed in solution. 
 There was further to be observed a certain 
 dirtiness, so to speak, which at the first 
 glance distinguished the section of crumbled 
 marble from the fresh stone. This was due 
 partly to corrosion, but chiefly to the intro- 
 duction of particles of soot and dust, which 
 could be traced among the interstices and 
 cleavage lamellae of the crystalline granules 
 for some distance back from the crust. 
 
 It may be inferred, therefore, that the dis- 
 integration of the marble is mainly due to the 
 action of carbonic acid in the permeating 
 rain-water, whereby the component crystal- 
 line granules of the stone are partially dis- 
 solved and their mutual adhesion is destroyed. 
 This piocess goes on in all exposures and 
 with every variety in the thickness of the 
 outer crust. It is distinctly traceable in 
 tombstones that have not been erected for 
 more than twenty years. In those which 
 have been standing for a century it is, save 
 in exceptionally sheltered positions, so far 
 advanced that a very slight pressure suffices 
 to crumble the stone in'o powder. But with 
 this internal disintegration we have to take 
 into consideration the third phase of weather- 
 ing to which I have alluded. In the upright 
 
 marble slabs it is the union of the two kinds 
 of decay that leads to so rapid an effacement 
 of the monuments. 
 
 (3 ) Curvature and Fracture. This most 
 remarkable phase of rock-weathering is only 
 to be observed in the slabs of marble which 
 have been firmly inserted into a solid frame- 
 work of sandstone, and placed in an erect or 
 horizontal position. It consists in the bulg- 
 ing out of the marble accompanied with a 
 series of fractures. This change cannot be 
 explained as mere sagging by gravitation, for 
 it usually appears as a swelling up of the 
 center of the slab, which continues until the 
 large blister-like expansion is ruptured. Nor 
 is it by any means exceptional ; it occurs, as 
 a rule, on all the older upright marble tablets, 
 and is only found to be wanting in those 
 cases where the marble has evidently not 
 been fitted tightly into its sandstone frame. 
 Wherever there has be.n little or no room for 
 expansion, protuberance of the marble may 
 be observed. Successive stages may be seen 
 from the first gentle uprise to an unsightly 
 swelling of the whole stone. This change is 
 accompanied by fracture of the marble. The 
 rents in some cases proceed from the margin 
 inward, more particularly from the upper 
 and under edges of the stone, pointing un- 
 mistakably to an increase in volume as the 
 cause of fracture. In other cases the rents 
 appear in the central part of the swelling 
 where the tension from curvature has been 
 greatest. 
 
 Some exceedingly interesting examples of 
 this singular process of weathering are to be 
 seen in Grey'riars Churchyard. On the south 
 wall, in the enclosure of a well-known county 
 family, there is an oblong upright marble 
 slab facing west, and- measuring 30^ inches 
 in height by 22^ inches in breadth and 
 
 inch in thickness. The last inscrip- 
 tion on it bears date 1838, at which time, of 
 course, it was no doubt still smooth and up- 
 right. Since then, however, it has escaped 
 from its fastenings on either side, though 
 still held firmly at the top and bottom. It 
 consequently projects from the wall like a 
 well-filled sail. The axis of curvature is, of 
 course, parallel to the upper and lower mar- 
 gins, and the amount of deviation from the 
 ariginal vertical line is fully 2^ inches, so 
 that the hand and arm can be inserted be- 
 tween the curved marble and the perfectly 
 vertical and undisturbed wall to which it was 
 fixed. At the lower end of the slab a minor 
 curvature, to the extent of >^ of an inch, is 
 observable, coincident with the longer axis 
 of the stone. In both cases the direction of 
 the benaing has been determined by the po- 
 sition of the enclosing solid frame of sandstone 
 which resisted the internal expansion of 
 he marble. Freed from its fastenings at 
 either side, the stone has assumed a simple 
 wave-like curve. But the tension has become 
 so great that a series of rents has appeared 
 along the crest of the fold. One of these has
 
 46 J 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 a breadth of one-tenth of an inch at its open- 
 ing. Not only hs the slab been ruptured, 
 but its crust has likewise yielded to the strain, 
 and has broken u . into a network of cracks, 
 and some of the Louted portions are begin- 
 ning to curl up at the edges, exposing the 
 crumbling, decayed marble below. I should 
 add that such has been the expansive force of 
 the marble that the part of the sandstone 
 block in the upper part of the frame, exposed 
 to the direct pressure, has begun to exfoliate, 
 though elsewhere the stone is quite sound. 
 
 More advanced stages of curvature and 
 fracture may be noticed on many other tomb- 
 stones in the same burying-place. One of 
 the most conspicuous of these has a peculiar 
 interest from the fact that it occurs on the 
 tablet erected to the memory of one of the 
 most illustrious dead whose dust lies within 
 the precincts of the Greyfriars the great Jo- 
 seph Black. He died in 1799. In the cen- 
 ter of the sumptuous tomb raised over his 
 grave is inserted a large uprig..t slab of white 
 marble, which, facing south, is protected from 
 the weather partly by heavy overhanging ma- 
 sonry and partly by a high stone wall imme- 
 diately to t e west. On this slab a Latin in- 
 scription records with pious reverence the ge- 
 nius and achievements of the discoverer of 
 carbonic acid and latent heat; and adds that 
 his friends wished to mark his resting-place 
 by the marble whilst it should last. Less 
 than eighty years, however, have sufficed to 
 render the inscription already partly illegible. 
 The stone, still firmly held all round its mar- 
 gin, has bulged out considerably in the cen- 
 ter, and -the blister-like expansion has been 
 rent by numerous cracks, which run, on the 
 whole, in the direction of the length of the 
 stone 
 
 A further stage of decay is exhibited by a 
 remarkable torn.* on the west wall of the 
 Greyfriars Churchyard. The marble slab, 
 bearing a now almost wholly effaced inscrip- 
 tion, on which the di-te 1779 can be seen, is 
 still held tightly within its enclosing frame of 
 sandstone slabs, which are firmly built into 
 the wall. But it has swollen out into a ghast- 
 ly protuberance in the center, and is, more- 
 over, seamed with' rents which strike inward 
 from the margins. In this and in some 
 other examples the marble seems to have un- 
 dergone most change on the top of the swell- 
 ing, partly from the system of fine fissures 
 by which it is broken up, and partly from 
 more direct and effective access of ram. 
 Eventually the cohesion of the stone at that 
 part is destroyed, and the crumbling marble 
 falls out, leaving a hole in the middle of the 
 slab. When this takes place, disintegration 
 proceeds rapidly. Three years ago I sketched 
 a tomb in this stage on t^e east wall of Can- 
 nongate Churchyard. In a recent visit to 
 the place I found that the whole of the mar- 
 ble had since fallen out. 
 
 The first cause that naturally suggests it- 
 df in explanation of the remarkable change 
 
 in the structure of a substance usually be- 
 lieved to be so inelastic as white marble, is 
 the action of frost. White statuary marble 
 is naturally porous. It is rendered still more 
 so by that internal solution which I have 
 described. The marble tombstones in our 
 graveyards are therefore capable of imbibing 
 ' a relatively large amount of moisture. When 
 this interstitial water is frozen, its expansive 
 force, as it passes into the solid state, must 
 increase the isolation of the granules and 
 augment the dimensions of a marble blocK. 
 I am inclined to believe that this must be the 
 principal cause of the c'uange. Whatever 
 may be the nature of the process, it is evi- 
 dently one which acts from within the marble 
 itself. Microscopic examination fails to dis- 
 cover any chemical transformation which 
 would account for the expansion. Dr. Angus 
 Smith has pointed out that in towns the 
 mortar of walls may be observed to swell up- 
 and lose cohesion from a conversion of its 
 lime into the condition of sulphate. I h ve 
 already mentioned that sulphate does exist. 
 within the substance of the marble, but that 
 its quantity, so far as I have observed, is too- 
 small to be taken into account in this ques- 
 tion. T .e expansive power is exerted in 
 such a way as not sensibly to affect the 
 internal structure and composition of the- 
 stone. And .this, I imagine, is mos: probably 
 the work of frost. 
 
 The results of my observations among our 
 burial-grounds show that, save in exception- 
 ally sheltered situations slabs of marbie, ex- 
 posed to the weather in such a climate and 
 atmosphere as that of Edinburgh, are en- 
 tirely destroyed in less tnan a century. 
 Where this destruction takes place by simple: 
 comparatively rapid superticial solution and. 
 removal of the stone, the rate of lowering of 
 the surface amounts sometimes to about a. 
 third of an inch (or roughly nine millimeters)- 
 in a century. Where it is effected by internal 
 displacement, a curvature of two-and-a-half 
 inches, with a.. undaut rents, a partial efface- 
 ment of the insciipiion, and a reduction of 
 the marble to a pu.verulent condition, may be 
 produced in about iorty years, and a total 
 disruption and tffacetncnt of the stone within, 
 one hundred. It is evident ihit white mar- 
 ble is here utterly unsuited for out-of-door 
 use, and that its employment for works of 
 art which are meant to stand in the open air 
 in such a climate ought to be strenuously 
 resisted. Of course, I am now referring not 
 to the durability of marble generally, but to 
 its behavior in a large town with a moist cli- 
 mate and plenty of coal-smoke. 
 
 II. SANDSTONES AND FLAGSTONES. 
 These, being the common building ma- 
 terials of the country, are of most frequent 
 occurrence as monumental sto --e* -'-vl *her,- 
 ,jt operly selected are remarkably durable. By 
 far the best varieties are those which consist 
 of a nearly pure fine silicious sand, with 
 little or no iron or lime, and without tract of
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 47 
 
 bedding or other structure, borne <-f them 
 contain as much as ninety-eight per cent, of 
 silica. A good illustration of their power 
 of resisting the weather is supplied by 
 Alexander Henderson s tomb in Greyfriars 
 Churchyard. He died in 1646, and a few 
 /ears afterwards, the present tombstone, in 
 *.he form of a solid square block of freestone, 
 was erected over his grave. It was ordered 
 to be defaced in 1662 by command of the 
 Scottish Parliament, but after 1688 it was 
 repaired. Certain bullet marks upon the 
 stone are pointed out as those of the soldiery 
 sent to execute the order. Be this as it may, 
 the original chisel marks on the polished 
 surface of the stone are still perfectly distinct, 
 and the inscribed lettering remains quite 
 sharp. Two hundred years have effected 
 hardly any change upon the stone, save that 
 on the west and north sides, which are those 
 most exposed to wind and rain, the surface 
 is somewhat roughened, and the internal fine 
 parallel jointing begins to show itself. 
 
 Three obvious causes of decay in arena- 
 ceous rocks may be traced among our 
 monuments. In the first place, the presence 
 of a soluble or easily removable matrix in 
 which the sand-grains are embedded. The 
 most common kinds of matrix are clay, car- 
 bonates of lime and iron, and the anhydrous 
 and hydrous peroxides of iron. The pres- 
 ence of the iron reveals itself by its yellow, 
 brown, or red color. So rapid is disintegra- 
 tion from removal of the matrix that the 
 sharply-incised date of a monument erected 
 in Greyfriars Churchyard to an officer who 
 died only in 1863 is no longer legible. At 
 least one-eighth of an inch of surface has 
 here been removed from a portion of the slab 
 in sixteen years, or at the rate of about 
 three-quarters of an inch in a century. 
 
 In the second place, where a sandstone is 
 marked by distinct laminae of stratification, it 
 is nearly certain to split up along these planes 
 under the action of the weather, if the surface 
 of the bedding planes is directly exposed. 
 This is well known to builders, who are 
 quite aware of the importance of "laying a 
 stone on its bed." Examples may be ob- 
 served in our churchyards where sandstones 
 of this character have been used for pilasters 
 and ornamental work, and where the stone, 
 stt on its edge, has peeled off in successive 
 layers. In flagstones, which are merely 
 Jhiuly-bedded sandstones, this minute lami- 
 aat ion is often, fatal to . durability. These 
 tones, from the arge size in which slabs of 
 them can be obtained, and from the ease 
 with which they can be worked, form a 
 tempting material for monumental inscrip- 
 tions. Tie mela-icholy result of trusting to 
 their permanence is strikingly shewn by a 
 tombstone at the end ot the south burying, 
 ground in Greyfriars Churchyard. The date 
 inscribed on it is 1841, and the lettering that 
 remains is as sharp as if cut only recently. 
 The stone weathers very little by surface dis- 
 
 integration. It is a laminated flagstone set 
 on edge, and large portions have scaled off. 
 leaving a rough, raw surface where the in- 
 scription once ran. In this instance a thick- 
 ness of about one-third of an inch has been 
 removed in forty years. 
 
 In the third nlace. where a sandstone con- 
 tains concretionary masses of different com- 
 position or texture from the main portion of 
 the stone, these are apt to weather at a dif- 
 ferent rate. Sometimes they resist destruc- 
 tion better than the surrounding sandstone 
 so as to be left as permanent excrescences. 
 More commonly they present less resistance, 
 and are therefore hollowed out into irregular 
 a ,d often exceedingly fantastic shapes. Ex- 
 amples of this kind of weathering abound in 
 our neighborhood. Perhaps the most curi- 
 ous to which a date can be assigned are to 
 be found in the two sandstone pillars which 
 until recently flanked the tomb of Principal 
 Carstares in Greyfriars Churchyard. They 
 were erected some time after the y ar 1715. 
 Each of them is formed of a single block of 
 stone about eight feet long. Exposure to 
 the air for about 1 50 years has allowed the 
 original differences of texture or composition 
 to make their influence apparent. Each col- 
 umn is hollowed out for almost its entire 
 length on the exposed side into a trough 
 four to six inches deep and six to eight inches 
 broad. As they lean against the wall, be- 
 neath the new pillars which have supplanted 
 them, tney suggest some rude form of canoe 
 rather than portions of a sephulchra! monu- 
 ment. 
 
 Where concretions are of a pyritous kind 
 their decomposition gives rise to sulphuric 
 acid, some of which combines with ihe iron 
 and gives rise to dark stains upon the cor- 
 roded surface of the stone. Some of the 
 sandstones of the district, full of sucn im- 
 purities, ought never to be employed for 
 architectural purposes. Every block of stone 
 in which they occur should be unhesitatingly 
 condemned Want of attention to this ob- 
 vious rule has led to the unsightly disfigure- 
 ment of public buildings. 
 
 III. GRANITES. In Professor Pfaff's ex- 
 perimems, to which I have already referred, 
 he employed plates of syenite and granite, 
 both rough and polished. He found that 
 they had all lost slightly in weight at the end 
 of a year. The annual rate of loss was est*. 
 mated by him as equal to o - oo76 min. from 
 the unpolished, and o'ooSs from the polished 
 granite. That a polished surface of granite 
 should weather more rapidly than a rough one 
 is perhaps hardly what might have been ex- 
 pected. The same observer remarks that 
 though the polished surface of syenite was 
 still bright at the end of not more than three 
 years, it was less so than at first ; and, in 
 particular, that some figures indicating the 
 date, which he had written on it with a dia- 
 mond, had become entirely defaced. Granite 
 has been employed for too short a time as a
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 monumental stone in our cemeteries to afford 
 any readv means of measuring even approx- 
 imately its rate of weathering. Traces of 
 decay in s me of its feldspar crystals may be 
 detected, yet in no case that I have seen is 
 1'he decay of a polished granite surface sen- 
 sibly apparent after exposure for fifteen or 
 twenty years. That the polish will disappear, 
 and that the surface will gradually roughen 
 as the individual component crystals are more 
 or less easily attacked by the weather, is of 
 cour e sufficiently evident. Even the most 
 durable granite will probably be far surpassed 
 in permanence by the best of our silicious 
 sandstones. But as yet the data do not exist 
 for making any satisfactory comparison be- 
 tween them. 
 
 Since the preceding pages were written I 
 have had an opportunity of examining the 
 condition of the monumental stones in the 
 graveyards of a number of towns and villages 
 in the northeast of Scotland, where the popu- 
 lation is sparse and where comparatively little 
 coal-smoke passes into the atmosphere. The 
 marble tablets last longer there than in Edin- 
 burg, but show everywhere indications of de- 
 cay. They appear to be. quite free from the 
 black or gray sulphate-crust They suffer 
 
 chiefly from superficial erosion, but I observed 
 a few cases of curvature and fracture. As a 
 contrast to the universal decay of the marble 
 tombstones, reference may be made to the 
 remarkable durability of the clay-slate which 
 has been employed for monumental purposes 
 in Aberdeenshire. It is a fine-grained, rather 
 soft rock, containing scattered tubes of py- 
 rites, and capable of being readily dressed 
 into thin smooth slabs. A tombstone of this 
 material, erected in the old burying-ground 
 at Peterhead, sometime between 1785 and 
 1790, retains its lettering as sharp and smooth 
 as if only recently incised. Yet the stone is 
 soft enough to be easily cut with the knife. 
 The cubes of pyrites have resisted weathering 
 so well that a mere thin film of brown hydrous 
 peroxide conceals the brassy undecomposed 
 sulphide from view. The slate is slightly 
 stained yellow round each cube or kernel of 
 pyrites, but its general smooth surface is not 
 affected. The lapse of nearly a century has 
 produced scarcely any change upon this stone, 
 while neighboring tablets of white marble, 
 loo to 150 years old, present rough granular 
 surfaces and half-effaced though still legible 
 'nscriptions. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 I. MY FIRST GEOLOGICAL EXCURSION . . . . . . . 
 
 II. "THE OLD MAN OF HOY" 
 
 III. THE BARON'S STONE OF KILLOCHAN +. r , 
 
 IV. THB COLLIERS OF CARRICK . 
 
 V. AMONG THE VOLCANOES OF CENTRAL FRANCE .... 
 
 V/.. THE OLD GLACIERS OF NORWAY AND SCOTLAND .... 
 Til. ROCK-WEATHERING MEASURED BY THE DECAY OF TOMBSTONES
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES 
 
 AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 BY ARCHIBALD GEIKIE, LL.D., F.R.S., 
 
 Director-General of the Geological Surveys of Great Britain and Ireland. 
 
 IN TWO PARTS PART H. 
 
 A FRAGMENT OF PRIMEVAL 
 EUROPE. 
 
 When the history of the growth of the 
 European area is traced backward through 
 successive geological periods, it brings before 
 us a remarkable persistence of land toward 
 the north. The stratified formations bear a 
 generally concurrent testimony to the exist- 
 ence of a northern source whence much of 
 their sediment was derived, even from very 
 early geological times. In their piles of con- 
 solidated gravel, sand, and mud, their un- 
 conformabilities and their buried coast-lines, 
 they tell of some boreal land which, continu- 
 ally suffering denudation, but doubtless at 
 intervals restored and augmented by up- 
 heaval, has gradually extended over the 
 whole of the present European area. The 
 chronicles of this most interesting history are 
 at best imperfect, and have hitherto been 
 only partially deciphered. They naturally 
 assume an increasingly fragmentary and ob- 
 scure character in proportion to their an- 
 tiquity. Nevertheless traces can still be de- 
 tected of the shores against which the oldest 
 
 known sedimentary accumulations were 
 piled. These shores have of course been 
 deeply buried under the deposits of subse- 
 quent ages. But the whirligig of time has 
 once mere brought them up to the light of 
 day by stripping off the thick piles of rock 
 beneath which they have lain preserved 
 during so vast a cycle of geological revo- 
 lutions. I shall here describe a fragment of 
 this earliest land, and allude to some of the 
 geological problems which it suggests. 
 
 In the northwest of Scotland, along the 
 seaboard of the counties of Ross and Suther- 
 land, a peculiar type of scenery presents 
 itself, which reappears nowhere else on the 
 mainland. Whether the traveler approaches 
 the region from the sea or from the land, he 
 can hardly fail to be struck by this pecu- 
 liarity, even though he may have no special 
 geological eye for the discrimination of rock- 
 structures. Seen from the westward or the 
 Atlantic side, as, for example, when sailing 
 into Loch Torridon, or passing the mouths 
 of the western fjords of Sutherlandshire, the 
 land rises out of the water in a succession of 
 bare rounded domes of rock, crowding be- 
 hind and above each other as far as the eyo 
 car. reach. Not a tree or bush casts
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 shadow over these folds of barren rock. It 
 might at first be supposed that even heather 
 had been unable to find a foothold on them 
 Gray, rugged, and verdureless, they look as 
 if they had but recently been thrust up from 
 beneath the waves, and as if the kindly hand 
 of nature had not yet had time to clothe them 
 with her livery of green. Strange, however, 
 as this scenery appears when viewed from a 
 distance, it becomes even stranger when we 
 enter into it, and more especially when we 
 climb one of its more prominent heights and 
 look down upon many square miles of its 
 extent. The whole landscape is one of 
 smoothed and rounded bosses and ridges of 
 bare rock, which, uniting and then separat- 
 ing, inclose innumerable little tarns. There 
 are no definite lines of hill and valley ; the 
 country consists, in fact, of a seemingly in- 
 extricable labyrinth of hills and valleys, which, 
 on the whole, do not rise much above, nor 
 sink much below, a general average level. 
 Over this expanse, with all its bareness and 
 sterility, there is a singular absence of peaks 
 or crags of any kind. The domes and ridges 
 present everywhere a rounded, flowing out- 
 line, though here and there this outline has 
 been partially defaced by the action of the 
 weather. 
 
 The rocks that have assumed this external 
 contour are the Archaean, Fundamental, 
 Lewisian, . or Laurentian gneiss, which, as 
 Murchison showed, form the platform where- 
 on the rest of the stratified rocks of Britain 
 lie. They do not, however, cover the whole 
 surface of these northwestern tracts. On the 
 contrary, they form a broken fringe from 
 Cape Wrath to the Island of Raasay, coming 
 out boldly to the Atlantic in the northern half 
 of its course, but throughout the southern 
 portion retiring chiefly toward the heads of 
 the bays and sea-lochs, and even extending 
 inland to the head of Loch Maree. The 
 reason of this want of continuity is to be 
 found in the spread of later formations over 
 the gneiss. At the ba--e of these over- 
 lying deposits comes a mass of dark 
 red standstone and conglomerate (classed 
 as Cambrian by Murchison and his as- 
 sociates), which, in gently-inclined or hori- 
 zontal strata, sweeps across the platform of 
 gneiss.rising here and there into solitary cones 
 or groups of cones fully 3,400 feet above 
 the sea. No contrast in Highland scenery 
 is more abrupt and impressive than that 
 between the ground occupied by the 
 old gneiss and that covered by this 
 overlying sandstone group. So sharp is 
 the line of demarkation between the two 
 tracts that it can* be accurately followed 
 by the eye even at a distance of several miles. 
 Where the sandstone supervenes, the tumbled 
 sea of bare gray gneiss is succeeded by smooth 
 heathy slopes, through which the flat or 
 gently-inclined parallel edges of the beds pro- 
 trude in successive lines of terrace. As the 
 ground rises into conical mountains, the cov- 
 
 ering of heather grows more and more scant, 
 but the same terraced bars of rock continue 
 to rise even to the summits, so that these vast 
 solitary cones, standing apart on their plat- 
 form of gneiss, have rather the aspect of 
 rudely symmetrical pyramids than the free, 
 bold sweep of crag and slope so characteristic 
 of other Scottish mountains. 
 
 The depth of these sandstones must amount 
 to several thousand feet. Even in single 
 mountains, a thickness of more than three 
 thousand four hundred feet can be taken in 
 at a glance of the eye from base to summit. 
 Yet when this massive formation is followed 
 along the belt of country in which it lies it is 
 found to thin out rapidly and even for some 
 distance to disappear. Such a disappearance 
 might arise either because the sandstone was 
 not continuously deposited, or more probably 
 because it was unequally worn down before 
 the next group was accumulated upon it. 
 Evidently the solution of this question has an 
 important bearing on any reconstruction of 
 the early geography of the region. 
 
 Above the red sandstones and creeping 
 transgressively across them lies the deep pile 
 of white quartzites, limestones, and schists, 
 which Mr. C. W. F-each's discovery of recog- 
 nizable fossils in them at Durness showed to 
 be of Lower Silurian age. Another well- 
 marked contrast of scenery is presented where 
 these rocks abut upon those just described. 
 The quartzites rise into long lines of bare 
 white hills which, as the rock breaks up under 
 the influence of the weather, are apt to be 
 buried under their own ddbris even up to the 
 summits. Here and there, outlying patches 
 of the white rock maybe seen gleaming along 
 the crests of the dark sandstone mountains, 
 like fields of snow or nascent glaciers. 
 Quartzites, limestones, and schists dip away 
 to the east and pass under the vast series of 
 younger schists which form most of the rest 
 of the Scottish Highlands. This order of 
 succession, first established by Murchison, 
 can be demonstrated by innumerable lines of 
 natural section. I have myself traced it 
 through the mountainous country from Cape 
 Wrath to Skye, and in many traverses across 
 Sutherland and Ross. I have sought for evi- 
 dence of the reappearance of the old or fun- 
 damental gneiss of the northwest, and have 
 ransacked every Highland county in the 
 search, but have never found the least trace 
 of that rock beyond its limits in Sutherland 
 and Ross. Its distinctive gneisses and other 
 crystalline masses, so wonderfully unlike any- 
 :hing else in the Highlands, never reappear 
 o the east. And that strange mammillated, 
 aossy surface is found in the northwest alone. 
 To realize what the appearance of the old 
 gneiss at the present surface involves we 
 must bear in mind that it was first buried 
 under several thousand feet of red sandstone, 
 :hat the area was then further submerged un- 
 til the vast pile of sediment was deposited 
 out of which the Highlands have betn
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 formed, that these sedimentary accumulations 
 how many thousand feet thick we cannot 
 yet tell were subsequently over the High- 
 land area crumpled and metamorphosed into 
 crystalline schists, and that finally toward 
 the west the ancient platform of gneiss was 
 once more ridged up and gradually bared of 
 its superincumbent load of rock, until now at 
 length some portions of it have been once 
 more laid open to the air. 
 
 There is thus a special historical interest 
 in this fragment of the old gneiss country. 
 It is a portion of the earliest European sur- 
 face of which as yet we know anything a 
 surface in cnronological comparison with 
 which the Alps are of quite modern date. 
 For many years past I have at intervals 
 wandered over it, finding in its undulations 
 of bare rock a fascination which a fairer 
 landscape might fail to exert. Each visit 
 suggests some fresh problem, if it does not 
 cast light on earlier difficulties. One of the 
 questions which must particularly engage 
 the attention of every observant traveler in 
 Western Sutherland and Ross is the origin 
 of that extraordinary contour presented by 
 the gneiss. A very slight examination shows 
 that every dome and boss of rock is ice- worn. 
 The smoothed, polished, and striated surface 
 left by the ice of the glacial period is every- 
 where to be recognized. Each hummock of 
 gneiss is a more or less perfect roche moutonnfr. 
 Perched blocks are strewn over the ground 
 by thousands. In short, there can hardly be 
 anywhere else in Britain a more thoroughly 
 typical piece of glaciation. 
 
 An obvious answer to the question of 
 the origin of the peculiar configuration 
 of this gneiss country is to refer it 
 to the action of the last ice-sheet whic*i 
 covered Britain. That the gneiss was power- 
 fully ground down by that ice is suffi- 
 ciently manifest. But if the peculiar bossy 
 surface is to be thus explained we are c n- 
 fronted by the difficulty that the ice must 
 have acted far more effectively on the gneiss 
 than on any other rock in the region. Yet 
 there is nothing either in the structure of the 
 rocks or in the configuration of the ground 
 to make the erosion greater on the gneiss 
 than on the red sandstone or quartzites and 
 schists. The same side of a sea-loch may be 
 seen to present slopes both of gneiss and 
 sandstone ; the gneiss is always worn into 
 smooth domes, ridges, and hollows ; but the 
 sandstone retains its parallel bands of rocky 
 terrace. The difference is evidently not due 
 to any recent greater glacial abrasion of the 
 gneiss. The area of high ground above the 
 gneiss platform in Sutherlandshire is com- 
 paratively small. It rises somewhat steeply 
 from the west, its chief area and drainage 
 lying toward the east. I have visited those 
 tracts of the Highlands where the rocks ap- 
 proach nearest to the type of the ancient 
 gneiss, and where the conditions have been 
 most favorable for intense glaciation. No 
 
 more promising locality for a comparison of 
 this kind could be found than the deep defiles 
 of Glen Shiel and Kintail. The rocks have 
 there been extremely metamorphosed, and 
 have been exposed to the action of ice de 
 scending from some of the highest uplands 
 in the West of Scotland. Yet we look in 
 vain among them for any semblance of the 
 bare bossy surface of the old gneiss. 
 
 A further difficulty arises when we reflect 
 that in the general erosion of the country 
 the gneiss, being covered by later forma- 
 tions, would be the last to be attacked, and 
 in so far as it was so covered, must have 
 been exposed to the erosive action of the ice 
 for a shorter time than the overlying rocks. 
 We might therefore have presumed that in- 
 stead of being more, it would have been less 
 trenchantly worn down than these. Its 
 great toughness and durability, which have 
 enabled it to retain the ice impress so faith- 
 fully, must have given it considerable powers 
 of resistance to the grinding action of the 
 glacier. 
 
 Every fresh excursion into these northern 
 wilds has increased my difficulty in account- 
 ing for the peculiar contours of the gneiss 
 ground by reference merely to the work of the 
 Glacial Period. A recent visit, however, 
 seems at last to have thrown some light on 
 the matter. I had long been familiar with 
 the fact that the platform of gneiss on which 
 the red sandstone and conglomerates we - e 
 laid down abounded in inequalities even at 
 the time of the deposit of these strata. Its 
 uneven surface rose here and there into high 
 ridges and cones, of which Stack is a dimin- 
 ished representative, and sank into depres- 
 sions now occupied by thick masses of sand- 
 stone. But I have lately observed that not 
 only do these larger features pass under the 
 sardstone, but that the minor domes and 
 I bosses of gneiss do so likewise. On both 
 I sides of Loch Torridon, for example, the 
 I hummocky outlines of the gneiss can be seen 
 i emerging from under the overlying sand- 
 : stones. On the side west of Loch Assynt 
 similar junctions are visible. But some of 
 the most impressive sections occur in the 
 neighborhood of Gairloch. Little more than 
 a mile to the north of the church the road 
 to Poolewe descends into a short valley sur- 
 rounded with gneiss hills. From the top of 
 the descent the eye is at once arrested by a 
 flat- topped hill standing in the middle of the 
 valley at its upper end, and suggesting some 
 kind of fortification; so different from th 
 surrounding hummocky declivities of gneist 
 is its level grassy top, flanked by wall-like 
 cliffs rising upon a glacis-slope of dfbris and 
 herbage. Closer examination shows that 
 the little eminence is capped with a coarse 
 reddish breccia mode up of fragments from 
 the surrounding gneiss. The stones in this 
 deposit are for the most part perfectly angu- 
 I lar, and are sometimes stuck on end in 
 the mass. They underwent but little re-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 arrangement after they were thrown down, 
 though occasional lenticular seams of red 
 sandstone running through the rock serve 
 prove that it is lying as a flat cake on the 
 gneiss. My friend Mr. Norman Lockyer 
 accompanied me in the examination of this 
 hill. We searched long for a striated stone 
 among the component materials of the brec- 
 cia, but the matrix was too firm to allow us 
 to bare and extract any of the pebbles or 
 boulders. We traced, however, tne charac- 
 teristic rounded bossy surface of the gneiss 
 until it passed under the breccia, and were 
 convinced that, could the outlier of breccia 
 be stripped off, the same kind of surface 
 would be found below it as on the gneiss 
 above and around. The valley containing 
 this little fragment of a once more extensive 
 deposit of breccia certainly existed as a hol- 
 low in Cambrian times. From the narrow- 
 ness of its present outlet, which has been 
 cut by the escaping streamlet, and from the 
 nature of the breccia, we may infer with 
 some plausibility that the hollow was filleJ 
 with water, and may have been a 1 ike. It 
 was almost certainly a rock-basin, surround- 
 ed with hills of gneiss that had been worn 
 into undulating dome-shaped hummocks. 
 
 Behind the new hotel at Gairloch the 
 ground rises steeply into a rocky bank of the 
 old gneiss. Along the base of these slope 
 the gneiss (which is here a greenish schist) is 
 wrapped round with a breccia of remarkable 
 coarseness and toughness. We noticed some 
 blocks in it fully five feet long. It is entirely 
 made up of angular fragments of the schist 
 underneath, to which it adheres with great 
 tenacity. Here aga ; n rounded and smoothed 
 domes of the older rock can be traced passing 
 under the breccia. On the coast immediately 
 to the south of the new Free Church a series 
 ef instructive sections lays bare the worn un- 
 dulating platform of gneiss, with it - overlying 
 cover of coarse angular breccia. Similar evi- 
 dence occurs to the north of Loch Inver. 
 
 On these far northern shores, then, there 
 gtill remain fragments of the surface on which 
 our oldest sedimentary accumulations were 
 deposited. These fragments are found to 
 oear in their smooth hummocky contours a 
 Striking resemblance to the surface which 
 geologists now always associate with the 
 action of the glacier-ice. There can at least 
 oe no doubt that they are denuded surfaces. 
 The edges of the vertical and twisted beds of 
 gneiss and schist have been smoothly beveled 
 off. These rocks, however, would never have 
 assumed such a contour if exposed merely to 
 ordinary sub-aerial disintegration. They 
 would have taken sharp craggy outlines like 
 those which are here and there gradually re- 
 placing the ice-worn curves of the roches mou- 
 tanntes. They have certainly been ground 
 by an agent that has produced results which, 
 if they were found in a recent formation, 
 would, without hesitation, be ascribed to 
 land-ice. The breccia, too, is quite compar- 
 
 able to moraine stuff. Without wishing at 
 present to prejudge a question on which I 
 hope yet to obtain further evidence, I think 
 we have in the meantime grounds for con- 
 cluding that in the northwest of Scotland 
 there is still traceable a fragment of the 
 earliest known land-surface of Europe ; that 
 this primeval country had a smooth undulating 
 aspect not unlike that of the west of Suther- 
 land at the present time ; that it contained 
 rock-hollows, some of them filled with water; 
 that into these hollows piles of coarse angular 
 detritus were thrust; that around and beneath 
 the tracts where this detritus accumulated the 
 gneiss was worn into dome-shaped forms 
 strongly suggestive of the operation of land* 
 ice; and that though the ice of the last Glacial 
 Period undoubtedly ground down the plat- 
 form of gneiss, bared as it was of the over- 
 lying formations, it found a surface already 
 worn into approximately the same forms as 
 those which it presents to-day. 
 
 II. 
 IN WYOMING. 
 
 Twenty-four hours after landing in New 
 York my preparations for a journey to the 
 Far West were completed, and I found myself 
 'ooking out from the windows of a Pullman 
 car that rapidly swept past the blue reaches 
 of the Hudson. A project which had been 
 little more than a dream for many years was 
 now at last actually realized. Let me briefly 
 explain this project, that the purport of the 
 journey, and of the following notes, may be 
 understood. 
 
 And first I would give the reader due 
 warning that the object of the expedition was 
 not sport or adventure, but science. My 
 companion and I were not, indeed, wholly 
 unarmed. To go without at least revolvers 
 into these western wildernesses would, we 
 were told, be sheer folly. My weapon disap- 
 peared, however, in an early part of our trav- 
 els, but my friend's did occasional service 
 upon a badger or prairie hen. All the sport 
 that was done consisted in the slaughter of 
 the antelope or elk that was needed for food. 
 Nevertheless, from first to last, the journey 
 was full of interest, and, in a quiet way, 
 even of excitement. We had game of our 
 own to hunt, and we pursued it with such 
 measure of success as at least amply to justify 
 our own expectations, and to reward us for 
 the enterprise. 
 
 Everybody now knows the kind of evidence 
 from which it has been established that the 
 present surface of the dry land has once 
 been in a wholly different condition. In all 
 parts of the world this evidence obtrudes it- 
 self, often so conspicuously as from earliest 
 times to have arrested the attention of man- 
 kind, and to have suggested, or at least 
 colored, mythology and local superstition.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 In many places, for example, as soon as the 
 layer of soil or subsoil has been removed, the 
 rock below, with its embedded shells or cor- 
 als, or other remains of marine life, is at 
 once seen to have been the bottom of the 
 sea. At other points we find traces of riv- 
 ers which must have had their sources in the 
 mountains that have long since disappeared, 
 and which fed lakes or watered woodlands 
 and plains that for ages have been buried 
 out of sight. Or, again, we come upon the 
 earth and stones left by vanished glaciers, 
 upon the limestone spread out by the springs 
 long ago dried up, upon the sheets of lava or 
 heaps of ashes thrown out by volcanoes that 
 have been extinct and effaced for ages It is 
 manifest, therefore, that the present surface 
 of the land, so far from being aboriginal, is 
 only the latest phase of a long succession of 
 geographical revolutions, the uppermost leaf, 
 as it were, of a series of volumes that lie be- 
 neath it. Mountains and hills, valleys and 
 plains, instead of standing out as parts of the 
 primeval architecture of the globe, can be 
 shown to belong to many different epochs of 
 the earth's long history. 
 
 But the question remains, how these fa- 
 miliar features have come to be impressed on 
 the surface of the land. Granted that the 
 solid materials out of which a mountain or 
 table-land has been built were originally ac- 
 cumulated as sediment on the floor of the sea, 
 how has this hardened sediment been fash- 
 ioned into the well-known lineaments of 
 the land ? The solution of this question 
 aroused some years ago a keen discussion, and 
 has given rise to a portentous mass of geolo- 
 gical literature. The combatants, as in most 
 warfares, scientific or other, ranged them- 
 selves into two camps. There were the Con- 
 vulsionists, or believers in the paramount ef- 
 ficacy of subterranean movement, who, 
 starting from the universally admitted proofs 
 of upheaval, crumpling, and fracture, sought 
 an explanation of the present inequalities of 
 the land in unequal disturbance from below. 
 On the other hand, there were the Erosion- 
 ists, or upholders of the efficacy of superfi- 
 cial waste, who maintained that besides the 
 elevations due to the subterranean causes, 
 mountains, valleys, and all the other features 
 of a landscape, have been gradually carved 
 into their present shapes by the slow abrasion j 
 of the air, rain, rivers, frosts, and the other 
 agents of sub-aerial eros'on. The contest, 
 which was keen enough so ne years ago, has 
 for a while almost ceased among us, though 
 an occasional shot from younger combatants, 
 fired with the old enthusiasm, serves to keep 
 alive the memory of the campaign. 
 
 Having long ago attached myself to the 
 camp of the Erosionists, though by no means 
 inclined to do battle under the extreme 
 " quietest " banners of some of it champions, 
 I have been led, in the course of my wander- 
 ings over Britain and the Continent, to 
 look at scenery with a peculiar interest. I 
 
 have long been convinced, however, that for 
 the proper discussion of the real efficacy of 
 superficial erosion in the .development of a 
 terrestrial surface, the geologists of Europe 
 have been at great disadvantage. The rocks 
 in these regions have undoubtedly been sub- 
 jected to so many changes squeezed, crum- 
 pled, fractured, upheaved, and depressed ' 
 that the effects of unequal erosion upon their 
 surface have been masked by those of subter- 
 ranean disturbance. The problem has thus 
 become much more complicated than with 
 simpler geological structure it would have 
 been. Its solution has demanded an amount 
 of knowledge of geological structure which 
 can hardly be acquired without long and la- 
 borious training, the want of which on the 
 part of many who have taken part in the con- 
 troversy has led to the calling in question or 
 denial of facts, about the reality and mean- 
 ing of which there never has been any 
 doubt at all That in spite of these obstacles, 
 observers in this country should have been 
 able to brush aside the accidental or adven- 
 titious difficulties and get at the real gist of 
 the matter, as I am certain they have done, 
 seems to me a lasting proof of their scientific 
 prowess. 
 
 Now, it is unquestionably true that had the 
 birthplace of geology lain on the west side of 
 the Rocky Mountains, this controversy would 
 never have arisen. The efficacy of denuda- 
 tion, instead of evoking doubt, discussion or 
 denial, would have been one of the first ob- 
 vious principles of the science, established on 
 the most irrefragable basis of patent and most 
 impressive facts. Over thousands of square 
 miles in that region the strata remain practi- 
 cally unchanged from their original horizontal 
 position, so that the effects of surface erosion 
 can at once be detected upon their flat parallel 
 layers. The country has not been under the 
 sea for avast succession of geological periods. 
 It has not been buried, like so much of North- 
 ern Europe and Northeastern America, under 
 a thick cover of ice-born clays and gravels. 
 Its level platforms of sandstone, shale, clay, 
 or limestone lie at the surface, bare to the 
 wind and rain, and their lines can be followed 
 mile after mile, as if the whole region were 
 one vast geological model to which the world 
 should come to learn the fundamental laws of 
 denuuation. 
 
 For the exploration of these western terri- 
 tories the enlightened enterprise of various 
 departments under the American Government 
 has already done a great deal. During the 
 last ten or' fifteen years various surveys of 
 different portions of the region have been 
 carried on, and a voluminous series of maps 
 and reports has been issued embodying the 
 results of the explorations. Through the cour- 
 teous liberality of these departments, for 
 which on all occasions I am anxious to ex- 
 press my gratitude and admiration, I had re- 
 ceived copies of most of their publications. 
 The descriptions of King, Hayden, Powell,
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 Gilbert, Button, Emmons, Hague, Marvine, 
 Endlich and others, and the remarkable draw- 
 ings of Holmes, had made me in some re- 
 spects familiar with the general aspects of 
 the scenery and geological structure of the 
 region. From these works it was evident 
 that questions over which we had been fight- 
 ing so long in Europe were finally settled by 
 Nature herself in America, after a fashion 
 admitting of no more cavil. It was well worth 
 while to make a journey to the Far West to 
 see with one's own eyes the demonstration for 
 which one had longed on this side of the At- 
 lantic. And this was what I now had deter- 
 mined to do, with the companionship of an 
 old friend of kindred tastes, Mr. Henry 
 Drummond, of the New College, Glasgow, 
 who from first to last shared in the work and 
 smoothed the little privations of the journey. 
 
 Of the traveling westward, now made so 
 familiar and comparatively easy by the various 
 rival railroad companies, little need be said 
 here. There is an early and late feature of it, 
 however, to which reference may be made, 
 partly in the hope that every renewed protest 
 against an abuse, as offensive to many of our 
 cousins on the other side as to a visitor from 
 the old country, may help toward its ultimate 
 suppression. Hardly is the traveler out of 
 New York when he notices that every natural 
 rock, islet, or surface of any kind that will 
 hold paint is disfigured with advertisements 
 in huge letters. The ice- worn bosses of gneiss 
 which, rising out of the Hudson, would in 
 themselves be such attractive objects in the 
 landscape, are rendered hideous by being 
 made the groundwork on which some kind of 
 tobacco, or tooth wash, or stove-polish, is 
 recommended to the notice of the multitude. 
 All the way west to the Pacific along the rail- 
 way route the same barbarous practice has 
 been employed, with an ingenuity and perse- 
 verance worthy of a better cause. Some of 
 the most picturesque canons on the route 
 have had their walls turned into advertising 
 boards for the spoilers have traveled with 
 ladders as well as paint pots, and have care- 
 fully inscribed their wares on precipices which 
 would ordinarily be inaccessible. Oil paint 
 lasts for many years; so that even if the sac- 
 rilege be soon suppressed it will be long be- 
 fore the record of it has wholly disappeared. 
 
 Not many years ago, Chicago lay at the 
 extreme verge of advancing civilization One 
 who had been so far west could boast that he 
 had reached the limit of settlements, and had 
 looked on the great plains haunted by wild 
 red men and buffaloes. Now, however, the 
 network of railways h s spread far beyond 
 Chicago, which has become one of the chief 
 marts of the Union, having free communica- 
 tion alike by water and land with the eastern 
 seaboard of the continent. I was making 
 some such natural reflections as the train 
 slowed in approaching Chicago station, when 
 a noise as of broken glass came from the 
 other unoccupied end of the car. The crash 
 
 was loud enough to startle everybody for a 
 moment, but the conversation and packing 
 up of bags were immediately resumed On 
 going to the spot, I found that two window- 
 panes of the car had been pierced at about 
 the same height by two successive bullets 
 from a revolver. One of the balls had made 
 a clean, sharp hole in the plate -glass, and 
 would no doubt have continued its journey 
 through the body of any unfortunate occu- 
 pant of the seat. This was our first expe- 
 rience of " Western Life." We looked next 
 morning in the papers for an account of the 
 " outrage," as it would have been termed by 
 our penny-a-liners at home. It was not men- 
 tioned at all. We found, however, records 
 of so many successful shootings that the non- 
 insertion of our episode was easily to be ex- 
 plained, he incident impressed me with a 
 sense of recklessness in the use of firearms 
 and disregard of life an impression that was 
 not effaced by the rest of the journey. 
 
 We crossed the Mississippi at night, and 
 having some time to wait at the Quincy 
 Junction, walked down to the banks of the 
 river and reverently dipped our hands in the 
 great ' ' Father of Waters. " Lights gleamed 
 from the farther side, heightening the effect 
 of vastness and mystery. Behind us, too, 
 gleamed the much brighter lights of rival 
 drinking saloons, from which, before resum- 
 ing the journey, we were enabled to enlarge 
 our rapidly-growing vocabulary of American 
 drinks. 
 
 The Missouri River at Kansas City is the 
 muddiest, most tumultuous flood of rolling 
 water I ever saw. Yet it was now the month 
 of August, and there had been a long course 
 of previous dry weather. The train carried 
 us slowly across a creaking wooden bridge 
 over the boiling sea below, past some cliffs 
 of old alluvium, into a station full of negroes, 
 of whom there had been a large influx from 
 the South in seach of a proposed settlement 
 in Kansas. There being now some kind of 
 picnic or holiday afoot, they were a merry, 
 noisy crowd, dressed out and bedizened as 
 only niggers can be. One seldom realizes 
 what an extraordinary variety of tint there 
 may be in a colored population Some of 
 the excursionists were of the most perfect 
 coalblack shade, from which every gradation 
 could be noted till the crisp hair and charac- 
 teristic features remained as almost the only 
 traces of negro blood. Westward still, 
 through endless monotonous miles of maize 
 and yet unbroken land, the train moved 
 wearily hour after hour, until on getting up 
 in the morning we found ourselves unmis- 
 takably on the great prairie at last. Perhaps 
 no type of scenery so closely fulfils a previous 
 mental picture of it as the western prairie of 
 North America. Seen after a hot summer, 
 it spreads out as a vast, treeless, arid ex- 
 panse, covered with a short and sparse grass, 
 which, though green and flowery in spring, 
 becomes parched hy drought into a kind of
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 creased interest on the homeward journey. 
 At last, on the far western horizon the first 
 summits on the Rocky Mountains rose like 
 blue islets out of the sea. Hour after hour, 
 as the train ground its dusty way over the 
 plain, these islets rose higher, till at last they 
 
 united into the long 
 
 ;e nigl 
 noble 
 
 range of the snow- 
 
 hay, through which the baked soil everywhere 
 peeps. For hundreds of miles together the 
 undulations never rise into hills nor sink into 
 valleys. A sluggish streamlet, depressed a 
 few feet or yards beneath the general level, 
 winds here and there in lazy curves till it 
 joins some sluggish and muddy tributary of 
 the Missouri, that creeps along a level plain 
 bounded by low bluffs. But ere autumn 
 comes many of these watercourses have been 
 reduced to groups of stagnant pools. 
 
 At proper intervals stations have been 
 built with means for supplying the engines 
 with water and fuel. It was at one of these 
 halting-places that we were able to set foot 
 for the first time on the prairie. The brief 
 halt enabled us to make some observations 
 that served materially to beguile the tedium 
 of this railway journey, and to invest the fea- 
 tureless prairie with a new interest. Every 
 traveler across the continent has remarked 
 the incredible number of ant-hills and bur- 
 rows of the prairie dog and gopher by which 
 the flat bare surface of the plains is marked. 
 The ground appears to be in a constant state of 
 cutaneous eruption. So leisurely does the 
 train move along, however, and so seldom 
 does it halt, that for some hours after day- 
 light we sat looking on this singular scene 
 before an opportunity came of getting down 
 
 to have a closer view of it. We noticed that I sharp and sudden is the bend that it would 
 though the general color of the soil is a dirty hardly be an exaggeration to say that you 
 yellowish gray or drab, the ant hills have a | might sit on the flat beds and lean your back 
 somewhat pinkish tint. Our first halt re- on the vertical ones. From some points of 
 vealed the curious fact that this difference ' 
 arises from the choice which the ants make 
 of their building materials. With infinite 
 
 streaked Colorado Alps, with Pike's Peak, 
 Long's Peak, and a host of other broad- 
 based cones towering far up into the clear 
 air. 
 
 Though it was no part of our programme 
 to linger among these mountains, we gladly 
 availed ourselves of the opportunity of mak- 
 ing an excursion into them in passing. The 
 first few hours showed us on what a different 
 plan these mountains had been constructed 
 from that which is more familiar in the Old 
 World. Approaching the Alps, for instance, 
 you cross a succession of parallel minor 
 ranges, or foot-hills, like the Jura, which 
 flank the more colossal ramparts behind them. 
 But these Colorado Mountains tower straight 
 out of the plain. For hundreds of miles to 
 the east the Cretaceous or Tertiary strata 
 underlying the prairie seem to be nearly flat 
 or only very slightly undulating, though 
 there is a steady rise of the ground west- 
 ward. But at the foot of the mountains they 
 are at once abruptly pitched up on end. So 
 
 stals of flesh-colored fel< 
 strewed there. The roc 
 
 ing 1 
 
 jick 
 
 of the prairie the small broken cry- 
 Idspar that are sparsely 
 ocks underneath are 
 various sandstones, clays, and limestones, the 
 decomposition of which could never have fur- 
 nished this feldspar detritus. I examined a 
 good many ant-hills, and found the same 
 kind of fragments on all of them. The 
 feldspar grains were most abundant.but there 
 occurred also small pieces of quartz and other 
 
 w the solid sheets of rock made a magnifi- 
 cent curve from the plains up into the line of 
 serrated crags which their broken edges 
 present against the sky. The meaning of 
 this' structure is soon apparent when the trav- 
 eler ascends one of the numerous deep 
 gorges or canons into which the flanks of the 
 mountains have been trenched by the erosion 
 of the escaping drainage. In the course of 
 a brief space he finds that he has crossed the 
 uptilted formations and has reached the 
 ancient granitic and crystalline rocks, which 
 have been driven up like a huge wedge 
 through the younger strata of the prairies, 
 
 minerals of crystalline rocks, and here and j and now form the axis of the Colorado 
 there some black glistening specks of coal. Mountains. But for the protrusion of this 
 There seemed to be a thin crust or veneering j wedge the "Centennial State" would have 
 of this kind of fine detritus over the drab- j been a quiet pastoral or agricultural territory 
 tinted soil, not thick enough to be readily ob- i like the region to the eastward. The rise of 
 servable, but yet sufficiently persistent to the granitic axis, however, has brought up 
 supply the materials so patiently gathered to- with it that incredible mineral wealth which, 
 gether into these little mounds. i in a few years, has converted the loneliest 
 
 No warning bell gives the traveler notice to mountain solitudes into busy hives of industry, 
 resume his place in the cars, and we had just j Places that a few years ago were haunted 
 time after hearing the "All aboard !" of the only by wild beasts, and probably hardly ever 
 conductor to regain the train, more puzzled i saw even a red man, now count their popula- 
 than ever by the prairie ant-hills. The source tion by thousands. Mining camps have 
 of this fine feldspar drift, and the cause of its grown into cities with important public 
 being spread so thinly over the many hun- ; buildings, hotels, and many of the luxuries 
 dreds of square miles it evidently covered, ! as well as vices of modern city life. There 
 were questions in the history of the prairies is a feverish rush westward. Advertisements 
 which we could not answer, but to which we placarded all over the Union by rival railroad 
 were able to return with more light and in- companies show the cheapest and quickest
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 route to the new El Dorado of Colorado, and 
 hold out tempting prospects of rapidly 
 acquiring a fortune there. We found our- 
 selves unwittingly moving westward on this 
 wave of emigration. It was tacitly assumed 
 that we too were bound for a "claim" some- 
 where. 
 
 After a glimpse at the canons and camp- 
 life of these uplands, we skirted their eastern 
 slopes amid mounds of dttris, which renewed 
 our interest in the problem that had been 
 started by the prairie ant-hills. Without halting 
 at that time, however, but pursuing our way 
 westward by the Union Pacific Railroad, we 
 made no stop till we came within sight of 
 the Uintah Mountains in Wyoming. This 
 long journey is marked in the recollection of 
 a traveler by the complete demolition of his 
 previous mental picture of the ' ' Rocky 
 Mountains. " Misled by the absurd and utterly 
 false system, still far from extinct, of represent- 
 ing a watershed on a map by a continuous range 
 of mountain chain, most people have grown 
 up in the belief that the backbone of North 
 America consists of a colossal rampart of 
 mountains which traverses the continent as a 
 continuous range, running in a nearly north 
 and south direction, and so extraordinarily 
 rugged as to have deserved the special appel- 
 lation of "Rocky." No conception could 
 well be further from the reality. To depict 
 the American watershed in this way is nearly 
 as erroneous as it would be to draw a lofty 
 mountain chain from the Pyrenees across the 
 heart of France, Switzerland, Germany, and 
 Russia, as indicative of the watershed of 
 Europe. Such is the force of habit engen- 
 dered by the long use of faulty maps that, 
 though we knew what the true structure of 
 the country had been shown to be, ic was with 
 a feeling almost of incredulity that we looked 
 out upon the scene on either side of the rail- 
 road track as the train approached the sum- 
 mit of the route. The Colorado Alps had 
 sunk down into a series of low ridges, though 
 we could still see in the far distance some of 
 their more notable peaks. Northward the 
 tops of some distant hills in Wyoming loomed 
 up on the horizon, but all around us not only 
 were there no mountains, but hardly anything 
 that deserved to be called a hill certainly 
 nothing that for a moment suggested the 
 crest of a mountain range. The railway 
 company, with a laudable desire for the diffu- 
 sion of correct geographical knowledge, has 
 had a board inscribed ' ' Summit of the Rocky 
 Mountains." and placed at the highest level 
 of their line. One looks round with a feeling 
 of disappointment for the peaks and crests that 
 ought to have been there. Instead of these, 
 there is the same long smooth prairie-like 
 slope, out of which rise numerous quaint knobs 
 of pink granite. The central wedge not having 
 been driven so far upward, here forms no 
 conspicuous feature at the surface. Yet it 
 has carried up the same red sandstones on its 
 eastern flank that rise in vertical bands among 
 
 the canons north of Denver. From the plain 
 of the Missouri the prairie, there about 1,000 
 feet above sea-level, rises slowly in elevation 
 westward, till at Cheyenne, a distance of 
 rather more than 500 miles, its surface has an 
 average elevation of about 6,000 feet. In the 
 next eighteen miles, however, it makes a more 
 rapid slope, for it mounts to an elevation of 
 8,271 feet above the sea. The loss of the 
 cherished delusion about the aspect of the 
 Rocky Mountains was in some small measure 
 compensated by a glimpse we had of the 
 source whence the prairies have derived their 
 fine detritus and the ants their favorite pink 
 building materials. The granite of this ele- 
 vatf-d plateau is a bright flesh-colored rock 
 crumbling into sand, the grains of which are 
 mainly of pink cleavable orthoclase feldspar. 
 Exposed to all the vicissitudes of weather at 
 so great an altitude, the rock readily disin- 
 tegrates. Every shower of rain washes down 
 some of its detritus, which is further carried 
 far over the plains by wind. It was, no 
 doubt, from such a rock as this that the wide- 
 spread feldspar drift of the prairie has been 
 derived, and this very ridge has probably fur- 
 nished a due amount of it. 
 
 After crossing the summit, the railroad 
 track descends slowly into the elevated pla- 
 teau known as the Laramie Plains, which still 
 drain eastward into the Atlantic. Not until 
 the train has crossed this dreary region for 
 some 1 50 miles or more, does it reach the true 
 watershed of the country. And then, instead 
 of a colossal rampart of rugged mountains, 
 we find still the same monotonous plains, on 
 which the few names that have been affixed 
 to localities Red Desert, Bitter Creek, Salt 
 Wells, and others sufficiently denote the 
 sterile character of the region. We were 
 now among the head-waters of the great 
 Colorado River on the Pacific slope of the 
 continent. But of visible slope there is for a 
 long way no trace. It is a bare, treeless, 
 verdureless waste, crumbling under the fierce 
 glare of a cloudless sky and the hot blast of 
 a parching wind. Yet for long ages these 
 deserts were the site of a succession of lakes 
 vaster in size than any now existing on the 
 American continent. The water has disap- 
 peared, and out of the hardened clay and 
 marl of the lake bottoms the elements are 
 carving some of the weirdest scenery on the 
 face of the earth. Every mile of the dusty 
 journey now brought with it new and still 
 stranger proofs of this marvelous erosion. 
 At one moment we were looking out on what 
 might have been taken for the bastions of a 
 fort that had stood a long siege. Another 
 curve of the line brought into view seemingly 
 the moldering battlements and decayed 
 acropolis of some early heroic city: at the 
 next turn the array of rock-forms could find 
 no adequate parallel in human architecture. 
 Scenery more indescribable can hardly be 
 conceived. As yet, indeed, all we could see 
 or know of these " Bad Lands" was from the
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 windows of the car. But we saw clearly 
 enough by their level lines of stratification 
 that their forms had been sculptured out of 
 horizontal rocks by surface agents. League 
 after league this lesson of utterly inconceiv- 
 able waste rose out impressively on either 
 side, until at last, when we reached Carter 
 Station, we almost felt that we had seen 
 about as much as our faculties could very 
 well assimilate. But much more was in store 
 for us. 
 
 Thanks to the thoughtful kindness of my 
 friends, Dr. F. V. Hayden, to whom the 
 geology of Western America owes so much, 
 and Dr. Joseph Leidy, the revered Nestor of 
 American comparative anatomy, Judge Carter 
 was waiting our arrival, and soon carried us 
 off, bag and baggage, to his hospitable home 
 at Fort Bridger. In former days, before 
 railway communication was opened across 
 the continent, Fort Bridger was an important 
 station on the emigrant road to Salt Lake 
 and the Pacific Coast. It is now no longer a 
 military post, and being at a distance from 
 the present highway of traffic, some of its 
 disused buildings are falling into disrepair. 
 But Judge Carter, who used to be the pa- 
 triarch of the district, still lives at his post, 
 combining in his own worthy person the 
 offices of postmaster, merchant, farmer, 
 cattle-owner, judge, and general benefactor 
 of all who claim his hospitality. His well- 
 known probity has gained him the respect 
 and good-will of white man and red man 
 alike, and we found his name a kind of 
 household word all through the West. So 
 rapidly and completely have things been 
 changed on this route by the formation of 
 the railway, that in listening to Judge Car- 
 ter's stories of the olden time one could 
 hardly realize that some of the most startling 
 of them did not go further back than fifteen 
 or twenty years. Horse-stealing would ap- 
 pear to have been the one unpardonable sin 
 in these quarters. You might kill a man 
 outright, and it might be nobody's affair 
 either to avenge him or to see you brought 
 to justice for the murder. But to steal his 
 horse was to leave him to perish on the plains ; 
 and if you stole his horse this week you might 
 return and steal mine next. So the best 
 method of preventing that mishap was to put 
 it out of your power ever to steal again. 
 Killing you was consequently not murder ; it 
 was merely punishing effectually an offense 
 that could not be reached by any ordinary 
 legal means, in a region where criminals were 
 many and police were none. Judge Carter had 
 had many experiences of horse-stealers. On 
 one occasion, traveling eastward across the 
 prairie with his wife and family, he found 
 next morning the horses stolen. Such a po- 
 sition resembles that of a ship at sea without 
 masts or sails. There was no station at 
 which provisions could be procured, so that 
 the loss of the means of transport meant 
 starvation and death. Fortunately the Judge 
 
 succeeded in recovering his animals. On 
 another occasion, having tried and convicted 
 a horse-stealer, he sent him in custody to the 
 Court in Utah. The man was chained hands 
 and feet, and in the course of the journey 
 succeeded in breaking his foot-chain, and 
 though still manacled, tried to escape. He 
 was of course speedily shot by the two men 
 who had been entrusted with the mission, 
 and who were probably a couple of dare- 
 devils no whit belt r than himself. They 
 consulted as to their next step, and finding 
 in their writ that they were "to deliver the 
 body of the prisoner " to the sheriff at Salt 
 Lake City, they took the instructions in their 
 literal sense, stowed the body into the stage- 
 coach, and delivered it duly at its destination. 
 From Fort Bridger the Judge carried us to 
 see the " Mauvaises Terres," or " Bad 
 Lands" of Wyoming. This expressive 
 name has been given to some of the strang- 
 est and, in many respects, most repulsive 
 scenery in the world. They are tracts of 
 irreclaimable barrenness, blasted and left 
 forever lifeless and hid ous. To understand 
 their peculiar features it is needful to bear in 
 mind that they lie on the sites of some of the 
 old lakes already referred to, and that they 
 have been carved out of flat sheets of sand- 
 stone, clay, marl, or limestone, that accumu- 
 lated on the floors of these lakes. Every- 
 where, therefore, horizontal lines of stratifi- 
 cation meet the eye, giving alternate stripes 
 of buff, yellow, white, or red, with here and 
 there a strange verdigris-like green. These 
 strata extend nearly horizontally for hundreds 
 of square miles. But they have been most 
 unequally eroded. Here and there isolated 
 flat-topped eminences or ' ' buttes, " as they 
 styled in the West, rise from the plain in 
 front of a line of bluff or cliff to a height of 
 several hundred feet. On examination, each 
 of these hills is found to be built up of hori- 
 zontal strata, and the same beds reappear in 
 lines of terraced cliff along the margin of the 
 plain. A butte is only a remnant of the 
 original deep mass of horizontal strata that 
 once stretched far across the plain. Its sides 
 and the fronts of the terraced cliffs, utterly 
 verdureless and bare, have been scarped into 
 recesses and projecting buttresses. These 
 have been further cut down into a labyrinth 
 of peaks and columns, clefts and ravines, 
 now strangely monumental, now uncouthly 
 irregular, till the eye grows weary with the 
 endless variety and novelty of the forms. 
 Yet beneath all this chaos of outlines there 
 can be traced everywhere the level parallel 
 Dars of the strata. The same band of rock, 
 originally one of the successive floors of the 
 o'd lake, can be followed without bend or 
 areak from chasm to chasm, and pinnacle to 
 jinnacle. Tumultuous as the surface may 
 3C, it has no relation to underground disturb- 
 ances, for the rocks are as level and unbro- 
 cen as when they were laid down. It 
 ts ruggedness entirely to erosion.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 But there is a further feature which crowns 
 the repulsiveness of the Bad Lands. There 
 are no springs or streams. Into the soil, 
 parched by the fierce heats of a torrid sum- 
 mer, the moisture of the sub-soil ascends by 
 capillary attraction, carrying with it the 
 saline solutions it has extracted from the 
 rocks. At the surface it is at once evapo- 
 rated, leaving behind a white crust or efflo- 
 rescence, which covers the hard ground and 
 encrusts the pebbles strewn thereon. Vege- 
 tation wholly fails, save here and there a 
 bunch of salt-weed or a bush of the ubiqui- 
 tous sage-brush, the parched livid green of 
 which serves only to increase the desolation 
 of the desert. 
 
 How, then, has this strange type of land- 
 scape been produced ? The rainfall is ex- 
 ceedingly small, though from lime to time 
 come heavy showers that no doubt do muc i 
 to furrow the crumbling sides of the cliffs 
 and "buttes,"and sweep down the detritus 
 to lower ground. The main instrument of 
 destruction, however, is not rain. In the 
 clear dry air of these western regions the 
 daily range of temperature is astonishingly 
 great. In my own experience, the thermom- 
 eter rose sometimes to 90 in the shade, and 
 fell at night to 19 Fahr. But this daily 
 range of 71 is much exceeded. Exposed 
 during the day to the expansion caused by 
 such heat, and during the night to contrac- 
 tion from such rapid chilling, the surface of 
 the friable strata is in a constant state of 
 strain, under which it exfoliates and crumbles 
 into sand. The sultry air during the earlier 
 part of the day remains motionless. Again 
 and again we saw mirage across the plains. 
 The isolated buttes and projecting cliffs were 
 broken up into clumps like trees, beneath 
 which lay what seemed the sheen of a placid 
 lake, though really a parched sage-brush 
 plain, or a burning expanse of sand and al- 
 kali soil. But in the afternoon a wind always 
 rose and swept across the country, though 
 fortunately, during our exploration, never 
 getting beyond a breeze. But it was not 
 difficult to realize what these blasts must be 
 in the full blaze of summer, when the hot 
 air, like the breath of a simoom, rushes 
 along the desert, lifting up clouds of sand 
 and of the fine white efflorescent dust. The 
 powdery urface of the crumbling rocks is 
 blown away. Wastes of loose sand, here 
 piled into shifting dunes, there dispersed far 
 and wide over the desert, are continually 
 augmented by fresh supplies of material 
 from the same source. Every pebble that 
 projects above the ground acquires, under 
 the action of the ceaseless sand drift, a cu- 
 riously polished and channeled surface. And 
 the same erosive action no doubt affects the 
 moldering precipices of the Bad Lands. 
 The rocks are actually ground down by their 
 own detritus, driven against them by the 
 wind- 
 
 To the south of the Bad Lands lie the 
 
 Uintah Mountains, one of the most interest- 
 ing ranges in North America; for, instead & 
 following the usual north and south direction, 
 it runs nearly east and west, and, in place or" 
 a central crystalline wedge driven through 
 the younger formations, it consists of a vast 
 flat arch of nearly horizontal strata that 
 plunge steeply down into the plains on either 
 side. We made an excursion from Fort 
 Bridger into these mountains. From the 
 arid plains the change was pleasant to the 
 densely forest-clad flanks of the chain. We 
 had, as guide, from the Judge, an old trapper 
 who had long hunted in the mountains, and 
 who had a good wallet of stories for the 
 camp-fire at night. We shall not soon for- 
 get our first day's experience of an American 
 forest Starting early with the view o.f 
 getting above the timber-line, and having 
 a general birdseye view of the interior of 
 the mountains, we rode for several hours 
 through the forest, making for a far peak 
 that rose high above the dense forest^of 
 pine. Probably the first remark of a novice 
 from the Old World, when he enters the 
 forests of the New, is sugges'ed by the 
 slimness and height of the trees ; they look 
 like .huge poles, feathered at top, and stuck 
 irregularly into the ground sometimes so 
 near each other that one cannot force one's 
 way between two trunks. Rarely, even in the 
 opener glades, does one meet with a really 
 handsome, well-grown stem, throwing its 
 branches out freely all the way up. The next 
 subject of astonishment is the variety of 
 stages of growth among the timber. The 
 tiny sapling, not long enough for a walking- 
 stick, may be seen springing up beside ths 
 molderiug prostrate stem of a departed patri- 
 arch of ti:e forest. Between these extremes 
 every gradation may be seen at any place 
 where one chooses to look, giving an impres- 
 sion of calm, undisturbed nature and vener- 
 able antiquity. Another novelty, and perhaps 
 the most striking ot all. is the sight of so 
 much fallen timber. Many trees die and 
 decay, but yet remain erect, either because 
 their roots hold on, or because their stems are 
 kept in place by the support of their still living 
 neighbors. Others lose their stability, and 
 topple over upon those next them. Every 
 angle of inclination among these decaying 
 stems may be observed. You can ride beneath 
 some of them, though with the risk of having 
 your hat switched off by some unobserved 
 branch. Others you may walk your horse 
 over, and an animal accustomed to the work 
 acquires a wonderful dexterity in surmount- 
 ing these obstacles. But when the trunks 
 approach the ground, or when they lie piled 
 across each other, as they so continually do, 
 you must ride round them ; so that in those 
 parts of the forest where fallen timber is 
 plentiful your progress becomes provokingly 
 slow and laborious. To us, however, every- 
 thing was fresh. We rode oc, hour after 
 hour, in a kind of new world, gradually as-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 11 
 
 tending till we found ourselves on the crest 
 of a wide valley filled with pine forest up to 
 the brim, yet with stripes of green meadow 
 peeping out here and there along its center. 
 From the farther side of this great depression 
 rose the fine snow-streaked summits of the 
 chain. The descent was less easy than the 
 ascent had been, for the trees had fallen 
 thickly down the steep declivity, which was 
 further roughened by rocky ledges and fallen 
 crags that would have been easy enough to 
 surmount with free hands and feet, but which 
 acquired in our eyes a novel importance from 
 the difficulty of getting a horse over them. 
 Nevertheless, every obstacle was successfully 
 overcome. We climbed the opposite side of 
 the valley, as far as it was practicable to take 
 the horses, and then, leaving them in charge 
 of "Dan," scaled the crags and steep slopes 
 of dJbris. We were soon above the limit of 
 tree growth, and emerged at last on a broad 
 bare plateau between 11,000 and 12,000 feet 
 above the sea. 
 
 The structure of the Uintah Mountains 
 has been investigated by several surveying 
 parties under the War and Interior De- 
 partments. Having read the reports of the 
 Hayden, Powell, and King surveys, I was 
 now able to take in, with comparative ease, 
 the general aspect and meaning of the mag- 
 nificent panorama around us. The broad 
 central mass of the range is constructed ot a 
 flat arch of dull red sandstones. The isolated 
 peaks and ranges of buttressed cliffs along 
 this part of the mountains reveal everywhere 
 horizontality of their component strata. Like 
 the Bad Lands, but on a far more magnificent 
 scale, they have been cut into their present 
 forms by atmospheric sculpturing. Origin- 
 ally the rocks stretched in an unbroken sheet 
 across the mountains ; but in the course of 
 ages this continuous mantle has been enor- 
 mously eroded Deep and wide valleys, vast 
 amphitheaters, lofty terraced alcoves, and 
 profound gorges, fretted with an infinite array 
 ft peaks, buttresses, pinnacles, columns, 
 obelisks, and endless forms which defy the 
 observer to find properly descriptive names 
 for them, have gradually been carved out of 
 these rocks. Isolated cones, with singularly 
 majestic architectural forms, have been left 
 standing in the midst of the denudation as 
 monuments of its greatness. The world can 
 show few more impressive memorials of the 
 efficacy of sub-aerial erosion than in the 
 Uintah Mountains. There are no structure- 
 less crystalline rocks here to deceive us with 
 their ruggedness. Every peak and crest, 
 valley and canon, bears witness to superficial 
 structure. Wherever the eye turns it detects 
 the same long lines of horizontal stratification 
 that serve as a base from which the reality 
 and amount of the erosion may be measured. 
 To gain such a vivid impression of the im- 
 portance of sub-aerial waste in the evolution 
 of mountain- forms was worth all the long 
 journey in itself. Yet to the south of these 
 
 mountains, in the high plateaux of Utah and 
 the great basin of the Colorado, the proofs 
 of enormous superficial waste rise to such a 
 gigantic scale as wholly to baffle every ob- 
 server who has yet attempted to describe 
 them. 
 
 A little below the summit which we had 
 gained we found some bushes in fruit that 
 recalled the wild gooseberry of home ; near 
 these a few stunted Douglas pines struggled 
 for life. But of animal life at these heights 
 we neither saw nor heard any sign, though 
 bears, deer, and other large game haunt the 
 surrounding forests. Rejoining the horses 
 and then descending as rapidly as possible, 
 we passed on the way some little tarns filling 
 high recesses of the mountain, but so thickly 
 wooded round that we failed to find the ice- 
 worn sides that were no doubt there to mark 
 the presence of a former glacier ; for no 
 so ner had we reached the valley-bottom than 
 abundant traces of vanished glaciers made 
 their appearance in the form of perfect cres- 
 cent-shaped moraine mounds thrown across 
 the valley. On these were strewn huge 
 blocks of red sandstone, borne of old on the 
 surface of the ice from far crags on the sky- 
 line. Each mound of rubbish had served as 
 a more or less effective barrier in the path- 
 way of the stream, ponding back its waters 
 into a lake that had eventually been con- 
 verted into a meadow. But far more effec- 
 tive than the glacier-made dams had been 
 those of the beaver. The extent to which 
 the valley bottoms in this and the other 
 mountain ranges of Western North America 
 have been changed by the operations of this 
 animal is almost incredible. In a single val- 
 ley, for example, hundreds of acres are grad- 
 ually submerged, and their cotton-wood or 
 other tree-growth is killed. In this way the 
 floor of the valley is cleared of timber. The 
 beaver-ponds eventually silting up, become 
 first marshes and then by degrees fine 
 meadows. Riding along the stream we 
 passed on its banks several groups of short 
 stakes thrust into the ground and tied to- 
 gether so as to form a framework as if for low 
 huts or wigwams. They were quite deserted, 
 and had been so for some time. Dan told us 
 they were constructed 1 y the Indians for 
 bathing purposes. Each of them is large 
 enough to hold only one person at a time. 
 When in use they are covered with skins, a 
 fire is kindled inside and kept burning until a 
 a few stones placed in it are thoroughly 
 warmed. The Indian or his squaw then 
 creeps in, remains until perspiration has been 
 induced, and finally dashes out into the stream 
 below. It was curious to find this simple 
 form of sudatorium and frigidarium among 
 the Utes in the wilds of the Far West. 
 
 It was now afternoon. We rested near an 
 old beaver-dam, caught a few trout for sup- 
 per, and crossing the valley began the ascent 
 of its farther side. The point at which we 
 recrossed the stream was considerably lower
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 that that by which we had made our way in 
 the morning. But I had taken my bearings 
 when we were clear of the timber, and 
 had no doubt we should strike into our 
 previous route. The ascent was steeper, 
 rougher, and more impeded with fallen 
 timber than anything we had yet come 
 to. By the time we reached the summit the 
 golden sunlight was playing in level beams 
 among the tall pines of the crest, and we 
 knew it would be dark in little more than an 
 hour. Pushing on through the forest, our 
 guide kept more and more towards the right 
 hand, away from the line which I felt sure 
 was that of my bearings from the mountain. 
 We should have reached our camp, or at 
 least the valley leading to it, but there was 
 no sign of either. Nothing all round us but 
 a forest that was growing every minute darker 
 and more hopeless. At last Dan, who would 
 not admit that he had lost his way, consented, 
 but with some show of reluctance, to wheel 
 round to the left. Night was now descend- 
 ing fast. Here and there we emerged from 
 the gloom of the pines into an open space 
 where there had been a forest fire. Seen in 
 the dim light of departing day, tall trunks 
 blackened by the fire, others bleached whi*e 
 by the loss of their scorched barks, rose up 
 like a companyof specters, swinging their gaunt 
 arms against the sky as if to warn us not to 
 pass them into the darkness beyond. After 
 such opener intervals the forest, as we re- 
 entered it, became more somber than ever. 
 The trees seemed to close all around and over 
 us. The fallen timber increased in confu- 
 sion, the horses stumbled on, and we could 
 no longer see to guide them. Reaching at 
 last a little glade above which we could see 
 the stars, we resolved to pass the night 
 there. Dan took charge of the horses, 
 and we groped our way to where we hoped 
 to find water. Our search proved successful, 
 and as we were tired and thirsty we drank 
 heartily from some pools which we could not 
 see, and only discovered by getting into them. 
 On our return we found that Dan had kindled 
 a fire, which was blazing and crackling mer- 
 rily. This was nearly all the comfort that 
 could be had under the circumstances. For 
 we had no food with us except the trout 
 caught in the afternoon, and no covering for 
 the night save the saddle-cloths of the horses. 
 There was no help for it, however ; so the 
 trout were duly roasted and eaten, and each 
 donned his saddle-cloth as bed and bedding 
 combined. But before long it was evident 
 that, choosing his fireplace in the dark, our 
 guide had placed it in rather perilous prox- 
 imity to a quantity of dried brushwood and 
 fallen timber. And, indeed, before we could 
 do anything to prevent them, the flames 
 spread onward till a venerable pine caught 
 fire, and was soon a sheet of coruscating fire- 
 works. His neighbors followed his example, 
 and in a few minutes it was evident that the 
 forest was on fire. The flames rushed along 
 
 the branches, mounting higher and higher 
 far up into the lofty crests of the pines, 
 whence showers of sparks flew out and fell in 
 long lines through the profoundly calm air. 
 Tree after tree joined the conflagration, till 
 the reports of the exploding branches, the 
 hiss of the leaping flames, and the crash of 
 the falling-firebrands, with the ghastly glare 
 that now died down almost to darkness and 
 anon shot forth into renewed brightness, 
 made sle'ip unwelcome even had it been will- 
 ing to come. Fortunately the fire eventually 
 spent its fury on the trees that stood round 
 the open spot we had selected. It had died 
 down before morning. The presence of so 
 much heat around us did little to modify the 
 cold of the night air, and our thin saddle-cloths 
 were not of much more service. My friend 
 and I huddled as close together as possible, 
 and lay looking up at the quiet stars as they 
 slowly sailed across our little space of sky, 
 yet keeping an eye, too, on the progress of 
 the conflagration, lest by any chance the flames 
 should spread and surround us. The stones 
 underneath us seemed somehow to grow 
 harder and more prominent before morning. 
 I got up more than once and removed an 
 offending block, but its place was soon taken 
 by another. At last the first faint blush of 
 dawn appeared beyond the pine-tops. As 
 soon as daylight returned, the horses, which 
 had been laboring wearily all night to find a 
 meal among the brushwood, were harnessed, 
 and we resumed the march. It was a glori- 
 ous morning. Not a breath of air was yet 
 astir. Long wreaths of blue smoke from our 
 conflagration lay at rest among the pine-trees, 
 like streaks of cloud asleep on a mountain. 
 We followed the r.ame line that we had been 
 
 Eursuing when darkness came down the even- 
 ig before. We had gone scarcely half a 
 mile when we found ourselves at the edge of 
 an open valley, and there in front stood our 
 tent, gleaming white in the motning sunlight. 
 
 THE GEYSERS OF THE YELLOW- 
 STONE. 
 
 The traveler by railway across the Amer- 
 ican continent, after traversing several hun- 
 dred miles of barren plain and sandy desert, 
 finds at last that the line begins sensibly to 
 descend. The panting engine moves along 
 with increasing ease and diminished noise as 
 it enters a long valley that leads out of the 
 western plains, sweeping by the base of high 
 cliffs, past the mouths of narrow lateral val- 
 leys, crossing and recrossing the watercourses 
 by slim creaking bridges ; now in a deep 
 cutting, now in a short tunnel, it brings 
 picturesque glimpses into view in such quick 
 succession as almost to weary the eye that 
 tries to scan them as they pass. After the
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 13 
 
 dusty monotonous prairie, to see and hear 
 the rush of roaring rivers, to catch sight of 
 waterfalls leaping down the crags, scattered 
 pine trees crowning the heights, and green 
 meadows carpeting the valleys, to find, too, 
 that every mile brings you farther into a re- 
 gion of cultivated fields and cheerful home- 
 steads, is a pleasure not soon to be forgotten. 
 The Mormons have given a look of long- 
 settled comfort to these valleys. Fields, or- 
 chards, and hedgerows, with neat farm 
 buildings, and gardens full of flowers, remind 
 one of bits of the old country rather than of 
 the bare flowerless settlements in the West. 
 But the sight of a group of Chinamen here 
 and there at work on the line dispels the mo- 
 mentary illusion. 
 
 Winding rapidly down a succession of 
 gorges or canons (for every valley in the 
 West seems to be known as a canon), the 
 traveler finds at last that he has entered the 
 "Great Basin" of North America, and has 
 arrived near the margin of the Great Salt 
 Lake. Looking back, he perceives that the 
 route by which he has come is one of many 
 transverse valleys hollowed out of the flanks 
 of the noble range of the Wahsatch Moun- 
 tains. This range serves at once as the 
 western boundary of the plateau country and 
 as the eastern rim of the Great Basin, into 
 which it plunges as a colossal rampart from 
 an average height of some four thousand 
 feet above the plain, though some of its iso- 
 lated summits rise to more than twice that 
 altitude. From the base of this great moun- 
 tain-wall the cc untry stretches westward as a 
 vast desert plain, in a slight depression of 
 which lies the Great Salt Lake. By indus- 
 triously making use of the drainage from 
 their mountain barrier, the Mormons have 
 converted the strip of land between the base 
 of the heights and the edge of the water into 
 fertile fields and well-kept gardens. 
 
 Everybody knows that the Great Basin has 
 no outlet to the ocean ; yet nobody can see 
 .the scene with his own eyes and refuse to ad- 
 mit the sense of strange novelty with which 
 it fills his mind. One's first desire is naturally 
 to get to the lake. From a dista-.ce it looks 
 blue enough, and not different from other 
 sheets of water. But on a nearer view its 
 shore is seen to be a level plain of salt- 
 crusted mud. So gently does this plain slip 
 under the water that the actual margin of the 
 lake is not very sharply drawn. The water 
 has a heavy, motionless, lifeless aspect, and 
 is practically destitute of living creatures of 
 every kind. Fish are found in the rivers 
 leading into the lake, but into the lake itself 
 they never venture. Nor did we see any of 
 the abundant bird-life that would have been 
 visible on a fresh-water lake of such dimen- 
 sions. There was a stillness in the air and 
 on the water befitting the strange desert a ; - 
 pect of the scenery. 
 
 After looking at the water for a while, the 
 next step was of course to get into it. The 
 
 Mormons and Gentiles of Salt Lake City 
 make good use of their lake for bathing pur- 
 poses. At convenient points they have 
 thrown out wooden piers provided with dress- 
 ing-rooms and hot-water apparatus. Betak- 
 ing ourselves to one of these erections, my 
 companion and I were soon fitted out in 
 bathing costumes of approved pattern, and 
 descending into the lake at once, realized the 
 heaviness of the water. In walking, the leg 
 that is lifted off the bottom seems somehow 
 bent on rising to the surface, and some ex- 
 ertion is needed to force it down again to the 
 mud below. One suddenly feels top-heavy, 
 and seems to need special care not to turn 
 feet uppermost. The extreme shallowness 
 of the lake is also soon noticed. We found 
 ourselves at first barely over the knees ; so 
 we proceeded to march into the lake. After 
 a long journey, so long that it seemed we 
 ought to be almost out of sight of the shore, 
 we were scarcely up to the waist. At its 
 deepest part the lake is not more than about 
 fifty feet in depth. Yet it measures eighty 
 miles in length by about thirty-two miles in 
 extreme breadth. We made some experi- 
 ments in flotation, but always with the un- 
 comfortable feeling that our bodies were not 
 properly ballasted for such water, and that we 
 might roll over or turn round head downmost 
 at any moment. It is quite possible to float 
 in a sitting posture with the hands brought 
 round the knees. As one of the lisks of 
 these experiments, moreover, the water would 
 now and then get into our eyes, or find out 
 any half-healed wound which the b azing 
 sun of the previous weeks had inflicted upon 
 our faces. So rapid is the evaporation in 
 the dry air of this region that the skin after 
 being wetted is almost immediately crusted 
 with salt I noticed, too, that the wooden 
 steps leading to the pier were hung with slen- 
 der stalactites of salt from the drip of the 
 bathers. After being pickled in this fashion, 
 we had the luxury of washing the salt crust 
 off with th&douc/ie of hot water wherewith 
 every dressing-room is provided. 
 
 It was strange to reflect that the varied 
 beauty of the valleys in the neighboring moun- 
 tains, with their meadows, clumps of cotton- 
 wood trees, and rushing streams, should lead 
 into this lifeless, stagnant sea. One could 
 not contemplate the scene without a strong 
 interest in the history of the Great Salt Lake. 
 The details of this history have been admira- 
 bly worked out by Mr. G. K. Gilbert. Theo- 
 retically, we infer that the salt lakes of con- 
 tinental basins were at first fresh, and have 
 become salt by the secular evaporation of 
 their waters and consequent concentration of 
 the salt washed into them from their various 
 drainage basins. But, in the case of the 
 Great Salt Lake, the successive stages of this 
 long process have been actually traced in the 
 records left behind on the surface of the 
 ground. At present the amount of water 
 poured into the lake nearly balances the
 
 14 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 amount lost by evaporation, so that, on the 
 whole, the level of the lake is maintained. 
 There are, however, oscillations of level de- 
 pendent, no doubt, upon variations of rain- 
 fall. When the lake was surveyed by the 
 Fortieth Parallel Survey in 1872, it surface 
 was found to be eleven feet higher than it 
 was in 1866. During the last few years, on 
 the other hand, the lake has been diminish- 
 ing. The Mormons have had to build addi- 
 tions to the ends of their bathing piers, from 
 which the water had receded. There has 
 been considerable anxiety, too, at Salt Lake 
 City, on the subject of the diminished rain- 
 fall, which has seriously affected the supply 
 of water for irrigation and other purposes. 
 
 That the aspect of this part, at least, of the 
 Great Basin was formerly widely different is 
 conclusively proved by some singular features, 
 which are among the first to attract the no- 
 tice even of the non-scientific traveler as he 
 journeys round the borders of the lake. 
 Along the flanks of the surrounding moun- 
 tains there runs a group of parallel level lines, 
 so level, indeed, that when first seen they 
 suggest some extensive system of carefully- 
 engineered waterways. On a far larger scale, 
 they are the equivalents of our well-known 
 Parallel Roads cf Glen Roy. Mile after mile 
 they can be fo lowed, winding in and out 
 along the mountain declivities, here and there 
 expanding where a streamlet has pushed out 
 a cone of detritus, and again narrowing to 
 hardly perceptible selvages along steeper 
 rocky faces, but always keeping their horizon- 
 tality and their proper distance from each 
 other. That these terraces are former shore- 
 lines admits of no doubt. The highest of 
 them is 940 feet above the present surface of 
 the lake, which is 4,250 feet above the sea. 
 Hence, when the lake stood at the line of 
 that terrace, its surface was 5,190 feet above 
 sea-level. Now, it has been found that the 
 
 But when, owing to diminution of 
 the rainfall, the lake no longer possessed an 
 outlet, and in the course of ages grew grad- 
 ually salt, it became unfit for the support of 
 life. Ever since this degree of salinity was. 
 reached the rivers have been cut off from 
 any communication with each other. These 
 are precisely the conditions which the natur- 
 alist most desires in tracing the progress of 
 change in animal forms. During a period 
 which, in a geological sense, is comparatively 
 short, but which, measured by years, must 
 be of long duration, each river-basin has 
 been an isolated area, with its own peculiari- 
 ties of rock-structure, slope, vegetation, char- 
 acter of water, food and other conditions of 
 environment that tell so powerfully on the 
 evolution of organic types. A beginning has 
 been made in working out the natural history 
 of these basins ; but much patient labor will 
 be needed before the story can be adequately 
 told. There are probably few areas in the 
 world which offer to the student of evolution 
 so promising a field of research. 
 
 In the course of my brief sojourn in the- 
 region, I was able to make an observation of 
 some interest in regard to the history of the- 
 Former wide enlargement of the Great Salt 
 Lake. The Wahsatch Mountains, which- 
 rise so picturesquely above the narrow belt 
 of Mormon cultivation between their base 
 and the edge of the water, have their higher 
 parts more or less covered, or at least streaked, 
 with snow, even in midsummer, though at 
 :he time of my visit, by reason of the great 
 icat, and I suppose in part also of a dimin- 
 .s.ied snowfall, the snow had almost entirely- 
 disappeared. But any cause which could 
 ower the mean summer temperature a few- 
 degrees would keep a permanent snow-capon 
 the summits, and a little further decrease- 
 would send glaciers down the valleys. That 
 jlaciers formerly did descend from the cen- 
 
 highest terrace corresponds with a gap in j tral masses of the Wahsatch range is put be- 
 the rim of the basin lying considerably to the yond question by the scored and polished 
 north of the existing margin of the lake, j rocks and the h-ige piles of moraine detritus- 
 Consequently, when the lake stood at its ! which they have left behind them. These 
 highest level, it had an outlet northward j phenomena have been described by the geol- 
 into the Snake River, draining into the Pa- ogists of the Fortieth Parallel Survey, and I 
 cific Ocean, and must thus have been fresh, could fully confirm their observations. But: 
 Moreover, search in the deposits of the ! I further noticed at the Little Cottonwood> 
 
 highest terrace has brought to light 
 convincing proof of the freshness of 
 the water at that time, for numerous 
 
 Canon that the moraines descend to the edge- 
 of the highest terrace, and that t e glacial 
 rubbish forms part of the alluvial deposits 
 
 shells have been fcun 1 belonging to lacus- j there. Hence we may infer that at the time 
 
 trine species. At its greatest development 
 the lake must have been vastly larger than 
 now a huge inland sea of fresh water lying 
 on the western side of the continent, and 
 quite comparable with some of the great 
 lakes on the eastern side. It measured about 
 300 miles from north to south and 180 miles 
 in extreme width from east to west. Into 
 this great reservoir of fresh water fishes from 
 the tributary rivers no doubt freely entered, 
 so that, on the whole, a community of spe- 
 cies would be established throughout the 
 
 of the greatest extension of the lake the 
 Wahsateh Mountains were a range of snowy- 
 alps, from which glaciers descended to the- 
 edge of the water. Salt Lake City being- 
 nearly on the same parallel of latitude with 
 Naples, the change to the former topography- 
 would be somewhat as if a lofty glacier-bear- 
 ing range took the place of the Apennines '-v 
 the south of Europe, 
 
 One leading object of our journey was to> 
 see the wonders of the Yellowstone that re- 
 gion of geysers, mud volcanoes, hot springs
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 and sinter-beds, which the United States 
 Congress, with wise forethought, has set 
 apart from settlement and reserved for the 
 instruction of the people. In a few years 
 this part of the continent will no doubt be 
 readily accessible by rail and coach. At the 
 time of our visit it was still difficult of ap- 
 proach. We heard on the way the most omi- 
 nous tales of Indian atrocities committed only 
 a year or two before, and were warned to be 
 prepared for something of the kind in our 
 turn. So it was with a little misgiving as to 
 the prudence of the undertaking that we 
 struck off from the line of the Union Pacific 
 Railway at Ogden and turned our faces to 
 the north. Ogden is the center at which the 
 railway from Salt Lake City and that from 
 Northern Utah and Idaho join the main 
 trans-continental line. The first part of the 
 journey passed pleasantly enough. The track 
 is a very narrow one and the carriages are 
 proportionately small. We started in the' 
 evening, and sitting at the end of the last car 
 enjoyed the glories of a sunset over the Great 
 Salt Lake. Next day about noon brought us 
 to the end of the railway in the midst of a 
 desert of black basalt and loose sand, with a 
 tornado blowing the hot desert dust in blind- 
 ing clouds through the air. It was the odd- 
 est "terminus" conceivable, consisting of 
 about a score of wooden booths stuck down 
 at random, with rows of freight wagons 
 mixed up among them, and the miscellaneous 
 population of a thoroughly Western town. In 
 a fortnight afterward the railway was to be 
 opened some fifty miles farther north, and the 
 whole town and its inhabitants would then 
 move to the new terminus. Some weeks af- 
 terward, indeed, we returned by rail over 
 the same track, and the only traces of our 
 mushroom town were the tin biscuit-boxes, 
 preserved-meat cans and other debns scat- 
 tered about on the dese.-t and too heavy for 
 the wind to disperse. 
 
 With this cessation of the railway all com- 
 fort in traveling utterly disappeared. A 
 "stage," loaded inside and outside with pack- 
 ages, but supposed to be capable of carrying 
 eight passengers besides, was now to be our 
 mode of conveyance over the bare, burning, 
 treeless and roadless desert. The recollec- 
 tion of Those two days and nights stands out 
 as a kind of nightmare. I gladly omit fur- 
 ther reference to them. There should have 
 been a third day and night, but by what 
 proved a fortunate accident we escaped this 
 prolongation of the horror. Reaching Vir- 
 ginia City, a collection of miserable wooden 
 houses, many of th:m deserted for the gold 
 of the valley is exhausted, though many Chi- 
 nese are there working over the old refuse 
 heaps we learnt that we were too late for 
 the stage to 'Boseman. Meeting, however, a 
 resident from Boseman as anxious to be there 
 as ourselves, we secured a carriage and were 
 soon again in motion. By one of the rapid me- 
 teorological changes not infrequent at such 
 
 altitudes, the weather, which had before been 
 warm, and sometimes even hot, now became 
 for a day or two disagreeably chilly. As we 
 crossed a ridge into the valley of the Madison 
 River snow fell, and the mountain crests 
 had had their first whitening for the 
 season when we caught sight of them, peak 
 beyond peak, far up into the southern hori- 
 zon. This valley contained the first illustra- 
 tions we had yet seen of those vast alluvial 
 accumulations which form so marked a 
 feature of many of the larger rivers of West- 
 ern America where they debouch from the 
 mountains. Across the whole broad plain, 
 evidently of alluvial origin, the Madison had 
 worked its way from side to side. From the 
 mouths of the principal tributary valleys 
 higher terraces of alluvium opened out upon 
 the main valley, each affluent projecting a 
 tongue of detritus from the base of the hills. 
 Night had fallen when we crossed the Madi- 
 son River below its last canon, and further 
 progress became impossible. There was a 
 "ranch," or cattle-farm, not far off, where 
 our companion had slept before, and where 
 he proposed that we should demand quarters 
 for the night. A good-natured welcome re- 
 conciled us to rough fare and hard beds. 
 
 On the afternoon of the third day we at 
 length reached Boseman, the last collectirn 
 of houses between us and the Yellowstone. 
 A few miles beyond it stands Fort Ellis, a 
 post of the United States army, built to com- 
 mand an important pass from the territory to 
 the east still haunted by Indians. Through 
 the kind thoughtfulness of my friend, Dr. 
 Hayden, I had been provided with letters of 
 introduction from the authorities at Wash- 
 ington to the commandants of posts in the 
 West. I found my arrival expected at Fort 
 Ellis, and the quartermaster happened him- 
 self to have come down to Boseman. Before 
 the end of the afternoon we were once more 
 in comfort under his friendly roof. And 
 here I am reminded of an incident at Bose- 
 man which brought out one of the character- 
 istics of travel in America, and particularly 
 in the West. It may be supposed that after 
 so long and so dusty a journey our boots 
 were not without the need of being blacked. 
 Having had luncheon at the hotel, I inquired ' 
 of the waiter where I should go to get this 
 done. He directed me to the clerk in the 
 office. This formidable personage, seated at 
 his ledger, quietly remarked to me, without 
 raising his eyes off his pen, that he guessed 
 I could find the materials in the corner. And 
 there, true enough, were blacking pot and 
 brush, with which every guest might essay to 
 polish his boots or not, as he pleased. In 
 journeying westward we had sometimes seen 
 a placard stuck up in the bedrooms of the 
 hotel to the effect that ladies and gentlemen 
 putting their boots outside their doors must 
 be understood to do so at their own risk. In 
 the larger hotels a shoe-black is one of the 
 recognized functionaries, with his room and
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 chair of state for those who think it needful 
 to employ him. 
 
 Of Fort Ellis and the officers' mess there 
 we shall ever keep the pleasantest memories. 
 INo Indians had now to be kept in order. 
 There was indeed nothing to do at the Fort 
 .save the daily routine of military duty. A 
 -very small incident in such circumstances is 
 enough to furnish amusement and conversa- 
 tion for an evening. We made an excursion 
 into the hills to the south, and had the satis- 
 faction of starting a black bear from a cover 
 of thick herbage almost below our feet. Not 
 one of the party happened to have brought a 
 rifle, and the animal was rapidly out of reach 
 of our revolvers, as he raced up the steep side 
 of the valley, and took refuge among the 
 crags and caves of limestone at the top. 
 
 Being assured that the Yellowstone country 
 was perfectly safe, that we should probably 
 see no Indians at all, and that any who might 
 cross our path belonged to friendly tribes, and 
 being further anxious to avoid having to re- 
 turn and repeat that dismal stage journey, we 
 arranged to travel through the ' ' Yellowstone 
 Park," as it is termed, and through the 
 mountains encircling the head-waters of the 
 Snake River, so as to strike the railway not 
 far from where we had left it. This involved 
 a ride of somewhere about 300 miles through 
 a mountainous region still in its aboriginal 
 loneliness. By the care of Lieutenant Alison, 
 the quartermaster of the Fort, and the liber- 
 ality of the army authorities, we were fur- 
 bished with horses and a pack-train of mules, 
 under an escort of two men, one of whom, 
 Jack Bean by name, had for many years 
 lived among the wilds through whieh we. were 
 io pass, as trapper and miner by turns ; the 
 other, a soldier in the cavalry detachment at 
 the Fort, went by the name of "Andy," and 
 acted as cook and leader of the mules. The 
 smaller the party, the quicker could we get 
 through the mountains, and as rapidity of 
 movement was necessary, we gladly availed 
 ourselves of the quartermaster's arrangements. 
 Provisions were taken in quantity sufficient 
 for the expedition, but it was expected we 
 should be able to add to our larder an occa- 
 sional haunch of antelope or elk, which in 
 good time we did. So, full of expectation, 
 we bade adieu, not without regret, to our 
 friends at Fort Ellis, and set out upon our 
 quest. 
 
 The reader may be reminded here that the 
 Yellowstone River has its head-waters close 
 to the watershed of the continent, among the 
 mountains which, branching out in different 
 directions, include the ranges of the Wind 
 River, Owl Creek, Shoshonee, the Tetons, 
 and other groups that have hardly yet re- 
 ceived names. Its course at first is nearly 
 north, passing out of the lake where its 
 upper tributaries collect their drainage, 
 through a series of remarkable canons till 
 about the latitude of Fort Ellis, after which 
 it bends round to the eastward, and eventu- 
 
 ally falls into the Missouri. We struck the 
 river just above its lowest canon in Montana. 
 It is there already a noble stream, winding 
 through a broad alluvial valley, flanked with 
 hills on either side, those on the right or 
 east bank towering up into one of the noblest 
 ranges of the Rocky Mountains. Here, as 
 well as on the Madison, we met with illus- 
 trations on a magnificent scale of the general 
 law of valley structure, that every gorge 
 formed by the convergence of the hills on 
 either side has an expansion of the valley into 
 a lake-like plain on its upper side. For sev- 
 eral hours we rode along this plain among 
 mounds of detritus, grouped in that crescent- 
 shaped arrangement so characteristic of gla- 
 cier-moraines. Large blocks of crystalline 
 rock, quite unlike the volcanic masses along 
 which we were traveling, lay tossed about 
 among the mounds. One mass in particular, 
 lying far off in the middle of the -valley, 
 looked at first like a solitary cottage. Cross- 
 ing to it, however, we found it to be only a 
 huge erratic of the usual granitoid gneiss. 
 There could be no doubt about the massive- 
 ness of the glaciers that once filled up the 
 alley of the Yellowstone. The moraine 
 mounds extend across the plain and mount 
 the bases of the hills on either side. The 
 glacier which shed them must consequently 
 have been here a mile or more in breadth. 
 All the way up the valley we were on the 
 outlook for evidence as to the thickness of the 
 ice, which might be revealed by the height at 
 which either transported blocks had been 
 stranded or a polished and striated surface 
 had been left upon the rocks of the valley. 
 We were fortunate in meeting with evidence 
 of both kinds. 
 
 I shall not soon forget my astonishment on 
 entering the second canon. We had made 
 our first camp someway farther down, and 
 before striking the tent in the morning had 
 mounted the kills on the left side and ob- 
 served how the detritus (glacial detritus, as 
 we believed it to be) had been rearranged 
 and spread out into terraces, either by the 
 river when at a much higher level than that 
 at which it now flows, or by a lake which 
 evidently once filled up the broad expansion 
 of the valley between the two lowest canons. 
 We were prepared, therefore, for the discov- 
 ery of still more striking proof of the power 
 and magnitude of the old glaciers, but never 
 anticipated that so gigantic and perfect a 
 piece of ice-work as the second canon was in 
 store for us. From a narrow gorge, the sides 
 of which rise to heights of i.ooofeetor more, 
 the river darts out into the plain which We 
 had been traversing. The rocky sides of 
 this ravine are smoothly polished and striated 
 from the bottom up apparently to the top. 
 Some of the detached knobs of schist rising 
 out of the plain at the mouth of the canon 
 were as fresh in their ice-polish as if the gla- 
 cier had only recently retired from them. The 
 scene reminded me more of the valley of the
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 17 
 
 Aar above the Grimsel than of any other 
 European glacier-ground. As we rode up 
 the gorge, with here and there just room to 
 pass between the rushing river and the rocky 
 declivity, we could trace the ice-worn bosses 
 of schist far up the heights till they lost them- 
 selves among the pines. The frosts of win- 
 ter are slowly effacing the surfaces sculptured 
 by the vanished glacier. Huge angular 
 blocks are from time to time detached from 
 the crags and join the piles of detritus at the 
 bottom. But where the ice-polished surfaces 
 are not much traversed with joints they have 
 a marvelous power of endurance. Hence 
 they may have utterly disappeared from one 
 part of a rock-face and remain perfectly pre- 
 served on another adjoining part. There 
 could be no doubt now that the Yellowstone 
 glacier was massive enough to fill up the 
 second canon to the brim, that is to say, it 
 must have been there at least 800 or 1,000 
 feet thick. But in the course of our ascent 
 we obtained proof that the thickness was 
 even greater than this, for we found that the 
 ice had perched blocks of granite and gneiss 
 on the sides of the volcanic hills not less than 
 1, 600 feet above the present plain of the 
 river, and that it not merely filled up the 
 main valley, but actually over-rode the bound- 
 ing hills so as to pass into some of the ad- 
 jacent valleys. That glaciers once nestled in 
 these mountains might have been readily an- 
 ticipated, but it was important to be able to 
 demonstrate their former existence, and to 
 show that they attained such a magnitude. 
 
 The glaciers, however, werj after all an 
 unexpected or incidental kind of game We 
 were really on the trail of volcanic produc- 
 tions, and devoted most of our time to the 
 hunt after them. The valley of the Yellow . 
 stone is of high antiquity. It has been ex- 
 cavated partly out of and nt crystalline 
 rocks, partly out of latter stratified forma- 
 tions, and partly out of masses of lava that 
 have been erupted during a long succession 
 of ages. Here and there it has been invaded 
 by streams of basalt,which have subsequently 
 been laboriously cut through by the river. In 
 the whole course of our journey through the 
 volcanic region we found that the oldest lav^s 
 were trachytes and their allies, while the 
 youngest were as invariably basalts, the in'er- 
 val' between the eruption of the two kinds 
 having sometimes been long enough to perm it 
 the older rocks to be excavated into gorges 
 before the emission of the more recent. 
 Even the youngest, however, must have been 
 poured out a long while ago, for they too 
 have been deeply trenched by the slow 
 erosive power of running water. But the 
 volcanic fires are not yet wholly extinguished 
 in the region. No lava, indeed, is now emit- 
 ted, but there are plentiful proofs of the 
 great heat that still exists but a short way 
 below the surface. 
 
 Quitting the moraine grounds of the Yel- 
 lowstone Valley, which above the second 
 
 canon become still more abundant and per- 
 fect, we ascended the tributary known as 
 Gardiner's River, and camped in view of the 
 hot springs. The first glimpse of this singu- 
 lar scene, c aught from a crest of the dividing 
 ridge, recalls the termination of a glacier. A 
 mass of snowy whiteness protrudes from a 
 lateral pine-clad valley, and presents a steep 
 front to the narrow plain at its base. The 
 contrast between it and the somber hue of the 
 pines all round heightens the resemblance of 
 its form and aspect to a mass of ice. It is all 
 solid rock, however, deposited by the hot 
 water which, issuing from innumerable open- 
 ings down the valley, has in course of time 
 filled it up with this white sinter. Columns 
 of steam rising from the mass bore wit 'ess, 
 even at a distance, to the nature of the lo- 
 cality. We wandered over this singular ac- 
 cumulation, each of us searching for a pool 
 cool enough to be used as a bath. I found 
 one where the water, after quitting its conduit, 
 made a circuit round a basin of sinter, and in 
 so doing cooled down sufficiently to let one 
 sit in it. The top of the mound, and indeed 
 those parts of the deposit generally from 
 which the water has retreated, and which ara 
 therefore dry and exposed to the weather, are 
 apt to crack into thin shells or to crumble 
 into white powder. But along the steep front, 
 from which most of the springs escape, the 
 water collects into basins at many different 
 levels. Each of these basins has the most 
 exquisitely fretted rim. It is at their mar- 
 gins that evaporation proceeds most vigor- 
 ously and deposition takes place most 
 rapidly, hence the rim is being constantly 
 added to. The colors of these wavy, frill-like 
 borders are sometimes remarkably vivid. The 
 sinter, where moist or fresh, has a delicate 
 pink or salmon-colored hue tnat deepen? 
 along the edge of each basin into rich yel- 
 lows, browns, and reds. Where the water 
 has trickled over the steep front from basin 
 to basin, the sinter has assumed smooth 
 curved forms like the sweep of unbroken 
 waterfalls. At many points, indeed, as one 
 scrambles along that front, the idea of a series 
 of frozen waterf 11s rises in the mind. There 
 are no eruptive springs or geysers at this lo- 
 cality now, though a large pillar of sinter on 
 the plain below probably matks the site of 
 one. Jack assured us that even since the 
 time he had first been up here, some ten 
 years before, the water had perceptibly 
 diminished. 
 
 The contrast oetween the heat below and 
 the cold above ground at nights was some- 
 times very great. We used to rise about 
 daybreak, and repairing to the nearest brook 
 or river for ablution, sometimes found a crust 
 of ice on its quiet pools. One night, indeed, 
 the thermometer fell to 19, and my sponge, 
 lying in its bag inside our tent, was solidly 
 frozen, so that I could have broken it with 
 my hammer. The camping-ground, selected 
 where wood, water, and forage for the ani-
 
 18 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 mals could b? had together, was usually 
 reached by about three o'clock in the after- 
 noon, so that we had still several hours of 
 daylight for sketching, or any exploration 
 which the locality seemed to invite. About 
 sunset, Andy's fire had cooked our dinner, 
 which we set out on the wooden box that held 
 our cooking implements. Then came the 
 camp-fire stories, of which our companions 
 had a sufficient supply. Andy, in particular, 
 would never be outdone. Nothing marvel- 
 ous was told that he could not instantly cap 
 with something more wonderful still that had 
 happened in his own experience. What dis- 
 tances he had ridden ! What hairbreadth 
 escapes from Indians he had gone through ! 
 What marvels of nature he had seen ! And 
 all the while, as the tales went round and the 
 fire burnt low or was wakened into fiercer 
 blaze by piles of pine logij hewn down by 
 Jack's diligent axe, the stars were coming out 
 in the sky overhead. Such a canopy to sleep 
 under ! Wrapping myself round in my trav- 
 eling cloak, I used to lie apart for a while 
 gazing up at that sky so clear, so sparkling, so 
 utterly and almost incredibly different from 
 the bleared cloudy expanse we must usually 
 be content with at home. Every familiar 
 constellation had a brilliancy we never see 
 through our moisture-laden atmosphere. It 
 seemed to swim overhead, while behind and 
 beyond it the heavens were aglow with stars 
 that are hardly ever visible here at all. These 
 quiet half-hours with the quiet stars, amid 
 the silence of the primeval forest, are among 
 the most delightful recollections of the journey. 
 Our mules were a constant source of amuse- 
 ment to us and of execration to Jack and 
 Andy. Andy led the party with his loaded 
 rifle slung in front of his saddle ready for any 
 service. After him came the string of mules 
 with their packs, followed by Jack, who with 
 volleys of abuse and frequent applications of 
 a leathern saddle-strap, endeavored to keep up 
 their pace and preserve them in line. My 
 friend and I varied our position, sometimes 
 riding on ahead and having the pleasure of 
 first starting any game that might be in our 
 way, more frequently lingering behind to 
 enjoy quietly some of the delicious glades in 
 the forest. But we could never get far out 
 of hearing of the whack of Jack's belt or the 
 fierce whoop with which he would ever and 
 anon charge the rearmost mules and send 
 them scampering on till every spoon, knife, 
 and tin-can in the boxes rattled and jingled. 
 The proper packing of a mule is an art that 
 requires considerable skill and practice, and 
 Jack was a thorough master of the craft. 
 After breakfast he used to collect the ani- 
 mals, while Andy made up the packs, and 
 the two together proceeded to the packing. 
 Such tugging and pulling and kicking on 
 the part of men and mules ! The quad- 
 rupeds, however, whatever their feelings 
 might be, gave no audible vent to 
 them. But the men found relief in 
 
 such fusillades of swearing as I had 
 never before heard or even imagined. I 
 ventured one morning to ask wnether the 
 oaths were a help to them in the packing. 
 Jack assured me that if I had them mules to 
 pack he'd give me two days, and at the end 
 of that he'd bet I'd swear myself worse than 
 any of them. Another morning Andy was 
 hanging his coat on a branch projecting near 
 the camp-fire. The coat, however, fell off 
 the branch and was, as a matter of course, 
 greeted by its owner with an execration. It 
 was put up again, and again slipped down. 
 This was repeated two or three times, and 
 each time the language was getting fiercer 
 and louder. At last, when the operation was 
 successfully completed, I asked him of what 
 use all the swearing at the coat had been. 
 " Wall, boss," rejoined he, triumphantly, 
 ' 'don't ye see the darned thing's stuck up 
 now ?" This I felt was, under the circum- 
 stances, an unanswerable argument. West- 
 ern teamsters are renowned for their powers 
 of continuous execration. I myself heard one 
 swear uninterruptedly for about ten minutes 
 at a man who was not present, but who, it 
 seemed, was doomed to the most horrible de- 
 struction, body and soul, as soon as this 
 bloodthirsty ruffian caught sight of him again, 
 either in this world or the next. 
 
 From Gardiner's River we made a d/itour 
 over a long ridge dotted with ice-borne blocks 
 of granite and gneiss, and crossed the 
 shoulder of Mount Washburne by a col 8,867 
 feet above the sea, descending once more to 
 the Yellowstone River at the head of the 
 Grand Canon. The whole of this region 
 consists of volcanic rocks, chiefly trachytes, 
 rhyolites, obsidians and tuffs. We chose as 
 our camping-ground a knoll under a clump of 
 tall pines, with a streamlet of fresh water 
 flowing below it in haste to join the main 
 river, which, though out of sight, was audible 
 in the hoarse thunder of its falls. Impatient 
 to see this ravine, of whose marvels we had 
 heard much, we left the mules rolling on the 
 ground and our packers getting the camp 
 into shape, and struck through the forest in 
 the direction of the roar. Unprepared for 
 anything so vast, we emerged from the last 
 fringe of the woods and stood on the brink 
 of the great chasm silent with amazement. 
 
 The Grand Canon of the Yellowstone is a 
 ravine from 1,000 to 1,500 feet deep. Where 
 its shelving sides meet at the bottom there is 
 little more than room for the river to flow be- 
 tween them, but it widens irregularly up- 
 ward. It has been excavated out of a series 
 of volcanic rocks by the flow of the river it- 
 self. The waterfalls, of which there are here 
 two, have crept backward, gradually eating 
 their way out of the lavas and leaving below 
 them the ravine of the Grand Canon. The 
 weather has acted on the sides of the gorge, 
 scarping some parts into percipitous crags 
 and scooping others back, so that each side 
 presents a series of projecting bastions and
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 19 
 
 semi-circular sloping recesses. The dai k for- 
 ests of pine that fill the valley above sweep 
 down to the very brink of the gorge on both 
 sides. Such is the g.neral plan of the place ; 
 but it is hardly possible to convey in words 
 a picture of the impressive grandeur of the 
 scene. 
 
 We spent a long day sketching and wan- 
 dering by the side of the canon. Scrambling 
 to the edge of one of the bastions and look- 
 ing down, we could see the river far below 
 dwarfed to a mere silver thread. From this 
 abyss the crags and slopes towered up in 
 endless variety of form, and with the weird- 
 est mingling of colors. Much of the rock, 
 especially of the more crumbling slopes, was 
 of a pale sulphur yellow. Through this ground- 
 work harder masses of dull scarlet, merging in- 
 to purple and crimson, rose into craggy knobs 
 and pinnacles, or shot up in sheer vertical 
 walls. In the sunlight of the morning the 
 place is a blaze of strange color, such as one 
 can hardly see anywhere save in the crater of 
 an active volcano. But as the day wanes 
 the shades of evening, sinking gently into the 
 depths, blend their livid tints into a strange 
 mysterious gloom, through which one can 
 still see the white gleam of the rushing 
 river and hear the distant murmur of its flow. 
 Now is the time to see the full majesty of the 
 canon. Perched on an outstanding crag, one 
 can look down the ravine and mark headland 
 behind headland mounting out of the gather- 
 ing shadows and catching up on their scarred 
 fronts of yellow and red the mellower 
 tints of the sinking sun. And above all lie 
 the dark folds of pine sweeping along the 
 crests of the precipices, which they crown 
 with a rim of somber green. There are 
 gorges of far more imposing magnitude in 
 the Colorado Basin, but for dimensions large 
 enough to be profoundly striking, yet not too 
 vast to be taken in by the eye at once, for in- 
 finite changes of picturesque detail, and for 
 brilliancy and endless variety of coloring, 
 there are probably few scenes in the world 
 more impressive than the Grand Canon of the 
 Yellowstone. Such at least were the feelings 
 with which we reluctantly left it to resume 
 our journey. 
 
 The next goal for which we made was the 
 Geyser Basin of the Firehole River a ride of 
 two days, chiefly through forest, but partly 
 over bare volcanic hills. Some portions of 
 this ride led into open park-like glades in the 
 forest, where it seemed as if no human foot 
 had ever preceded us ; not a trail of any kind 
 was to be seen. Here and there, however, 
 we noticed footprints of bears, and some of 
 the trees had their bark plentifully scratched 
 at a height of three or four feet from the 
 ground, where, as Jack said, ' ' the bears had 
 been sharpening their claws." Deer of dif- 
 ferent kinds were not uncommon, and we 
 shot enough to supply our diminishing larder. 
 Now and then we came upon a skunk or a 
 badger, and at night we could hear the 
 
 mingled bark and howl of the wolves. Andy's 
 rifle was always ready, and he blazed away at 
 everything. As he rode at the head of the 
 party the first intimation those behind had of 
 any game afoot was the crack of his rifle, fol- 
 lowed by the immediate stampede of the 
 mules and a round of execration from Jack. 
 I do not remember that he ever shot anything 
 save one wild duck, which immediately sank, 
 or at least could not be found. 
 
 Reaching at length the Upper Geyser 
 Basin, we camped by the river in the only 
 group of trees in the immediate neighbor- 
 hood that had not been invaded by the sheets 
 of white sinter which spread out all round on 
 both sides of the river. There were hot 
 springs, and spouting geysers, and steaming 
 caldrons of boiling water in every direction. 
 We had passed many openings by the way 
 whence steam issued. In fact, in some parts 
 of the route we seemed to be riding over a 
 mere crust between the air above and a huge 
 boiling vat below. At one place the hind 
 foot of one of the horses went through this 
 crust, and a day or two afterward, repassing 
 the spot, we saw it steaming. But we had 
 come upon no actual eruptive geyser. In this 
 basin, however, there is one geyser which, 
 ever since the discovery of the region some 
 ten years ago, has been remarkably regular in 
 its action. It has an eruption once every 
 hour and a few minutes more. The kindly 
 name of "Old Faithful" has accordingly 
 been bestowed upon it. We at once betook 
 ourselves to this vent. It stands upon a 
 low mound of sinter, which, seen from a little 
 distance, looks as if built up of successive 
 sheets piled one upon another. The stratified 
 appearance, however, is due to the same 
 tendency to form basins so marked at the Hot 
 Springs on Gardiner's River. These basins 
 are bordered with the same banded, brightly- 
 colored rims which, running in level lines, 
 give the stratified look to the mound. On 
 the top the sinter has gathered into huge 
 dome-shaped or coral-like lumps, in the midst 
 of which lies the vent of the geyser a hole 
 not more than a couple of feet or so in dia- 
 meter whence s earn constantly issues. 
 When we arrived a considerable agitation 
 was perceptible. The water was surging 
 up and down a short distance below, and 
 when we could not see it for the cloud of va- 
 por its gurgling noise remained distinctly 
 audible. We had not long to wait before 
 the water began to be jerked out in occa- 
 sional spurts. Then suddenly, with a tre- 
 mendous roar, a column of mingled water and 
 steam rushed up for 120 feet into the air, fall- 
 ing in a torrent over the mound, the surface 
 of which now streamed with water, while its 
 strange volcanic colors glowed vividly in the 
 sunlight. A copious stream of still steaming 
 water rushed off by the nearest channels to 
 the river. The whole eruption did not last 
 longer than about five minutes, after which 
 the water sank in the funnel, and the same
 
 20 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 restless gurgitation was resumed. Again, at 
 the usual interval, another outburst of the 
 same kind and intensity took place. 
 
 Though the most frequent and regular in 
 its movements, "Old Faithful" is by no 
 means the most imposing of the geysers either 
 in the volume of its discharge or in the height 
 to which it erupts. The "Giant" and "Bee- 
 hive" both surpass it, but are fitful in their 
 action, intervals of several days occurring 
 between successive explosions. Both of 
 them remained tantalizingly quiet, nor could 
 they be provoked by throwing stones down 
 their throats to do anything for our amusement. 
 The "Castle Geyser," however, was more ac- 
 commodating. It presented us with a mag- 
 nificent eruption. A far larger body of 
 water than at "Old Faithful" was hurled 
 into the air, and continued to rise for more 
 than double the time. It was interesting to 
 watch the rocket- like projectiles of water and 
 steam that shot through and out of the main 
 column, and burst into a shower of drops out- 
 side. At intervals, as the energy of dis- 
 charge oscillated, the column would sink a 
 little, and then would mount up again as 
 high as before, with a hiss and roar that must 
 have been audible all round the geyser basin, 
 while the ground near the geyser perceptibly 
 trembled. I had been sketching close to the 
 spot when the eruption began, and in three 
 minutes the place where I had been sitting 
 was the bed of a rapid torrent of hot water 
 rushing over the sinter floor to the river. 
 
 Without wearying the reader with details 
 that possess interest only for geologists, I 
 may be allowed to refer to one part of the 
 structure of these geyser mounds which is 
 not a little curious and puzzling the want of 
 sympathy between closely adjacent vents. At 
 the summit of a mound the top of the 
 subterranean column of boiling water can be 
 seen about a yard from the surface in a con- 
 stant state of commotion, w'lile at the base 
 of the mound, at a level thirty or forty feet 
 lower, lie quiet pools of steaming water, some 
 of them with a point of ebullition in their 
 center. There can be no direct connection 
 between these pipes. Their independence 
 is still more strikingly displayed at the time 
 of eruption, for while the geyser is spouting 
 high into the air these surrounding pools go 
 on quietly boiling as before. It is now gen- 
 erally acknowledged that the seat of eruptive 
 energy is in the underground pipe itself, each 
 geyser having its peculiarities of shape, depth, 
 and temperature. But it would appear also 
 that a: least above this seat of activity there 
 can be no communication even between con- 
 tiguous vents on the same geyser mound. 
 
 Another interesting feature of the locality 
 k the tendency of each geyser to build up a 
 cylinder of sinter round its vent. A few of 
 these are quite perfect, but in most cases they 
 are more or less broken down, as if they had 
 been blown out by occasional explosions of 
 exceptional severity. Usually there is only 
 
 one cylindrical excrescence on a sinter mound; 
 but in some cases several may be seen with 
 their bases almost touching each other. As 
 the force of the geyser diminishes and its 
 eruptions become less frequent the funnel 
 seems to get choked up with sinter, until in 
 the end the hollow cylinder becomes a more or 
 less solid pillar. Numerous eminences of this 
 kind are to be seen throughout the region. 
 Their surfaces are white and crumbling. They 
 look, in fact, so like pillars of salt that one 
 could not help thinking of Lot's wife, and 
 wondering whether such geyser columns 
 could ever have existed in the plains of 
 Sodom. In a rainless climate they might last 
 a long time. But the sinter here, as at Gar- 
 diner's River, when no longer growing by 
 fresh deposits from the escaping water, breaks 
 p into thin plates. Those parts of the basin 
 where this disintegration is in progress look 
 as if they had been strewn with pounded oys- 
 ter-shells. 
 
 That the position of the vents slowly 
 changes is indicated on the one hand by the 
 way in which trees are spreading from the 
 surrounding forest over the crumbling floor 
 of sinter, and on the other by the number of 
 dead or dying trunks which here and there 
 rise out of the sinter. The volcanic energy 
 is undoubtedly dying out Yet it remains 
 still vigorous enough to impress the mind 
 with a sense of the potency of subterranean 
 heat. From the upper end of the basin 
 the eye ranges round a wide area of bare sin- 
 ter plains and mounds, with dozens of col- 
 umns of steam rising on all sides; while even 
 from among the woods beyond an occasional 
 puff of white vapor reveals the presence of 
 active vents in the neighboring valley. A 
 prodigious mass of sinter has, in the course 
 of ages, been laid down, and the form of the 
 ground has been thereby materially changed. 
 We made some short excursions into the for- 
 est, and as far as we penetrated the same floor 
 of sinter was everywhere traceable. Here 
 and there a long-extinct geyser mound was 
 nearly concealed under a covering of vegeta- 
 tion, so that it resembled a gigantic ant-hill ; 
 or a few steaming holes about its sides or sum- 
 mit would bring before us some of the latest 
 stages in geyser history. 
 
 One of the most singular sights of this 
 interesting region is the volcanoes, or 
 mud geysers. We visited one of the 
 best of them, to which Jack gave the 
 name of "the Devil's Paint pot." It lies 
 near the margin of the Lower Geyser Basin. 
 We approached it from below, surmounting 
 by the way a series of sinter mounds dotted 
 with numerous vents filled with boiling 
 water. It may be described as a huge vat 
 of boiling and variously-colored mud, about 
 thirty yards in diameter. At one side the 
 ebullition was violent, and the grayish-white 
 mud danced up into spurts that were jerked 
 a foot or two into the air. At the other side, 
 however, the movement was much less vigor-
 
 GEOLOGICAL ^KETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 21 
 
 ous. The mud there rose slowly into blister- 
 like expansions, a foot or more in diameter, 
 which gradually swelled up till they burst, 
 and a liitle of the mud with some steam was 
 tossed up, after which the bubble sank down 
 and disappeared. But nearer the edge on 
 this pasty side of the caldron the mud ap- 
 peared to become more viscous, as well as 
 more brightly-colored green and red, so that 
 the blisters when formed remained, and were 
 even enlarged by expansion from within, and 
 the ejection of more liquid mud over their 
 sides. Each of these little cones was in fact 
 a miniature volcano with its circular crater 
 atop. Many of them were not more than a 
 foot high. Had it been possible to transport 
 one unbroken, we could easily have removed 
 it entire from its platform of hardened mud. 
 It would have been something to boast of, 
 that we had brought home a volcano. But, 
 besides our invincible abhorrence of the van- 
 dalism that would in any way disturb these 
 natural productions, in our light marching 
 order the specimen, even had we been barba- 
 rous enough to remove it, would soon have 
 been reduced to the condition to which the 
 jolting of the mules had brought our biscuits 
 that of fine powder. We remained for 
 hours watching the formation of these little 
 volcanoes, and thinking of Leopold von Buch 
 and the old exploded "crater of elevation" 
 theory. Each of these cones was neverthe- 
 less undoubtedly a true crater of elevation. 
 
 Willingly would we have lingered longer in 
 this weird district. But there still lay a long 
 journey before us ere we again could reach 
 the confines of civilization ; we had therefore 
 to resume the march. The Firehole River, 
 which flows through the Geyser Basins, and 
 whose banks are in many places vaporous 
 heaps of sinter, the very water of the river 
 steaming as it flows along, is the infant Mad- 
 ison River, which we had crossed early in the 
 journey, far down below its lowest canon, on 
 our way to Fort Ellis. Our route now lay 
 through its upper canon, a densely-timbered 
 gorge with picturesque volcanic peaks mount- 
 ing up here and there on either side far 
 above the pines. Below this defile the valley 
 opens out into a little basin, filled with forest 
 to the brim, and then, as usual, contracts 
 again toward the opening of the next canon. 
 We forded the river, and. mounting the 
 ridges on its left side, looked over many 
 square miles of undulating pine tops a vast 
 dark green sea of foliage stretching almost 
 up to the summits of the far mountains. At 
 last, ascending a short narrow valley full of 
 beaver dams, we reached a low flat watershed 
 seven thousand and sixty-three feet above 
 the sea, and stood on the "great divide" 
 of the continent. The streams by which we 
 had hitherto been wandering all ultimately 
 find their way into the Missouri and the Gulf 
 of Mexico; but the brooks we now en- 
 countered were some of the infant tributaries 
 of the Snake or Columbia River, which drains 
 
 into the Pacific. Making our way across to 
 Henry's Fork, one of the feeders of the Snake 
 River, we descended its course for a time. 
 It led us now through open moor-like spaces, 
 and then into seemingly impenetrable forest. 
 For some time the sky toward the west 
 had been growing more hazy as we ap- 
 proached, and we no.v found out the cause. 
 The forest was on fire in several places. At 
 one part of the journey we had just room to 
 pass between the blazing, crackling trunks 
 and the edge of the river. For easier pass- 
 age we forded the stream, and proceeded 
 down its left bank, but found that here and 
 there the fire had crossed even to that side. 
 Most of these forest fires result from the 
 grossest carelessness. Jack was particulary 
 cautious each morning to see that every 
 ember of our camp fire was extinguished, and 
 that by no chance could the dry grass around 
 be kindled, for it might smolder on and 
 slowly spread for days, until it eventually set 
 the nearest timber in a blaze. We used to 
 soak the ground with water before resuming 
 our march. These forest fires were of course 
 an indication that human beings, either red 
 or white, had been on the ground not long 
 before us. But we did not come on their 
 trail. One morning, however it was the 
 last day of this long march we had been 
 about a couple of hours in the saddle. The 
 usual halt had been made to tighten the 
 packs, and we were picking our way across 
 a dreary plain of sage-brush on the edge of 
 the great basalt flood of Idaho, when Jack, 
 whose eyes were like a hawk's for quickness, 
 detected a cloud of dust far to the south on 
 the horizon. We halted, and in a few min- 
 utes Jack informed us that it was a party 
 of horsemen, and that they must be Indians 
 from their way of riding. As they came 
 nearer we made out that there were four 
 mounted Indians with four led horses. Jack 
 dismounted and got his rifle ready. Andy, 
 without saying a wo-d, did the same. They 
 covered with their pieces the foremost rider, 
 who now spurred on rapidly in front of the 
 rest, gesticulating to us with a rod or whip 
 he carried in his hand. ' ' They are friendly, " 
 remarked Jack, and down went the rifles. 
 The first rider came up to us, and after a 
 palaver with Jack, in which we caught here 
 and there a word of broken English, we learnt 
 that they were bound for a council of Indians 
 up in Montana. 
 
 Four more picturesque savages could not 
 have been desired to complete our reminis- 
 cences of the Far West. Every bright color 
 was to be found somewhere in their costumes. 
 One wore a bright blue coat faced with 
 scarlet; another had chosen his cloth of the 
 tawniest orange. Their straw hats were 
 encircled with a band of down and surmounted 
 with feathers. Scarlet braid embroidered 
 with beads wound in and out all over their 
 dress. Their rifles (for every one of them 
 was fully armed) were cased in richly-broidered
 
 22 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 canvas covers, and were slung across the 
 front of their saddles, ready for any emergency. 
 One of them, the son of a chief, whose father 
 Jack had known, carried a twopenny looking- 
 glass hanging at his saddle-bow. We were 
 glad to have seen the noble savage in his 
 war-paint among his native wilds. Our sat- 
 isfaction, however, would have been less had 
 we known then what we only discovered when 
 we got down into Utah, that a neighboring 
 tribe of the Utes were in revolt, that they had 
 murdered the agent and his people, and killed 
 a United States officer and a number of his 
 soldiers, who had been sent to suppress the 
 rising, and that there were rumors of the dis- 
 affection spreading into other tribes. We 
 saluted our strangers with the Indian greeting, 
 " How ! " whereupon they gravely rode round 
 and formally shook hands with each of us. 
 Jack, h wever, had no faith in Indians, and 
 after they had left us, and were scampering 
 along the prairie in a bee-line due north, he 
 still kept his eye on them till they entered a 
 valley among the mountains, and were lost to 
 sight. In half an hour afterward another 
 much larger cloud of dust crossed the mouth 
 of a narrow valley down which we were moving. 
 Waiting a little unperceived, to give the party 
 time to widen their distance from us, we 
 were soon once more upon the great basalt 
 plain. 
 
 The last section of our ride proved to be in 
 a geological sense one of the most interesting 
 parts of the whole journey. We found that 
 the older trachytic lavas of the hills had been 
 deeply trenched by lateral valleys, and that 
 all these valleys had a floor of the black basalt 
 that had been poured out as the last of the 
 molten materials from the now extinct vol- 
 canoes. There were no visible cones or vents 
 from which these floods of basalt could have 
 proceeded. We rode for hours by the mar- 
 gin of a vast plain of basalt, stretching 
 southward and westward as far as the eye 
 could each. It seemed as if the plain had 
 been once a great lake or sea of molten rock 
 which surged along the base of the hills, en- 
 tering every valley, and leaving there a solid 
 floor of bare black stone. We camped on this 
 basalt plain near some springs of clear cold 
 water which rise close to its edge. Wander- 
 ing over the bare hummocks of rock, on many 
 of . hich not a vestige of vegetation had yet 
 taken root, I realized with vividness the truth 
 of an assertion made first by Richthofen, 
 but very generally neglected by geologists, 
 that our modern volcanoes, such as Vesuvius 
 or /Etna., present us with by no means the 
 grandest type of volcanic action, but rather 
 belong to a time of failing activity. There 
 have been periods of tremendous volcanic en- 
 ergy, when, instead of escaping from a local 
 vent, like a Vesuvian cone, the lava has 
 found its way to the surface by innumerable 
 fissures opened for it in the solid crust of the 
 globe over thousands of square miles. I 
 felt that the structure of this and the other 
 
 volcanic plains of the Far West furnish the 
 true key to the history of the basaltic pla- 
 teaux of Ireland and Scotland, which had 
 been an enigma to me for many years. 
 
 At last we reached the railway that had 
 been opened only a week or two before. Andy 
 rode on ahead to the terminus, to intimate 
 that we wished to be picked up. In a short 
 while the train came up, and as we sat there in 
 the bare, desolate valley, the engine slowed at 
 sight of us. Our two companions were now to 
 turn back and take a shorter route to Fort El- 
 lis, but would be ten days on the march. We 
 parted from them not without regret. Rough, 
 but kindly, they had done everything to make 
 the journey a memorably pleasant one to us. 
 We took our seats in the car, and from the 
 window, as we moved a^ay, caught the last 
 glimpse of our cavalcade, Andy in front with 
 a riderless horse, and Jack in the rear with 
 another. 
 
 IV. 
 
 THE LAVA-FIELDS OF NORTH- 
 WESTERN EUROPE. 
 
 From the earliest times of human tradition 
 the basin of the Mediterranean has been the 
 region from which our ideas of volcanoes and 
 volcanic action have been derived. When the 
 old classical mythology passed away and men 
 began to form a more intelligent conception 
 of a nether region of fire, it was from the 
 burning mountains of that basin that the facts 
 were derived which infant philosophy sought 
 to explain. Pindar sang of the crimson 
 floods of fire that rolled down from the sum- 
 mit of ;tna to the sea as the buried 
 Typhceus struggled under his mountain load. 
 Strabo, with matter-of-fact precision and 
 praiseworthy accuracy, described the erup- 
 tions of Sicily and the ^Lolian Islands, and 
 pointed out that Vesuvius, though it had 
 never been known as an active volcano, yet 
 bore unequivocal marks of having once been 
 corroded by fires that had eventually died out 
 from want of fuel. In later centuries, as the 
 circle of human knowledge* and experience 
 widened, it has still been by the Mediterra- 
 nean type that the volcanic phenomena of 
 other countries have been judged. When a 
 geologist thinks or writes of volcanoes and 
 volcanic action, it is the structure and pro- 
 ducts of such mountains as JEtna. and Vesu- 
 vius that are present to his mind. Nowhere 
 over the whole surface of the globe have 
 eruptions been witnessed different in kind 
 from those of the Mediterranean vents, 
 j though varying greatly in degree. And 
 I hence even among those who have specially 
 , devoted themselves to the study of volcanoes 
 there has been a tacit assumption that from 
 the earliest times and in all countries of the 
 I world where volcanic outbreaks have occurred, 
 it has been from local vents like those of
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 23 
 
 , the /Eolian Islands, the Thlegraean 
 Fields, or the Greek Archipelago. 
 
 If one were to assert that this assumption 
 is probably erroneous, that the type of vol 
 canic "cones and craters" has not been ii 
 every geological age and all over the earth's 
 surface the prevalent one ; that, on the con- 
 trary, it is the less portentous, though possibly 
 always the more frequent type of volcanic ac- 
 tion, and belongs perhaps to a feebler or waning 
 degree of volcanic excitement these state- 
 ments would berec.ived by most European ge- 
 ologists with incredulity, if not with some more 
 pronounced form of dissent. Yet I am con- 
 vinced that they are well founded, and that a 
 striking illustration of their truth is supplied 
 by the greatest of all the episodes in the vol- 
 canic history of Europe, that of the basalt- 
 plateaux of the northwest. 
 
 It is now some twelve years since Richt 
 hofen pointed out that on the Pacific slope of 
 North America there is evidence of the emis- 
 sion of vast floods of lava without the form- 
 ation of cones and craters. Geologists inter- 
 ested in these matters may remember with 
 what destructive energy Scrope reviewed 
 that writer's Natural System of Volcanic 
 Rocks; how he likened it to the old 
 crude notions that had been in vogue 
 in his own younger days, and which a 
 study of the classical district of Auvergne had 
 done so much to dispel : how he ridiculed 
 what he regarded as "fanciful ideas " and 
 "untenable distinctions," which it was "a 
 miserable thing" to find still taught in min- 
 ing schools abroad. My own reverence for 
 the teaching of so eminent a master and so 
 warm hearted a friend led me to acquiesce 
 without question in the dictum of the author 
 oi Considerations on Volcanoes. Having 
 rambled over Auvergne with his admirable 
 sections and descriptions in my hand, I knew 
 his contention as to the removal of cones and 
 craters by denudaticn . and the survival of 
 more or less fragmentary plateaux once con- 
 nected with true cones to be undoubtedly 
 correct with respect at least to that region. 
 Nevertheless there were features of former 
 volcanic action on which the phenomena of 
 modern volcanoes seemed to me to throw 
 very little light. In particular, the vast 
 number of fissures which in Britain had been 
 filled with basalt and now formed the well- 
 known and abundant "dykes," appeared 
 hardly to connect themselves with any known 
 phase of volcanism. The area over which 
 these dykes can be traced is probably not less 
 than 100,000 square miles, for they occur 
 from Yorkshire to Orkney, and from Donegal 
 to the mouth of the Tay. As they pierce 
 formations of every age, including the Chalk, 
 as they traverse even the largest faults and 
 cross from one group of rocks into another 
 without interruption or deflection, as they 
 become more numerous toward the great 
 basaltic plateaux of Antrim and the Inner 
 Hebrides, and as they penetrate the older 
 
 portions of these plateaux, I inferred that 
 the dykes probably belonged to the great 
 volcanic period which witnessed the outburst 
 of these western basalts. Further research 
 has fully confirmed this inference. There 
 can be no doubt that the outpouring of these 
 great floods of lava of which . he hills of An- 
 trim, Mull, Morven, Skye, Faroe, an l part 
 of Iceland are merely surviving fragments 
 and the extravasation of these thousands of 
 dykes are connected manifestations of vol- 
 canic energy during the Tertiary period. 
 
 But this association of thin nearly level 
 sheets of basalt piled over each other to a 
 depth of sometimes 3,000 feet, with lava- 
 filled fissures sometimes 200 miles distant 
 from tnem, presented difficulties which in 
 the light of modern volcanic action remained 
 insoluble. The wonderfully persistent course 
 and horizontality of the basalts with the ab- 
 sence or paucity of interstratified tuffs, and 
 the want of any satisfactory evidence of the 
 thickening and uprise of the basalts toward 
 what might be supposed to be the vents of 
 eruption, were problems which again and 
 again I attempted vainly to solve. Nor so 
 long as the incubus of " cones and craters " 
 lies upon one's mind does the question ad- 
 mil of an answer. A recent journey in 
 Western America has at last lifted the mist 
 from my geological vision. Having traveled 
 for many leagues over some of the lava-fields 
 of the Pacific slope, I have been enabled to 
 realize the conditions of volcanism described 
 by Richthofen, and, without acquiescing in 
 all his theoretical conclusions, to judge of the 
 reality of the distinction which he rightly 
 drew between "massive eruptions " and or- 
 dinary volcanoes with cones and craters. 
 Never shall I forget an afternoon in the 
 autumn of last year upon the great Snake 
 River lava desert of Idaho. It was the last 
 day of a journey of several hundred miles 
 through the volcanic region of the Yellow- 
 stone and Madison. We had been riding 
 for two days over fields of basaft, level 
 as lake-bottoms among the valleys, and on 
 :he morning of the last day, after an 
 interview with an armed party of Indians 
 ]it was only a few days before the disastrous 
 expedition of Major Thornburgh, and, un- . 
 cnown to us, the surrounding tribes were al- 
 ready in a ferment), we emerged from the 
 mountains upon the great sea of black lava 
 which seems to stretch inimitably westward. 
 With minds kee'nly excited by the incidents 
 of the journey, we rode for hours by the side 
 of that apparently boundless pla>n. Here and 
 here a trachytic spur projected from the hills, 
 iucceeded now and then by a valley up which 
 he black flood of lava would stretch away 
 nto the high grounds. It was as if the great 
 plaiii had been filled with molten rock 
 rhich had kept its level and wound in and 
 ut along the plains and promontories of the 
 mountain-slopes as a sheet of water would 
 lavt done. Copious springs and streams
 
 24 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 which issue from the mountains are soon 
 lost under the arid basalt. The Snake River 
 itself, however, has cut out a deep gorge 
 through the basalt down into the trachytic 
 lavas underneath, but winds through the des- 
 \ ert without watering it. The precipitous 
 walls of the canon show that the plain is cov- 
 ered by a succession of parallel sheets of ba- 
 salt to a depth of several hundred feet. Here 
 and there, I was told, streams that have 
 crossed from the hills and flowed underneath 
 the lava desert issue at the base of the canon 
 walls, and swell the Snake River on its way 
 to the Pacific. The resemblance of the hori- 
 zontal basalt sheets of this region to those 
 with which I was familiar at home brought 
 again vividly before my mind the old problem 
 of our Miocene dykes and Richthofen's re- 
 jected type of "massive" or fissure eruptions. 
 I looked round in vain for any central cone 
 from which this great sea of basalt could 
 have flowed. It assuredly had not come from 
 the adjacent mountains, which consisted of 
 older and very different lavas, round the worn 
 flanks of which the basalt had eddied. A few 
 solitary cinder cones rose at wide intervals 
 from the basalt plains, as piles of scorire 
 sometimes do from the vapor vents on the 
 surface of a Vesuvian lava-stream, and were 
 as unequivocally of secondary origin. Riding 
 hour after hour among these ariJ wastes, 
 I became convinced that all volcanic 
 phenomena are not to be explained by 
 the ordinary conception of volcanoes, but that 
 there is another and grander type of volcanic 
 action, where, instead of issuing from a local 
 vent, whether or not along a line of fissure, 
 and piling up a cone of lava and ashes around 
 it, the molten rock has risen in many fissures, 
 accompanied by the discharge of little or no 
 fragmentary material, and has welled forth 
 so as to flood the, lower ground with success- 
 ive horizontal sheets of basalt. Recent re- 
 newed examinatian of the basalt plateaux and 
 associated dykes in the west of Scotland has 
 assureffme that this view of their origin and 
 connection, which first suggested itself to my 
 mind on the lava-plains of Idaho, furnishes 
 the true key to their history. 
 
 The date of these lava-floods of the Snake 
 River is in a geological sense quite recent. 
 They have been poured over the bottoms of 
 the present valleys, sealing up beneath sheets 
 of solid stone, river-beds and lake-floors with 
 their layers of gravel and silt. The surface 
 of the lava is in many places black and bare, 
 as if it had cooled only a short time ago. Yet 
 there has been time for the excavation of the 
 Snake River canon to a depth of 700 feet 
 through the basalt floor of the plain. In so 
 arid a climate, however, the denudation of 
 this floor must be extremely slow. Much of 
 the plain is a verdureless waste of loose sand 
 and dust which has gathered into shifting 
 dunes. Save in the gorges laid open by the 
 main river and some of its tributaries, hardly 
 any sections have yet been cut into the volcan- 
 
 ic floor. Dykes and other protrusions of basalt 
 occur on the surrounding hills, but the chief 
 fissures or vents of emission are still no doubt 
 buried beneath the lava that escaped from 
 them. 
 
 In Northwestern Europe, however, the 
 basalt sheets were erupted as far back as I 
 Miocene or Oligocene times. Since then, 
 exposed to the many vicissitudes of geological 
 history subterranean movement and changes 
 of climate, with the whole epigene army of 
 destructive agencies, air, rain, frost, streams, 
 glaciers, and ice- sheets the volcanic pla- 
 teaux, trenched by valleys two or three 
 thousand feet deep and a mile or more in 
 breadth, and stripped bodily off many a 
 square mile of ground over which they once 
 spread, have been so scarped and cleft that 
 their very roots have been laid bare. Viewed 
 in the light of the much younger basalts of 
 the Western Territories of North America, 
 their history becomes at last intelligible and 
 more than ever interesting. We are no 
 longer under the supposed necessity of find- 
 ing volcanic cones vast enough to have 
 poured forth such widespread floods of basalt. 
 The sources of the molten rock are to be 
 sought in those innumerable dykes which run 
 across Britain from sea to sea, and which in 
 this view of their relations at once fall into 
 their place in the volcanic history of the time. 
 
 No more stupendous series of volcanic 
 phenomena has yet been discovered in any 
 part of the globe. We are first presented 
 with the fact that the crust of the earth over 
 an area which in the British Islands alone 
 amounted to probably not less than 100,000 
 square nrles, but which was only part of the 
 far more extensive region that included the 
 Faroe Islands and Iceland, was rent by innu- 
 merable fissures in a prevalent east and west 
 or southeast and northwest direction. These 
 fissures, whether due to sudden shocks or 
 slow disruption, were produced with such 
 'rresistible force as to preserve their linear 
 character and parallelism through rocks of 
 the most diverse nature, and even across old 
 dislocations having a throw of many thousand 
 feet. Yet so steadily and equably did the 
 fissuring proceed over this enormous area, 
 that comparatively seldom was there any 
 ertical displacement of the sides. We rarely 
 meet with a fissure which has been made a 
 rue fault with an upthrow and downthrow 
 side. 
 
 The next feature is the rise of molten basalt 
 up these thousand of fissures. The most 
 voluminous streams of lava that have issued 
 rom any modern volcanic cone appear but ns 
 a minor manifestation of volcanic activity 
 when compared with the filling of those 
 countless rents over so wide a region. Min- 
 ng operations in the Scottish coal-fields have 
 shown that the dykes do not always reach the 
 surface. In all parts of the country, too, 
 examples may be observed of breaks in the 
 continuity of dykes. The same dyke van-
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 Ishes for an interval and reappears on the 
 same line, but is doubtless continuous under- 
 neath. What proportion of the dykes ever 
 communicated with the surface at the time 
 of their extravasation is a question that may 
 perhaps never be answered. It is difficult to 
 believe that a considerable number of them 
 did not overflow above ground even far to the 
 east of the main and existing outflows. But 
 so extensive has been the subsequent denuda- 
 tion that all trace of such superficial emis- 
 sion has been removed. The general 
 surface of the country has been lowered by 
 sub-aerial waste several hundred feet at least, 
 and the dykes now protrude as hard ribs of 
 rock across the hills. 
 
 Traced westward the dykes increase 
 in abundance, till at last they reach 
 the great basaltic plateaux. MacCulloch 
 long ago sketched them in Skye, rising 
 through the Jurassic rocks and merging into 
 the overlying sheets of basalt. Similar sec- 
 tions occur in the other islands and in the 
 north of Ireland. The lofty mural escarp- 
 ments presented by the basalt plateaux once 
 extended far beyond the limits to which they 
 have now been reduced. The platform from 
 which they have been removed shows in its 
 abundant dykes the fissures up which the 
 successive discharges of lava rose to the sur- 
 face, where they overflowed in wide level 
 sheets like those still so fresh and little eroded 
 in Western North America. 
 
 That there were intervals between success- 
 ive outpourings of basalt is indicated by the 
 occasional interstratification of seams of coal 
 and shale between the different flows. These 
 partings contain a fragmentary record of the 
 vegetation which grew on the neighboring 
 hills, and which may even have sometimes 
 found a foothold on the crumbling surface of 
 the basalt floor until overwhelmed by fresh 
 floods of lava. Not a trace of marine organ- 
 isms has anywhere been found among these 
 interstratifications. There is every reason to 
 believe that the volcanic eruptions were all 
 sub-aerial. Sheet after sheet was poured 
 forth over the wide valley between the mount- 
 ains of Donegal and the Outer Hebrides on 
 the cne side, and those of the northeast of 
 Ireland and the west of Scotland on the 
 other, until the original surface had been 
 buried in some places 3,000 feet beneath vol- 
 canic ejections. 
 
 I believe that the most stupendous out- 
 pourings of lava in geological history have 
 been effected not by the familiar type of 
 conical volcano, but by these less known 
 fissure-eruptions. Both types are of course 
 only manifestations in different degrees of the 
 same volcanic energy. It may be said, indeed, 
 that both are fissure-eruptions, for the more 
 important examples of cones and craters are 
 no doubt placed linearly on lines of fissure. 
 It is by no means certain that the "massive" 
 or fissure type belongs wholly to former geo- 
 logical periods. In particular, one is disposed 
 
 to inqiure whether the great Icdandic lava- 
 floods of 1783 the most voluminous on rec- 
 ord as well as some of the recent eruptions 
 in that island, may not have been connected 
 rather with the opening of wide-reaching fis- 
 sures than with the emissions of a single vol- 
 canic cone. The reality and importance of 
 the grander phase of volcanism marked by 
 fissure eruptions have been recognized by 
 some of the able geologists who in recent 
 years have explored the Western States and 
 Territories of the American Union. But 
 they have not yet received due acknowledg- 
 ment on this side of the Atlantic, where the 
 lesser type of cones and craters has been 
 regarded as that by which all volcanic mani- 
 festations must be judged. We are fortu- 
 nate in possessing in the northwest of Europe 
 so magnificent an example of fissure-eruptions 
 and one which has been so dissected by de- 
 nudation that its whole structure can be in- 
 terpreted. The grand examples on the 
 Pacific slope of America have yet to be worked 
 out in detail, and will no doubt cast much 
 fresh light on the subject, more especially 
 upon those phenomena of which in Europe 
 the traces have been removed by denudation. 
 But the other continents also are not without 
 their illustrations. The basaltic plateaux of 
 Abyssinia and the " Deccan traps " of India 
 probably mark the sites of some of the great 
 fissure-eruptions which have produced the 
 lava-fields of the Old World. In their recent 
 admirable rhuml of the Geology of India, 
 Messrs. MedlScott and Blanford describe the 
 persistent horizon tality of the vast basalt 
 sheets of the Deccan, the absence of any 
 associated volcanic cones or the least trace of 
 them in that region, and the abundance of 
 dykes in the underlying platform of older 
 rocks, where it emerges from beneath the 
 volcanic plateau. They confess the difficulty 
 of explaining the origin of such enormous 
 outpourings of basalt by reference to any 
 modern volcanic phenomena. Their descrip- 
 tions of these Indian Cretaceous lava-floods 
 might, however, be almost literally applied to 
 the Miocene plateaux of Northwestern Europe 
 and to the Pliocene or recent examples of 
 Western North America. 
 
 V. 
 
 THE SCOTTISH SCHOOL OF GE- 
 OLOGY.* 
 
 For the first time in the history of Uni- 
 versity education in Scotland, we are to-day 
 met to begin the duties of a Chair specially 
 devoted to the cultivation of Geology and 
 Mineralogy. Though Science is of no country 
 
 The Inaugural Lecture at the opening of the 
 Class of Geology and Mineralogy in the University of 
 Edinburgh, 6th November, 1881.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 shut our eyes to the fact that these achieve- 
 ments are of the past, that the measure of 
 the early promise at the beginning of this 
 century has been but scantily fulfilled in 
 Scotland, and that the state of the science 
 among us here, instead of being in advance, 
 is rather behind the time. And thus I dwell 
 now on the example of our predecessors 
 colorings which finally gives the 
 neutral tint of science This is in a marked \ what that example really was, we may be 
 degree true of Geology. Each country, , stimulated to follow it. The same hills and 
 where any part of the science has been more j valleys, crags and ravines, remain around us 
 particularly studied, has furnished its local j which jave these great men their inspiration, 
 names to the general nomenclature, and its ' 
 rocks have sometimes served as ypes from 
 which the rocks of other regions have been 
 
 nor kin, it yet bears some branches which 
 take their hue largely from the region whence 
 they sprang, or where they have been most 
 sedulously nurtured. Such local colorings 
 need not be deprecated, since they are both 
 inevitable and useful. They serve to bring 
 out the peculiarities of each climate, or land, 
 or people, and it is the blending of all these 
 
 and still preach to us the lessons whicb they 
 were the first to understand. 
 
 The period during which the distinctively 
 Scottish School of Geology rose and flourished 
 may be taken as included between the years 
 1780 and 1825 a brief half-century. Pre- 
 vious to that time Geology, in the true sense 
 of the word, can hardly be said to have ex- 
 isted. Steno, indeed, more than a hundred 
 years before, had clearly shown, from the oc- 
 currence of the remains of plants and animals 
 embedded in the solid rocks, that the present 
 was not the original order of things, that 
 there had been upheavals of the sea into dry 
 land and depressions of the land beneath the 
 sea, by the working of forces lodged within 
 the earth, and that the memorials of these 
 changes were preserved for us in the rocks. 
 Seventy years later another writer of the 
 Italian school, Lazzaro Moro, adopting and 
 extending the conclusions of Steno, pointed 
 to the evidence that the surface of the earth 
 is everywhere worn away, and is repaired by 
 the upheaving powers of earthquakes, but 
 for which the mountains and all the dry land 
 would at last be brought beneath the level of 
 the waves. 
 
 But none of these desultory researches, 
 interesting and important though they were 
 as landmarks in the progress of science, bore 
 immediate fruit in any broad and philosophic 
 outline of the natural history of the globe. 
 Men were still trammeled by the belief that 
 the date of the creation of the world and its 
 inhabitants could not be placed farther back 
 than some five or six thousand years, that 
 this limit was fixed for us in Holy Writ, and 
 that every new fact must receive an interpre- 
 tation in accordance with such limitation. 
 They were thus often driven to distort the 
 facts or to explain them away. If they ven- 
 tured to pronounce for a natural and obvious 
 interpretation, they laid themselves open to 
 the charge of impiety and atheism, and might 
 bring down the unrelenting vengeance of the 
 Church. 
 
 Such was the state of inquiry when the 
 
 the onward march of thi science. I do this j Scottish Geological School came into being, 
 in no vainglorious spirit, nor with any wish I The founder of that school was James Hut- 
 to exalt into prominence a mere question of ton, a man of a singularly original and active 
 nationality. Science knows no geographical mind, who was born at Edinburgh in 1726. 
 or pclitical limits. Nor, though we mav be and .lied there in 1797. Educated for th 
 proud of wliat has been achieved for Geology medical profession, but possessed of a sma/ 
 in this Jittle kin dom, cm we for a moment fortune, which gave him leisure O follow hib 
 
 classified and described. The very scenery 
 of the country, reacting on the minds of the 
 early observers, has sometimes influenced 
 their observations, and has thus left an im- 
 press on the general progress of the science. 
 As we enter to-day upon a new phase in the 
 cultivation of Geology he e, it seems most 
 fitting that we should look back for a little 
 At the past development of the science in this 
 part of the British Islands. 
 
 There was a time, still within the memory 
 of living men, when a handful of ardent 
 original observers here in Edinburgh car- 
 ried geological speculation and research to 
 such a height as to found a new, and, in the 
 end, a dominant school of Geology. The 
 history of the Natural Sciences, like that of 
 Philosophy, has been marked by epochs of 
 activity and intervals of quiescence. One 
 genius, perhaps, has arisen and kindled in 
 other minds the flame that burned so brightly 
 in his own. A time of vigorous research has 
 ensued, but as the personal influence that 
 evoked it has waned a period of feebleness 
 and torpor has been apt to ensue, and to last 
 until the advent of some new awakening. 
 Such oscillations of mental energy have an 
 importance and a significance far beyond the 
 narrow limits of the country or city in which 
 they may have been manifested. They form 
 part of that long and noble record of the 
 struggle of man with the forces of nature, 
 -and deserve the thoughtful consideration of 
 .all who have joined or who contemplate join- 
 in ? in that struggle. I propose on the pres- 
 ent occasion to sketch the story of one of 
 these periods of vigorous originality, which 
 had its rising and its setting in this city the 
 tory of what may be called the Scottish 
 School of Geology. I wish to place before 
 you, in as clear a light as I can, the work 
 which was accomplished by the founders of 
 that school, that you may see how greatly it 
 has influenced, and is now even influencing,
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOMF AND ABROAD. 
 
 27 
 
 favorite pursuits, he eventually devoted him- 
 self to the study of Mineralcgy. But It was 
 not merely as rare or interesting objects, nor 
 <ven as parts of a mineralogical system, that 
 he dealt with minerals. They seemed to 
 suggest to him constant questions as to the 
 earlier conditions of our planet, and he thus 
 was gradually led into the wider fields of 
 Geology and Physical Geography. Quietly 
 working in his study here, a favorite member 
 of a brilliant circle of society, which included 
 such men as Black, Cullen, Adam Smith, and 
 Clerk of Eldin, and making frequent excur- 
 sions to gather fresh data and test the truth 
 of his deductions, he at length matured his 
 immortal Theory of the Earth, and published 
 it in 1785. Associated with Hutton, rather 
 as a friend and enthusiastic admirer than as 
 an independent observer, was John Playfair, 
 Professor of Natural Philosophy in this Uni- 
 versity, by whose graceful exposition the 
 doctrines of Hutton were most widely made 
 known to the world. His classic Illustrations 
 cf the Huttonian Theory is one of the most 
 delightful books of science in our language 
 clear, elegant, and vivacious a model ot 
 scientific description and argument, which I 
 would earnestly recommend to your notice. 
 Sir James Hall, another of this illustrious 
 little band, had one of the most inventive 
 minds which have ever taken up the pursuit 
 of science in this country. His merits have 
 never yet been adequately realized by his 
 countrymen, though they are better appre- 
 ciated in Germany and in France. He was, 
 in fact, the founder of Experimental Geol- 
 ogy, since it was he who first brought 
 geological speculation to the test of actual 
 physical experiment. This he accomplished 
 in a series of ingenious researches, whereby 
 he corroborated some of the disputed parts of 
 the doctrines cf his master, Hutton. These 
 were the three chief leaders of the Scottish 
 School ; but to their number, as worthy but 
 less celebrated associates, we must not omit 
 to add the names of Mackenzie, Webb Sey- 
 mour, and Allan. 
 
 It would lead me far beyond the allotted 
 hour of lecture to attempt any adequate sum- 
 mary of the work achieved by each of these 
 early pioneers of the science. It will be 
 enough for my present purpose to sketch 
 what were the leading characteristics of this 
 Scottish School, and what claim it has to be 
 remembered, not by us only, but by all to 
 whom Geology is the subject either of serious 
 stud_y or of pleasant recreation. 
 
 Born in a land of " mountain and flood," 
 the geology of the Scottish School naturally 
 dealt in the main with the inorganic part of 
 the science, with the elemental forces which 
 have burst through and cracked and worn 
 down the crust of the earth. It asked the 
 mountains of its birthplace by what chain of 
 events they had been upheaved, how their 
 rocks, so gnarled and broken, had come into 
 being, how valleys and glens had been im- 
 
 pressed upon the surface of the land, and how 
 the various strata through which these wind 
 had been step by step built up. It encoun- 
 tered no rocks like those which had arrested 
 the notice of the early Italian geologists, 
 charged with fossil shells, corals, and bones 
 of fish, such as still lived in the adjoining 
 seas, and which at once suggested the former 
 presence of the sea over the land. Neither 
 did it meet with deposits showing abundant 
 traces of ancient lakes, rivers, and land-sur- 
 faces, each marked by the presence of ani- 
 mal and plant remains, like those which set 
 Steno and Moro thinking. The rocks of 
 Scotland are, as a whole, unfossiliferpus. It 
 was therefore rather with the records of phy. 
 sical events, unaided by the testimony of OP 
 ganic remains, that the Scottish geologists 
 had to deal. Their task was to unravel the 
 complicated processes by which the rocky 
 crust of the earth has been built up, and by 
 which the present varied contour of the 
 earth's surface has been produced to ascer- 
 tain, in short, from a study of the existing 
 economy of the world, what has been the 
 physical history of our planet in earlier ages. 
 The marvelous story told by the organic 
 remains in the earth's crust had not yet been 
 in any way conjectured. 
 
 Hitherto, while men had been accustomed 
 to believe that the earth was but some 6,000 
 years old, they sought in the rocks beneath 
 and around them evidence only of six days' 
 creation or of the flood of Noah. Each new 
 cosmological system was based upon that 
 belief, and tried in various ways to reconcile 
 the Bibliotl narrative with fanciful interpre- 
 tation of the facts of Nature. It was reserved 
 for Hutton to declare, for the first time, that 
 the rocks around us reveal no trace of the 
 beginning of things. He, too, first clearly and 
 persistently proclaimed the great fundamental 
 truth of Geology, t.at in seeking to interpret 
 the past history of the earth as chronicled in 
 the rocks, we must use the present economy 
 of nature as our guide. In our investigations, 
 "no powers, "he says, "are to be employed 
 that are not natural to the globe, no action to 
 be admitted of except those of which we know 
 the principle." "Nor are we to proceed in 
 feigning causes when those appear insufficient 
 which occur in our experience." The changes 
 of the past must be investigated in the light 
 of similar changes now in operation. This 
 was a guiding principle of the Scottish School, 
 and through their influence it has become a 
 guiding principle of modern Geology; though, 
 under the name of " Uniformitarianism," it 
 has unquestionably been pushed to an unwar- 
 rantable length by some of the later followers 
 of Hutton. The appeal to Nature in her 
 present condition for light in geological in- 
 quiry was a watchword of the Huttonians, 
 and in the hands of one of the most illustrious 
 of their number, Sir Charles Lyell, has been 
 largely influential in the establishment of 
 Geology as a truly observational science.
 
 23 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 There were two directions in which Hutton 
 labored, and in each of which he and his 
 followers constantly traveled by the light of the 
 present order of nature viz., the. investiga- 
 tions of (i) changes which have transpired 
 beneath the surface and within the crust of 
 the earth, and (2) changes which have been 
 effected on the surface itself. 
 
 That the interior of the earth was hot, that it 
 
 had been erupted through other stony masses; 
 and that the dark trap- rocks, or "whinstones" 
 of Scotland, were likewise of igneous origin. 
 When the sedimentary rocks were studied in 
 the broad way which was followed by Hutton 
 and his associates, many proofs appeared of 
 ancient convulsions and re-formations of the 
 earth's surface. It was found that among 
 the hills the strata were often on end, while 
 
 the seat ot powerful forces, by which : on the plains they were gently inclined; and 
 
 solid rocks had been rent open and wide 
 regions of land convulsed, were familiar facts, 
 attested by every volcano and earthquake. 
 These phenomena had been for the most part 
 regarded as abnormal parts of the system of 
 nature ; by many writers, indeed, as well as 
 by the general mass of mankind, they were 
 looked upon as Divine judgments, specially 
 sent for the punishment and reformation of 
 the human species. To Hutton, pondering 
 over the great organic system of the world, a 
 deeper meaning was necessary. He felt, as 
 Steno and Moro had done, that the earth- 
 quake and volcano were but parts of the gen- 
 eral mechanism of our planet. But he saw, 
 also, that they were not the only exhibitions 
 of the pote..-}" of sub:erraneau agencies, that 
 in fact they were only partial and perhaps 
 even secondary manifestations of thi influ- 
 ence of the great internal heat of the globe, 
 and that the full import of that influence 
 could not be understood unkss careful study 
 were given also to the structuie of the rocky 
 crust of the earth. Accordingly, he set him- 
 self for years patiently to gather and medi- 
 tate over data whica would throw light upon 
 that structure and its history. The moun- 
 tains and glens, river-valleys and sea-coasts 
 of his native country were diligently tra- 
 versed by him, every journey adding some- 
 thing to his store of materials, and enabling 
 him to arrive continually at wider views of 
 the general economy of nature. At one time 
 we find him in a Highland glen searching for 
 proofs of a hypothesis which he was con- 
 vinced must be true, and, at their eventual 
 discovery, breaking forth into such gleeful 
 excitement that his attendant gillies con- 
 cluded he must certainly have hit upon a 
 mine of gold. At another time, we read of 
 him boating with his friends Playfair and 
 Hall along the wild cliffs ot Berwickshire, 
 again in search of confirmation to his views, 
 and finding, to use the words of Playfair. 
 "palpable evidence of one of the most extra- 
 ordinary and important facts in th<* natural 
 history of the earth." As a result of his 
 wanderings and reflection, he concluded that 
 the great mass of the rocks which form the 
 visible part of crust of the earth was formed 
 i nder the sea as sand, gravel, and mud are 
 laid down there now; that these ancient sedi- 
 ments were consolidated by subterranean heat, 
 and, by paroxysms of the same force, were 
 fractured, contorted, and upheaved into dry 
 land. He found that portions of the rocks 
 had even been in a fused state; that granite 
 
 the inference was deduced by Hutton that 
 the former series must have been broken up 
 by subterranean commotions before the ac- 
 cumulation of the latter, which was derived 
 from its ddbris. He conjectured that the later 
 rocks would be found actually resting upon 
 the edges of the older. His search for, and 
 discovery of, this relation at the Siccar Point, 
 on the Berwickshire coast, are well described 
 by his biographer Playfair, who accompanied 
 him, and who, dwelling on the impression 
 which the scene had left upon himself, adds, 
 "The mind seemed to grow giddy by looking 
 so far into the abyss of time; and while we 
 listened with earnestness and admiration tc 
 the philosopher who was now unfolding to us 
 the order and series of th >,e wonderful events, 
 we became sensible ho-, much farther reason 
 may sometimes go than imagination can ven- 
 ture to follow. Sir James Hall afterward, 
 by a series of characteristically ingenious ex- 
 periments, showed how the rocks of that 
 coast-line may have been contorted by move- 
 ments in the crust of the earth under great 
 superincumbent pressure. 
 
 Hutton contended for the former molten 
 condition of granite and of many other crys- 
 talline masses. He maintained that the 
 combined influence of subterranean heat and 
 pressure upon sedimentary rocks could con- 
 solidate and mineralize them, and even con- 
 vert them into crystalline masses. He may 
 thus be regarded as the founder of the 
 modern doctrine of metamorphism, or the 
 gradual transformation of marine sediments 
 into the gnarled and rugged gneiss and schist 
 of which mountains are built up. Lit me 
 quote the eulogium passed upon this part of 
 his work in an essay by M. Daubree, which 
 eleven years ago was crowned with a prize by 
 the Academy of Sciences at Paris : " By an 
 idea entirely new, the illustrious Scottish 
 philosopher showed the successive co-opera- 
 tion of water and the internal heat of the 
 globe i i the formation of the same rocks. It 
 is the mark of genius to unite in one common 
 origin phenomena very different in their 
 nature." " Hutton explains the history of 
 the globe with as much simplicity as grand- 
 eur. Like most men of genius, indeed, who 
 have opened up new paths, he exaggerated 
 the extent to which his conceptions could be 
 applied. But it is fcnpossible not to view 
 with admiration the profound penetration 
 and the strictness of induction of so clear- 
 sighted a man at a time when exact observa- 
 tions had been so few, he being the first to
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 recognize the simultaneous effect of water 
 and heat in the formation of rocks, in imag- 
 ining a system which embraces the whole 
 physical system of the globe. He established 
 principles which, in so far as they are funda- 
 mental, are now universally admitted." 
 
 While Hutton fortified his convictions by 
 constant appeals to the rocks themselves, his 
 disciple Hall tested their truth in the labor- 
 atory. It is the boast of Scotland to have 
 led the way in the application of chemical 
 and physical experiment to the elucidation of 
 geological history. It was objected to Hut- 
 ton's theory that, if basalt and similar rocks 
 had ever been in a melted state, they would 
 now have been seen in the condition of glass 
 or slag, and not with the granular or crys- 
 talline texture which they actually possess. 
 Hall demolished this objection by melting 
 basalt into a glass, and then, by slow cool- 
 ing, reconverting it into a granular substance 
 more or less resembling the original rock. 
 Hutton had maintained that under enormous 
 pressure, such as he conceived must exist 
 beneath the ocean, or deep within the crust 
 of the earth, even limestone itself might be 
 melted without losing its carbonic acid. This 
 was ridiculed by his opponents, on whom he 
 retorted that they "judged of the great 
 operations of the mineral kingdom from 
 having kindled a fire and looked into the 
 bottsm of a little crucible." Hall, however, 
 to whom fire and crucible were congenial 
 implements, resolved to put the question to 
 the test of experiment, and though, out of 
 deference to his master, he delayed his task 
 until after the death of the latter, he did at 
 last succeed in converting limestone, under 
 various great pressures, into a kind of mar- 
 ble, and even in reducing it to complete 
 fusion, in which state it acted powerfully on 
 other rocks. He concluded his elaborate 
 essay on this subject with these words : 
 "This single result affords, I conceive, a 
 strong presumption in favor of the solution 
 which Dr. Hutton has advanced of all the 
 geological phenomem ; for the truth of the 
 most doubtful principle which he has assumed 
 lias thus been established by direct experi- 
 ment." 
 
 Though they saw clearly the proofs which 
 the rocks afford us of former revolutions, 
 neither Hutton nor his friends had any con- 
 ception of the existence of the great series of 
 fossiliferous formations which has since been 
 unfolded by the abors of later observers 
 that voluminous record in which the history 
 of life upon this planet has been preserved. 
 They spoke of "Alpine schistus," "pri- 
 mary" or "secondary " strata, as if the geo- 
 logical past had consisted but of two great 
 ages the second replete w th traces of the 
 destruction of the first. "The ruins of an 
 older world," said Hutton, "are visible in 
 the present structure of our planet." He 
 knew nothing of the long, but then undis- 
 covered, succession of such "ruins,"' each 
 
 marking a wide interval of time. Neverthe- 
 less for the establishment of the great truths 
 which Hutton labored to confirm, such knowl- 
 edge was not necessary. On the other hand, 
 it was most needful that the significance of 
 that discordance between the older and newer 
 strata which Hutton recognized should be 
 persistently proclaimed. And the Huttoni- 
 ans, in spite of their limited range of knowl- 
 edge and opportunity, saw its value, and 
 held by it. 
 
 2. But it was not merely, nor even per- 
 haps chiefly, for their exposition of the 
 structure and history of the rocks under our 
 feet that the geologists of the Scottish School 
 deserve to be held in lasting remembrance. 
 They could not, indeed, have advanced as 
 far as they did in expounding former condi- 
 tions of the planet, had they not, with singu- 
 lar clearness, perceived the order and system 
 of change which is in progress over the sur- 
 face of the globe at the prete.it day. It was 
 their teaching which led men to recognize 
 the harmony and co-operation of the forces 
 of nature that work within the earth, with 
 those which are seen and felt upon its sur- 
 face. Hutton first caught the meaning of 
 that constant circulation of water which, by 
 means of evaporation, winds, clouds, rain, 
 snow, brooks, and rivers, is kept up between 
 land and sea. He saw that the surface of the 
 dry land is everywhere being wasted and 
 worn away. The scarped cliff, the rugged 
 glen, the lowland valley, are each undergoing 
 this process of destruction; wherever land 
 rises above ocean, there, from mountain-top 
 to sea-shore, degradation is continually going 
 on. Here and there, indeed, the debris of 
 :he hills may be spread out upon the plains ; 
 here and there, too, dark angular peaks and 
 crags rise as they rose centuries ago, and 
 seem to defy the elements. But these are 
 only apparent and not real exceptions to the 
 universal law, that so long as a surface of 
 land is exposed to the atmosphere it must 
 suffer disintegration and removal. 
 
 But Hutton saw, further, that this waste 
 s not equally distributed over the whole face 
 of the dry land. He perceived that while, 
 owing to the greater or less resistance offered 
 by different kinds of rocks, the decay must 
 vary indefinitely in rate.its amount must neces- 
 sarily be greatest where the surplus water 
 flows bff toward the sea that is, along the 
 channels of the streams. Watercourses, he 
 argued, are precisely in the lines which wa- 
 ter would naturally follow in running down 
 the slope of the land from its water-shed to 
 the sea, and which, when once selected by 
 the surplus drainage, would necessarily be 
 continually widened and deepened by the 
 excavating power of the rivers. He regarded 
 the streams and rivers of a country as follow- 
 ing the lines which they had chiseled for 
 themselves out of the solid land, and thus he 
 arrived at the deduction that valleys have 
 been, inch by inch and foot by foot, dug out
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES Af HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 of the solid framework of the lancf by the 
 same natural agents rain, frost, springs, 
 rivers by which they are still made wider 
 and deeper. "The mountains," he said, 
 "have been formed by the hollowing out of 
 the valleys, and the valleys have been hol- 
 lowed out by the attrition of hard materials 
 coming from the mountains." This is a 
 doctrine which is only now beginning to be 
 adequately realized. Yet to Hutton it was so 
 obvious as to convince him, to use his own 
 memorable words, "that the great system 
 upon the surface of this earth is that of val- 
 leys and rivers, and that however this system 
 shall be interrupted and occasionally de- 
 stroyed, it would necessarily be again formed 
 in time while the earth continued above the 
 level of the sea." 
 
 Although these views were again and again 
 proclaimed by Hutton in the pages of his 
 treatise, and though Playfair, catching up th; 
 spirit of his master, preached them with a 
 force and eloquence which might almost have 
 insured the triumph of any cause, they met 
 with but scant acceptance. The men were 
 before their time ; and thus while the world 
 gradually acknowledged the teaching of the 
 Scottish School as to the past history of the 
 rocks, it lent an incredulous ear to that teach- 
 ing when dealing with the present surface of 
 the earth. Even some of the Huttonians 
 themselves refused to follow their master 
 when he sought to explain the existing 
 inequalities of the land by the working of 
 the same quiet, unobtrusive forcej which are 
 still plying their daily tasks around us. But 
 no incredulity or neglect can destroy the 
 innate vitality of truth. And so now, after 
 the lapse of fully two generations, the views 
 of Hutton have in recent years been revived, 
 especially in Britain, and have become the 
 war cry of a yearly increasing crowd of 
 earnest hard-working geologists. 
 
 While they insisted upon the manifest 
 proofs of constant and universal decay over 
 the surface of the globe, the Scottish geolo- 
 gists no less strongly contended that this 
 decay was a necessary part of the present 
 economy of nature, that it had been in pro- 
 gress from the earliest periods in the history 
 of the earth, and that it was essential for the 
 presence of organized beings upon the planet. 
 They pointed to the vegetable soil, derived 
 from the decomposition of the rocks which 
 it covers, and necessary for the support of 
 vegetable life. They appealed to the vast 
 quantity of sedimentary rocks forming the visi- 
 ble part of the crust of the earth, and be .ring 
 witness in every bed and layer to the degra- 
 dation and removal of former continents. 
 They showed that the accumulated debris of 
 the land, carried to the sea, was there spread 
 out on the sea-floor to form new strata, 
 which, hardened in due time into solid rock, 
 would hereafter be upheaved to form the 
 framework of new lands. 
 
 Such was the geology of the Scottish 
 
 School. It was based not on mere specula- 
 tion, but on broad fundamental facts drawn 
 from mountain and valley, hill and plain, 
 and tested as far as was then possible by the 
 scrutiny of actual experiment. It strove, for 
 the first time in the history of science, to- 
 evolve a system out of the manifold compli- 
 cations of nature, to harmonize wtiat had 
 seemed but the wild random working of sub- 
 terranean forces with the quiet operations in 
 progress upon the surface of the earth, to- 
 understand what is the present system of the 
 world, and through that to peer into the his- 
 tory of earlier conditions of the planet. It 
 taught that the earthquake and volcano were 
 parts of the orderly arrangement by which 
 new continents were from time to time raised 
 up to supply the place of others that had 
 been worn away ; that the surface of the 
 land required to decay to furnish life to- 
 plants and animals ; that in the removal of 
 the ctebris thus produced mountains and val- 
 leys were carved out ; and that in the depths 
 of the ocean there were at the same time laid 
 down the materials for the formation of 
 other lands, which in after ages would be up- 
 heaved by underground forces, to be anew 
 worn away as before. The Scottish School, 
 proclaimed that in the inorganic world there 
 s ceaseless change, that this change is the 
 central idea of the system, and that in its- 
 constant progress lie the conditions necessary 
 For the continuance of our earth as a habita- 
 ble globe. 
 
 That Hutton and his followers failed to real- 
 ze that the planet has had a vastly prolonged 
 evolution which the visible geological record 
 chronicles only imperfectly, that they were 
 "gnprant of the geological importance of 
 Fossils, that they saw only partially the truths- 
 which they labored so zealously to establish, 
 and that they fell into errors, attaching to- 
 secondary and even erroneous parts of their 
 system an importance which we now see to- 
 lave been misplaced, is only what may be 
 said of any body of men who, at any time, 
 lave led the way in a new development of 
 luman inquiry. But, after all allowance is 
 m de for such shortcomings, we see that 
 ;heir mistakes were, for the most part, main- 
 s' in matters of detail, and lhat the funda- 
 mental principles for which they fought have 
 become the very life and soul of modern ge- 
 ology. 
 
 1 have spoken of this Scottish School as 
 marking a period of activity which rose into- 
 brightness and then waned. It is only too- 
 true, that so far as the originality and influ- 
 ence of its cultivators go, Geology has never 
 since held in Scotland the place which it held 
 here at the beginning of this century. Its decay 
 is perhaps to be ascribed chiefly, if not en- 
 tirely, to the introduction of the doctrines of 
 Werner from Germany. The Huttonians 
 had dealt rather with general principles thaa 
 with minute details ; they were weak in ac- 
 curate mineralogical knowledge not that
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 they were ignorant of or in any degree de- 
 spised such knowledge ; but it was not nec- 
 essary for their object. When, however, the 
 system of Werner came to be taught within 
 these walls by his devoted pupil Jameson, its 
 precision and simplicity, and its supposed 
 capability of ready application in every 
 country, joined to the skill and zeal of its 
 teacher, gave it an impulse which lasted for 
 years. I shall have occasion in a subsequen 
 lecture to speak of this system. It attemptec 
 to explain the geological history of the globe 
 from the rocks of a limited district in Saxony. 
 It required mineralogical determination o( 
 rocks and pointed out a certain order of suc- 
 cession among them. In so far it did good 
 service, but its theoretical teaching as re- 
 ga. ds the history of the earth cannot now be 
 regarded without a smile. It maintained 
 that the globe was covered with certain uni- 
 versal formations which had been precipitated 
 successively from solution into a primeval 
 ocean. Of upheaval and subsidence, earth- 
 quakes and volcanoes, and all the mechanism 
 of internal heat, it could make nothing, and 
 ignored as much as it dared. Werner, the 
 founder of this system, had the faculty of at- 
 taching his students to him, and of infusing in- 
 to them no small share of his own zeal and faith 
 in his doctrines. His pupil Jameson had a 
 similar aptitude. Skilled in the mineralogy 
 of his time, and full of desire to apply the 
 teachings of Freyberg to the explication of 
 Scottish geology, or geognosy, as the Wer- 
 nerians preferred to call it, Jameson gathered 
 round him a band of active observers, who 
 gleaned facts from all parts of Scotland, and 
 to whom the first accurate descriptions of the 
 mineralogy of the country are due. It is but 
 fitting that a tribute of gratitude should on 
 the present occasion be offered to the mem- 
 ory of Jameson for the life-long devotion 
 with which he taught Natural History, and 
 especially Mineralogy, in this University. 
 His influence is to be judged not by what he 
 wrote, but by the effect of his example, and 
 by the number of ardent naturalists who 
 sprang from his teaching. He founded a 
 scientific society here, and called it Werner- 
 ian, after his chief a society which, under 
 his guidance, did excel lent service to the cause 
 of science in Scotland. And yet in the course 
 of my scientific reading I have never met a 
 sadder contrast than to turn from the earlier 
 volumes of the Transactions of the Royal So- 
 ciety of Edinburgh, containing the classic es- 
 says of Hutton, Hall, and Playfair essays 
 which made an epoch in the history of geol- 
 ogy to the pages of the Wcmerian Memoirs, 
 and find grave discussions about the univer- 
 sal formations, the aqueous origin of basalt, 
 and the chemical disposition of such rocks as 
 
 slate and conglomerate. 
 
 Between the followers of Hutton and Wer- 
 
 nists," as if they recognized only the power ot 
 internal fire, while the others were in turn 
 nicknamed " Neptunists, " in token of their 
 adherence to water. The warfare lasted in a 
 desultory way for many years, and though 
 the Wernerian school, having essentially no 
 vitality, eventually died out, and its leader 
 Jameson publicly and frankly recanted its 
 errors, the early Huttonian magnates had 
 meanwhile one by one departed and left no 
 successors. The Huttonian school triumphed 
 indeed, but its triumph was seen rather in 
 other countries than in Scotland, and was due 
 chiefly to the impetus given to the reception 
 of its doctrines by the Principles of Geo ogy 
 
 of Lyell. The Wernerian faith prea'ched here 
 by Jameson attracted in great measure the 
 younger men, and when its influence waned 
 there were no great names on the other side 
 to rally the thinned and weakened ranks of 
 Huttonianism. Hence came a period of com-* 
 parative quiescence, which has lasted almost 
 down to our own day. From time to time, 
 indeed, a geologist has arisen among us to 
 show that the science was not dead, and that 
 the doctrines of Hutton had borne good fruit. 
 But geology has never since held such a 
 prominent place in Scotland, nor have the 
 writings of our geologists taken the same 
 position in the literature of the science. The 
 great name of Lyell, and others of lesser 
 note, have earned elsewhere their title to 
 fame. 
 
 But there is one name which must be in our 
 hearts and on our lips to-day, that of Roder- 
 ick Impey Murchison. To his munificence 
 and the liberality of the Crown we owe the 
 foundation of this Chair of Geology, and to 
 his warm friendship I am indebted for the 
 position in which I stand before you. Of his 
 achievements in science, and of the influence 
 of his work all over the world, it is not nec- 
 essary now to speak ; but on Scottish Geol- 
 ogy no man has left his name more deeply 
 engraven. It was he who, with Professor 
 Sedgwick, first made known the order of 
 succession of the Old Red Sandstone of the 
 north of Scotland ; it was he who sketched 
 'or us the relations of the great Silurian 
 nasses of the Southern uplands ; and it was 
 
 who, by a series of admirable researches, 
 >rought order out of the chaos of the so- 
 called primary rocks of the Highlands, and 
 jlaced these rocks on a parallel with the Silu- 
 ian strata of other countries. These la- 
 jors will come again before us in detail, and 
 will then better understand their value, 
 and the debt we owe to the man who accom- 
 )lished them. 
 
 Sir Roderick Murchison looked forward 
 with interest to the occasion which has called 
 us together to-day. Only a few weeks ago I 
 alked with him regarding it, and his eye 
 jrightened as I told him of the subject on 
 
 ner there necessarily arose a keen warfare, j which I proposed to speak to you. I had 
 The one battalion of combatants was styled I hoped that he would have lived to see this 
 by its opponents "Vulcanists" or " Pluto- I day, and to hear at least of the beginning of
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 the work which he has inaugurated for us in 
 this University ; but this was not to be. He 
 has been taken from us ripe in years, in 
 work, and in honors, and he leaves us the 
 trxample of his unwearied industry, his ad- 
 mirable powers of observat on, and his rare 
 goodness of heart. 
 
 In the course of study now before us, we 
 are to be engaged in examining together the 
 structure and his'ory of the earth. We shall 
 trace the woiking of tiio various natural 
 agents which are now canying on geological 
 change, and by which the past changes of 
 the globe may be explained. In so doing we 
 shall be brought continually face to face with 
 the history of life as recorded in the rocks 
 for it is by that history mainly that the 
 sequences of geological time can be estab- 
 lished. We shall thus have to trespass a 
 Httle on what is the proper domain of the 
 Professors of Botany and of Natural History. 
 But you will find that no hard line can be 
 drawn between the sciences. Each must 
 needs overlap upon the other ; and indeed it is 
 in this mutual interlacing that one great ele- 
 ment of the strength and interest of science 
 lies. From Profej-sors Balfour and \Vy- 
 ville Thomson you will learn the struc- 
 ture of the fossils with which we shall have 
 to deal as our geological alphabet, and their 
 relation to living plants and animals. By 
 Professor Crum Brown you are taught the 
 full meaning and application of the chemical 
 laws under which the minerals and rocks, 
 which we in this class must study, have been 
 formed, and of the processes concerned in 
 those subsequent changes, both of rocks and 
 minerals, .which are of such paramount im- 
 portance in Geology. 
 
 And now, in conclusion, permit me to give 
 expression to the feelings which must strongly 
 possess the mind of one who is called upon 
 to fill the first Chair dedicated in Scotland to 
 the cultivation of Geology. When I look 
 back to the times of that illustrious group of 
 men Hutton, Hall, Playfair who made 
 Edinburgh the special home of Geology ; of 
 Boue and MacCulloch, who gave to Scottish 
 rocks a European celebrity ; of Jameson 
 and Edward Forbes, who did so much to 
 stimulate the study of Geology and Miner- 
 alogy in this University ; and to the memory 
 of Hugh Miller and Charles Maclaren, who 
 fostered the love of these sciences throughout 
 the community, and for whose kindly frienc- 
 ship and guidance given to me in my boy 
 hood I would fain express my hearty 
 gratitude when I cast my thoughts back 
 upon these associations, it would be affecta- 
 tion to conceal the anxiety with which the 
 prospect fills me. The memory of these 
 great names arises continually before me, 
 bearing with it a con ciousness of the re- 
 sponsibility under which I lie to labor ear- 
 nestly not to be unworthy of the traditions of 
 the past. And, gentlemen, I feel deeply my 
 responsibility to you who are to enter with 
 
 me upon a yet untrodden path of the .Aca- 
 demic curriculum. It is only experience that 
 will show us how we shall best travel over 
 the wide field before us. In the meaniime I 
 must bespeak your kindly forbearance. While 
 I shall cheerfully teach you all I know, and 
 confess what I do not know, I would fain 
 have you in the end to regard me as much in 
 the light of a fellow student, searching with 
 you after truth, as of a teacher putting 
 before you what is already known. We have 
 now an opportunity of combined and sedu- 
 lous work which has not hitherto been ob- 
 tainable in Scotland. We may not rival a 
 Hutton or a Hall ; but we may at least try to 
 raise again the standard of geological in- 
 quiry here. On every s-ide of us are incen- 
 tives to study. Crag a'hd hill rise around us, 
 each eloquent of ancient revolutions, and 
 each a silent witness of the revolution in 
 progress now. At our very gates tower on 
 one side the 'picture que memorials of long 
 silent volcanoes, with their crumbling lavas 
 and ashes. On the other lies the buried 
 vegetation of an ancient land, with the corals 
 and shells of a former ocean. Everywhere 
 the scarred and wasted rocks tell of the 
 degradation of the solid land, and show us 
 how the waste goes on. Let us then carry 
 into our task some share of the enthusiasm 
 which these daily exemplars called forth in 
 bygone times. Let us turn from the lessons 
 of the lecture-room to the lessons of the 
 crags and ravines, appealing constantly to 
 nature for the explanation and verification of 
 what is taught. And thus, whatsoever may 
 be your career in future, you will in the 
 meantime cultivate habits of observation and 
 communion with the free fresh world around 
 you nabits which will give a z :st to every 
 journey, which will enable you to add to the 
 sum of human knowledge, and which will 
 assuredly make you wiser and better men. 
 
 VI. 
 GEOGRAPHICAL EVOLUTION." 
 
 > In the quaint preface to his Navigations 
 and Voyages of the English Nation, Hakluyt 
 calls geography and chronology "the sunne 
 and moone, the right eye and the left of all 
 history." The position thus claimed for ge- 
 ography three hundred years ago by the great 
 English chronicler was not accorded by his 
 successors, and has hardly been admitted even 
 now. The functions of the geographer and 
 the traveler, popularly assumed to be identi- 
 cal, have been supposed to consist in de- 
 scriptions of foreign countries, their climates, 
 productions, and inhabitants, bristling on the 
 one hand with dry statistics, and relieved on 
 the other by as copious an introduction as 
 may be of stirring adventure and personal 
 
 * A Lecture delivered at the Evening Meeting of 
 the Royal Geographical Society, 34th March, 1879.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 anecdote. There has indeed been much to 
 justify this popular assumption. It was not 
 until the keynote of its future progress was 
 struck by Karl Ritter, within the present 
 century, that geography advanced beyond the 
 domain of travelers' tales and desultory ob- 
 servation into that of orderly, methodical, 
 scientific progress. This branch of inquiry, 
 however, is now no longer the pursuit of mere 
 numerical statistics, nor the chronicle of mar- 
 velous and often questionable adventures by 
 rkod and fell. It seeks to present a lumin- 
 ous picture of the earth's surface, its various 
 forms of configuration, its continents, islands, j 
 and oceans, us mountains, valleys, and plains, 
 its rivers and lakes, its climates, plants and | 
 animals. It thus endeavors to produce a I 
 picture which shall not be one of mere topo- 
 graphical detail. It ever looks for a connec- 
 tion between scattered facts, tries to ascer- j 
 tain the relations which subsist between the | 
 different parts of the globe, their reactions on j 
 each other and the function of each in the 
 general economy of the whole. Modern ge- | 
 ography studies the distribution of vegetable 
 and animal life over the earth's surface, with 
 the ac'ion and reaction between it and the 
 surrounding organic world. It traces how 
 man, alike unconsciously and knowingly, 
 has changed the face of nature, and how, on 
 the other hand, the conditions of his geo- 
 graphical environment have molded his own 
 progress. 
 
 With these broad aims, geography comes 
 frankly for assistance to many different 
 branches of science. It does not, however, 
 claim in any measure to occupy their domain. 
 It brings to the consideration of their prob- 
 lems a central human interest in which these 
 sciences are sometimes apt to be deficient ; 
 for it demands first of all to know how the 
 problems to be solved bear upon the position 
 and history of man and of this marvelously- 
 ordered world wherein he finds himself un- 
 disputed lord. Geography freely borrows 
 from meteorology, physics, chemistry, geolo- 
 gy, zoology, and botany ; but the debt is not 
 all on one side. Save for the impetus derived 
 from geographical research, many of these 
 sciences would not be in their present ad- 
 vanced condition. They gain in vast aug- 
 mentation of facts, and may cheerfully lend 
 their aid in correlating these for geographical 
 requirements. 
 
 In no respect does modern geography stand 
 out more prominently than in the increased 
 precision and fullness of its work. It has 
 fitted out exploratory expeditions, and in so 
 doing has been careful to see them provided 
 with the instruments and apparatus necessary 
 to enable them to contribute accurate and 
 definite results. It has guided and fostered 
 research, and has been eager to show a gen- 
 erous appreciation of the labors of those by 
 whom our knowledge of the earth has been 
 extended. Human courage and endurance 
 are not less enthusiastically applauded than 
 
 they once were ; but they must be united to 
 no common powers of observation before they 
 will now raise a traveler to the highest rank. 
 When we read a volume of recent travel, 
 while warmly appreciating the spirit of ad- 
 venture, fertility of resource, presence of 
 mind, and other moral qualities of its author, 
 we instinctively ask ourselves, as we close its 
 pages, what is the sum of its additions to our 
 knowledge of the earth? From the geo 
 g-aphical point of view and it is to this 
 point alone that these remarks apply we 
 must rank an explorer according to his suc- 
 cess in widening our knowledge and enlarg- 
 ing our views regarding the aspects of 
 nature. 
 
 The demands of modern geography are 
 thus becoming every year more exacting. It 
 requires more training in its explorers abroad, 
 more knowledge on the part of its readers at 
 home. The days are drawing to a close when 
 one can gain undying geographical renown 
 by struggling against man and beast, fever 
 and hunger and drought, across some savage 
 and previously unknown region, even though 
 little can be shown as the outcome of the 
 journey. All honor to the pioneers by whom 
 this first exploratory work has been so nobly 
 done ! They will be succeeded by a race that 
 will find its laurels more difficult to win a 
 race from which more will be expected, and 
 which will need to make up in the variety, 
 amount, and value of its detail, what it lacks 
 in the freshness of first glimpses into new 
 lands. 
 
 With no other science has geography be- 
 come more intimately connected than with 
 geology, and the connection is assuredly 
 destined to become yet deeper and closer. 
 These two branches of hum.n knowledge 
 are, to use Hakluyt's phrase, " the sunne 
 and moone, the right eye and the left," of 
 all fruitful inquiry into the character and his- 
 tory of the earth's surface. As it is impos- 
 sible to understand the genius and tempera- 
 ment of a people, its laws and institutions, 
 its manners and customs, its buildings and 
 its industries, unless we trace back the his- 
 tory of that people, and mark the rise and 
 effect of each varied influence by which its 
 progress has been molded in past genera- 
 tions ; so it is clear that our knowledge of 
 the aspect of a continent, its mountains and 
 valleys, rivers and plains, and all its surface- 
 features, cannot be other than singularly 
 feeble and imperfect, unless we realize what 
 has been the origin of these features. The 
 land has had a history, not less than the 
 human races that inhabit it. 
 
 One can hardly consider attentively the 
 future progress of geography without being 
 convinced that in the wide development yet 
 in store for this branch of human inquiry, 
 one of its main lines of advance must be in 
 the direction of what may be termed geo- 
 graphical evolution. The geographer will 
 no longer be content to take continents and
 
 34 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 islands, mountain chains and river valleys 
 table-lands and plains, as initial or aborigina 
 outlines of the earth's surface. He will in 
 sist on knowing what the geologist can tel 
 him regarding the growth of these outlines 
 He will try to trace out the gradual evolution 
 of a continent, and may even construct maps 
 to show its successive stages of development 
 At the same time he will seek for information 
 regarding the history of the plants and ani 
 mals of the region, and may find much to 
 reward his inquiry as to the early migrations 
 of the fauna and flora, including those even 
 of man himself. Thus his pictures of the 
 living world of to-day, as they become more 
 detailed and accurate will include more and 
 more distinctly a back-ground of bygone 
 geographical conditions, out of which, by 
 continuous sequence, the present conditions 
 will be shown to have arisen. 
 
 I propose this evening to sketch in mere 
 outline the aspects of one side of this evolu- 
 tional geography. I wish to examine, in the 
 first place, the evidence whereby we establish 
 the fundamental fact that the present surface 
 of any country or continent is not that which 
 it has always borne, and the data by which 
 we may trace backward the origin of the 
 land ; and, in the second place, to consider, 
 by way of illustration, some of the more 
 salient features in the gradual growth of the 
 framework of Europe. 
 
 The first of these two divisions of the sub- 
 ject deals with general principles, and may 
 be conveniently grouped into two parts : ist, 
 The Materials of the Land. 2d, The Build- 
 ing of the Land. 
 
 I. GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF CONTINENTAL 
 EVOLUTION. 
 
 i. The Materials of the Ljnd, 
 
 Without attempting to enter into detailed 
 treatment of this branch of the subject, we 
 may, for the immediate purpose in view, 
 content ourselves with the broad, useful 
 classification of the materials of the land into 
 two great series Fragmental and Crys- 
 talline. 
 
 I. Fragmental. A very cursory examina- 
 tion of rocks in almost any part of the world 
 suffices to show that by far the larger portion 
 of them consists of compacted fragmentary 
 materials. Shales, sandstones, and con- 
 glomerates, in infinite variety of texture and 
 color, are piled above each other to form the 
 foundation of plains and the structure of 
 mountains. Each of these rocks is composed 
 of distinct particles, worn by air, rain, frost, 
 springs, rivers, glaciers, or the sea, from 
 previously existing rocks. They are thus 
 derivative formations, and their source, as well 
 as their mode of origin, can be determined. 
 Their component grains are for the most 
 part rounded, and bear evidence of having 
 
 been rolled about in water. Thus we 
 easily and rapidly reach a first and funda- 
 mental conclusion that the substance of the 
 main part of the solid land has been originally 
 laid down and assorted under water. 
 
 The mere extent of the area covered by 
 these water-formed rocks would of itself sug- 
 gest that they must have been deposited in 
 the sea. We cannot imagine rivers or lake* 
 of magnitude sufficient to have spread over 
 the sites of the present continents. The 
 waters of the ocean, however, may easily be 
 conceived to have rolled at different times 
 over all that is now dry land. The fragmental 
 rocks contain, indeed, within themselves 
 proof that they were mainly of marine, and 
 not of lacustrine or fluviatile origin. They 
 have preserved in abundance the remains of 
 foraminifera, corals, crinoids, mollusks, an- 
 nelides, crustaceans, fishes, and other organ- 
 s of undoubtedly marine habitat, which 
 must have lived and died in the places where 
 their traces remain still visible. 
 
 But not only do these organisms occur 
 scattered through sedimentary rocks ; they 
 actually themselves form thick masses of 
 mineral matter. The Carboniferous or 
 Mountain Limestone of Central England 
 and Ireland, for example, reaches a thick- 
 ness of from 2,000 to |,ooo feet, and covers 
 thousands of square miles of surface. Yet 
 it is almost entirely composed of congre- 
 gated stems and joints and plates of crinoids, 
 with foraminifera, corals, bryozoans, brachio- 
 pods, lamellibranchs, gasteropods, fish-teeth, 
 ind other unequivocally marine organisms. 
 It must have been for ages the bottom of a 
 clear sea, over which generation after genera- 
 tion lived and died, until their accumulated 
 remains had gathered into a deep and com- 
 pact s :eet of rock. From the internal evi- 
 dence of the stratified formations we thus 
 confidently announce a second conclusion 
 :hat a great portion of the solid land consists 
 of materials which have been laid down on 
 he floor of the sea. 
 
 From these familiar and obvious deduc- 
 ions we may proceed further to inquire under 
 what conditions these marine formations, 
 spreading so widely over the land, were 
 "ormed. According to a popular belief, 
 ihared in perhaps by not a few geologists, 
 and and sea have been continually changing 
 >laces. It is supposed that while, on the 
 ne hand, there is no part of a continent over 
 which sea-waves may not have rolled, so. on 
 he other hand, there is no lonely abyss of 
 he ocean where a wide continent may not 
 lave bloomed. That this notion rests upon 
 i mistaken interpretation of the facts may be 
 hown from an examination^-(i) of the rocks 
 )f the land, and (2) of the bottom of the 
 >resent ocean. 
 
 (i) Among the thickest masses of sedimen- 
 ary rock those of the ancient palaeozoic sys- 
 ems no features recur more continually 
 han alternations of different sediments, and
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 35 
 
 surfaces of rock covered with well-preserved 
 ripple-marks, trails and burrows of annelides, 
 polygonal at d irregular desiccation marks, 
 like the cracks at the bottom of a sun-dried 
 muddy pool. These phenomena unequivo- 
 cally point to shallow and even littoral waters. 
 They occur from bottom to top of deposits 
 which reach a thickness of several thousand 
 feet. They can be interpreted only in one 
 way, namely, that their deposition began in 
 shallow water ; that during their formation 
 the area of deposit gradually subsided for 
 thousands of feet; yet that the rate of accu- 
 mulation of sediment kept pace on the whole 
 with this depression ; and hence, that the 
 original shallow-water character of the de- 
 posits remained, even after the original sea- 
 bottom had been buried under a vast mass of 
 sedimentary matter. Now, if this explana- 
 tion be true, even for the enormously thick 
 and comparatively uniform systems of older 
 geological periods, the relatively thin and 
 much more varied stratified groups of 
 later date can offer no difficulty. In short, 
 the more attentively the stratified rocks of 
 the crust of the earth are studied, the more 
 striking becomes the absence of any deposits 
 among them which can legitimately be con- 
 sidered those of a deep sea. They have 
 all been deposited in comparatively shallow 
 water. 
 
 The same conclusion may be arrived at 
 from a consideration of the circumstances 
 under which the deposition must have taken 
 place. It is evident that the sedimentary 
 rocks of all ages have been derived from 
 degradation of land. The gravel, sand, and 
 mud, of which they consist, existed previously 
 as part of mountains, hills, or plains. These 
 materials carried down to the sea would ar- 
 range themselves there as they do still, the 
 coarser portions nearest the shore, the finer 
 silt and mud farthest from it. From the 
 earliest geological times the great area of de- 
 posit has been, as it still is, the marginal belt 
 of sea-floor skirting the land. It is there 
 that nature has always strewn "the dust of 
 continents to be." The decay of old rocks 
 has been unceasingly in progress on the land, 
 and the building up of new rocks has been 
 unintermittently going on underneath the a J- 
 joming sea. The two phenomena are the 
 complementary sides of one process, which 
 belongs to the terrestrial and shallow oceanic 
 parts of the earth's surface and not to the 
 wide and deep ocean basins. 
 
 (2) Recent explorations of the bottom of 
 the deep sea all over the world have brought 
 additional light to this question. No part of 
 the results obtained by the Challenger Expe- 
 dition has a profounder interest for geologists 
 and geographers than the proof which they 
 furnish that the floor of the ocean basins has 
 no real analogy among the sedimentary for- 
 mations that form most of the framework 
 of the land. We now know by actual 
 dredging and inspection that the ordinary 
 
 sediment washed off the land sinks to the 
 sea-bottom before it reaches the deeper 
 abysses, and that, as a rule, only the finer 
 particles are carried more than a few scores 
 of miles from the shore. Instead of such 
 sandy and pebbly material as we find so 
 largely among the sedimentary rocks of the 
 land, wide tracts of the sea-bottom at great 
 depths are covered with various kinds of or. 
 ganic ooze, composed sometimes of minute 
 calcareous foraminifera, sometimes of silice- 
 ous radiolaria or diatoms. Over other areas 
 vast sheets of clay extend, derived apparently 
 from the decomposition of volcanic detritus, 
 of which large quantities are floated away 
 from volcanic islands, and much of which 
 may be produced by submarine volcanoes. 
 On the tracts farthest removed from any land 
 the sediment seems to settle scarcely so 
 rapidly as the dust that gathers over the floor 
 of a deserted hall. Mr. Murray, of the Chal- 
 lenger staff, has described how from these re- 
 mote depths large numbers of sharks' teeth 
 and ear-bones of whales were dredged up. 
 We cannot suppose the number of sharks 
 and whales to be much greater in these 
 regions than in others where their relics were 
 found much less plentifully. The explana- 
 tion of the abundance of their remains was 
 supplied by their varied condition of decay 
 and preservation. Some were comparatively 
 fresh, others had greatly decayed, and were 
 "ncrusted with or even completely buried in a 
 deposit of earthy manganese. Yet the same 
 cast of the dredge brought up these different 
 stages cf decay from the same surface of the 
 sea-floor. While generation after generation 
 of sea-creatures drops its bones to the bottom, 
 now here, now there, so exceedingly feeble is 
 the rate of deposit of sediment that they lie 
 uncovered, mayhap for centuries, so that the 
 remains which sink to-day may lie side by 
 side with the moldered and incrusted bones 
 that found their way to the bottom hundreds 
 of years ago. 
 
 Another striking indication of the very 
 slow rate at which sedimentation takes place 
 in these abysses has also been brought to no- 
 tice by Mr. Murray. In the clay from the 
 bottom he found numerous minute spherical 
 granules of native iron, which, as he sug- 
 gests, are almost certainly of meteoric origin 
 fragments of those falling stars which, 
 coming to us from planetary space, burst 
 into fragments when they rush into the 
 denser layers of our atmosphere. In tracts 
 where the growth of silt upon the sea-floor is 
 excessively tardy, the fine particles, scattered 
 by the dissipation of these meteorites, may 
 remain in appreciable quantity. In this case, 
 again, it is not needful to suppose that me- 
 teorites have disappeared over these ocean 
 depths more numerously than over other 
 parts of the earth's surface. The iron gran- 
 ules have no doubt been as plentifully show- 
 ered down elsewhere, though they cannot be 
 so readily detected in accumulating sediment.
 
 36 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 I know no recent observation in physical , rents of the subterranean rocks. We can 
 
 geography more calculated to impress deeply ' "- * u ~* * u ~ -~"- -' --* -* -- ' 
 
 the imagination than the testimony of this 
 presumably meteoric iron from the most dis- 
 tant abysses of the ocean. To be told that j 
 mud gathers on the floor of these abysses at ' 
 an extremely slow rate conveys but a vague 
 notion of the tardiness of the process. But 
 to learn that it gathers so slowly that the very 
 star-dust which falls from outer space forms 
 an appreciable part of it, brings home to us, 
 as hardly anything else could do, the idea of 
 undisturbed and excessively slow accumula- 
 
 tion. 
 
 From all this evidence we may legitimately 
 conclude that the present land of the globe, 
 though formed in gieat measure of marine 
 formations, has never lain under the deep 
 sea; but that its site must always have been 
 near land. Even its thick marine limestones 
 are the deposits of comparatively shallow 
 water. Whether or not any trace of aborig- 
 inal land may now be discoverable, the char- 
 acters of the most unequivocally marine for- 
 
 mations bear emph 
 
 testimony to this 
 
 proximity of a terrestrial surface. The pres- 
 ent continental ridges have probably always 
 existed in some form, and as a corollary we 
 may infer that the present deep ocean basins 
 likewise date from the remotest geological 
 antiquity. 
 
 2. Crystalline. While the greater part 
 of the framework of the land has been slowly 
 built up of sedimentary mater.als, it is abun- 
 dantly varied by the occurrence of crystalline 
 masses, many of which have been injected in 
 a molten condition into rents underground, 
 or have been poured out in lava-streams at 
 the surface. 
 
 Without entering at all into geological de- 
 tail, it will be enough for the present pur- 
 pose to recognize the characters and origin 
 of two great types of crystalline material 
 which have been called respectively the Erup- 
 tive and Metatnorphic. 
 
 (a) Eruptive. As the name denotes, 
 Eruptive or Igneous rocks have been 
 
 ejected 
 
 earth. 
 
 from the heated interior of the 
 In a modern volcano lava as- 
 
 cends the central funnel, and issuing from 
 the lips of the crater or from lateral fissures 
 pours down the slopes of the cone in 
 sheets of melted rock. The upper surface of 
 the lava column within the volcano is kept in 
 constant ebullition by the rise of steam 
 through its mass. Every now and then a 
 vast body of steam rushes out with a terrific 
 explosion, scattering the melted lava into im- 
 palpable dust, and filling the air with ashes 
 and stones, which descend in showers upon 
 the surrounding country. At the surface, 
 therefore, igneous rocks appear, partly 
 as masses of congealed lava, and par.ly as 
 more or less consolidated sheets of dust and 
 stones. But beneath the surface there must 
 be a downward prolongation of the lava col- 
 umn, which no doubt sends out veins into 
 
 suppose that the general aspect of the lava 
 which consolidates at some depth will difter 
 from that which solidifies above ground. 
 
 As a result of the revolutions which the 
 crust of the earth has undergone, tie roots 
 of many ancient volcanoes have been laid 
 bare. We have been, as it were : admitted 
 into the secrets of these subterranean labora- 
 tories of nature, and have learned much re- 
 garding the mechanism of volcanic action 
 which we could never have discovered from 
 any modern volcano. Thus, while on the 
 one hand we meet with beds of lava and con- 
 solidated volcanic ashes which were undoubt- 
 edly erupted at the surface of the ground in 
 ancient periods, and were subsequently 
 buried deep beneath sedimentary accumula- 
 tions now removed, on the other hand we 
 find masses of igneous rock which certainly 
 never came near the surface, but must have 
 been arrested in their ascent from below 
 while still at a great depth, and have been 
 laid bare to the light after the removal of the 
 pile of rock under which they originally lay. 
 
 By noting these and other characters, geol- 
 ogists have learnt that, besides the regions 
 of still active volcanoes, there are few large 
 areas of the earth's surface where proofs of 
 former volcanic action or of the protrusion of 
 igneous rocks may not be found. The crust 
 of the earth, crumpled and fissured, has 
 been, so to speak, perforated and cemented to- 
 gether by molten matter driven up from below. 
 
 (b) Metamorphic. The sedimentary rocks 
 of the land have undergone many changes 
 since their formation, some of which are still 
 far from being satisfactorily accounted for. 
 One of these changes is expressed by the 
 term Metamorphism, and the rocks which 
 have undergone this process are called Meta- 
 morphic. It seems to have taken place under 
 widely varied conditions, being sometimes 
 confined to small local tracts, at other times 
 extending across a large portion of a conti- 
 nent. It consists in the rearrangement of 
 the component materials of rocks, and nota- 
 bly in their recrystallization along particular 
 lines or laminae. It is usually associated 
 with evidence of great pressure ; the rocks in 
 which it occurs having been corrugated and 
 crumpled, not only in vast folds, which ex- 
 tend across whole mountains, but even in 
 such minute puckerings as can only be ob- 
 served with the microscope. It shows itself 
 more particularly among the older geological 
 formations, or those which have been once 
 deeply buried under more recent masses of 
 
 ;k, and have been exposed as the result ol 
 the removal of these overlying accumulations. 
 The original characters of the sandstones, 
 shales, grits, conglomerates, and limestones, 
 of which, no doubt, these metamorphic 
 masses once consisted, have been more or less 
 effaced, and have given place to that pecu- 
 liar crystalline laminated or foliated structure 
 so distinctively a result of metamorphism.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 An attentive examination of a metamor 
 phic region shows that here and there th< 
 alteration and recrystallization have pro- 
 ceeded so far that the rocks graduate into 
 granites and other so-called igneous rocks 
 A series of specimens may be collected show- 
 ing unaltered or at least quite recognizable 
 sedimentary rocks at the one end, and 
 thoroughly crystalline igneous rocks at the 
 other. Thus the remarkable fact is brought 
 home to the mind that ordinary sandstones, 
 shales, and other sedimentary materials may 
 in the course of ages be converted by under- 
 ground changes into crystalline granite. The 
 framework of the land, besides being knit 
 together by masses of igneous rock intruded 
 from below, has been strengthened by the 
 welding and crystallization of its lowest rocks. 
 It is these rocks which rise along the central 
 crests of mountain chains, where, after the 
 lapse of ages, they have been uncovered and 
 laid bare, to be bleached and shattered by 
 frost and storm. 
 
 ii. The Architecture of the Land, 
 
 Let us now proceed to consider how these 
 materials, sedimentary and crystalline, have 
 been put together, so as to constitute the solid 
 land of the globe. 
 
 It requires but a cursory examination to 
 observe that the sedimentary masses have 
 not been huddled together at random; that, 
 on the contrary, they have been laid down in 
 sheets, one over the other. An arrangement 
 of this kind at once betokens a chronological 
 sequence. The rocks cannot all have 
 been formed simultaneously. Those at 
 the bottom must have been laid 
 down before those at the top. A 
 truism of this kind seems hardly to require 
 formal statement. Yet it lies at the very 
 foundation of any attempt to trace the geo- 
 logical history of a country. Did the rocks 
 everywhere lie undisturbed one above another 
 as they were originally laid down, their clear or- 
 der of succession would carry with it its own 
 evident interpretation. But such have been the 
 changes that have arisen, partly from the 
 operation of forces from below, partly from 
 that of forces acting on the surface, that the 
 true order of a series of rocks ; s not always 
 so easily determined. By starting, however, 
 from where the succession is normal and un- 
 broken, the geologist can advance with con- 
 fidence into regions where it has been com- 
 pletely interrupted ; where the rocks have 
 been shattered, crumpled, and even inverted. 
 
 The clue which guides us through these 
 labyrinths is a very simple one. It is afforded 
 by the remains of once living plants and ani- 
 mals, which have been preserved in the rocky 
 framework of the land. Each well-marked 
 series of sedimentary accumulations contains 
 its own characteristic plants, corals, crusta- 
 ceans, shells, fishes, or other organic remains. 
 By these it can be identified and traced from 
 country to country across a whole continent. 
 
 When, therefore, the true order of superposi. 
 tion of the rocks has been ascertained by ob- 
 serving how they lie upon each other, the 
 succession of their fossils is at the same 
 time fixed. In this w^y the sedimentary 
 part of the earth's crust has been classified 
 into different formations, each characterized 
 by its distinct assemblage of organic remains. 
 In the most recent formations, most of these 
 remains are identical with still living species 
 of plants and animals; but as we descend in 
 the series and come into progressively older 
 deposits the proportion of existing species 
 diminishes, until at last all the species of fos- 
 sils are found to be extinct. Still lower and 
 older rocks reveal types and assemblages 
 of organisms which depart farther and farther 
 from the existing order. 
 
 By noting the fossil contents of a forma- 
 tion, therefore, even in a district where the 
 rocks have been so disturbed that their se- 
 quence is otherwise untraceable, the geologist 
 can confidently assign their relative position 
 o each of the fractured masses. He knows, 
 or instance, using for our present purpose 
 he letters of the alphabet to denote the se- 
 quence of the formations, that a mass of lime- 
 stone containing fossils typical of the forma- 
 ion B must be younger than another mass of 
 ock containing the fossils of A. A series of 
 itrata full of the fossils of H resting imme- 
 diately on others charged with those of C, 
 must evidently be separated from these by a 
 jreat gap, elsewhere filled in by the interven- 
 ng formations D, E, F, G. Nay, should the 
 ocks in the upper part of a mountain be re- 
 )lete with the fossils proper to D, while those 
 n the lower slopes showed only the fossils of 
 2, F and G, it could be demonstrated that 
 s materials o the mountain had actually 
 >een turned upside down, for, as proved by 
 ts organic, remains, the oldest, and therefore 
 owest, formation had come to lie at the top, 
 and the youngest, and therefore highest, at 
 he bottom. 
 
 Of absolute chronology in such questions 
 science can as yet give no measure How 
 nany millions of years each formation may 
 lave required for its prodaction, and how far 
 jack in time may be the era of any given 
 jroup of fossils, are problems to which no 
 answer, other than a mere guess, can be re- 
 urned. But this is a matter of far less 
 moment than the relative chronology, which 
 :an usually be accurately fixed for each coun- 
 ry, and on which all attempts to trace back 
 he history of the land must be based. 
 
 While, then, it is true that most of the ma- 
 
 erials of the solid land have been laid down 
 
 t successive periods under the sea, and that 
 
 he relative dates of their deposition can be 
 
 etermined, it is no less certain that the for- 
 
 lation of these materials has not proceeded 
 
 ninterruptedly, and that they have not 
 
 nally been raised into Land by a single 
 
 movement. The mere fact that thej' are of 
 
 marine origin shows, of course, that the lant'
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 owes its origin to some kind of terrestrial 
 cnsturbance. But when the sedimentary for- 
 mations are examined in detail, they present 
 a most wonderful chronicle of long-continued, 
 oft-repeated, and exceedingly complex move- 
 ments of the crust of the globe. They show 
 that the history of every country has been 
 long and eventful ; that, in short, hardly any 
 portion of the land has reached its present 
 condition, save after a protracted series of 
 geological revolutions. 
 
 One of the most obvious and not the least 
 striking features in the architecture of the 
 land is the frequency with which the rocks, 
 though originally horizontal, or approximate- 
 ly so, have been tilted up at various angles, 
 or even placed on end. At first it might be 
 supposed that these disturbed positions have 
 been assumed at random, according to the 
 capricious operatiots of subterranean forces. 
 They seem to follow no order, and to defy 
 any attempt to reduce them to system. Yet 
 a closer scrutiny serves to establish a real 
 connection among them. They are found, 
 for the most part, to belong to great, though 
 fractured, curves, into which the crust of the 
 earth has been folded. In low countries, far 
 removed from any great mountain range, 
 the rocks often present scarcely a trace of dis- 
 turbance, or if they have been affected, it is 
 chiefly by having been thrown into gentle 
 undulations. As we approach the higher 
 grounds, however, they manifest increasing 
 signs of commotion. Their undulations be- 
 come more frequent and steeper, until, enter- 
 ing within the mountain region, we find the 
 rocks curved, crumpled, fractured, inverted, 
 tossed over each other into yawning gulf and 
 towering crest, like billows arrested at the 
 height of a furious storm. 
 
 Yet even in the midst of such apparent 
 chaos it is not impossible to trace the funda- 
 mental law and order by which it is underlaid. 
 The prime fact to be noted is the universal 
 plication and crumpling of rocks which were 
 at first nearly horizontal. From the gentle 
 undulations of the strata beneath the plains 
 to their violent contortion and inversion among 
 the mountains, there is that insensible grada- 
 tion which connects the whole of these dis- 
 turbances as parts of one common process. 
 They cannot be accounted for by any mere 
 local movements, though such movements no 
 doubt took place abundantly. The existence, 
 of a mountain chain is not to be explained by 
 a special upheaval or series of upheavals 
 caused by an expansive force acting from 
 below. Manifestly the elevation is only one 
 phase of a vast terrestrial movement which 
 has extended over whole continents, and has 
 affected plains as well as high grounds. 
 
 The only cause which, so far as our present 
 knowledge goes, could have produced such 
 widespread changes is a general contraction 
 of the earth's mass. There can be no doubt 
 that at one time our planet existed in a gase- 
 ?us, then in a liquid condition. Since these 
 
 i early periods it has continued to lose heat, 
 and consequently to contract and to grow 
 more and more solid, until, as the physicists 
 insist, it has now become practically as rigid 
 as a globe of glass or of steel. But in the 
 course of the contraction, after the solid ex- 
 ternal crust was formed, the inner hot nucleus 
 has lost heat more rapidly than the crust, and 
 has tended to shrink inward from it. As a 
 consequence of this internal movement, the 
 outer solid shell has sunk down upon the re- 
 treating nucleus. In so doing, it has of course 
 had to accommodate itself to a diminished 
 area, and this it could only accomplish by 
 undergoing plication and fracture. Though 
 the analogy is not a very exact one, we may 
 liken our globe to a shriveled apple. The 
 skin of the apple does not contract equally. 
 As the internal moisture passes off, and the 
 bulk of the fruit is .reduced, the once smooth 
 exterior becomes here and there corrugated 
 and dimpled. 
 
 Without entering into this difficult problem 
 in physical geology, it may suffice if we carry 
 with us the idea that our globe must once 
 have had a greater diameter than it now pos- 
 sesses, and that the crumpling of its outer 
 layers, whether due to mere contraction or, 
 as has been suggested, to the escape also of 
 subterranean vapors, affords evidence of this 
 diminution. A little reflection suffices to 
 show us that, even without any knowledge of 
 the actual history of the contraction, we might 
 anticipate that the effects would neither be 
 continuous nor everywhere uniform. The 
 solid crust would not, we may be sure, sub- 
 side as fast as the mass inside. It would, for 
 a time at least, cohere and support itself, un- 
 til at last, gravitation proving too much for 
 its strength, it would sink down. And the 
 areas and amount of descent would be greatly 
 regulated by the varying thickness and struc- 
 ture of the crust. Subsidence would not 
 take place everywhere ; for, as a consequence 
 of the narrower space into which the crust 
 sank, some regions would necessarily be 
 pushed up. These conditions appear to have 
 been fulfilled in the past history of the earth. 
 There is evidence that the terrestrial disturb- 
 ance has been renewed again and again, after 
 long pauses, and that, while the ocean basins 
 have on the whole been the great areas of de- 
 pression, the continents have been the lines 
 of uprise or relief, where the rocks were 
 crumpled and pushed out of the way. Para- 
 doxical, therefore, as the statement may ap- 
 pear, it is nevertheless strictly true, that the 
 solid land, considered with reference to the 
 earth's surface as a whole, is the consequence 
 of subsidence rather than of upheaval. 
 
 Grasping, then, this conception of the real 
 character of the movements to which the earth 
 owes its present surface configuration, we are 
 furnished with fresh light for exploring the 
 ancient history and growth of the solid land. 
 The great continental ridges seem to lie 
 nearly on the site of the earliest lines of relief
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 39 
 
 from the strain of contraction. They were 
 forced up between the subsiding oceanic 
 basins at a very early period of geological 
 history. In each succeeding epoch of move- 
 ment they were naturally used over again, 
 and received an additional push upward. 
 Hence we see the meaning of the evidence 
 supplied by the sedimentary rocks as to shal- 
 low seas and proximity of land. These rocks 
 could not have been otherwise produced. 
 They were derived from the waste of the 
 land, and were deposited near the land. For 
 it must be borne in mind that every mass of 
 land as soon as it appeared above water was 
 at once attacked by the ceaseless erosion of 
 moving water and atmospheric influences, 
 and immediately began to furnish materials 
 for the construction of future lands to be 
 afterward raised out of the sea. 
 
 Each great period of contraction elevated 
 anew the much-worn land, and at the same 
 time brought the consolidated marine sedi- 
 ments above water as parts of a new terres- 
 trial surface. Again a long interval would 
 ensue, marked perhaps by a slow subsidence 
 both of the land and sea-bottom. Meanwhile 
 the surface of the land was channeled and 
 lowered, and its detritus was spread over the 
 sea-floor, until another era of disturbance 
 raised it once more with a portion of the sur- 
 rounding ocean-bed. These successive up- 
 ward and downward movements explain why 
 the sedimentary formations do not occur as a 
 continuous series, but often lie each upon the 
 upturned and worn edges of its predecessors. 
 
 Returning now to the chronological se- 
 quence indicated by the organic remains pre- 
 served among the sedimentary rocks, we see 
 how it may be possible to determine the rela- 
 tive order of the successive upheavals of a 
 continent. If, for example, a group of rocks, 
 which as before may be called A, were found 
 to have been upturned and covered over by 
 undisturbed beds C, the disturbance could 
 be affirmed to have occurred at some part of 
 the epoch represented elsewhere by the miss- 
 ing series B. If, again, the group C were 
 observed to have been subsequently tilted, 
 and to pass under the gently-inclined or hori- 
 zontal strata E, a second period of disturb- 
 ance could be proved to have occurred be- 
 tween the time of C and E. 
 
 I have referred to the unceasing destruction 
 of its surface which the land undergoes from 
 the time when it emerges out of the sea. As 
 a rule, our conceptions of the rate of this 
 degradation are exceedingly vague. Yet they 
 may be easily made more definite by a con- 
 sideration of present changes on the surface 
 of the land. Every river carries yearly to 
 the sea an immense amount of sand and mud. 
 But this amount is capable of measurement. 
 It represents, of course, the extent to which 
 the general level of the surface of the river's 
 drainage basin is annually lowered. Accord- 
 ing to such measurements and computations 
 as have been already made, it appears that 
 
 somewhere about one-sixthousandth of a foot 
 is every year removed from the surface of ks 
 drainage basin by a large river. This seems 
 a small fraction, yet by the power of mere 
 addition it soon mounts up to a large total. 
 Taking the mean level of Europe to be 600 
 feet, its surface, if everywhere worn away at 
 what seems to be the present mean normal 
 rate, would be entirely reduced to the sea- 
 level in a little more than three and a half 
 millions of years. 
 
 But of course the waste is not uniform 
 over the whole surface. It is greatest on 
 the slopes and valleys, least on the more 
 level grounds. A few years ago, in making 
 some estimates of the ratios between the rates 
 of wast on these areas, I assumed that the 
 tracts of more rapid erosion occupy only one- 
 ninth of the whole surface affected, and that 
 in these the rate of destruction is nine times 
 greater than on the more level spaces. Tak- 
 ing these proportions, and granting that 
 one-sixthousandth of a foot is the actual ascer- 
 :ained amount of loss from the whole surface, 
 we learn by a simple arithmetical process that 
 one-twelfth of an inch is carried away from 
 the plains and table-lands in seventy-five 
 years, while the same amount is worn out of 
 the valleys in eight and a half years. One 
 foot must be removed from the former in 
 10,800 years, and from the latter in 1,200 
 years. Hence, at the present rate of erosion, 
 a valley 1,000 feet deep may be excavated in 
 1,200,000 years by no means a very long 
 period in the conception of most geologists. 
 
 I do not offer these figures as mbre than 
 tentative results. They are based, however, 
 not on mere guesses, but on data which, 
 though they may be co- reeled by subsequent 
 inquiry, are the best at present available, and 
 are probably not far from the truth. They 
 are of value in enabling us more vividly to 
 realize how the prodigious waste of the land, 
 proved by the existence of such enormous 
 masses of sedimentary rock, went quietly on 
 age after age, until results were achieved 
 which seem at first scarcely possible to so slow 
 and gentle an agency. 
 
 It is during this quiet process of decay and 
 removal that all the distinctive minor features 
 of the land are wrought out. When first 
 elevated from the sea, the land doubtless 
 presents on the whole a comparatively feature- 
 less surface. It may be likened to a block 
 of marble raised out of the quarry rough 
 and rude in outline, massive in solidity and 
 strength, but giving no indication of the 
 grace into which it will grow under the hand 
 of the sculptor. What are the effects upon 
 the marble block, nature accomplishes upon 
 the surface of the land. Her tools are many 
 and varied air, frost rain, springs, torrents, 
 rivers, avalanches, glaciers, and the sea 
 each producing its own characteristic traces 
 in the sculpture. With these implements, 
 out of the huge bulk of the land, she cuts the 
 valleys and ravines, scoops the lake-basins,
 
 40 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 hews with bold hand the colossal outlines of 
 the mountains, carves out peak and crag, 
 crest and cliff, chisels the courses of the tor- 
 rents, splinters the sides of the precipices, 
 spreads out the alluvium of the rivers, and 
 piles up the moraines of the glaciers. 
 Patiently and unceasingly has this great 
 earth-sculptor sat at her task since the land 
 first rose above the sea, washing down into 
 the ocean the debris of her labor, to form the 
 materials for the framework of future 
 countries ; and there she will remain at work 
 so long as mountains stand, and rain falls, 
 and rivers flow. 
 
 II. THE GROWTH OF THE EUROPEAN 
 CONTINENT. 
 
 Passing now from the general principles with 
 which we have hitherto been dealing, we may 
 seek an illustration of their application to the 
 actual history of a large mass of land. For 
 this purpose let me ask your attention to 
 some of the more salient features in the 
 gradual growth of Europe. This continent 
 has not the simplicity of structure elsewhere 
 recognizable ; but without entering into de- 
 tail or following a continuous sequence of 
 events, our present purpose will be served by 
 a few broad outlines of the condition of the 
 European area at successive geological pe- 
 riods. 
 
 It is the fate of continents, no less than of 
 the human communities that inhabit them, to 
 have their first origin shrouded in obscurity. 
 When the curtain of darkness begins to rise 
 from our primeval Europe, it reveals to us a 
 scene marvelously unlike that of the existing 
 continent. The land then lay chiefly to the 
 north and northwest, probably extending as 
 far as the edge of the great submarine pla- 
 teau by which the European ridge is prolonged 
 under the Atlantic for 230 miles to the west 
 of Ireland. Worn fragments of that land 
 exist in Finland, Scandinavia, and the north- 
 west of Scotland, and there are traces of 
 what seem to have been some detached is- 
 lands in Central Europe, notably in Bohemia 
 and Bavaria. Its original height and extent 
 can of course never be known ; but some idea 
 of them may be formed by considering the 
 bulk of solid rock which was formed out of 
 the waste of that land. I find that if we take 
 merely one portion of the detritus washed 
 from its surface and laid down in the sea 
 viz., that which is comprised in what is termed 
 the Silurian system and if we assume that 
 it spreads over 60,000 square miles of Britain 
 with an average thickness of 16,000 feet, or 3 
 miles, which is probably under the truth, 
 then we obtain the enormous mass of 180,000 
 cubic miles. The magnitude of this pile of 
 material may be better realized if we reflect 
 that it would form a mountain ridge three 
 times as long as the Alps, or from the North 
 Cape to Marseilles (1,800), with a breadth of 
 more than 33 miles, and an average height 
 
 of 16,000 feet that is, higher th-.n the sum- 
 mit of Mount Blanc. All this vast pile of 
 sedimentary rock was worn from the slopes 
 and shores of the primeval northern land. 
 Yet it represents but a small fraction of the 
 material so removed, for the sea of that an- 
 cient time spread over nearly the whole of 
 Europe eastward into Asia, and everywhere 
 received a tribute of sand and mud from the 
 adjoining shores. 
 
 There is perhaps no mass of rock so strik- 
 ing in its general aspect as that of which this 
 northern embryo of Europe consisted. It 
 lacks the variety of composition, structure, 
 color, and form, which distinguishes rocks of 
 more modern growth ; but in dignity of 
 massive strength it stands altogether unrivaled. 
 From the headlands of the Hebrides to the 
 far fjords of Arctic Norway it rises up grim 
 and defiant of the elements. Its veins of 
 quartz, feldspar, and hornblende project from 
 every boss and crag like the twisted and 
 knotted sinews of a magnificent torso. Well 
 does the old gneiss of the north deserve to 
 have been made the foundation-stone of a 
 continent. 
 
 What was the character of the vegetation 
 that clothed this earliest prototype of Europe 
 is a question to which at present no definite 
 answer is possible. We know, however, that 
 the shallow sea which spread from the Atlan- 
 tic southward and eastward over most of 
 Europe was tenanted by an abundant and 
 characteristic series of invertebrate animals 
 trilobites, graptolites, cystideans.brachiopods, 
 and cephalopods, strangely unlike, on the 
 whole, to anything living in our waters now, 
 but which then migrated freely along the 
 shores of the Arctic land between what are 
 now America and Europe. 
 
 The floor of this shallow sea continued to 
 sink, until over Britain, at least, it had gone 
 down several miles. Yet the water remained 
 shallow because the amount of sediment con- 
 stantly poured into it from the northwest 
 filled it up about as fast as the bottom sub- 
 sided. Tnis slow subterranean movement 
 was varied by uprisings here and there, and 
 notably by the outburst at successive periods 
 of a great group of active submarine volca- 
 noes over Wales, the Lake district, and the 
 south of Ireland ; but at the close of the 
 Silurian period a vast series of disturbances 
 took place, as the consequence of which the 
 first rough outlines of the European conti- 
 nent were blocked out. The floor of the sea 
 was raised into long ridges of land, among 
 which were some on the site of the Alps, the 
 Spanish peninsula, and the hills of the west 
 and north of Britain. The thick mass of 
 marine sediment was crumpled up, and here 
 and there even converted into hard crystal- 
 line rock. Large inclosed basins, gradually 
 cut off from the sea, like the modern Cas- 
 pian and Sea of Aral, extended from beyond 
 the west of Ireland across to Scandinavia and 
 even into the west of Russia. These lakes
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 abounded in bone-covered fishes of strange 
 and now long-extinct types, while the land 
 around was clothed with a club-moss and 
 reed-like vegetation Psilophyton, Sigillaria, 
 Calami te, etc. the oldest terrestrial flora of 
 which any abundant records have yet been 
 found in Europe. The sea, dotted with 
 numerous islands, appears to have covered 
 most of the heart of the continent. 
 
 A curious fact deserves to be noticed here. 
 During the convulsions by which the sedi- 
 ments of the Silurian sea-floor were crumpled 
 up, crystallized, and elevated into land, the 
 area of Russia seems to have remained nearly 
 unaffected. Not only so, but the same im- 
 munity from violent disturbance has pre- 
 vailed over that vast territory during all sub- 
 sequent geological periods. The Ural 
 Mountains on the east have again and again 
 served as a line of relief, and have been from 
 time to time ridged up anew. The German 
 domains on the west have likewise suffered 
 extreme convulsion. But the wide interven- 
 ing plateau of Russia has apparently always 
 maintained its flatness either as sea-bottom 
 or as terrestrial plains. As I have already 
 remarked, there has been a remarkable per- 
 sistence alike in exposure to and immunity 
 from terrestrial disturbance. Areas that lay 
 along lines of weakness have suffered re- 
 peatedly in successive geological revolutions, 
 while tracts outside of these regions of con- 
 vulsion have simply moved gently up or 
 down without material plication or fracture. 
 
 By the time of the coal growths, the aspect 
 of the European area had still further changed. 
 It then consisted of a series of low ridges or 
 islands in the midst of a shallow sea or of 
 wide salt-water lagoons. A group of islands 
 occupied the site of some of the exisiting 
 high grounds of Britain. A long, irregular 
 ridge ran across what is now France from 
 Brittany to the Mediterranean. The Spanish 
 peninsula stood as a detached island. The 
 future Alps rose as a long, low ridge, to the 
 north of the eastern edge of which lay another 
 insular space, where now we find the high 
 grounds of Bavaria and Bohemia. The shal- 
 low waters that wound among these scattered 
 patches of land were gradually silted up. 
 Many of them became marshes, crowded with 
 a most luxuriant cryptogamic vegetation, 
 specially of lycopods and ferns, while the dry 
 grounds waved green with coniferous trees. 
 By a slow intermittent subsidence, islet after 
 islet sank beneath the verdant swamps. Each 
 fresh depression submerged the rank jungles 
 and buried them under sand and mud, where 
 they were eventually compressed into coal. 
 To this united co-operation of dense vege- 
 table growth, accumulation of sediment, and 
 slow subterranean movement, Europe owes 
 her coal-fields. All this time the chief area 
 of high ground in Europe appears still to have 
 lain to the north and northwest. The old 
 gnarled gneiss of that region, though con- 
 stantly worn down and furnishing materials 
 
 toward each new formation, yet rose up as 
 land. It no doubt received successive eleva- 
 tions during the periods of disturbance, which 
 more or less compensated for the constant 
 loss from its surface. 
 
 The next scene we may contemplate brings 
 before us a series of salt lakes, covering the 
 center of the continent from the north of Ire- 
 land to the heart of Poland. These basins 
 were formed by the gradual cutting off of 
 portions of the sea which had spread over 
 the region. Their waters were red and 
 bitter, and singularly unfavorable to life. On. 
 the low intervening ridges a coniferous and 
 cycadaceous vegetation grew, sometimes in 
 quantity sufficient to supply materials for the 
 formation of coal seams. The largest of these 
 salt lakes stretched from the edge of the old 
 plateau of Central France along the base of 
 the Alpine ridge to the high ground of Bo- 
 hemia, and included the basin of the Rhine 
 from Bale down to the ridge beyond Mayence, 
 which has been subsequently cut through by 
 the river into the picturesque gorge between 
 Bingen and the Siebengebirge. This lake 
 was filled up with red sand and mud, lime- 
 stone, and beds of rock salt. Where the 
 eastern Alps now rise the opener waters were 
 the scene of a long-continued growth of dolo- 
 mite, out of which in later ages the famous- 
 dolomite mountains of the Tyrol were carved. 
 
 These salt lakes of the Triassic period seem 
 to have been everywhere quietly effaced by a 
 widespread depression, which allowed the 
 water of the main ocean once more to over- 
 spread the greater part of Europe. This slow 
 subsidence went on so long as to admit of 
 the accumulation of limestone, shale, and 
 sandstone, several thousand feet in thickness, 
 and probably to bring most of the insular 
 tracts of Central Europe under watef. To- 
 this period, termed by geologists the Jurassic, 
 we can trace back the origin of a large part 
 of the rock now forming the surface of the 
 continent, from the low plains of Central 
 England up to the crests of the northern Alps, 
 while in the Mediterranean basin, rocks of 
 the same age cover a large area of the pla- 
 teau of Spain, and form the central mass of 
 the chain of the Apennines. It is interesting 
 to know that the northwest of Britain con- 
 tinued still to rise as land in spite of all the 
 geographical changes which had taken place 
 to the south and east. We can trace even 
 yet the shores of the Jurassic sea along the 
 skirts of the mountains of Skye and Ross- 
 shire. 
 
 The next long era, termed the Cretaceous, 
 was likewise more remarkable for slow accu- 
 mulation of rock under the sea than for the 
 formation of new land. During that time 
 the Atlantic sent its waters across the whole 
 of Europe and into Asia. But they were 
 probably nowhere more than a few hundred, 
 feet deep over the site of our continent, even 
 at their deepest part. Upon their bottom 
 there gathered a vast mass of calcareous mud,
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 composed in great part of foramintfera, 
 corals, echinoderms, and mollusks. Our 
 English chalk which ranges across the north 
 of France, Belgium, Denmark, and the North 
 of Germany, represents a portion of the de- 
 posits of that sea-floor, probably accumulated 
 in a northern, somewhat isolated basin, while 
 the massive hippurite limestone of Southern 
 Europe represents the deposits of the opener 
 ocean. Some of the island spaces which had 
 remained for a vast period above water, and 
 had by their degradation supplied materials 
 for the sediment of successive geological 
 formations, now went down beneath the Cre- 
 taceous sea. The ancient high grounds of 
 Bohemia, the Alps, the Pyrenees, and the 
 Spanish table-land were either entirely sub- 
 merged, or at least had their area very con- 
 siderably reduced. The submergence like- 
 wise affected the northwest of Britain ; the 
 western highlands of Scotland lay more than 
 1,000 feet below their present level. 
 
 When we turn to the succeeding geological 
 period, that of the Eocene, the proofs of 
 widespread submergence are still more 
 striking. A large part of the Old World 
 seems to have sunk down ; for we find that 
 one wide sea extended across the whole of 
 Central Europe and Asia. It was at the close 
 of this period of extreme depression that 
 those subterranean movements be^an to 
 which the present configuration of Europe is 
 mainly due. The Pyrenees, Alps, Apen- 
 nines, Carpathians, the Caucasus, and the 
 heights of Asia Minor mark, as it were, the 
 crests of the vast earth-waves into wnich the 
 solid framework of Europe was then thrown. | 
 
 So enormous was the contortion that, as may j ting off the Pyrenees and Spain from the rest 
 be seen along the northern Alps, the rocks | of the continent. It swept round the north 
 for thousands of feet were completely in- I of France, covering the rich fields of Tou- 
 verted, this inversion being accompanied by i raine and the wide flats of the Netherlands. 
 
 than Europe now can boast. Palms of Amer- 
 ican types, as well as date palms, huge Cali- 
 fornian pines (Sequoia), laurels, cypresses, 
 and evergreen oaks, with many other ever- 
 green trees, gave a distinctive character to the 
 vegetation. Among the trees, too, were 
 planes, poplars, maples, willows, oaks, and 
 other ancestors of our living woods and for- 
 ests ; numerous ferns grew in the underwood, 
 while clematis and vine wound themselves 
 among the branches. The waters were 
 haunted by huge pachyderms, such as the 
 dinofherium and hippopotamus, while the 
 rhinoceros and mastodon roamed through the 
 woodlands. 
 
 A marked feature of this period in Europe 
 was the abundance and activity of its volca- 
 noes. In Hungary, Rhineland, and Central 
 France numerous vents opened and poured 
 out their streams of lava and showers of 
 ashes. From the south of Antrim, also, 
 through the west coast of Scotland, the 
 Faroe Islands, and Iceland, even far into 
 Arctic Greenland, a vast series of fissure 
 eruptions poured forth successive floods of 
 basalt, fragments of which now form the ex- 
 tensive volcanic plateaux of these regions. 
 
 The mild climate indicated by the vegeta- 
 tion in the deposits of the Swiss lake prevailed 
 even into Polar latitudes, for the remains of 
 numerous evergreen shrubs, oaks, maples, 
 walnuts, hazels, and many other trees have 
 been found in the far north of Greenland, and 
 even within 8 15' of the Pole. The sea 
 still occupied much of the lowlands of Eu- 
 rope. Thus it ran as a strait between the 
 Bay of Biscay and the Mediterranean, cut- 
 
 the most colossal folding and twisting. The 
 massive sedimentary formations were crum- 
 pled up and doubled over each other, as we 
 
 It rolled far up the plains of the Danube, and 
 stretched thence eastward across the south of 
 Russia into Asia. 
 
 light fold a pile of cloth. In tde midst of j By this time some of the species of shells 
 these commotions the west of Europe re- i which still people the European seas had ap- 
 mained undisturbed. It is strange to reflect : peared. So long have they been natives of 
 that the soft clays and sands under London i our area that they have witnessed the rise of a 
 are as old as some of the hardened rocks j great part of the continent. Some of the 
 which have been upheaved into such pictur- j most stupendous changes which they have 
 esque peaks along the northern flanks of the , seen have taken place in the basin of the 
 
 Alps. 
 
 Mediterranean, where, at a comparatively re- 
 
 After the completion of these vast terres- cent geological period, parts of the sea-floor 
 trial disturbances, the outlines of Europe be- were upheaved to a height of 3,000 feet. It 
 gan distinctly to shape themselves into their | was then that the breadth of the Italian penin- 
 present form. The Alps rose as a great sula was increased by the belt of lower hills 
 mountain range, flanked on fie north by a | that flanks the range of the Apennines. Then, 
 vast lake which covered all the present low- i too, Vesuvius and yEtna began their erup- 
 lands of Switzerland, and stretched north- i tions. Among these later geographical 
 ward across a part of the Jura Mountains, j events also we must place the gradual isolation 
 and eastward into Germany. The size of i of the Sea of Aral, the Caspian, and the Black 
 this fresh water basin may be inferred from j Sea from the rest of the ocean, which is be- 
 the fact that one portion only of the sand and j lieved to have once spread from the Arctic 
 gravel that accumulated in it even now meas- ' regions down the west of Asia, along the base 
 
 ures 6,000 feet in thickness. The surround- 
 ing land was densely clothed with a vegeta- 
 tion indicative of a much warmer climate 
 
 of the Ural Mountains into the southeast of 
 Europe. 
 The last scene in this long history is one
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 of the most unexpected of all. Europe, hav- I 
 ing nearly its present height and outlines, is I 
 found swathed deep in snow and ice. Scan- ' 
 dinavia and Finland are one vast sheet of 
 ice, that creeps down from the watershed 
 into the Atlantic on the one side, and into 
 the basin of the Baltic on the other. All the 
 high grounds of Great Britain are similarly 
 buried. The bed of the North Sea as well as 
 of the Baltic is in great measure choked with 
 ice. The Alps, the Pyreness, the Carpathians, 
 and the Caucasus send down vast glaciers 
 into the plains at their base. Northern plants 
 find their way south even to the Pyrenees, 
 while the reindeer, musk-ox, lemming, and 
 their Actic companions, roam far and wide 
 over France. 
 
 As a result of the prolonged passage of 
 solid masses of' ice over them, the rocks on 
 the surface of the continent, when once more 
 laid bars to the sun, present a worn, flowing 
 outline. They have been hollowed into 
 basins, ground smooth, and polished. Long 
 mounds and wide sheets of clay, gravel, and 
 sand have been left over the low grounds, and 
 the hollows between them are filled with in- 
 numerable tarns and lakes. Crowds of 
 boulders have been perched on the sides of 
 the hills and dropped over the plains. With 
 the advent of a milder temperature, the Arc- 
 cic vego.ation gradually disappears from the 
 plains. Driven up step by step before the 
 advancing flora from more congenial climates, 
 it retired into the mountains, and there to 
 this day'contiuues to maintain itself. The 
 present Alpine flora of the Pyrenees, the Alps, 
 Britain, and Scandinavia, is thus a living re- 
 cord of the ice-age. The reindeer and his 
 friends have long since been forced to return 
 to their northern homes 
 
 After this long succession of physical re- 
 volutions, man appears as a denizen of the 
 Europe thus prepared for him. The earliest 
 records of his presence reveal him as a fisher 
 and hunter, with rude flint-pointed spear ai d 
 harpoon. And doubtless for many a dim 
 century such was his condition. He made 
 no more impress on external nature than one 
 of the beasts which he chased. But in course 
 of time, as civilization grew, he asserted his 
 claim to be one of the geographical forces of 
 the globe. Not content with gathering the 
 fruits and capturing the animals which he found 
 needful for his wants, he gradually entered 
 into a contest with nature to subdue the 
 earth and to possess it. Nowhere has this 
 warfare been fought out so vigorously as 
 on the surface of Europe. On the one hand, 
 wide, dark regions of ancient forest have 
 given place to smiling cornfields. Peat and 
 moor have made way for pasture and tillage. 
 On the other hand, by the clearance of wood- 
 lands the rainfall has been so diminished 
 that drought and barrenness have spread 
 where verdu e anJ luxuriance once pre 
 vailed. Rivers have been straightened and 
 made to keep their channels, the sea has 
 
 been barred back from its former shores. 
 For many generations the surface of the con- 
 tinent has been covered with roads, villages 
 and towns, bridges, aqueducts and canals, 
 to which this century has added a multitu- 
 dinous network of railways, with their em- 
 bankments and tunnels. In short, wherever 
 man has lived the ground beneath him bears 
 witness to his presence. It is slowly covered 
 with a stratum either wholly formed by him 
 or due in great measure to his operations. 
 The soil under old cities has been increased 
 to a depth of many feet by the rubbish of 
 his buildings ; the level of the streets 
 of modern Rome stands high above 
 that of the pavements of the Caesars, 
 and that again above the roadways of the 
 early Republic. Over cultivated fields his 
 potsherds are turned up in abundance by the 
 plow. The loam has risen within the 
 walls of his graveyards as generation after 
 generation has moldered into dust. 
 
 ltmust.be owned that man, in much of 
 his struggle with the world around him, has 
 fought blindly for his own ultimate interests. 
 His contest, successful for the moment, has 
 too often led to sure and sad disaster. 
 Stripping forests from hill and mountain, he 
 has gained hi; immediate object in the pos- 
 session of their abundant stores of timber ; 
 but he has laid open the slopes to be parched 
 by drought, or swept bare by rain. Countries 
 once rich in beauty, and plenteous in all that 
 was needful for his support, are now burnt 
 and barren, or almost denuded of their soil. 
 Gradually he has been taught, by his own 
 bitter experience, that while his aim still is 
 to subdue the earth, he can attain it, not by 
 setting nature and her laws at defiance, but 
 by enlisting them in his service. He has 
 learnt at last to be the minister and in- 
 terpreter of nature, and he finds in her a 
 ready and unrepining slave. 
 
 In fine, looking back across the long 
 cycles of change through which the land has 
 been shaped into its present form, let us 
 realize that these geographical revolutions 
 are not events wholly of the dim past, but 
 that they are still in progress. So slow and 
 measured has been their march, that even 
 from the earliest times of human history 
 they seem hardly to have advanced at all. 
 But none the less are they surely and steadily 
 transpiring around us. In the fall of rain 
 and the flow of rivers, in the bubble of 
 springs and the silence of frost, in the quiet 
 creep of glaciers and the tumultuous rush of 
 ocean waves, in the tremor of the earthquake 
 and the outburst of the volcano, we may 
 recognize the same play of terrestrial forces 
 by which the framework of the continents 
 has been step by step evolved. In this light 
 the familar phenomena of our daily ex- 
 perience acquire an historical interest and 
 dignity. Through them \ve are enabled to 
 bring the remote past vivid'y before us, and 
 to look forward hopefully to that great future
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 in which, in the physical not less than in th 
 moral world, man is to be a fellow-worke 
 with God. 
 
 VII. 
 
 THE GEOLOGICAL INFLUENCE 
 WHICH HAVE AFFECTED TH] 
 COURSE OF BRITISH HISTORY. 
 
 Probably few readers realize to how larg 
 an extent the events of history have been in 
 fluenced by the geological structure of th 
 ground whereon they have been enacted, 
 propose to illustrate this influence from som 
 of the more salient features in the early hu 
 man occupation of the British Islands, and in 
 the subsequent historical progress of th 
 English people. No better proof of the 
 reality of the relation in question could be 
 given than the familiar contrast between thi 
 heart of England and the heart of Scotland 
 The one area is a region of low plains, in 
 .abited by an English-speaking race ; richly 
 agricultural in one part, teeming with a busy 
 mining population in another ; dotted with 
 large cities ; the air often foul from the smoke 
 of thousands of chimneys, and resonant with 
 the clanking of innumerable manufactories 
 and the screams of locomotives flying hither 
 and thither over a network of railways. The 
 other region is one of rugged mountains and 
 narrow glens tenanted by a Celtic race that, 
 keeping to its old Gaelic tongue and primitive 
 habits, has never built towns, hardly even 
 villages a region partly devoted to pasture 
 and still haunted by the game and wild ani- 
 mals of primeval times, but with no industrial 
 centers, no manufactures of any kind, and 
 only a feeble agriculture that struggles for 
 existence along the bottoms of the valleys. 
 Now, why should two parts of the same small 
 country differ so widely from each other? 
 To give a complete answer to the question 
 would of course involve a detailed examina- 
 tion of the history of each area. But we 
 should find that fundamentally the differences 
 have arisen from the originally utterly dis- 
 tinct geological structure of the two regions. 
 This diversity of structure initiated the di- 
 vergences in human characteristics even in 
 far prehistoric times, and it continues, even 
 in spite of the blending influences of modern 
 civilization, to maintain them down to the 
 present day. 
 
 Let us first briefly consider what was the 
 probable condition of Britain at the time 
 when the earliest human beings appeared in 
 the country. At that ancient epoch there 
 can be no doubt that the British Islands still 
 formed part of the mainland of Continental 
 Europe. There is reason to believe that the 
 
 >*n I of r the Ct ry LeCtUre at the - P enin . f the ses - 
 
 general level of these islands may have been 
 considerably higher than it has been since. 
 From the shape of the bottom of the Atlantic 
 immediately to the west of our area, as re- 
 vealed by the abundant soundings and dredg- 
 ings of recent years, it is evident that if the 
 British Islands were now raised even 1,000 
 feet or more above their present level, they 
 would not thereby gain more than a belt of 
 lowland somewhere about 200 miles broad on 
 their western border. They stand, in fact, 
 nearly upon the edge of the great European 
 plateau which, about 230 miles to the west 
 of them, plunges rapidly down into the 
 abysses of the Atlantic. It is perfectly cer- 
 tain, therefore, that though our area was for- 
 merly prolonged westward beyond its present 
 limits, there has never been any important 
 mass of land to the west of us in recent 
 geological times, or within what we call the 
 luman period, probably never at any geolog- 
 cal epoch at all. Every successive wave of 
 migration, whether of plant or of animal, 
 must have come from the other or eastern 
 ide. But though our country could never 
 lave stretched much beyond its present west- 
 ward limits, it once undoubtedly spread east- 
 ~ard over the site of what is now the North 
 
 ea. Even at the present day, an elevation 
 )f less than six hundred feet would convert 
 he whole of that sea into dry land from the 
 orth of Shetland to the headlands of Brit- 
 iny. At the time when these wide plains 
 nited Britain to the mainland, the Thames 
 ras no doubt a tributary of the Rhine, which, 
 n its course northward, may have received 
 ther affluents from the east of Britain before 
 t poured its waters into the Atlantic some- 
 
 here between the heights of Shetland and the 
 mountainous coasts of Southern Norway. 
 
 There is evidence of remarkable oscillations 
 f climate .- 1 the epoch of the advent of man 
 nto this part of Europe. A time of intense 
 old, known as the Ice Age or Glacial Period, 
 as drawing to a close. Its glaciers, frozen 
 vers and lakes, and floating icebergs, had 
 onverted most of Britain, and the whole of 
 Northern Europe, into a waste of ice and 
 now, such as North Greenland still is ; but 
 ic height of the cold was past, and th *e 
 ow came intervals of milder seasons, wh> \ 
 
 e wintry mant'^ wfes withdrawn northward 
 o as to allow the fetation and the roaming 
 nimals of more ten.^ -rate latitudes to spread 
 estward into Britain. From time to time a 
 enewal of the cold once more sent down the 
 " ciers into the valleys or even into the sea, 
 oze the rivers over in winter, and allowed 
 ic Arctic flora and fauna again to migrate 
 mthward into tracts from which the temper- 
 e plants and animals were forced by the 
 creasing cold to retreat. At last, however, 
 ic Arctic conditions of climate ceased to re- 
 ppear, and the Arctic vegetation, with its 
 companying reindeer, musk-sheep, lem- 
 ing, Arctic fox, glutton, and other northern 
 nimals, retreated from our low grounds.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 Of these ancient chilly periods, however, the 
 Arctic plants still found on our mountain-tops 
 remain as living witnesses, for they are doubt- 
 less descendants of the northern vegetation 
 which overspread Britain when still part of 
 the continent, and before the arrival of our 
 present temperate flora and fauna. 
 
 Previous to the final retreat of the ice, the 
 alternating warmer intervals brought into 
 Britain many wild animals from wilder re- 
 gions to the south. Horses, stags, Irish 
 elks, roe deer, wild oxen, and bisons roamed 
 over the plains ; wild boars, three kinds of 
 rhinoceros, two kinds of elephant, brown 
 bears and grizzly bears, haunted the forests 
 The rivers were tenanted by the hippo- 
 potamus, beaver, otter, water-rat ; while 
 among the carnivora were wolves, foxes, 
 wild cats, hyenas, and lions. Many of these 
 animals must have moved in herds across the 
 plains, over which the North Sea now rolls. 
 Their bones have been dredged up in hun- 
 dreds by the fishermen from the surface of 
 the Dogger-Bank. 
 
 Such were the denizens of southern Eng- 
 land when man made his first appearance 
 there. It seems not unlikely that he came 
 some time before the close of the long Ice 
 Age. He may have been temporarily 
 driven out of the country by the return- 
 ing cold periods, but would find his 
 way back as the climate ameliorated. 
 Much ingenuity has been expended in 
 tracing a succession of civilization in this 
 primeval human population of Britain. 
 Among the records of its presence there have 
 been supposed to be traces of an earlier race 
 of hunters of a low order, furnished with the 
 rudest possible stone implements ; and a 
 later people, who, out of the bones of the 
 animals they captured, supplied themselves 
 with deftly-made, and even artistically-deco- 
 rated weapons. All that seems safely de- 
 ducible from the evidence, however, may be 
 summed up in saying that the paleolithic 
 men, or men of the older stone period, who 
 hunted over the plains, and fished in the 
 rivers, and lived in the caves of this country, 
 have left behind them implements, rude in- 
 deed, but no doubt quite suitable for their 
 purpose*; and likewise other weapons and 
 tools of a more finished kind, which bear a 
 close relationship to the implements still in 
 use among the modern Esquimaux. It has 
 been suggested that the Esquimaux are their 
 direct descendants, driven into the inhospitable 
 north by the pressure of more warlike races. 
 
 The rude hunter and dweller in caves 
 passed away before the advent of the farmer 
 and herdsman of the Neolithic or later stone 
 period. We know much more of him than 
 his predecessors. He was short of stature, 
 with an oblong head, aad probably a dark 
 skin and dark curly hair. His implements of 
 stone were often artistically fashioned and 
 polished. Though still a hunter and fisher, 
 be knew also how to farm. He had flocks 
 
 and herds of domestic animals ; he was ac- 
 quainted with the arts of spinning and 
 weaving, could make a rude kind of pottery, 
 and excavate holes and subterranean galleries 
 in the chalk for the extraction of flints for his 
 weapons and tools. That he had some no- 
 tion of a future state may be inferred from 
 arrow-heads, pottery, and implements of vari- 
 ous kinds which are found in his graves, evi- 
 dently placed there for the use of the departed. 
 He has been regarded as probably of a 
 Non-Aryan race, of which perhaps the mod- 
 ern Basques are lineal descendants, isolated 
 among the fastnesses of the Pyrenees by the 
 advance of younger tribes. Traces of his 
 former presence in Britain have been conjec- 
 tured to be recognizable in the small dark 
 Welshmen, and the short swarthy Irishmen of . 
 the west of Ireland. 
 
 When the earliest Neolithic men appeared 
 in this region, Britain may have still been 
 united to the coniinent. But the connec- 
 tion was eventually broken. It is obvious 
 that no event in the geological history of 
 Britain can have had a more powerful influ- 
 ence on its human history than the separation 
 of the country as a group of islands cut off 
 by a considerable channel from direct com- 
 munication with the mainland of Europe. 
 Let us consider for a moment how the discon- 
 nection was probably brought abot:t. 
 
 There can be no doubt that at the time 
 when Britain became an island, the general 
 contour of the country was, on the whole, 
 what it is still. The same group's of moun- 
 tains rose above the same plains and valleys, 
 which were traversed by the same winding 
 rivers. We know that in the glacial and 
 later periods considerable oscillations of level 
 took place ; for, on the one hand, beds of 
 sea-shells are found at heights of 1,200 or 
 1,300 feet above the present sea-level ; and, 
 on the other hand, ancient forest-covered 
 soils are now seen below tide-mark. It was 
 doubtless mainly subsidence that produced 
 the isolation of Britain. The whole area 
 slowly sank, until the lower tracts were sub 
 merged, the last low ridge connecting the 
 land with France was overflowed, and Britain 
 became a group of islands. But unquestion- 
 ably the isolation was helped by the ceaseless 
 wear and tear of the superficial agencies 
 which are still busy at the same task. The 
 slow but sure washing of descending rain, 
 the erosion of water-courses, and the gnaw- 
 ing of sea-waves, all told in the long degra- 
 dation. And thus, foundering from want 6f 
 support below, and eaten away by attacks 
 above, the low lands gradually diminished, 
 and disappeared beneath the sea. 
 
 Now, in this process of separation, Ireland 
 unfortunately became detached from Britain. 
 We have had ample occasion in recent years 
 to observe how much this geological change 
 has affected our domestic history. That the 
 isolation of Ireland took place before Britain 
 had been separated from the continent may
 
 4C 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 be inferred from a comparison of the distri- 
 bution of living plants and animals. Of 
 course, the interval which had then elapsed 
 since the submergences and ice-sheets of the 
 glacial period must have been of prodigious 
 duration, if measured by ordinary human 
 standards. Yet it was too short to enable the 
 plants and animals of Central Europe com- 
 pletely to possess themselves of the British 
 area. Generation after generation they were 
 moving westward, but long before they could 
 all reach the northwestern seaboard, Ireland 
 had become an island, so that their further 
 march in that direction was arrested, and be- 
 fore the subsequent advancing bands had 
 come as far as Britain, it too had been sepa- 
 rated by a sea channel which finally barred 
 their progress. Comparing the total land 
 mammals of the west of Europe, we find that 
 while Germany has ninety species, Britain 
 has forty, and Ireland only twenty-two. The 
 reptiles and amphibia of Germany number 
 twenty-two, those of Britain thirteen, and 
 those of Ireland four. Again, even among 
 the winged tribes, where the capacity for dis- 
 persal is so much greater, Britain possesses 
 twelve species of bats, while Ireland has no 
 more than seven, and 130 land birds to no 
 in Ireland. The same discrepancy is trace- 
 able in the flora, for while the total number 
 of species of flowering plants and ferns found 
 in B.itain amounts to 1,425, those of Ireland 
 number 970 about two thirds of the British 
 flora. Such facts as these are not explicable 
 by any difference of climate rendering Ire- 
 land less fit for the reception of more varied 
 vegetation and animal life, for the climate of 
 Ireland is really more equable and genial than 
 that of the regions lying to the east of it. 
 They receive a natural and consistent inter- 
 pretation on the assumption of the gradual 
 separation of the British Islands during a con- 
 tinuous northwestward migration of the 
 present flora and fauna from Central Europe. 
 The last neck of land which united Britain 
 to the mainland was probably that through 
 which the Strait of Dover now runs. Apart 
 from the general subsidence of the whole 
 North Sea area, which is attested by sub- 
 merged forests on both sides, it is not diffi- 
 cult to perceive how greatly the widening of 
 the channel has been aided by waves and 
 ridal currents. The cliffs of Kent on the one 
 side and of the Boulonnais on the other, 
 ceaselessly battered by the sea, and sapped 
 by the trickle of percolating springs, are 
 crumbling before our very eyes. The scour 
 of the strong tides which pour alternately up 
 and down the strait, must have helped also 
 to deepen the Channel. And yet, in spite of 
 the subsidence and this constant erosion, the 
 depression remains so shallow that its deep- 
 est parts are less than 1 80 feet below the sur- 
 face. As has often been remarked, if St. 
 Paul's Cathedral could be shifted from the 
 heart of London to the middle of the strait 
 more than half of it would rise above water. 
 
 At what relative time in the human occu- 
 pation of the region this channel was 
 finally opened cannot be determined. At first 
 the strait was doubtless much narrower than 
 it has since become, so that it would not oppose 
 the same obstacle to free intercourse which it 
 n w does, and Neolithic man may have 
 readily traversed it in his light coracle of 
 skins. Be this as it may, there can be no 
 doubt that the old Basque or Iberian stock 
 had for many ages inhabited Britain before 
 the succeeding wave of human migration ad- 
 vanced to overflow and efface it. The next 
 invaders the first advance-guard of the great 
 Aryan family were Celts, whose descend- 
 ants still form a considerable part of the pop- 
 ulation of the British Isles. The Celt differed 
 in many respects from the small swarthy 
 Iberian whom he supplanted. He was tall, 
 round-headed, and fair-skinned, with red or 
 brown hair. Endowed with greater bodily 
 strength and pugnacity, he drove before him 
 the older smaller race of short, oblong-headed 
 men, gradually extirpating them, or leaving 
 here and there, in less attractive portions of 
 the country, small island-like remnants of 
 them which insensibly mingled with their 
 conquerors, though, as I have already re- 
 marked, traces of these remnants are perhaps 
 partially recognizable in the characteristic 
 Iberian-like lineaments of some districts of 
 the country even at the present day. 
 
 The Celts, as we now find them in Britain,, 
 belong to two distinct divisions of the race, 
 the Irish or Gaelic, and the Welsh or Cymric. 
 Some difference of opinion has arisen as to- 
 which of these branches appeared in the 
 country first. It seems to me that if the 
 question is discussed on the evidence of geo- 
 logical analogy, the unquestionable priority 
 should be assigned to the Gaels. There can 
 be no doubt that the Celts came from the 
 east. They had already overspread Gaul and 
 Belgium before they invaded Britain. The 
 tribe which is found on the most northerly 
 and westerly tracts should be the older, hav- 
 ing crossed, on its way, the regions lying ta 
 the east, while, on the other hand, the race 
 occupying the eastern tracts should be of 
 later origin. We ought to judge of the 
 spread of the human population as we do of 
 that of the flora and fauna. Had England 
 been already occupied by the Welsh, Cymric 
 or British branch, it is inconceivable that the 
 Irish or Gaelic branch could have marched 
 through the territory so occupied, and 
 have established itself in Scotland and 
 Ireland. The Gaels were, no doubt, the 
 first to arrive. Finding the country in- 
 habited by the little Neolithic folk, they 
 dispossessed them, and spread by degrees 
 over the whole of the islands. At a later 
 time the Cymry arose. We are not here 
 concerned with the question whether these 
 originated by a gradual bifurcation In the 
 development of the Celtic race after its set- 
 lement within Britain, or came as a later
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 47 
 
 Celtic wave of migration from the continent. 
 It is enough to notice that they are found at 
 the beginning of the historical period to be 
 in possession of England, Wales, and the 
 south of Scotland up to the estuary of the 
 Clyde. It is improbable that the Gaels, who 
 no doubt once occupied the same attractive 
 region, would have willingly quitted it for 
 the more inhospitable moors of Scotland and 
 the distant bogs and fenlands of Ireland. It 
 is much more likely that they were driven 
 forcibly out of it. Possibly the traditions 
 they carried with them of the greater fertility 
 of England may have instigated the numer- 
 ous inroads which from early Roman times 
 downward they made to recover the lands of 
 their forefathers. Crossing from Ireland, 
 they repossessed themselves of the west of 
 Wales, and sweeping down from the Scottish 
 Highlands, they repeatedly burst across the 
 Roman wall, carrying pillage and rapine far 
 into the province where their Clymric cousins 
 had begun to learn some of the arts and 
 effeminacy of Roman civilization. 
 
 Looking at the territory occupied by the 
 Cymry at the time of their greatest extension, 
 we can see how their course northward was 
 influenced by geological structure. As they 
 advanced along the plains which lay on the 
 west side cf the great Pennine chain of the 
 center and north of England, they encoun- 
 tered the range of fells which connects the 
 mountain group of Cumberland and West- 
 moreland with the uplands of Yorkshire and 
 Durham. This would probably be for some 
 time a barrier to their progress. But after 
 crossing it by some of the deep valleys by 
 which it is trenched, they would find them- 
 selves in the wide plains of the Eden and the 
 Solway. Still pushing their way northward, 
 and driving the Gaels before them, they would 
 naturally follow the valley of the Nith, leav- 
 ing on the left hand the wild mountainous 
 region of Galloway, or " country of the Gael," 
 to which the conquered tribe retired, and on 
 the right the high moorlands about the head 
 of Clydesdale and Tweeddale. Emerging at 
 last upon the lowlands of Ayrshire and lower 
 Clydesdale, they would spread over them 
 until their further march was arrested by the 
 great line of the Highland mountains. Into 
 these fastnesses, stoutly defended by the Pict- 
 i-h Gaels, they seem never to have pene- 
 trated. But they built, as their northern 
 outpost, the city and castle of Alcluyd, where 
 the picturesque rock of Dumbarton, or ' ' fort 
 of the Britons," towers above the Clyde. 
 
 At one time, therefore, the Cymry extended 
 from the mouth of the Clyde to the south of 
 England. One language Welsh and its 
 dialects appears to have been spoken 
 throughout that territory. Hence the battles 
 of King Arthur, which, from the evidence of 
 the ancient Welsh poems, appear to have been 
 fought, not in the southwest of England, as 
 is usually supposed, but in the middle of 
 Scotland, against the fierce Gwyddyl Ffichti 
 
 or Picts of the north and the heathen swarm- 
 ing from beyond the sea, were sung all the 
 way down into Wales and Devon, and across 
 the Channel among the vales of Brittany, 
 whence, becoming with every generation, 
 more mystical and marvelous, they grew into 
 favorite themes of the romantic poetry of 
 Europe. 
 
 The Roman occupation affected chiefly the 
 lowlands of England and Scotland where the 
 more recent geological formations extend in 
 broad plains or plateaux. Numerous towns 
 were built there, between which splendid 
 roads extended across the country. The 
 British inhabitants of these lowlands were 
 not extirpated, but continued to live on the 
 lands which they had tilled of old, more or 
 less affected by the Roman civilization with 
 which, for some four centuries or more, they 
 were brought in contact. But the regions 
 occupied by the more ancient rocks, rising 
 into rugged forest-covered mountains, offered 
 an effective barrier to the march of the Roman 
 legions, and afforded a shelter within which 
 the natives could preserve their ancient man- 
 ners and language with but little change. 
 The Romans occupied the broad central low- 
 land region of Scotland which is formed by 
 the Old Red Sandstone and Carboniferous 
 strata, extending up to the base of the High- 
 lands. But though they inflicted severe de- 
 feats upon the wild barbarians who issued 
 from the dark glens, and though they seemed 
 to have been led by Severus round by the 
 Aberdeenshire low grounds to the shores of 
 the Moray Firth, and to have returned through 
 the heart of the Highlands, they were never 
 able permanently to bring any part of the 
 mountainous area of crystalline rocks under 
 their rule. 
 
 The same geological influences which 
 guarded the progress of the Roman armies 
 may be traced in the subsequent Teutonic 
 invasions of Angles, Saxons, Jutes, and Nor- 
 wegians. Arriving from the east and north- 
 east, these hordes found level lowlands open 
 to their attack. Where no inpenetrable 
 thicket, forest, fenland, or mountainous bar- 
 rier impeded their advance, they rapidly 
 pushed inland, utterly extirpating the British 
 population and driving its remnants steadily 
 westward. By the end of the sixth century 
 the Britons had disappeared from the eastern 
 half of the island south of the Firth of Forth. 
 Their frontier, everywhere obstinately de- 
 fended, was very unequal in its capabilities 
 of defence. In the north, where they had 
 been driven across bare moors and bleak up- 
 lands, they found these inhospitable tracts for 
 a time a barrier to the further advance of the 
 enemy ; but where they stood face to face 
 with their foe in the plains they could not 
 permanently resist his advance. This differ- 
 ence in physical contour and geological struc- 
 ture led to the final disruption of the Cymric 
 tract of country by the two most memorable 
 battles in the early history of England.
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 Between the Britons of South Wales and 
 those of Devon and Cornwall lay the rich 
 vale of the Severn. Across this plain there 
 once spread in ancient geological times a 
 thick sheet of Jurassic strata of which the 
 "bold escarpment of the Cotswold Hills forms 
 a remnant. The valley has been in the course 
 of ages hollowed out of these rocks, the depth 
 of which is only partly represented by the 
 height of the Cotswold plateau. The Ro- 
 mans had found their way into this fertile 
 plain, and attracted by the hot springs which 
 still rise there, had built the venerable city of 
 Bath and other towns. One hundred and 
 seven years after the Romans quitted Britain, 
 the West Saxons, who had gradually pushed 
 their way westward up the valley of the 
 Thames, found themselves on the edge of the 
 Cotswod plateau, looking down upon the 
 rich and long settled plains of the Severn. 
 Descending from these heights, they fought 
 in 577 the decisive battle of Deorham, which 
 had the effect of giving them possession of 
 the Severn valley, and thus of isolating the 
 Britons of Devon and Cornwall from the rest 
 of their kinsmen. Driven thus into the south- 
 west corner of England upon ancient Devo- 
 nian and granitic rocks, poorer in soil, but 
 rich in wealth of tin and copper, these 
 Britons maintained their individuality for 
 many centuries. Though they have now 
 gradually been fused into the surrounding 
 English-speaking people, it was only about 
 the middle of last century that they ceased to 
 use their ancient Celtic tongue. 
 
 Still more important was the advance of the 
 Angles on the north side of Wales. The 
 older Palaeozoic rocks of the principality form 
 a mass cf high grounds which, flanked with 
 a belt of coal-bearing strata, descend into the 
 plains of Cheshire. Younger formations of 
 soft red Triassic marl and sandstone stretch 
 northward to the base of the Carboniferous 
 and Silurian hills of north Lancashire. This 
 strip of level and fertile ground, bounded on 
 the eastern side by high desert moors and im- 
 penetrable forests', connected the Britons of 
 Wales with those of the Cumbrian uplands, 
 and, for nearly 200 years after the Romans 
 had left Britain, was subject to no foreign in- 
 vasion, save perhaps occasional piratical de- 
 scents from the Irish coasts. But at last, in 
 the year 607, the Angle:, who had overspread 
 the whole region from the Firth of Forth to 
 the south of Suffolk, crossed the fastnesses 
 of the Pennine Chain and burst upon the in- 
 habitants of the plains of the Dee. A great 
 battle was fought at Chester in which the 
 Britons were routed. The Angles obtained 
 permanent possession of these lowlands, and 
 thus the Welsh were effectually cut off from 
 the Britons of Cumbria and Strathclyde. The 
 latter have gradually mingled with their Teu- 
 tonic neighbors, though the names of many a 
 hili and river bear witness to their former 
 sway. The Welsh, on the other hand, 
 driven in:o their hilly and mountainous tracts 
 
 of ancient Palaeozoic rocks, have maintained 
 their separate language and customs down to 
 the present day. 
 
 Turning now to the conflict between the 
 Celtic and Teutonic races in Scotland, we 
 notice in how marked a manner it was di- 
 rected by the geological structure of the coun- 
 try. The level Secondary formations which, 
 underlying the plains, form so notable a fea- 
 ture in the scenery of England, are almost 
 wholly absent from Scotland. The Palaeozoic 
 rocks of the latter kingdom have been so 
 crumpled and broken, so invaded by intru- 
 sions of igneous matter from below, and over 
 two-thirds of the country rendered so crys- 
 talline and massive, that they stand up for 
 the most part as high table-lands, deeply 
 trtnched by narrow valleys. Only along the 
 central counties between the base of the 
 Highlands on the one side and the southern 
 uplands on the other, where younger Palaeo- 
 zoic formations occur, are there any consid- 
 erable tracts of lowland, and even these are 
 everywhere interrupted by protrusions of 
 igneous rock forming minor groups of hills 
 or isolated crags like those that form so char- 
 acteristic a feature in the landscapes around 
 Edinburgh. In old times dense forests and 
 impenetrable morasses covered much of the 
 land. A country fashioned and clothed in 
 this manner is much more suitable for de- 
 fense than for attack. The high mountain- 
 ous interior of the north, composed of the 
 more ancient crystalline rocks, which had 
 sheltered the Caledonian tribes from the well- 
 ordered advance of the Roman legions, now 
 equally protected them from the sudden 
 swoop of Saxon and Scandinavian sea-pirates. 
 Neither Roman nor Teuton every made any 
 lasting conquest of that territory. It has re- 
 mained in the hands of its Celtic conquerors 
 till the present time. 
 
 But the case has been otherwise with the 
 tracts where the younger Palaeozoic deposits 
 spread out from the base of the Highland 
 mountains. These strata have not partaken 
 of the violent corrugations and marked crys- 
 tallization to which the older rocks have been 
 subjected. On the contrary, they extend in 
 gentle undulations forming level plains and 
 strips of lowland between the foot of the 
 more ancient hills and the margin of the sea. 
 It was on these platforms of undisturbed 
 strata that invaders could most successfully 
 establish themselves. So dominant has been 
 this geological influence that the line of 
 boundary between the crystalline rocks and 
 the Old Red Sandstone, from the north of 
 Caithness to the coast of Kincardineshire, 
 was almost precisely that of the frontier es- 
 tablished between the old Celtic natives and 
 the later hordes of Danes ;:nd Northmen. To 
 this day, in spite of the inevitable mingling 
 of the races, it still serves to define the re- 
 spective areas of the Gaelic-speaking and 
 English-speaking populations. On the Old 
 Red Sandstone we hear only English, often
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 49 
 
 with a northern accent, and even with not a 
 few northern words that seem to remind us 
 of the Norse blood which flows in the veins 
 of these hardy fish-folk and farmers. We 
 meet with groups of villages and towns ; the 
 houses, though often poor and dirty, are for 
 the most part solidly built of hewn stone and 
 mortar, with well-made roofs of thatch, slate, 
 or flagstone. The fuel in ordinary use is coal 
 brought by sea from the south . But no sooner 
 do we penetrate within the area of the 
 crystalline rocks than all appears changed. 
 Gaelic is now the vernacular tongue. There 
 are few or no villages. The houses, built of 
 boulders gathered from the soil and held to- 
 gether with mere clay or earth, are covered 
 with frail roofs of ferns, straw, or heather, 
 kept down by stone- weigh ted ropes of the 
 same materials. Fireplaces and chimneys 
 are not always present, and the pungent blue 
 smoke from fires of peat or turf finds its way 
 out by door and window, or beneath the be- 
 grimed rafters. The geological contrast of 
 structure and scenery which allowed the 
 Teutonic invaders to drive the older Celtic 
 people from the coast-line, but prevented 
 them from advancing inland, has sufficed 
 during all the subsequent centuries to keep 
 the two races apart 
 
 On the northwestern coasts of the island 
 there are none of the fringes of more recent 
 formations which have had so marked an in- 
 fluence on the east side. From the north of 
 Sutherland to the headlands of Argyle the 
 more ancient rocks of the country rise steep 
 and rugged out of the sea, projecting in long 
 bare promonotories, forever washed by the 
 restless surge of the Atlantic. Here and 
 there the coast-line sinks into a sheltered bay, 
 or is interrupted by some long winding inlet 
 that admits the ebb and flow of the ocean 
 tides far into the heart of the mountains. 
 Only in such depressions could a seafaring 
 people find safe harbors and fix their settle- 
 ments. When the Norsemen sailed round 
 the northwest of Scotland they found there the 
 counterpart of their own native country the 
 same type of bare, rocky, island-fringed coast- 
 line sweeping up into bleak mountains, wind- 
 ing into long sea-lochs or fjords beneath the 
 shadow of somber pine-forests, and to the 
 west the familiar sweep of the same wide 
 blue ocean. So striking even now is this re- 
 semblance, that the Scot who for the first 
 time sails along the western seaboard of 
 Norway can hardly realize that he is not 
 skirting the coast-line of Inverness, Ross, or 
 Sutherland. Such a form of coast forbade 
 easy communication by land between valley 
 and valley. Detached settlements arose in 
 the more sheltered bays, where glens, open- 
 ing inland, afforded ground for tillage and 
 pasture. But the intercourse between them 
 would be almost wholly by boat, for there 
 could be no continuous line of farms, villages, 
 and roads like those for which the Old Red 
 Sandstone selvages afforded such facilities on 
 
 the eastern coast. Hence, though the Norse- 
 men possessed themselves of every available 
 bay and inlet, driving the Celts into the more 
 barren interior, the natural contours made it 
 impossible that their hold of the ground 
 should be so firm as that of their kinsmen in 
 the east. When that hold began to -elax, 
 the Gaelic natives of the glens came down 
 once more to the sea, and all obvious trace of 
 the Norse occupation eventually disappeared, 
 save in the names given by the sea rovers to 
 the islands, promonotories, and inlets the 
 "ays," "nishes,"or "nesses," and "fords," 
 or fjords which, having been adopted by 
 the Celtic natives, show that there must have 
 been some communication and probable in- 
 termarriage between the races. Among the 
 outer islands the effects of the Norwegian 
 occupation were naturally more enduring, 
 though even there the Celtic race has long 
 recovered its ground. Only in the Orkney 
 and Shetland group have the Vikings left 
 upon the physical frame and language of the 
 people the strong impress of their former 
 presence. To this day a Shetlander speaks 
 of going to Scotland, meaning the mainland, 
 much as a Lowland Scot might talk of visit- 
 ing England, or an Englishman of crossing 
 to Ireland. 
 
 But besides governing in no small degree 
 the distribution of races in Britain, the 
 geological structure of the country has prob- 
 ably not been without its influence upon 
 the temperament of the people. Let us take 
 the case of the Celts, originally one great 
 race, with no doubt the same average type 
 of mental and moral disposition, as they un- 
 questionably possessed the same general 
 build of body and cast of features. Proba- 
 bl nowhere within our region have they re- 
 mained unmixed with a foreign element, 
 which together, with the varying political 
 conditions under which they have lived, must 
 have distinctly affected their character. But 
 after every allowance has been made for 
 these several influences, it seems to me that 
 there are residual differences which cannot 
 be explained except by the effects of environ- 
 ment. The Celt of Ireland and of the Scot- 
 tish Highlands was originally the same being; 
 he crossed freely from country to country ; 
 his language, manners and customs, arts, re- 
 ligion, were the same on both sides of the 
 channel, yet no two natives of the British 
 Islands are now marked by more character- 
 istic differences. The Irishman seems to have 
 changed less than the Highlander; he has 
 retained the light-hearted gayety, wit, impul- 
 siveness and excitability, together with that 
 want of dogged resolution and that indiffer- 
 ence to the stern necessities of duty which 
 we regard as pre-eminently typical of the 
 Celtic temperament The Highlander, on 
 the other hand, cannot be called either merry 
 or witty ; he is rather of a self-restrained, 
 reserved, unexpansive, and even perhaps 
 somewhat sullen disposition. HIB music
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 partakes of the melancholy cadence of the 
 winds that sigh through his lonely glens ; his 
 religion, too, one of the strongest and noblest 
 features of his character, retains still much 
 of the gloomy tone of a bygone time. Yet 
 he is courteous, dutiful, determinedly per- 
 severing, unflinching as a foe, unwearied as a 
 friend, fitted alike to follow with soldier-like 
 obedience, and to lead with courage, skill, 
 and energy a man who has done much in 
 every climate to sustain and expand the re- 
 putation of the British Empire. 
 
 Now, what has led to so decided a con- 
 trast ? I cannot help thinking that one 
 fundamental cause is to be traced to the great 
 difference between the geological structure 
 and consequent scenery of Ireland and the 
 Highlands. By far the greater part of Ire- 
 land is occupied by the Carboniferous lime- 
 stone, which, in gently undulating sheets, 
 spreads out as a vast plain. Round the mar- 
 gin of this plain the older formations rise as 
 a broken ring of high ground, while here and 
 there from the surface of the plain itself they 
 tpwer into isolated hills or hilly groups ; but 
 there is no extensive area of mountains. The 
 soil is generally sufficiently fertile, the climate 
 soft, and the limestone plains are carpeted 
 with that rich verdant pasture which has sug- 
 gested the name of the Emerald Isle. In 
 such a region, so long as the people are left 
 free from foreign interference, there can be 
 but little to mar the gay, careless, childlike 
 temperament of the Celtic nature. If the 
 country yields no vast wealth, it yet can fur- 
 nish with but little labor all the necessaries 
 of life. The Irishman is naturally attached 
 to his holding. His fathers for generations 
 past have cultivated the same little plots. 
 He sees no reason why he should try to be bet- 
 ter than they, and he resents, as an injury 
 never to be forgiven, the attempt to remove 
 him to where he may elsewhere improve his 
 fortunes. The highlander, on the other hand, 
 has no such broad fertile plains around him. 
 Placed in a glen, separated from his neigh- 
 bors in the next glens by high ranges of 
 rugged hills, he finds a soil scant ard stony, 
 a climate wet, cold, and uncertain. He has 
 to fight with the elements a never-ending 
 battle, wherein he is often the loser. The 
 dark mountains that frown above him gather 
 around their summits the cloudy screen which 
 keeps the sun from ripening his miserable 
 patch of corn, or rots it with perpetual rains 
 after it has been painfully cut. He stands 
 among the mountains face to face with Na- 
 ture in her wilder moods. Storm and tem- 
 pest, mist-wreath and whirlwind, the roar of 
 waterfalls, the rush of swollen streams, the 
 crash of loosened landslips, which he may 
 seem hardly to notice, do not pass without 
 bringing, unconsciously perhaps, to his 
 imagination, their ministry of terror. Hence 
 the playful mirthfulness and light-hearted 
 ease of the Celtic temperament have in his 
 case been curdled into a stubbornness which 
 
 may be stolid obstinacy or undaunted perse- 
 verance, according to the circumstances which 
 develop it. Like his own granitic hills, he 
 has grown hard and enduring, not without 
 a tinge of melancholy suggestive of the sad- 
 ness that lingers among his wind-swept glens, 
 and that hangs about the slopes of birk round 
 the quiet waters of his lonely lakes. The 
 difference between Irishman and Scot thus 
 somewhat resembles, though on a minor 
 scale, that between the Celt of lowland France 
 and the Celt of the Swiss Alps, and the cause 
 of the difference is doubtless traceable, in great 
 measure, to a similar kind of contrast in their' 
 respective surroundings. 
 
 If now we turn to the influences which 
 have been at work in the distribution of the 
 population of the country and the develop- 
 ment of the national industries, we find them 
 in large degree of a geological kind. 
 
 In the first place, the feral ground, or ter- 
 ritory left in a state of nature and given up 
 togame, lies mostly upon rocks which, pro- 
 truding almost every whe r e to the surface and 
 only scantily and sparsely covered with a poor 
 soil, are naturally incapable of cultivation. 
 The crystalline formations of the Scottish 
 Highlands may be taken as an example of 
 this kind of territory. The grouse-moors 
 and deer-forests of that region exist there 
 not merely because the proprietors of the land 
 have so willed it, but because over hundreds 
 of square miles the ground itself could be 
 turned to no better use, for it can neither be 
 tilled nor pastured. Much patriotic nonsense 
 has been written about the enormity of re- 
 fining so much land as game preserves. But 
 n this, as in so many other matters, man 
 must be content to be the servant of Nature. 
 He cannot plant crops where she has appoint- 
 ed that they shall never grow; nor can he pas- 
 ;ure sheep where she has decreed that only 
 the fox, the wild-cat, and the eagle shall find 
 a home. 
 
 In the second place, the true pasture lands 
 that is, the tracts which are too high or 
 sterile for cultivation, but which are not too 
 rocky to refuse to yield, when their heathy 
 covering is burnt off, a sweet grassy herbage, 
 excellent for sheep and cattle lie mainly on 
 elevated areas of non-crystalline Palaeozoic 
 rocks. The long range of pastoral uplands 
 in the Sou'.h of Scotland, and the fells of 
 Cumberland, Northumberland,and Yorkshire, 
 are good examples. These lonely wilds might 
 be grouped into districts each marked off by 
 certain distinctive types of geological 
 structure, and consequently of scenery. And 
 it might, for aught I know, be possible to 
 show that these distinctions have not been 
 without their influence upon the generations 
 of shepherds who have spent their solitary 
 lives among them; that in character, legends, 
 superstitions, song, the peasants of Lammer- 
 muir might be distinguished from those of 
 Liddesdale, and both from those of Cumber- 
 lanJ and Yorkshire the distinction, subtle
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 61 
 
 perhaps and hardly definable, pointing more 
 or less clearly to the contrasts between their 
 respective surroundings. 
 
 In the third place, the sites of towns and 
 villages may often be traced to a guiding 
 geological influence. Going back to feudal 
 times, we at once observe to what a large 
 extent the positions of the castles of the 
 nobles were determined by the form of the 
 ground, and notably by the prominence of 
 some crag which, rising well above the rest 
 of the country, commanded a wide view and 
 was capable of defense. Across the low- 
 lands of Scotland such crags are abundantly 
 scattered. They consist for the most part of 
 hard projections of igneous rock, from which 
 the softer sandstones and shales, that once 
 surrounded and covered them, have been 
 worn away. Many of them are crowned 
 with medieval fortresses, some of which 
 stand out among the most famous spots in 
 the history of the country. Dumbarton, 
 Stirling, Blackness, Edinburgh, Tantallon, 
 Dunbar, the Bass, are familiar names in the 
 stormy annals of Scotland. A strong castle 
 naturally gathered around its walls the 
 peasantry of the neighborhood for protection 
 against the common foe, and thus by degrees 
 the original collection of wooden booths or 
 stone huts grew into a village or even into a 
 a populous town. The Scottish metropolis 
 undoubtedly owes its existence in this way 
 to the bold crag of basalt on which its 
 ancient castle stands. 
 
 In more recent times the development of 
 the mining industries of the country has 
 powerfully affected both the growth and de- 
 cay of towns. Comparing in this respect 
 the maps of to-day with those of 150 or 200 
 years ago, we cannot but be struck with the 
 remarkable changes that have taken place in 
 the interval. Some places which were then 
 of but minor importance have now advanced 
 to the first rank, while others that were 
 among the chief towns of the realm have 
 either hardly advanced at al! or have posi- 
 tively declined. If now we turn to a geo- 
 logical map, we find that in almost all 
 cases the growth has taken place within or 
 near to some important mineral field, while 
 the decadence occurs in tracts where there 
 are no workable minerals. Look, for exam- 
 ple, at the prodigious increase of such towns 
 as Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester, New- 
 castle, Birmingham, and Middlesborough. 
 Each of these owes its advance in population 
 and wealth to its position in the midst of, or 
 close to, fields of coal and iron. Contrast, 
 on the other hand, the sleepy, quiet, unpro- 
 gressive content, and even sometimes un- 
 mistakable decay, of not a few county towns 
 in our agricultural districts. 
 
 Closely connected with this subject is the 
 remarkable transference of population which 
 for the last generation or two has been in 
 such rapid progress among us. The large 
 manufacturing towns are increasing at the 
 
 expense of the rural districts. The general 
 distribution of the population is changing, 
 and the change is obviously underlaid by a 
 geological cause. People are drawn to the 
 districts where they can obtain most employ- 
 ment and best pay ; and these districts are 
 necessarily those where coal and iron can be 
 obtained, without which no branch of our 
 manufacturing industry could at present exist. 
 
 In the fourth place the style of architecture 
 in different districts is largely dependent 
 upon the character of their geology. The 
 mere presence or absence of building-stone 
 creates at once a fundamental distinction. 
 Hence the contrast between the brickwork of 
 England, where building-stone is less com- 
 mon, and the stonework of Scotland, where 
 stone abounds. But even as we move 
 from one part of a stone-using region to an- 
 other, marked varieties of style may be ob- 
 served, according to local geological develop- 
 ment. The massive yellow limestone blocks 
 of Bath or Portland, the thin blue flags of the 
 Lake district, the thick courses of deep red 
 freestone in Dumfriesshire, the bands of fine, 
 easily-dressed white sandstone of Edinburgh, 
 have all produced certain differences of style 
 and treatment. To a geological eye that 
 passes rapidly through a territory, this char- 
 acter of its buildings is often suggestive of 
 its geology. 
 
 In the fifth and last place, the dominant 
 influence of the geology of a country upon its 
 human progress is nowhere more marvellously 
 exhibited than in the growth of British com- . 
 merce. The internal trade of this country 
 may be spoken of as its life-blood, pulsating 
 unceasingly along a network of railways. 
 This vast organism possesses not one but 
 many hearts, from each of which a vigorous 
 circulation proceeds. Each of these hearts 
 or nerve centers is situated on or near a 
 mineral region, whence its nourishment 
 comes. The history of the development of 
 our system of railways, our steam machinery, 
 our manufactures, is unintelligible except 
 when taken together with the opening up of 
 our resources in coal and iron. 
 
 The growth of the foreign commerce of 
 the country enforces the same lesson. Even, 
 however, before the days of steam naviga- 
 tion, her geological structure gave England 
 a distinct advantage over her neighbors on 
 the Continent. Owing to the denudation 
 that has hollowed out the surface of th 
 country, and the subsidence that has de- 
 pressed the shoreward tracts beneath the sea, 
 the coast-line of Britain abounds in admirable 
 natural harbors, which on the opposite side 
 of the Channel and North Sea are hardly to 
 be found. There can be no question that in 
 the infancy of navigation this gave a superi- 
 ority for which hardly anything else could 
 compensate. We boast that it is our insular 
 position and our English blood that have 
 Tiade us sailors. Let us remember that, in 
 pile of their less favorable position, our
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. 
 
 52 
 
 neighbors on the opposite shores of the Con- 
 tinent have become excellent sailors too, and 
 that If we have been able to lead the van in 
 international commerce it has been largely 
 due to the abundant, safe, and commodious 
 inlets in our coast-line which have sheltered 
 our marine. 
 Of the foreign trade of the country it is 
 
 not needful to speak. Its rapid growth dur- 
 ing the present century is distinctly traceable 
 to the introduction of steam navigation, and 
 therefore directly to the development of those 
 mineral resources which form so marked an 
 element in the fortunate geological construc- 
 tion of the British Islands, 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 I. A FRAGMENT or PRIMEVAL EUROPI 
 II. I* WYOMING 
 
 III. THB GEYSERS OF THB YELLOWSTONE ...........! 
 
 IV. THE LAVA FIELDS OF NORTHWESTERN EUROPE .... 10 
 
 V. THE SCOTTISH SCHOOL OF GEOLOGY .... as 
 
 VI. GEOGRAPHICAL EVOLUTION 33 
 
 VII. THE GEOLOGICAL INFLUENCES WHICH HAVE AFFECTED THE COVME or BRITISH HMTOBT . . 44
 
 THE 
 
 Hunjboldt Library of Science 
 
 is the only publication of its kind, the only one containing popular 
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 meat for them that are of full age." 
 
 In this series are well represented the writings of 
 
 DARWIN, HUXLEY, SPENCER, TYNDALL, PROCTOR, CLIFFORD, 
 
 CLODD, BAGEHOT, BAIN, BATES, WALLACE, TRENCH, 
 
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 GEIKIE, HINTON, SULLY, FLAMMARION, 
 
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 EVIDENCE AS TO MAN'S PLACE IN NATURE.-By THOMAS H. 
 
 HUXLEY, F.R.S., F.L.S. With numerous illustrations. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Natural History of the Manlike I Chapter II. The Relations of Man to the Lower 
 Apes. Animals. 
 
 I Chapter III. Some Fossil Remains of Man. 
 
 EDUCATION: INTELLECTUAL, MORAL, AND PHYSICAL.- By 
 
 HERBERT SPENCER. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. What Knowledge is of Most Worth 1 \ Chapter III. Moral Education. 
 Chapter II. Intellectual Education. | Chapter IV. Physical Education. 
 
 No. 6. 
 
 TOWN GEOLOGY. By the Rev. CHARLES KINGSLET, F.L.S., F.G.S., Canon of 
 Chester. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Soil of the Field. I Chapter IV. The Coal in the Fire. 
 
 Chapter II. The Pebbles in the Street. Chapter V. The Lime in the Mortar. 
 
 Chapter III. The Stones in the Wall. | Chapter VI. The Slates on the Roof. 
 
 THE CONSERVATION OF ENERGY.- By BALFOUR STEWART, LL.D., 
 F.R.S., Professor of Natural Philosophy at the Owens College, Manchester, Eng. 
 With an Appendix "The Correlation of Nervous and Mental Forces," by Prof. 
 ALEXANDER BAIN. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. What is Energy? 
 
 Chapter II. Mechanical Energy and its Change 
 
 into Heat. 
 Chapter III. The Forces and Energies of Nature : 
 
 the Law of Conservation. 
 Chapter IV. Transmutations of Energy. 
 
 Chapter V. Historical Sketch: the Dissipation 
 
 of Energy. 
 Chapter VI. The Position of Life. 
 
 APPENDIX. The Correlation of Nervous and 
 Mental Forces. 
 
 THE STUDY OF LANGUAGES BROUGHT BACK TO ITS 
 
 TRUE PRINCIPLES. By C. MARCEL, Kut. Leg. Hon., author of "Language 
 as a Means of Mental Culture," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Subdivision and Order of Study. 
 Chapter II. The Art of Reading. 
 Chapter III. The Art of Hearing. 
 Chapter IV. The Art Speaking. 
 
 Chapter V The Art of Writing. 
 Chapter VI. On Mental Culture. 
 Chapter VII. On Routine. 
 
 THE DATA OF ETHICS.-By HERBERT SPENCER; 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter 1. Conduct in General. 
 
 Chapter II. The Evolution of Conduct. 
 
 Chapter III. Good and Bad Conduct. 
 
 Chapter IV. Ways of Judging Conduct. 
 
 Chapter V. The Physical View. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Biological View. 
 
 Chapter VTI. The Psychological View. 
 Chapter VIH. The Sociological View. 
 
 Chapter IX. Criticisms and Explanations. 
 Chapter X. The Relativity of Pains and Pleas- 
 Chapter XI. Egoism verms Altruism, [ures. 
 Chapter XII. Altruism versus Egoism. 
 Chapter XIII. Trial and Compromise. 
 Chapter XIV. Conciliation. 
 
 Chapter XV. Absolute Ethics and Relative Eth- 
 Chapter XVI. The Scope of Ethics. lies. 
 
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 THE THEORY OF SOUND IN ITS RELATION TO MUSIC.-By 
 
 Professor PIETRO BLASERNA, of the Royal University of Rome. With numerous 
 woodcuts. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Periodic Movements: Vibration. 
 Sonorous Vibration. Vibration of a Bell. Vibra- 
 tion of a Tuning-fork. Vibration of a String. Of 
 Plates and Membranes. Vibration of Air in a 
 Sounding -pipe. Method of the Monometric 
 Flame. Conclusion. 
 
 Chapter II. Transmission of Sound. Propaga- 
 tion in Air. In Water and Other Bodies. Ve- 
 locity of Sound in Air.- In Water and Other Bodies. 
 Reflection of Sound. Echo. 
 
 Chapter III. Characteristics of Sound, and Dif- 
 ference between Musical Sound and Noise. Loud- 
 ness of Sound, and the Various Causes on which 
 it depends. Principle of the Superposition of 
 Sounds. Sounding-boards and Resonators. 
 
 Chapter IV. Measure of the Number of Vibra- 
 tions. Pitch of Sounds : Limit of Audible Sounds, 
 of Musical Sounds, and of the Human Voice. 
 The "Normal Pitch." Laws of the Vibrations of 
 a String, and of Harmonics. 
 
 Chapter V. Musical Sounds. Law of Simple 
 Ratio. Unison: interference. Beats: their ex- 
 planation. Resultant Notes. Octaves, and other 
 Harmonics. Consonant Chords and their limits. 
 The Major fifth, fourth, sixth, and third: the 
 Minor third and sixth. The Seventh Harmonic. 
 
 Chapter VI. Helmholtz's Double Siren. Appli- 
 cation of the Law of Simple Ratio to three or 
 more notes. Perfect Major and Minor Chords: 
 their nature. Their inversion. 
 
 Chapter VII. Discords. The Nature of Music 
 and Musical Scales. Ancient Music. Greek 
 Scale. Scale of Pythagoras. Its decay. Ambro- 
 sian and Gregorian Chants. Polyphonic Music: 
 Harmony. The Protestant Reformation. Pales- 
 trina. Change of the Musical Scale. The Tonic 
 or Fundamental Chord. The Major Scale. Mu- 
 sical Intervals. The Minor Scale. Key and Trans- 
 position. Sharps and Flats. The Temperate 
 Scale: its inaccuracy. The Desirability of aban- 
 doning it. 
 
 Chapter VIII. Quality or timbre of Musical 
 Sounds. Forms assumed by the Vibrations. 
 Laws of Harmonics. Quality or timbre of Strings 
 and of Instruments. General Laws of Chords. 
 Noises accompanying Musical Sounds. Quality 
 or timbre of Vocal Musical Sounds. 
 
 Chapter IX. Difference between Science and 
 Art. Italian and German Music. Separation of 
 the two Schools. Influence of Paris. Conclusion. 
 
 Nos. 11 and 12. 
 
 Double number, 3O cents. 
 
 THE NATURALIST ON THE RIVER AMAZONS.-A Record of 
 Adventures, Habits of Animals, Sketches of Brazilian and 
 Indian Life, and Aspects of Nature under the Equator, during 
 
 eleven years of travel. B >' HENRY WALTER BATES, F.L.S., Assistant 
 Secretary of the Royal Geogi'aphical Society of England. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 (In part.) 
 
 Chapter I. Arrival at Para Aspect of the 
 country First walk in the suburbs of Para Birds, 
 lizards, and insects Leaf-carrying ant Sketch of 
 the climate, history, and present condition of Para. 
 
 Chapter H. The swampy forest of Para A Por- 
 tuguese landed proprietor Life of a Naturalist 
 under the Equator The dryer virgin forests Re- 
 tired creeks Aborigines. 
 
 Chapter III. The Tocantins River and Cameta 
 Sketch of the River Grove of fan-leaved palms 
 Native life on the Tocantins. 
 
 Chapter V.Caripi and the Bay of Maraj6 
 Negro observance of Christmas A German family 
 Bats Ant-eaters Humming-birds Domestic 
 life of the inhabitants Hunting excursion with 
 Indians White ants. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Lower Amazons Modes of 
 traveling on the Amazons Historical sketch of the 
 early explorations of the river First sight of the 
 great river Flat-topped mountains. 
 
 Chapter VII. Vilfe Nova, its inhabitants.forest, 
 and animals A rustic festival River Madeira 
 Mura Indians Yellow Fever. 
 
 Chapter VIII. Santarem Manners and customs 
 
 of the inhabitants Sketches of Natural History- 
 palms, wildfruit- trees, mining- wasps, mason- wasps, 
 bees.and sloths. 
 
 Chapter IX. Voyage up the Tapajos Modes of 
 obtaining fish White Cebus,and habits and dispo- 
 sitions ofCebi monkeys Adventure with anaconda 
 
 Smoke-dried monkey Boa-constrictor Hya- 
 cinthine macaw Descent of river to Santarem. 
 
 Chapter X. The Upper Amazons Desolate ap- 
 pearance of river in the flood season Mental con- 
 dition of Indians Floating pumice-stones from 
 the Andes Falling banks Ega and its inhabitants 
 The four seasons of the Upper Amazons. 
 
 Chapter XI. Excursions in the neighborhood of 
 Ega Character and customs of the Passe Indians 
 Hunting rambles with natives in the forest. 
 
 Chapter XII. Animals of the neighborhood of 
 Ega-Scarlet-faced monkeys- Owl faced night-apes 
 
 Marmosets Bats Birds Insects Pendulous 
 cocoons Foraging ants Blind ants. 
 
 Chapter XIII. Excursions beyond Ega Steam- 
 boat traveling on the Amazons Various tribes of 
 Indians Descent to Para Great changes at ParA 
 Departure for England. 
 
 % This is one of the most charming books of travel ever written, and is both interesting and in- 
 structive. It is a graphic description of " a country of perpetual summer, where trees yield flower and 
 fruit all the year round," "a region where the animals and plants have been fashioned in Nature's 
 choicest moulds." 
 
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 ON THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE.- With Other Essays, viz., 
 The Scientific Aspects of Positivism. A Piece of Chalk. Geo- 
 logical Contemporaneity. A Liberal Education. By THOMAS H. 
 
 HUXLEY, F.R.S., F.L.S. 
 
 No. 22. 
 
 SEEING AND THINKING. B y WILLIAM KINGDON CLIFFORD, F.K.S., Pro- 
 fessor of Applied Mathematics and Mechanics in University College, London, 
 and sometime Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. 
 
 The Eye and the Brain. 
 The Eye and Seeing. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 The Brain and Thinking. 
 Of Boundaries in General. 
 
 No. 23. 
 
 SCIENTIFIC SOPHISMS. A Review of Current Theories con- 
 cerning Atoms, Apes, and Men. By SAMUEL WAINWRIGHT, D.D., 
 author of ''Christian Certainty," "The Modern Avernus," &c. 
 
 Chapter I. The Right of Search. 
 
 Chapter II. Evolution. 
 
 Chapter HI. "A Puerile Hypothesis." 
 
 Chapter IV. " Scientific Levity." 
 
 Chapter V. A House of Cards. 
 
 Chapter VI. Sophisms. 
 
 Chapter VH. Protoplasm. 
 
 CONTBNTS. 
 
 Chapter Vill. The Three Beginnings. 
 Chapter IX. The Three Barriers. 
 Chapter X. Atoms. 
 Chapter XI. Apes. 
 Chapter XH. Men. 
 Chapter XTH.Animi MundL 
 
 No. 24. 
 
 POPULAR SCIENTIFIC LECTURES, viz., On the Relation of Optics 
 to Painting. On the Origin of the Planetary System. On 
 Thought in Medicine. On Academic Freedom in German Uni- 
 versities. By H. HELMHOLTZ, Professor of Physics in the University of 
 Berlin. 
 
 No. 25. 
 
 THE ORIGIN OF NATIONS.- In two parts.- On Early Civiliza- 
 tions. On Ethnic Affinities, &C. By GEORGE RAWLINSON, M.A., 
 Camden Professor of Ancient History, Oxford. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART L EARLY CIVILIZATIONS. 
 Chapter I. Introduction. 
 Chapter H. On the Antiquity of Civilizatior 
 
 Chapter 
 Chapter 
 Chapter 
 
 in Egypt. 
 HI. On the Antiquity of Civilization 
 
 at Babylon. 
 IV. On the Date and Character of 
 
 Phoenician Civilization. 
 V. On the Civilizations of Asia Minor 
 Phrygia, Lydia. Lrcia, Troas. 
 Chapter VI. On the Civilizations of Central Asia 
 Assyria, Media. Persia, India. 
 Chapter VTI. On the Civilization of the Etruscans 
 Chapter VIIL On the Civilization of the British 
 
 Celts. 
 Chapter IX. Results of the Inquiry. 
 
 PART LT. ETHNIC AFFINITIES IN THE 
 ANCIENT WORLD. 
 
 Chapter I. The Chief Japhetic Races. 
 Chapter IT. Subdivisions of the Japhetic Races, 
 
 Gomer and Javan. 
 
 Chapter III. The Chief Hamitic Races. 
 Chapter IV. Subdivisions of Cush. 
 Chapter V. Subdivisions of Mizraim and 
 
 Canaan. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Semitic Races. 
 Chapter VII. On the Subdivisions of the Semitic 
 
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 THE EVOLUTIONIST AT LARGE.-By GRANT ALLEN. 
 
 CON 
 
 Chapter I. Microscopic Brains. 
 Chapter II A Wayside Berry. 
 Chapter III. In Summer Fields. 
 Chapter IV. A Sprig of Water Crowfoot. 
 Chapter V. Slugs and Snails. 
 Chapter VI. A Study of Bones. 
 < hupter VII. Blue Mud. 
 Chapter VIII. Cuckoo-pint. 
 Chapter IX. Berries and Berries. 
 Chapter X. Distant Relations. 
 Chapter XI. Among the Heather. 
 
 TENTS. 
 
 Chapter XII. Speckled Trout. 
 Chapter XIII. Dodder and Broomrape. 
 Chapter XIV. Dog's Mercurv and Plantain. 
 Chapter XV. Butterfly Psychology. 
 Chapter XVI. Butterfly ^Esthetics. 
 Chapter XVII. The Origin of Walnuts. 
 Chapter XVIII. A Pretty Land-shell. 
 Chapter XIX. Dogs and Masters. 
 Chapter XX Blackcock. 
 Chapter XXI. Bindweed. 
 Chapter XXII.- On Cornish Cliffs. 
 
 No. 27. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF LANDHOLDING IN ENGLAND.-By JOSEPH 
 
 FISHER, F.E.H.S. 
 
 I. The Aborigines. 
 II. The Romans. 
 III. The Scandinavians. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 IV The Normans. 
 V. The Plantagenets. 
 VI The Tudors. 
 
 VII. The Stuarts. 
 VIII. The House of Hanover. 
 
 FASHION IN DEFORMITY, AS ILLUSTRATED IN THE CUS- 
 TOMS OF BARBAROUS AND CIVILIZED RACES.-By WILLIAM 
 
 HENRY FLOWER, LL.D., F.E.S., F.E.C.S., P.Z.S., &c., Hunterian Professor of 
 Comparative Anatomy, and Conservator of the Museum of the Eoyal College of 
 Surgeons of England. With illustrations. 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 MANNERS AND FASH ION. -By HERBERT SPENCER. 
 
 No. 29. 
 
 FACTS AND FICTIONS OF ZOOLOGY.- By ANDREW WILSON, Ph.D., 
 F.E.P.S.E., &c., Lecturer on Zoology and Comparative Anatomy in the Edin- 
 burgh Medical School; Lecturer on Physiology, Watt Institution and School 
 of Arts, Edinburgh, &c. With numerous illustrations. 
 
 Zoological Myths. 
 
 The Sea-serpents of Science. 
 
 Some Animal Architects. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Parasites and their Development. 
 What I Saw in an Ant's Nest. 
 
 No. 30. and No. 31. [15 cents each number. 
 
 ON THE STUDY OF WORDS. By EICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH, D.D., 
 Archbishop of Dublin. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Lecture I. Introductory Lecture. Lecture V. On the Rise of New Words. 
 
 Lecture II On the Poetry in Words. Lecture VI. On the Distinction of Words. 
 
 Lecture HI On the Morality in Words. Lecture VII. The Schoolmaster's Use of Words. 
 
 Lecture IV. On the History in Words. 
 
 HEREDITARY TRAITS, AND OTHER ESSAYS.-By EICHARD A. 
 
 PROCTOR, B.A., F.E.A.S., author of "The Sun," "Other Worlds than Ours," 
 "Saturn," &c. 
 
 I. Hereditary Traits. 
 II. Artificial Somnambulism. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I in. Bodily Illness as a Mental Stimulant. 
 IV. Dual Consciousness. 
 
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 No. 33. 
 
 VIGNETTES FROM 
 
 tionist at Large." 
 
 NATURE. By GRANT ALLEN, author of "The Evolu. 
 
 I. Fallow Deer. 
 II. Sedge and Woodbrush. 
 III. Red Campion aud White. 
 IV. Butterfly -Hun ting Begins. 
 V. Red Campion Again. 
 VI. The Hedgehog's Hole. 
 VII. On Musbnrv Castle. 
 VIII. A Big Fossil Bone. 
 IX. Veronica. 
 X. Guelder Rose. 
 XI. The Heron's Haunt. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 XII. A Bed of Nettles. 
 XIII. Loosestrife and Pimpernel. 
 XIV. The Carp Pond. 
 XV. A Welsh Roadside. 
 XVI. Seaside Weeds. 
 XVII. A Mountain Tarn. 
 XVIII. Wild Thyme. 
 XIX. The Donkey's Ancestors. 
 XX. Beside the Cromlech. 
 XXI. The Fall of the Leaf. 
 XXII. The Fall of the Year. 
 
 No. 34. 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF STYLE. By HERBERT SPENCER, author of "First 
 Principles of Philosophy," ''Social Statics," "Elements of Psychology," "Ele- 
 ments of Biology," "Education," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. Causes of Force in Language which depend upon Economy of the Mental 
 
 Energies. 
 
 I. The Principle of Economy applied to 
 Words. 
 
 II. The Effect of Figurative Language Ex- 
 plained. 
 
 III. Arrangement of Minor Images in Build- 
 ing up a Thought. 
 
 IV. The Superiority of Poetry to Prose 
 Explained. 
 
 PART II. Causes of Force in Language which depend upon Economy of the Mental 
 
 Sensibilities. 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 THE MOTHER TONGUE. By ALEXANDER BAIN, LL.D., Professor of Logic 
 in the University of Aberdeen. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Conditions of Language Acquisition Generally. 
 The Mother Tongue. 
 Teaching Grammar. 
 
 The Age for Commencing Grammar. 
 The Higher Composition. 
 English Literature. 
 
 No. 35. 
 
 ORIENTAL RELIGIONS. By JOHN CAIRD, S.T.D., President of the Univer- 
 sity of Glasgow, and other authors. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Religion of China. Confucianism. 
 
 By Rev. GEORGE MATHESOF. 
 
 Religions of India. 
 
 '.. Brahmanism. 
 :.- Buddhism. 
 By JOHN CAIRD, S.T.D. 
 
 Religion of Persia. Zoroaster and the Zend 
 Avesta. By Rev. JOHN MILNE, M.A. 
 
 LECTURES ON EVOLUTION.-With an Appendix on The Study 
 of Biology. By THOMAS H. HUXLEY. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 I. THREE LECTURES ON EVOLUTION. 
 
 Lecture I. The Three Hypotheses respecting 
 
 the History of Nature. 
 Lecture II. The Hypothesis of Evolution. The 
 
 Neutral and the Favorable Evidence. 
 
 Lecture III. The Demonstrative Evidence of 
 Evolution. 
 
 n. A LECTURE ON THE STUDY OF BIOLOGY. 
 
 No. 37. 
 
 SIX LECTURES ON LIGHT.- By Prof. JOHN TYNDALL, F.R.S. 
 
 Lecture I. Introductory. 
 Lecture II. Origin of Physical Theories. 
 Lecture III. Relation of Theories to Experience. 
 Lecture IV. Chromatic Phenomena produced by 
 Crystals on Polarized Light. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Lecture V. Range of Vision incommensurate 
 with Range of Radiation. 
 
 Lecture VI. Principles of Spectrum Analysis. 
 Solar Chemistry. Summary 
 and Conclusions. 
 
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 No. 38 and No. 39. [15 cents each number. 
 
 GEOLOGICAL SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD.- By ARCH- 
 IBALD GEIKIE, LL.D., F.R.S., Director-General of the Geological Surveys of 
 Great Britaiu and Ireland. In Two Parts, each complete in itself. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. No. 38. 
 I. My First Geological Excursion. 
 H. -the Old Man of Hoy." 
 III. The Baron's Stone of "Killochan. 
 IV. The Colliers of Carrick. 
 V. Among the Volcanoes of Central France. 
 VI. The Old Glaciers of Norway and Scotland. 
 VII. Rock-Weathering Measured by the Decay 
 of Tombstones. 
 
 PART II. No. 39. 
 
 I. A Fragment of Primeval Europe. 
 II. In Wyoming. 
 
 HI. The Geysers of the Yellowstone. 
 IV. The Lava Fields of Northwestern Europe. 
 V. The Scottish School of Geology. 
 VI. Geographical Evolution. 
 VII. The Geological Influences which have affect- 
 ed the Course of British History. 
 
 THE SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION.-By 
 
 GEORGE J. ROMANES, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S., Zoological Secretary of the Linnean 
 Society, London. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 V. The Argument from Geographical Distribu- 
 VI. The Argument from Embryology. [tion. 
 VII. Arguments drawn from Certain General 
 Considerations. 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION.-By 
 
 I. Introduction. 
 
 II. The Argument from Classification. [are. 
 III. The Argument from Morphology or Struct- 
 IV. The Argument from Geology. 
 
 PALEONTOLOGY AND 
 
 Prof. THOMAS H. HUXLEY. 
 
 NATURAL SELECTION AND NATURAL THEOLOGY.- By EUSTACE 
 
 R. CONDER, D.D. 
 No. 41. 
 CURRENT DISCUSSIONS IN SCIENCE.-By W. MATTIBU WILLIAMS, 
 
 F.R.A.S., F.C.S., author of "The Fuel of the Sun," "Through Norway with a 
 
 Knapsack," "A Simple Treatise on Heat," &c. 
 
 I. Meteoric Astronomy. 
 II. Dr. Siemens's Theory of the Sun. 
 III. Another World Down Here. 
 IV. The Origin of Volcanoes. 
 V. Note on the Direct Effect of Sun-Spots on 
 
 Terrestrial Climates. 
 VI. The Philosophy of the Radiometer and its 
 
 Cosmical Revelations. 
 VII. The Solidity of the Earth. 
 VIII. Meteoric Astronomy. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 IX 
 
 . Aerial Exploration of the Arctic Regions. 
 . "Baily's Beads." 
 XI. World-smashing. 
 XII. On the so-called "Crater-Necks" and 
 
 "Volcanic Bombs" of Ireland. 
 XIII. Travertine. 
 XIV. Murchison and Babbage. 
 XV. The "Consumption of Smoke." 
 XVI. The Air of Stove-heated Rooms. 
 
 No. 42. 
 
 HISTORY OF 
 
 POLLOCK. 
 
 THE SCIENCE OF POLITICS.- By FREDERICK 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Introductory. Place of the Theory 
 of Politics in Human Knowledge. 
 
 Chapter II. The Classic Period: Pericles Soc- 
 rates Plato Aristotle. The Greek Ideal of 
 the State. 
 
 Chapter HI. The Mediaeval Period: The Papacy 
 and the Empire. Thomas Aquinas Dante 
 Bracton Marsilio of Padua. 
 
 Chapter IV. The Modem Period: Maehiavelli 
 Jean Bodin Sir Thomas Smith Hobbes. 
 
 Chapter V. The Modern Period (continued): 
 Hooker Locke Rousseau Blackstone. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Modern Period (continued): 
 Hume Montesquieu Burke. 
 
 Chapter VII. The Present Century: Political 
 Sovereignty Limits of State Intervention 
 Bentham Austin Maine Bagehot Kant 
 Ahrens Savigny Oornewall Lewis John 
 Stuart Mill Herbert Spencer Laboulaye. 
 
 No. 43. 
 
 DARWIN AND HUMBOLDT.-Their Lives and Work.-By Prof. 
 
 HUXLEY and others. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHARLES DARWIN. 
 
 I. Introductory Notice. By TH. H. HUXLEY. 
 II. Life and Character. By GEO. J. ROMANES. 
 III. Work in Geology. By ARCHIBALD GEIKIE. 
 IV. Work in Botany.-ByW.T.THiSELTON DYER. 
 V. Work in Zoology. By GEO. J. ROMANES. 
 VI. Work in Psychology. By GEO. J. ROMANES. 
 
 ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT. 
 
 I. An Address delivered by Louis AOASSIZ at 
 the Centennial Anniversary of the birth of ALEX- 
 ANDER VON HUMBOLDT, under the auspices of the 
 Boston Society of Natural History, Sept. 14. 1869. 
 
 II. Remarks by Prof. FREDERIC H. HKDGI, of 
 Harvard University. 
 
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 No. 44 and No. 45. 
 
 [15 cents each number. 
 
 THE DAWN OF HISTORY.- An Introduction to Prehistoric 
 
 Study. Edifced *>y C. F. KEARY, M.A., of the British Museum. In Two 
 Parts, each complete in itself. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I No. 44. 
 
 Chapter I. The Earliest Traces of Man. 
 Chapter II. The Second Stone Age. 
 Chapter III. The Growth of Language. 
 Chapter IV. Families of Language. 
 Chapter V. The Nations of the Old "World. 
 Chapter VI. Early Social Life. 
 Chapter VII. The Village Community. 
 
 PART II. No. 45. 
 Chapter VIII. Religion. 
 Chapter IX. Aryan Religions. 
 Chapter X. The Other World. 
 Chapter XI. Mythologies and Folk-Tales. 
 Chapter XII. Picture- Writing. 
 Chapter XIII. Phonetic Writing. [hies. 
 
 Chapter XIV. Conclusion. Notes and Author- 
 
 THE DISEASES OF MEMORY.- By TH. EIBOT, author of "Heredity," 
 "English Psychology," &c. Translated from the French by J. FITZGERALD, A.M. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. MEMORY AS A BIOLOGICAL FACT. 
 
 Memory essentially a biological fact, incident- 
 ally a psychic fact. Organic memory. Mod- 
 ifications of nerve-elements: dynamic associa- 
 tions between these elements. Conscious mem- 
 ory. Conditions of consciousness: intensity; 
 diiration. Unconscious cerebration. Nerve- 
 action is the fundamental condition of memory; 
 consciousness is only an accessory. Localiza- 
 tion in the past, or recollection. Mechanism 
 of this operation. It is not a simple and instan- 
 taneous act; it consists of the addition of sec- 
 ondary states of consciousness to the principal 
 state of consciousness. Memoiy is a vision in 
 time. Localization, theoretical and practical. 
 Reference points. Resemblance and difference 
 between localization in the future and in the 
 past. All memory an illusion. Forgetfulness 
 a condition of memory. Return to the starting- 
 point : conscious memory tends little by little to 
 become automatic. 
 
 Chapter IL GENERAL AMNESIA. 
 
 Classification of the diseases of memory. Tem- 
 porary amnesia. Epileptics. Forgetfulness of 
 certain periods of life. Examples of re-educa- 
 tion. Slow and sudden recoveries. Case of pro- 
 visional memory. Periodical or intermittent 
 amnesia. Formation of two memories, totally 
 or partially distinct. Cases of hypnotism re- 
 corded by Maenish, Azam, and Dufay. Progress- 
 ive amnesia. Its importance. Reveals the law 
 which governs the destruction of memory. Law 
 of regression : enunciation of this law. In what 
 
 order me_mory fails. Counter-proof: it is recon- 
 stituted in inverse order. Confirmatory facts. 
 Congenital amnesia. Extraordinary memory of 
 some idiots. 
 
 Chapter III. PARTIAL AMNESIA. 
 Reduction of memory to memories. Anatomical 
 and physiological reasons for partial memories. 
 Amnesia of numbers, names, figures. forms.&c. 
 Amnesia of signs. Its nature : a loss of motor- 
 memory. Examination of this point. Progress- 
 ive amnesia of signs verifies completely the law 
 of regression. Order of dissolution : proper 
 names: common nouns; verbs and adjectives; 
 interjections, and language of the emotions; 
 gestures. Relation between this dissolution and 
 the evolution of the Indo-European languages. 
 Counter-proof : return of signs in inverse order. 
 
 Chapter IV. EXALTATION OF MEMORY, OR 
 
 HYPERMNESIA. 
 
 Geiieral excitation. Partial excitation. Return 
 of lost memories. Return of forgotten lan- 
 guages. Reduction of this fact to the law of re- 
 gression. Case of false memory. Examples, 
 and a suggested explanation. 
 
 Chapter V. CONCLUSION. 
 
 Relations between the retention of perceptions 
 and nutrition, between the reproduction of rec- 
 ollections and the general and local circulation. 
 Influence of the quantity and quality of the 
 blood. Examples. The law of regression con- 
 nected with a physiological principle and a psy- 
 chological principle. Recapitulation. 
 
 No. 47. 
 
 THE CHILDHOOD OF RELIGIONS.-Embracing a Simple Account 
 of the Birth and Growth of Myths and Legends. By EDWARD 
 
 CLODD, F.E.A.S., author of "The Childhood of the World," "The Story of 
 Creation," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Introductory. [tion. 
 
 Chapter II. Legends of the Past about the Crea- 
 Chapter III. Creation as told by Science. 
 Chapter IV. Legends of the Past about Mankind. 
 Chapter V. Early Races of Mankind. [tions. 
 Chapter VI. The Aryan, or Indo-European na- 
 ChapterVII. The Ancient and Modern Hindu 
 Religions. 
 
 Chapter VTII. Zoroastrianism, the Ancient Re- 
 ligion of Persia. 
 Chapter IX. Buddhism. 
 Chapter X. The Religions of China. 
 Chapter XL The Semitic Nations. 
 Chapter XII. Mohammedanism, or Islam. 
 Chapter XIII. On the Study of the Bible. 
 
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 No. 48. 
 
 LIFE IN NATURE.-By JAMES HINTON, author 
 Place," "The Mystery of Pain," &e. 
 
 of "Man and his Dwelling- 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Of Function; or, How We Act 
 Chapter II. Of Nutrition; or, Why We Grc 
 Chapter III. Of Nutrition; The Vital Force. 
 
 Chapter VIII. Nature and Man. 
 
 Chapter IX. The Phenomenal and the True. 
 
 Chapter X. Force. 
 
 Chapter IV. Of Living Forms: or. Morphology. 
 Chapter V. Living Forms. The Law of Form. 
 Chapter VI Is Life Universal? 
 Chapter VII The Living World. 
 
 Chapter XL The Organic and the Inorganic. 
 Chapter XII The Life of Man. 
 Chapter XIII. Conclusion. 
 
 No. 49. 
 
 THE SUN: Its Constitution; 
 
 By NATHAN T. CAUR, LL.D., Judge 
 With an Appendix by EICHARD A. 
 
 CONT 
 Section I. Purpose of this Essay. Difficulties 
 of the Subject. 
 Section H. Distance from the Earth to the Sun. 
 Section III The Diameter of the Sun. 
 Section IV. The Form of the Sun. 
 Section V. Rotary Motion of the Sun. 
 Section VI. Perturbating Movement. 
 Section VII. The Sun's Orbital Movement. 
 Section VIII. The Sun's Attractive Force. Den- 
 sity of the Solar Mass. 
 Section IX. The Son's Atmosphere. 
 Section X. The Chromosphere. 
 Section XI. Corona, Prominences, and Faculw. 
 Section XII. The Photosphere. 
 Section XIII. The Sun's Heat. 
 Section XIV. Condition of the Interior. 
 Section XV. Effects of Heat on Matter. 
 
 Appendix First. The Sun's Corona a 
 Second. The Fuel of the J 
 Third. The Fuel of the Si 
 
 ts Phenomena; Its Condition. 
 
 of the Ninth Judicial Circuit of Indiana. 
 PROCTOR and M. W. WILLIAMS. 
 
 ENTS. 
 Section XVI. The Expansive Power of Heat. 
 Section XVII. The Sun's Crust. 
 Section XVIII. The Gaseous Theory. 
 Section XIX The Vapor Theory. 
 Section XX The " Cloud-like "' Theory. 
 Section XXI. Supposed Supports of the Fore- 
 going Theoi'ies. 
 Section XXII. The Crust in a Fluid Condition. 
 Section XXIII Production of the Sun-Spots. 
 Section XXIV. The Area of Sun-Spots Limited. 
 Section XXV. Periodicity of the Spots. 
 Section XXVI. The Spots are Cavities in the 
 Sun. 
 Section XXVII. How the Heat of the Sun reaches 
 the Earth. 
 Section XXVIII. The Question of the Extinction 
 of the Sun. 
 
 nd his Spots. By RICHARD A. PROCTOE. 
 mix. By RICHARD A. PROCTOR. 
 m A Reply, by W. M. WILLIAMS. 
 
 No. 50 and No. 51. 
 
 MONEY AND THE MECHANISI 
 
 JEVONS, M.A., F.E.S., Professor of I 
 College, Manchester, England. In T 
 
 CONT 
 Chapter I. Barter. 
 Chapter II. Exchange. 
 Chapter III. The Functions of Money. 
 Chapter IV. Early History of Money. 
 Chapter V. Qualities of the Material of Money 
 Chapter VI The Metals as Money. 
 Chapter VII Coins. 
 Chapter VIII The Principles of Circulation. 
 Chapter IX. Systems of Metallic Money. 
 Chapter X The English System of Metallic 
 Currency. 
 Chapter XL Fractional Currency. 
 Chapter XII The Battle of the Standards. 
 Chapter XIII. Technical Matters relating to 
 Coinage. 
 Chapter XIV. International Money. 
 
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 Yl OF EXCHANGE.- By W.STANLEY 
 
 jogic and Political Economy in the Owens 
 wo Parts. 
 
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 Chapter XV. The Mechanism of Exchange. 
 Chapter XVI. Representative Money. 
 Chapter XVII The Nature and Varieties of 
 Promissory Notes. 
 Chapter XVIII Methods of Regulating a Paper 
 Currency. 
 Chapter XIX. Credit Documents. [System. 
 Chapter XX Book Credit and the Banking 
 Chapter XXL The Clearing-House System. 
 Chapter XXII The Check Bank. 
 Chapter XXIII Foreign Bills of Exchange. 
 Chapter XXTV. The Bank of England and the 
 Money Market. 
 Chapter XXV A Tabular Standard of Value. 
 Chapter XXVI The Quantity of Money needed 
 by a Nation. 
 
 No. 52. 
 
 THE DISEASES OF THE WILL- By TH. EIBOT. author of "The Dis- 
 eases of Memory," &c. Translated from the French by J. FITZGERALD, A.M. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Introduction.-The Question Stated. 
 Chapter II. Impairment of the Will. Lack of 
 
 Impulsion. 
 Chapter III. Impairment of the Will. Excess of 
 
 Impulsion. 
 
 Chapter IV. Impairment of VoluntaryAttention. 
 Chapter V. The Realm of Caprice. 
 Chapter VI. Extinction of the Will. 
 
 Chapter VII. Conclusion. 
 
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 ANIMAL AUTOMATISM, AND OTHER ESSAYS.- By THOMAS 
 HENRY HUXLEY, LL.D., F.E.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. On the Hypothesis that Animals are 
 
 Automata, and its History. 
 II. Science and Culture. 
 III. On Elementary Instruction in Physiology. 
 
 IV. On the Border Territory between the 
 Animal and the Vegetable Kingdoms. 
 V. Universities: Actual and Ideal. 
 
 No. 54. 
 
 THE BIRTH AND GROWTH OF MYTHS.-By EDWARD CLODD, 
 F.R.A.S., author of "The Childhood of the World," "The Childhood of Re- 
 ligions," "The Story of Creation," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. Nature as Viewed by Primitive Man. 
 II. Personification of the Powers of Nature. 
 HI. The Sun and Moon in Mythology. 
 IV. The Theories of Certain Comparative 
 
 Mythologists. 
 V. Aryan Mythology. 
 
 VI. The Primitive Mature-Myth Transformed. 
 VTI. The Stars in Mythology. 
 VIII. Myths of the Destructive Forces of Nature. 
 IX. The Hindu Sun-and-Cloud Myth. 
 X. Demonology. 
 
 XI. Metempsychosis and Transformation. 
 XII. Transformation in the Middle Ages. 
 XIIL The Belief in Transformation Universal. 
 XIV. Beast-Fables. 
 XV. Totemism. 
 
 XVI. Heraldry: Ancestor-worship. [tives. 
 XVII. Survival of Myth in Historical Narra. 
 XVin. Myths of King Arthur and Llewellyn. 
 XIX -Semitic Myths and Legends. 
 XX. Conclusion. 
 Appendix. An American Indian Myth. 
 
 THE SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF MORALS, AND OTHER ESSAYS. 
 
 By WILLIAM KINGDON CLIFFORD, F.R.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. On the Scientific Basis of Morals. I HI. The Ethics of Belief. 
 
 II. Right and Wrong: the Scientific Ground I IV. The Ethics of Religion, 
 of their Distinction. | 
 
 No. 56 and No. 57. [15 cents each number. 
 
 ILLUSIONS: A PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY.- By JAMES SULLY, author 
 of "Sensation and Intuition," "Pessimism," &c. In Two Parts. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter L The Study of Illusion. 
 Chapter II. The Classification of Illusions. 
 Chapter III. Illusions of Perception : General. 
 Chapter IV. Illusions of Perception (continued). 
 Chapter V. Illusions of Perception (continued). 
 Chapter VT. Illusions of Perception (continued). 
 Chapter VII. Dreams. 
 
 Chapter VIII. Illusions of Introspection. 
 Chapter EX. Other Quasi-Presentative Illu- 
 sions: Errors of Insight. 
 Chapter X. Illusions of Memory. 
 Chapter XI. Illusions of Belief. 
 Chapter XII. Results. 
 
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 TION, or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle 
 
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 and latest English edition, with additions and corrections. Two double numbers. 
 
 CONT 
 Chapter I. Variation under Domestication. 
 Chapter II. Variation under Nature. 
 Chapter III. Struggle for Existence. 
 Chapter IV. Natural Selection: or, the Sur- 
 vival of the Fittest. 
 Chapter V. Laws of Variation. 
 Chapter VI. Difficulties of the Theory. 
 Chapter VII. Miscellaneous Objections to the 
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 Chapter VTII. Instinct. 
 Chapter LX. Hybridism. 
 
 E N T S. 
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 Organic Beings. 
 Chapter XII. Geological Distribution. 
 Chapter XIIL Geological Distribution (contin'd). 
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 Rudimentary Organs. 
 Chapter XV. Recapitulation and Conclusion. 
 Index. Glossary of Scientific Terms. 
 
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 No. 60. 
 
 THE CHILDHOOD OF THE WORLD.-A Simple Account of Man 
 in Early Times. By EDWARD CLODD, F.K.A.S., author of "The Childhood 
 of Religions," "The Story of Creation," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 I. Introductory. 
 II Man's First Wants. 
 III. Man's First Tools. 
 IV. Fire. 
 
 V. Cooking and Pottery. 
 VI. Dwellings. 
 VII. Use of Metals. 
 VIII. Man's Great Age on the Earth. 
 IX. Mankind as Shepherds, Farmers, and 
 
 Traders. 
 X. Language. 
 XI. Writing. 
 XII. Counting. 
 
 XIII. Man's Wanderings from his first Home. 
 XIV. Man's Progress in all things. 
 XV. Decay of Peoples. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 XVI. Introductory. 
 XVIL Man's First Questions. 
 XVIII. Myths. 
 
 XIX. Myths about Sun and Moon. 
 XX. Myths about Eclipses. 
 XXI. Myths about Stars. 
 XXII. Myths about the Earth and Man. 
 XXIIL Man's Ideas about the Soul. 
 XXIV.- Belief in Magic and Witchcraft. 
 XXV. Man's Awe of the Unknown. 
 XXVI. Fetish -Worship. 
 XXVII. Idolatry. 
 XXVIII. Nature'- Worship. 
 
 1. Water -Worship. 
 
 2. Tree -Worship. 
 
 3. Animal -Worship. 
 XXIX. Polytheism, or Belief in Many Gods. 
 
 XXX. Dualism, or Belief in Two Gods. 
 XXXI. Prayer. 
 XXXII. Sacrifice. 
 
 XXXIII. Monotheism, or Belief in One God. 
 XXXIV. Three Stories About Abraham. 
 XXXV. Man's Belief in a Future Life. 
 XXXVI. Sacred Books. 
 XXXVII. Conclusion. 
 
 No. 61. 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS ESSAYS,-By RICHARD A. PBOCTOK, B.A, F.R.A.S., 
 author of "The Sun," "Other Worlds than Ours," "Saturn," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 I. Strange Coincidences. 
 II. Coincidences and Superstitions. 
 III. Gambling Superstitions. 
 
 TV. Learning Languages. 
 
 V. Strange Sea Creatures. 
 VI. The Origin of Whales. 
 
 VII. Prayer and Weather. 
 
 No. 62. 
 
 [Double number, SO cents. 
 
 THE RELIGIONS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD, including Egypt, 
 Assyria and Babylonia, Persia, India, Phoenicia, Etruria, Greece, 
 
 Rome. By GEORGE RAWLINSON, M.A., Camden Professor of Ancient History, 
 Oxford, and Canon of Canterbury. Author of "The Origin of Nations," "The 
 
 Five Great Monarchies," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Religion of the Ancient 
 
 Egyptians. 
 Chapter II. The Religion of the Assyrians 
 
 and Babylonians. 
 Chapter III. The Religion of the Ancient 
 
 Iranians. 
 Chapter IV. The Religion of the Early 
 
 Sanskritic Indians. 
 
 Chapter V. The Religion of the Phoenicians 
 and Carthaginians. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Religion of the Etruscans. 
 
 Chapter VII. The Religion of the Ancient 
 Greeks. 
 
 Chapter VIII. The Religion of the Ancient 
 Romans. 
 
 Concluding Remarks. 
 
 No. 63. 
 
 PROGRESSIVE MORALITY.-An Essay in Ethics.- By THOMAS 
 
 FOWLER, M.A., LL.D., F.S.A., President of Corpus Christi College, Wykeham 
 Professor of Logic in the University of Oxford. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Introduction. The Sanctions of 
 
 Conduct. 
 Chapter II. The Moral Sanction or Moral 
 
 Sentiment. Its Functions, and 
 
 the Justification of its Claims to 
 
 Superiority. 
 
 Chapter III. Analysis and Formation of the 
 Moral Sentiment. Its Education 
 and Improvement. 
 
 Chapter IV. The Moral Test and its Justification. 
 
 Chapter V. The Practical Application of the 
 Moral Test to Existing Morality. 
 
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 THE HUMBOLDT LIBRARY 
 
 THE DISTRIBUTION OF LIFE, Animal and Vegetable, in Space 
 and Time. By ALFRED KUSSEL WALLACE and W. T. THISELTON DYER. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 SECTION I. DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 
 Geographical Distribution of Land Animals. 
 A. Vertical Distribution of Animals. 
 B. Powers of Dispersal of Animals. 
 C. Widespread and Local Groups. [mals. 
 
 D. Barriers which Limit the Distribution of Ani- 
 E. Zoological Regions. 
 
 The Pafcearetic Region. 
 The Ethiopian Region. 
 The Oriental Region. 
 The Australian Region. 
 The Neotropical Region. 
 The Nearctic Region. 
 Distribution of the Higher Animals during the 
 
 Tertiary Period. 
 
 A. Tertiary Faunas and their Geographical Rela- 
 tions to those of the six Zoological Regions. 
 B. Birthplace and Migrations of some Mamma- 
 lian Families and Genera. 
 Distribution of Marine Animals. 
 
 Foraminifera. Cirrhipedia. 
 
 Spougida. Mollusea. 
 
 Actinozoa. Fishes. 
 
 Polyzoa. Marine Turtles. 
 
 Echinodermata. Cetacea. 
 
 Crustacea. 
 
 General Relations of Marine with Terrestrial 
 
 Zoological Regions. 
 Distribution of Animals in Time. 
 
 SECTION n. DISTRIBUTION OF VEGETABLE LIFE. 
 
 THE NORTHERN FLORA. 
 The Arctic-Alpine Flora. 
 The Intermediate or Temperate Flora. 
 The Mediterraneo-Caucasian Flora. 
 
 THE SOUTHERN FLORA. 
 
 The Antarctic-Alpine Flora. 
 
 The Australian Flora. 
 
 The Andine Flora. 
 
 The Mexico-Californian Flora. 
 
 The South-African Flora. 
 
 THE TROPICAL FLORA. 
 
 The Indo-Malayan Tropical Flora. 
 The American Tropical Flora. 
 The African Tropical Flora. 
 
 No. 65. 
 
 CONDITIONS OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT, and Other Essays. 
 
 By WILLIAM KINGDON CLIFFORD, F.R.S., late Professor of Applied Mathematics 
 in University College, London. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. On some of the Conditions of Mental 
 
 Development. 
 
 II. On the Aims and Instruments of Scientific 
 Thought. 
 
 III. A Lecture on Atoms. 
 
 IV. The First and the Last Catastrophe. A crit- 
 icism on some recent speculations about 
 the duration of the universe. 
 
 No. 66. 
 
 TECHNICAL EDUCATfON, AND OTHER ESSAYS.-By 
 
 THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY, F.E.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 L Technical Education. I IV. On Sensation and the Unity of Structure of 
 
 II. The Connection of the Biological Sciences Sensiferous Organs. 
 
 with Medicine. V. On Certain Errors respecting the Structure 
 
 III. Joseph Priestly. | of the Heart attributed to Aristotle. 
 
 No. 67. 
 
 THE BLACK DEATH: An Account of the Deadly Pestilence of 
 
 the Fourteenth Century. By J - F - C. HECKER, M.D., Professor in the 
 Frederick William University, Berlin; Member of various learned societies in 
 London, Lyons, New York, Philadelphia, &c. Translated for the Sydenham 
 Society, of London, by B. G. BABINGTON, M.IX, F.E.S. 
 
 Chapter I. General Observations. 
 Chapter II. The Disease. 
 Chapter III. Causes. Spread. 
 Chapter IV. Mortality. 
 Chapter V. Moral E'ffects. 
 Chapter VI. Physicians. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Appendix. 
 
 I. The Ancient Song of the Flagellants. 
 II. Examination of the Jews accused of 
 Poisoning the Wells. 
 
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 No - 68 - Special number, 1O cents. 
 
 LAWS IN GENERAL, AND THE ORDER OF THEIR DISCOVERY. 
 THE ORIGIN OF ANIMAL WORSHIP.- POLITICAL FETICHISM. 
 
 Three Essays by HERBERT SPENCER. 
 
 No. 69. [Double number, 3O cents. 
 
 FETICH ISM.- A Contribution to Anthropology and the History of 
 
 Religion. By FRITZ SCHULTZE, Dr. Phil. Translated from the German by 
 J. FITZGERALD, M.A. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Introductory. Chapter 
 
 Chapter II. The Mind of the Savage in its In- 1. 
 
 tellectual and Moral Aspects. 2. 
 
 1. The Intellect of the Savage. 3. 
 
 2. The Morality of the Savage. 4. 
 
 3. Conclusion. 5. 
 Chapter III. The Relation between the Savage 6. 
 
 Mind and its Object. 7. 
 
 1. The Value of Objects. fleets. Chapter 
 
 2. The Anthropathic Apprehension of Ob- 1. 
 
 3. The Causal Connection of Objects. 2. 
 Chapter IV. Fetichisin as a Religion. 3. 
 
 1. The Belief in Fetiches. 4. 
 
 2. The Range of Fetich Influence. 5. 
 
 3. The Religiosity of Fetich Worshipers. 6. 
 
 4. Worship and Sacrifice. 7. 
 
 5. Fetich Priesthoods. Chapter 
 
 6. Fetichisin among Non-Savages. 1. 
 
 V. The Various Objects of Fetich Wor- 
 Stones as Fetiches. [ship. 
 
 Mountains as Fetiches. 
 Water as a Fetich. 
 Wind and Fire as Fetiches. 
 Plants as Fetiches. 
 Animals as Fetiches. 
 Men as Fetiches. 
 
 VI. The Highest Grade of Fetichism. 
 The New Object. 
 
 The Gradual Acquisition of Knowledge. 
 The Worship of the Moon. 
 The Worship of the Stars. 
 The Transition to Sun -Worship. 
 The Worship of the Sun. 
 The Worship of the Heavens. 
 VII. The Aim of Fetichism. 
 Retrospect. 2. The New Problem. 
 
 No. 70. 
 
 ESSAYS, SPECULATIVE 
 
 AND PRACTICAL.- By HERBERT SPENCER. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. Specialized Administration. 
 H. "The Collective Wisdom." 
 III. Morals and Moral Sentiments. 
 
 TV. Reasons for Dissenting from the Philosophy 
 
 of Comte. 
 V. What is Electricity? 
 
 ANTHROPOLOGY. By DANIEL WILSON, LL.D., author of "Prehistoric Man." 
 
 Chapter I. Scope of the. Science. 
 Chapter II. Man's Place in Nature. 
 Chapter III. Origin of Man. 
 Chapter IV. Races of Mankind. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter V. Antiquity of Man. 
 
 Chapter VI. Language. 
 
 Chapter VII. Development of Civilization. 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 ARCHEOLOGY. By E. B. TYLOR, F.R.S., author of "The Early History of 
 Mankind," "Primitive Culture," &c. 
 
 THE DANCING MANIA OF THE MIDDLE AGES.- By J. F. c. 
 
 HECKER, M.D., Professor in the Frederick William University, Berlin; author of 
 "The Black Death." Translated by B. G. BABINGTON, M.D., F.R.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Dancing Mania in Germany and 
 
 the Netherlands. 
 Sect. 1. St. John's Dance. 
 Sect. 2. St. Vitus's Dance. 
 Sect. 3. Causes. 
 
 Sect. 4. More Ancient Dancing Plagues. 
 Sect. 5. Physicians. 
 Sect. 6. Decline and Termination of the 
 Dancing Plague. 
 
 Chapter II. The Dancing Mania in Italy. 
 
 Sect. 1. Tarantism. 
 
 Sect. 2. Most Ancient Traces. Causes. 
 
 Sect. 3. Increase. 
 
 Sect. 4. Idiosyncracies. Music. 
 
 Sect. 5. Hysteria. 
 
 Sect. 6. Decrease. 
 Chapter III. The Dancing Mania in Abyssinia, 
 
 Sect. 1. Tigretier. 
 Chapter IV. Sympathy. 
 
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 EVOLUTION IN HISTORY, LANGUAGE, AND SCIENCE. 
 
 Four addresses delivered at the London Crystal Palace School of Art, Science, 
 and Literature. 
 
 Past and Present in the East. A Parallelism demonstrating the principle 
 of Causal Evolution, and the necessity of the study of General History. 
 By G. G. ZERFFI, D.Ph., Fellow of the Eoyal Historical Society of London. 
 
 
 for a More Scientific Study of Geography.- By Rev. w. A. 
 
 HALES, M.A., formerly Exhibitioner of Caius College, Cambridge. 
 
 Hereditary Tendencies as Exhibited in History. -By HENRY ELLIOT 
 
 MALDEN, M.A., F.R.H.S., Trinity Hall, Cambridge. 
 IV. 
 
 Vicissitudes of the English Language. By Rev. ROBINSON THORNTON, 
 
 D.D., F.R.H.S., formerly Fellow of St. John's College, Oxford. 
 Nos. 74, 75, 76, 77 (double number). 
 
 THE DESCENT OF MAN, AND SELECTION IN RELATION 
 
 TO SEX. By CHARLES DARWIN. With Illustrations. New Edition, Re- 
 vised and Augmented. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 PART I. 
 
 THE DESCENT OR ORIGIN OF MAN. 
 Chapter I. The Evidence of the Descent of 
 
 Man from some Lower Form. 
 Chapter II. On the Manner of Development of 
 Man from some Lower Fc 
 
 Chapter III. Comparison of the Mental Powers 
 of Man and the Lower Animals. 
 
 Chapter IV. Comparison of the Mental Powers 
 of Man and the Lower Animals 
 (continued). 
 
 Chapter V. On the Development of the Intel- 
 lectual and Moral Faculties dur- 
 ing Primeval and Civilized Times 
 
 Chapter VI. On the Affinities and Genealogy of 
 Man. 
 
 Chapter VH. On the Races of Man. 
 
 PART II. 
 SEXUAL SELECTION. 
 
 Chapter VIII. Principles of Sexual Selection. 
 
 Chapter IX. Secondary Sexual Character in 
 the Lower Classes of the An- 
 imal Kingdom. 
 
 Chapter 
 Chapter 
 Chapter 
 
 X. Secondary Sexual Characters of 
 
 Insects. 
 XI. Insects (continued) Order Lepi- 
 
 doptera(butterflies and moths) 
 XII. Secondary Sexual Characters of 
 
 Fishes, Amphibians, and Rep- 
 tiles. 
 Chapter XIII. Secondary Sexual Characters of 
 
 Birds. 
 
 Chapter XIV. Birds (continued). 
 Chapter XV. Birds (continued). 
 Chapter XVI. Birds (concluded). 
 Chapter XVII. Secondary Sexual Characters of 
 
 Mammals. 
 Chapter XVIII. Secondary Sexual Characters of 
 
 Mammals (continued). 
 
 PART m. 
 SEXUAL SELECTION IN RELATION TO MAN, 
 
 AND CONCLUSION. 
 Chapter XIX. Secondary Sexual Characters of 
 
 Man. 
 
 Chapter XX. Secondary Sexual Characters of 
 Man (continued). [sion. 
 
 Chapter XXI. General Summary and Concln- 
 
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 HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE DISTRIBUTION OF LAND IN 
 ENGLAND, with Suggestions for some Improvement in the law. 
 
 By WILLIAM LLOYD BIRKBECK, M.A., Master of Downing College, and Downing 
 Professor of the Laws of England in the University of Cambridge. 
 
 PART I. 
 I. Anglo-Saxon Agriculture. Geneats and 
 
 Geburs. Villani. 
 
 IT. Agriculture after the Conquest. Villein- 
 age. Copyholders. Continental Serfs. 
 III. Origin of Large Properties. Estates of 
 Anglo-Saxon Nobility. Evidence of 
 Domesday. 
 
 IV. The Soke. Socage Tenure. 
 V. Agricultural Communities. 
 VI. -Mr. Seebohm. 
 
 VII. The First Taxation of Land. The Hide. 
 VIII. Saxon Law of Succession to Land. 
 IX. Effect of the Norman Conquest on the 
 
 Distribution of Land. 
 X. Norman Law of Succession. 
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 Condi tionalibus." 
 XH. Effects of Strict Entails. Scotch Entails. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 XIII.- 
 
 XV.- 
 XVI.- 
 
 XVIII.- 
 XIX.- 
 
 L- 
 
 II.- 
 III.- 
 IV.- 
 
 Relaxation of Strict Entails. Common 
 
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 -Effect of Strict Settlements of Land. 
 Mr. Thorold Rogers. 
 
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 Powers of Sale. 
 
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 Walter. Formation of a Peasant Pro- 
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 PART II. 
 
 -Amendment of Law of Primogeniture. 
 -Proposed System of Registration. 
 -Modern Registration Acts. 
 -The Present General Registration Act. 
 
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 SCIENTIFIC ASPECTS OF SOME FAMILIAR THINGS.- By w. 
 
 M. WILLIAMS, F.R.S., F.C.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. On the Serial Benefits of Paraffin. 
 
 II. The Formation of Coal. 
 HI. The Chemistry of Bog Reclamation. 
 IV. The Coloring of Green Tea. 
 
 V. "Iron-Filings" in Tea. 
 VI. The Origin of Soap. 
 
 VII. The Action of Frost in Water-Pipes and 
 
 on Building Materials. 
 Vni. Fire-Clay and Anthracite. 
 IX. Count Rumford's Cooking- Stoves. 
 X. The Air of Stove-Heated Rooms. 
 XI. Domestic Ventilation. 
 
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 CHARLES DARWIN: HIS LIFE AND WORK.- By GRANT ALLEN. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The World into which Darwin was 
 
 born. 
 
 Chapter II. Charles Darwin and his Antecedents. 
 Chapter III. Early Days. 
 Chapter IV. Darwin's Wander- Years. 
 Chapter V. The Period of Incubation. 
 Chapter VI. " The Origin of Species." 
 
 Chapter VTL The Darwinian Revolution begins. 
 Chapter VIII. The Descent of Man. 
 Chapter IX. The Theory of Courtship. 
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 Chapter XI. Darwin's Place in the Evolution- 
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 Chapter XII. The Net Result. 
 
 THE MYSTERY OF MATTER: and 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF IGNORANCE. 
 
 By J. ALLANSON PICTON. 
 
 ILLUSIONS OF THE SENSES: AND OTHER ESSAYS.-By 
 
 RICHARD A. PROCTOR. 
 
 I. Illusions of the Senses. 
 II. Animals of the Present and the Past. 
 III. Life in Other Worlds. 
 IV. Earthquakes. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
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 PROFIT-SHARING BETWEEN CAPITAL AND LABOR.-Six Essays. 
 
 By SEDLEY TAYLOR, M.A., late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, Eng. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Essay I. Profit-Sharing in the Maison Leclaire. 
 Essay II. Profit-Sharing in Industry. 
 Essay III. Profit-Sharing in Industry(conimd). 
 Essay IV. Profit-Sharing in the Paris and Orleans 
 Railway Company. 
 
 Essay V. Profit-Sharing in Agriculture. 
 
 Appendix to Essay V. Mr. Vande- 
 leur's Irish Experiment. 
 
 Essay VI. Profit-Sharing in Distributive Enter- 
 prise. 
 
 STUDIES OF ANIMATED NATURE.- Four Essays, viz., 
 
 Bats. -By W. S. DALLAS, F.L.S. 
 
 Dragon-Flies. By W. S. DALLAS, F.L.S. 
 
 The Glow-worm and other Phosphorescent Animals. By G. G. CHTS- 
 
 HOLM, M.A., B.Sc. 
 
 rv. 
 Minute Organisms. By FREDERICK P. BALKWILL. 
 
 No. 85. 
 
 THE ESSENTIAL NATURE OF RELIGION.- By J. ALLANSON PICTON, 
 author of "The Mystery of Matter," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I Religion and Freedom of Thought. 
 II. The Evolution of Religion. Fetichism. 
 III. Nature -Worship. 
 
 IV. Prophetic Religions. 
 V. Religious Dogma. The Future of Religion. 
 
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 THE UNSEEN UNIVERSE. By WILLIAM KINGDON CLIFFORD, F.E.S. 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE PURE SCIENCES.-By WILLIAM KING- 
 DON CLIFFORD, F.E.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. Statement of the Question. 
 H Knowledge and Feeling. 
 
 UI. The Postulates of the Science of Space. 
 IV. The Universal Statements of Arithmetic. 
 
 No. 87. 
 
 THE MORPHINE HABIT (MORPHINOMANIA).- Three Lectures by 
 Professor B. BALL, M.D., of the Paris Faculty of Medicine. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. Morphinomania. General Description. 
 
 Effects of the Abuse of Morphine. 
 II. Morphinomania. Effects of Abstinence 
 from Morphine. 
 
 HI. Morphinomania. Diagnosis, Prognosis, and 
 Treatment. 
 
 To which is appended four other lectures, viz., 
 
 ! The Border-Land of Insanity. I ni. Prolonged Dreams, 
 n. Cerebral Dualism. iv. Insanity in Twins. 
 
 SCIENCE AND CRIME, AND OTHER ESSAYS.- By ANDREW WILSON, 
 F.K.S.E. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. The Earliest Known Life-Relic. 
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 111. On Giants. 
 
 IV. The Polity af a Pond. 
 V. Skates and Rays. 
 VI. Leaves. 
 
 THE GENESIS OF SCIENCE. -By HERBERT SPENCER. 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 THE COMING OF AGE OF "THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES."-By 
 
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 NOTES ON EARTHQUAKES: with Thirteen Miscellaneous Essays. 
 
 By EICHARD A. PROCTOR. 
 
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 I. Notes on Earthquakes. 
 II. Photographing Fifteen Million Stars. 
 III. The Story of the Moon. 
 IV. The Earth's Past. 
 V. The Story of the Earth. 
 VI. The Falls of Niagara. 
 VII. The Unknowable. 
 
 Vm. Sun -Worship. 
 IX. Herbert Spencer on Priesthoods. 
 X. The Star of Bethlehem and a Bible Comet. 
 XI. An Historical Puzzle. 
 XH. Galileo, Darwin, and the Pope. 
 XIII. Science and Politics. 
 XIV. Parents and Children. 
 
 No. 91. 
 
 Double number, 3O cents. 
 
 THE RISE OF UNIVERSITIES." By S. S. LAURIE, LL.D., Professor of the 
 Institutes and History of Education in the University of Edinburgh. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 1. The Romano-Hellenic Schools and their 
 
 Decline. 
 II. Influence of Christianity on Education, and 
 
 Rise of Christian Schools, 
 in. Charlemagne and the Ninth Century. 
 IV. InnerWork of Christian Schools (450-1100). 
 V. Tenth and Eleventh Centuries. 
 VI The Rise of Universities (A. D. 1100). 
 VII. The First Universities. The Schola Saler- 
 
 ndtana and the University of Naples. 
 Tin. The University of Bologna. 
 
 IX. The University of Paris. 
 X. The Constitution of Universities. The 
 terms "Studium Generale" and "Uni- 
 versitas." 
 
 XI. Students, their Numbers and Discipline. 
 Privileges of Universities. Faculties. 
 XII. Graduation. 
 XIII. Oxford and Cambridge. 
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 THE FORMATION OF VEGETABLE MOULD THROUGH THE 
 Action of Earthworms, with Observations on their Habits. 
 
 By CHARLES DARWIN, L.L.D., F.B.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Habits of Worms. 
 
 Chapter II. Habits of Worms (continued). 
 
 Chapter III. The Amount of Fine Earth brought 
 
 up by Worms to the surface. 
 Chapter TV. The Part which Worms have played 
 
 in the Burial of Ancient Build- 
 
 Chapter V. The Action of Worms in the Dena 
 dation of the Laud. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Denudation of the Land (con- 
 tinued). 
 
 Chapter VII. Conclusion. 
 
 SCIENTIFIC METHODS 
 
 MOUNT BLEYER, M.D. 
 
 I. General Review of the Subject. 
 II. Death by Hanging. 
 III. Death by Electricity. 
 IV. Death by Morphine Injection. 
 
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 THE FACTORS OF ORGANIC 
 
 EVOLUTION. B Y HERBERT SPENCER. 
 
 THE DISEASES OF PERSONALITY.-By TH. RIBOT.- Translated from 
 the French by J. FITZGERALD, M.A. 
 
 Chapter I. Introduction. 
 Chapter II. Organic Disturbance. 
 Chapter III. Affective Disturbance. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I Chapter IV. Intellective Disturbance. 
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 A HALF-CENTURY OF SCI ENCE.- By THOMAS HENRY HUXLET, F.E.S. 
 
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 THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE from 1836 to 1 886.-By GRANT ALLEN. 
 
 No. 97. 
 
 THE PLEASURES 
 
 F.R.S., D.C.L., LL.D. 
 
 OF LIFE.-By Sir JOHN LUBBOCK, Bart., M.P., 
 
 Chapter I. The Duty of Happiness. 
 Chapter II. The Happiness of Duty. 
 Chapter III. A Song of Books. 
 Chapter IV. The Choice of Books. 
 Chapter V. The Blessing of Friends. 
 
 PAJIT FIRST. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Value of Time. 
 
 Chapter VII. The Pleasures of Travel. 
 Chapter VIII. The Pleasures of Home. 
 
 Chapter IX. Science. 
 
 Chapter X. Education. 
 
 # % PART SECOND. For the contents of Part Second see No. Ill of this Catalogue. 
 No. 98. [Special number, 1O cents. 
 
 COSMIC EMOTION.-Aiso, THE TEACHING OF SCIENCE.-By 
 
 WILLIAM KINGDON CLIFFORD, F.E.S. 
 
 No. 99. 
 
 NATURE-STUDIES. Four Essays by various authors, viz., 
 
 I. Flame., By Prof. F. E. EATON LOWE. 
 II. Birds of Passage. By Dr. EGBERT BROWN, F.L.S. 
 HI. Snow. By GEORGE G. CHISHOLM, F.E.G.S. 
 IV. Caves. By JAMES DALLAS, F.L.S. 
 
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 No. 100. 
 
 SCIENCE AND POETRY, AND OTHER ESSAYS.-By 
 
 ANDREW WILSON, F.R.S.E. 
 
 I._5 c j ence ant j Poetry. A Valedictory Address to a Literary Society. 
 
 ii. The Place, Method, and Advantages of Biology in Ordi- 
 nary Education. 
 
 III. Science -Culture for the Masses. An Opening Lecture at a 
 "People's College." 
 
 iv. The Law of Likeness, and its Working. 
 
 No. 101. 
 
 AESTHETICS.- By JAMES SULLY, M.A. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 (A). Metaphysical Problems. 
 (B). Scientific Problems. 
 (C).^- History of Systems. 
 
 DREAMS.- By JAMES SULLY, M.A. 
 
 II. German Writers on Esthetics. 
 HI. French Writers on Esthetics. 
 IV. Italian and Dutch Writers on ^Esthetics. 
 V. English Writers on Esthetics. 
 
 The Dream as Immediate Objective Experience. 
 The Dream as a Communication from a Super- 
 
 natnral Being. 
 Modern Theory of Dreams. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 The Sources of Dream-Materials. 
 The Order of Dream-Combinations. 
 The Objective Reality and Intensity of Dream- 
 Imaginations. 
 
 TO "WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS. By Prof. GEOBGB GROOM ROBERTSON. 
 
 No. 102. 
 
 ULTIMATE FINANCE.-A True Theory of Co-operation.- By 
 
 WILLIAM NELSON BLACK. 
 
 PART FIRST. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Origin of Social Discontent. 
 
 Chapter II. Definition of Capital. 
 
 Chapter III. Men not Capitalists because not 
 
 Creators of Capital. 
 
 Chapter IV. Social Results Considered. 
 Chapter V. The Evolution of Finance. 
 Chapter VI. Every Man his own Householder. 
 
 Chapter VII. Illustrations from Real Life. 
 Chapter VIII. Effects of Material Growth. 
 Chapter IX Objections Answered. 
 Chapter X. Some Political Reflections. 
 
 Appendix An Act for the Incorporation ot 
 Bond Insurance Companies. 
 
 *** PART SECOND. For the contents cf Part Second see No. 107 of this Catalogue. 
 So. 103. 
 
 1. The Coming Slavery. 2. The Sins of Legislators. 3. The Greal 
 Political Superstition. Three Essays by HERBERT SPENCE-R. 
 
 No. 104. 
 
 TROPICAL AFRICA. By HENRY DRUMMOND, LL.D., F.K.S.E., L.G.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Water-Route to the Heart of 
 
 Africa. The Rivers Zambesi 
 
 and Shire. 
 Chapter II. The East African Lake Country. 
 
 Lakes Shirwa and Xyassa. 
 Chapter III. The Aspect of the Heart of Africa. 
 
 The Country and its People. 
 Chapter IV. The Heart-Disease of Africa. Its 
 
 Pathology and Cure. 
 
 Chapter V. Wanderings on the Nyassa-Tangan- 
 yika Plateau. A Traveler's 
 Diarv. 
 
 Chapter VI. The White Ant. A Theory. 
 
 Chapter VIL Mimicry. The Ways of African 
 Insects. 
 
 Chapter Vin. A Geological Sketch. 
 
 Chapter IX. A Political Warning. 
 
 Chapter X. A Meteorological Note. 
 
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 No. 105. 
 
 FREEDOM IN SCIENCE AND TEACHING.- By ERNST HAECKEL, 
 Professor in the University of Jena. With a Prefatory Note by Professor 
 THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY, F.E.S. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Development and Creation. 
 Chapter II. Certain Proofs of the Doctrine of 
 
 Descent. 
 Chapter III. The Skull Theory and the Ape 
 
 Theory. 
 Chapter IV The Cell-Soul and the Cellular 
 
 Psychology. 
 
 Chapter V. The Genetic and the Dogmatic 
 Methods of Teaching. 
 
 Chapter 
 
 Chapter VII. Ignorabimus et Restringamur. 
 
 VI. The Doctrine of Descent and 
 Social Democracy. 
 
 No. 106. 
 
 FORCE AND ENERGY.-A Theory of Dynamics.-By GRANT ALLEN. 
 
 Chapter I. 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 Chapter III. 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 
 Chapter V. 
 
 Chapter VI. 
 
 Chapter VII. 
 Chapter VIII. 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 PART I. ABSTRACT OR ANALYTIC. 
 
 -Power. 
 -Force. 
 
 The Species of Force. 
 -The Species of Energy. 
 -The Modes of Energy. 
 -The Kinds of Kinesis. 
 -The Persistence of Force. 
 -The Conservation of Energy. 
 
 Chapter 
 Chapter 
 
 X. The Indestructibility of Pqwer. 
 XI. The Mutual Interference of 
 
 Forces. 
 
 Chapter XII. The Suppression of Energies. 
 Chapter XIII. Liberating Energies. 
 Chapter XIV. Miscellaneous Illustrations. 
 Chapter XV. The Dissipation of Energy. 
 Chapter XVI. The Nature of Energy. 
 Chapter XVII. The Nature of Motion. 
 
 PART II. CONCRETE OR SYNTHETIC. 
 
 Chapter I. Dynamical Formula of the Uni- 
 
 Chapter II. The Sidere:d System. [verse. 
 
 Chapter III. The Solar System. 
 
 Chapter IV. The Earth. 
 
 Chapter V. Organic Life. 
 Chapter VI. The Vegetal Organism. 
 Chapter VII. The Animal Organism. [gies. 
 Chapter VTIL General View of Mundane Ener- 
 
 No. 107. 
 
 ULTIMATE FINANCE. -A True Theory 
 
 WILLIAM NELSON BLACK. 
 
 PART SECOND. 
 
 of Wealth. -By 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Origin of Property. 
 
 Chapter II. The Evolution of Wealth. 
 
 Chapter III. Banking, and its Relation to Accu- 
 mulation. 
 
 Chapter IV. The Relation of Insurance to Accu- 
 mulation. 
 
 Chapter V. The Creative and Benevolent Feat- 
 ures of Fortune-Hunting. 
 
 Chapter VI. Wealth an Enforced Contributor 
 to the Public Welfare. 
 
 Chapter VII. The Impairment and Destruction 
 of Property. 
 
 % PART FIRST. For the contents of Part First see No. 102 of this Catalogue. 
 
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 ENGLISH: PAST AND PRESENT.- A Series of Eight Lectures by 
 EICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH, D.D., Archbishop of Dublin. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Lecture I. The English Vocabulary. 
 Lecture II. English as it might have been. 
 Lecture III. Gains of the English Language. 
 Lecture IV. Gains of the English Language 
 (continued). 
 
 Lecture V. Diminutions of the English Lan- 
 guage. 
 
 Lecture VI. Diminutions of the English Lan- 
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 Lecture VII. Changes in the Meaning of English 
 Words. 
 
 Lecture VIII. Changes in the Spelling of English 
 Words. 
 
 Index of Subjects. Index of Words and Phrases. 
 
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 No. 110. Double number, 30 cents. 
 
 THE STORY OF CREATION.-A Plain Account of Evolution. 
 
 By EDWARD CLODD, author of "The Childhood of the World," "The Childhood 
 of Eeligions," " The Birth and Growth of Myths," &c. Eighty Illustrations. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. THE UNIVERSE: ITS CONTENTS. 
 
 1. Matter. a. Force. 
 
 2. Power. b. Energy. 
 
 Chapter II. DISTRIBUTION OP MATTER IN 
 SPACE. 
 
 Chapter III. THE SUN AND PLANETS. 
 The Earth: General Features. 
 
 Chapter IV. THE PAST LIFE-HISTORY OP THE 
 
 EARTH. 
 Character and Contents of Rocks of 
 
 1. Primary Epoch. 3. Tertiary Epoch. 
 
 2. Secondary Epoch. 4. Quaternary Epoch. 
 
 Chapter V. PRESENT LIFE-FORMS. 
 Physical Constituents and Unity. 
 
 A. Plants. 
 
 1. Flowerless. 2. Flowering. 
 
 B. Animals. 
 
 1. Protozoa. 4. Annulosa. 
 
 2. Coelenterata. 5. Mollusca. 
 
 3. Echinodermata. 6. Vertebrata. 
 
 Chapter VI. THE UNIVERSE: MODE OP ITS 
 BECOMING AND GROWTH. 
 
 1. Inorganic Evolution. 3. Evolution of the 
 
 2. Evolution of the So- Earth. 
 
 lar System. 
 
 Chapter VII. THE ORIGIN OP LIFE. 
 Time. Place. Mode. 
 
 Chapter VIII. THE ORIGIN OP LIFE-FORMS. 
 Priority of Plant or Animal. 
 Cell-Structure and Development. 
 
 Chapter IX. THE ORIGIN OP SPECIES. 
 Argument : 
 
 1. No two individuals of the same species are alike. 
 
 Each tends to vary. 
 
 2. Variations are transmitted, and therefore tend 
 
 to become permanent. 
 
 3. Man takes advantage of these transmitted un- 
 
 likenesses to produce new varieties of plants 
 and animals. 
 
 4. More organisms are born than survive. 
 
 5. The result is obvious : a ceaseless struggle for 
 
 place and food. 
 
 6. Natural selection tends to maintain the balance 
 
 between living things and their surround- 
 
 oundin 
 
 living things must adap 
 or perish. 
 
 Chapter X. PROOFS OF THE DERIVATION OF 
 SPECIES. 
 
 1. Embryology. 4. Succession in Time. 
 
 2. Morphology. 5. Distribution in Space. 
 
 3. Classification. Objections. 
 
 Chapter XI. SOCIAL EVOLUTION. 
 
 1. Evolution of Mind. 4. Evolution of Morals. 
 
 2. Evolution of Society. 5. Evolution of Theol- 
 
 3. Evolution of Language, ogy. 
 
 Arts, and Science. Summary. 
 
 ings. These surroundings change ; therefore 
 apt themselves thereto, 
 
 No. 111. 
 
 THE PLEASURES OF LIFE.-By Sir JOHN LUBBOCK, Bart., M.P., 
 F.E.S., D.C.L., LL.D. 
 
 PART SECOND. 
 
 Chapter I. Ambition. 
 Chapter II. Wealth. 
 Chapter HI. Health. 
 Chapter IV. Love. 
 Chapter V. Art. 
 Chapter VL Poetry. 
 Chapter VII Music. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter VIII. The Beauties of Nature. 
 Chapter IX. -The Troubles of Life. 
 Chapter X. Labor and Rest. 
 Chapter XI. Religion. 
 Chapter XII. The Hope of Progress. 
 Chapter XIII. The Destiny of Man. 
 
 * PART FIRST. For the contents of Part First see No. 97 of this Catalogue. 
 
 No. 112. 
 
 PSYCHOLOGY OF ATTENTION.- By TH. EIBOT.- Translated from the 
 French by J. FITZGERALD, M.A. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Purpose of this treatise: study of 
 the mechanism of Attention. 
 Attention defined. 
 
 Chapter II. Spontaneous or Natural Attention. 
 Its cause always affective states. 
 Its physical manifestations. 
 Attention simply the subjective 
 side of the manifestations that 
 express it. Origin of Sponta- 
 neous Attention. 
 
 Chapter HI. Voluntary or Artificial Attention. 
 How it is produced. The three 
 principal periods of its genesis: | 
 
 action of simple feelings, complex 
 feelings, and habits. Mechanism 
 of Voluntary Attention. Atten- 
 tion acts only upon the muscles 
 and through the muscles. The 
 feeling of effort. 
 
 Chapter IV. Morbid States of Attention. Dis- 
 traction. Hypertrophy of Atten- 
 tion. Atrophy of Attention. 
 Attention in idiots. 
 
 Chapter V. Conclusion. Attention dependent 
 on Affective States. Physical 
 Condition of Attention. 
 
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 HYPNOTISM: ITS HISTORY AND PRESENT DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 By FREDRIK BJORXSTROM, M.D., Head Physician of the Stockholm Hospital, 
 Professor of Psychiatry, late Eoyal Swedish Medical Councillor. Authorized 
 Translation from the Second Swedish Edition, by Baron NILS POSSE, M.G., 
 Director of the Boston School of Gymnastics. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. Historical Retrospect. 
 11. Definition of Hypnotism. Susceptibility to 
 
 Hypnotism. 
 
 III. Means or Methods of Hypnotizing. 
 IV. Stages or Degrees of Hypnotism. 
 V. Unilateral Hypnotism. 
 VI. Physical Effects of Hypnotism. 
 
 VII. Psychical Effects of Hypnotism. 
 VIII. Suggestion. 
 
 IX. Hypnotism as a Remedial Agent. 
 X. Hypnotism as a Means of Education, 
 
 as a Moral Remedy. 
 XI. Hypnotism and the Law. 
 XII. Misuses and Dangers of Hypnotism. 
 Bibliography of Hypnotism. 
 
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 CHRISTIANITY AND AGNOSTICISM.-A Controversy .-Consisting 
 
 of papers contributed to The Nineteenth Century by HENRY WACE, D.D., Prof. 
 THOMAS H. HUXLEY, THE BISHOP OF PETERBOROUGH, W. H. MALLOCK, Mrs. 
 HUMPHRY WARD. 
 
 I. On Agnosticism. By HENRY WACE, 
 D.D., Prebendary of St. Paul's Cathe- 
 dral ; Principal of King's College, London. 
 
 II. Agnosticism By Professor THOMAS H. 
 
 HUXLEY. 
 III. Agnosticism. A Reply to Prof. HUXLEY. 
 
 By HENRY WACE, D.D. 
 IV. Agnosticism By W. C. MAGEE, D.D., 
 
 Bishop of Peterborough. 
 V. Agnosticism. A Rejoinder. By Prof. 
 
 THOMAS H. HUXLEY. 
 
 VI. Christianity and Agnosticism By 
 HENRY WACE, D.D. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 VII.- 
 
 -An Explanation to Prof. Huxley. 
 
 By W. C. MAGEE, D.D., Bishop of Peter- 
 borough. 
 
 - The Value of Witness to the Mirac- 
 
 ulous. By. Prof. THOMAS H. HUXLEY. 
 
 -Agnosticism and Christianity By 
 
 Prof. THOMAS H. HUXLEY. 
 
 -"Cowardly Agnosticism." A Word 
 with Prof. HUXLEY. -By W.H.MALLOCK. 
 
 - The New Reformation. By Mrs. 
 
 HUMPHRY WARD. 
 
 No. 115 and No. 116. 
 
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 DARWINISM: AN EXPOSITION OF THE THEORY OF NATURAL 
 SELECTION, with some of its applications. By ALFRED RUSSEL. 
 WALLACE, LL.D., P.L.S., &c. With Portrait of the Author, Colored Map, and 
 numerous illustrations. 
 
 CONTESTS. 
 
 Chapter I. What are "Species," and what is 
 meant by their "Origin." 
 
 Chapter II. The Struggle for Existence. 
 
 Chapter HI. The Variability of Species in a 
 State of Nature. 
 
 Chapter IV. Variation of Domesticated Animals 
 and Cultivated Plants. 
 
 Chapter V. Natural Selection by Variation and 
 Survival of the Fittest. 
 
 Chapter VI. Difficulties and Objections. 
 
 Chapter VII On the Infertility of Crosses be- 
 tween Distinct Species, and the 
 usual Sterility of their Hybrid 
 Offspring. 
 
 Chapter VIII. The Origin and Uses of Color in 
 Animals. 
 
 Chapter IX. Warning Coloration and Mimicry. 
 
 Chapter X. Colors and Ornaments character- 
 istic of Sex. 
 
 Chapter XI. The Special Colors of Plants. 
 Their Origin and Purpose. 
 
 Chapter XII. The Geographical Distribution of 
 Organisms. 
 
 Chapter XIII. The Geological Evidences of Evo- 
 
 Chapter XTV. Fundamental Problems in Rela- 
 tion to Variation and Heredity. 
 Chapter XV. Darwinism applied to Man. 
 
 same general lines as wer 
 
 The present work treats the problem of the Origin of Species on the .-,....,, *.~ 
 
 adopted by Darwin: but from the standpoint reached after nearly thirty years of discussion, with an 
 abundance of new facts and the advocacy of many new or old theories. 
 
 While not attempting to deal, even in outline, with the vast subject of evolution in general, an 
 endeavor has been made to give such an account of the theory of Natural Selection as may enable any 
 intelligent reader to obtain a clear conception of Darwin's work, and to understand something of the 
 power and range of his great principle. Extract from the Preface. 
 
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 jj o H7_ [Double number, 3O ceuts. 
 
 MODERN SCIENCE AND MODERN THOUGHT.-A Clear and 
 Concise View of the Principal Results of Modern Science, 
 and of the Revolution which they have effected in Modern 
 Thought.- By S. LAIKG. 
 
 PART I. 
 MODEEN SCIENCE. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Space. 
 
 Primitive Idea* Natural Standards-Dimensions of the 
 Earth Of Sun and Solar System Distance of Fixed Stars 
 Their Order and Size Nebulae and Other Universes The 
 Telescope and the Infinitely Great^Tbe Microscope and the 
 Infinitely Small Uniformity of Law Law of Gravity Acts 
 through all Space-Double Stars, Comets, and Meteors Has 
 acted through all time. 
 
 Chapter II. Time. 
 
 Evidence of Geology-Stratification-Denudation-Strata 
 identified by Superposition-- i;> fossils-Geological Record 
 shown by Upturned Strata General Kesult Palaeozoic and 
 Primary Periods Secondary- Tertiary- Time required- 
 Coal Formation Chalk Elevations and Depressions of Land 
 -Internal Heat of the Earth-Earthquakes and Volcanoes- 
 Changes of Fauna and Flora-Astronomical Time-Tides and 
 the Moon Sun's Radiation Earth's Cooling Geology and 
 Astronomy Bearings on Modern Thought 
 Chapter III. Matter. 
 
 11 Conservation 
 
 Chapter IV. Life. 
 
 tion Development of 
 
 from Primitive Cells-Super- 
 
 natural Theory Zoological Provinces Separate Creatio 
 Law or Miracle Darwinian Theory- Struggle for Life Sur- 
 vival of the Fittest^Development and Design-The Hand- 
 Proof required to establish Darwin's Theory as a Law Species 
 -HybridV-Man subject to Law. 
 
 Chapter V. Antiquity of Man. 
 
 elief in Man's Recent Origin Boucher de Perthcs' Dis- 
 ries Confirmed by Prestwicli Nature of Implements 
 
 Bone-cavesKent's Cavern Victoria,Gower,and other Caves 
 Caves of France and Belgium Ages of Cave Bear, Mam- 
 er Artistic Race- Dra ' 
 
 ?rgence > 
 
 Land-Tertiary Man-Eocene Period-Miocene-Evidence 
 for Pliocene and Miocene Man-Conclusions as to Antiquity. 
 
 Chapter VI. Man's Place in Nature. 
 
 Origin of Man from an Egg-Like other Mammals-Devel- 
 opment of the Embryo -Backbone-Eye and other Organs of 
 Sense Fish, Reptile, and Mammalian Stages Comparison 
 with Apes and Monkeys Germs of Human Faculties in An- 
 imalsThe Dog Insects Helplessness of Human Infant- 
 Instinct Heredity and Evolution The Missing Link Races 
 of Men Leading Types and Varieties Common Origin Dis- 
 tant^Language How Formed Grammar Chinese, Aryan, 
 nitic. &c. Conclusions from Language Evolution and 
 
 Antiquity Religions of Savage Races- 
 Anthropomorphic Deities-Traces in 
 lithic Times-Development by Evolut 
 Tools and Weapons Fire Flint Imple 
 
 -Traces in Neolithic and 
 
 " Evolution Primitive Arts- 
 Tools and Weapons Fire Flint I mplements Progress from 
 Paleolithic to Neolithic Times-Domestic Animals-Clothing 
 Ornaments Conclusion, Man a Product of Evolution. 
 
 No. 118. [Single number, 15 cents. 
 
 MODERN SCIENCE AND MODERN THOUGHT.-With a Sup- 
 plemental Chapter on Gladstone's "Dawn of Creation" and 
 "Proem to Genesis," and on Drummond's "Natural Law in 
 the Spiritual World." By s. LAING. 
 
 PART II. 
 MODERN THOUGHT. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter VII. Modern Thought. 
 Lines from Te 
 
 Tennyson The Gospel of Modern Thought 
 plitied by Carlyle, Renan, and George Eliot- 
 ilng universal Attitude of Orthodox Writers 
 st Cause unknowable New Philosophies 
 rbert Spencer and Agnosticion Comte 
 and Positivism Pessimism Mormonism Spiritualism 
 Dreams and Visions Somnambulism Mesmerism Great 
 Modern Thinkers Carlyle Hero-worship. 
 
 Chapter VIII. Miracles. 
 
 Origin of Belief in the Supernatural-Thunder-Belief in 
 Miracles formerly Universal-St Paul's Testimony-Now In- 
 credibleChristian Miracles Apparent Miracles Real Mir- 
 jfcles-Absurd Miracles Worthy Slin.c les-The Resurrection 
 and Ascension Nature of Evidence required Inspiration- 
 Prophecy Direct Evidence St. Paul The Gospels What 
 is Known of Them The Synoptic Gospels Resemblances 
 and Differences Their Origin Papias-Gospel of St. John- 
 Evidence rests on Matthew, Mark, and Luke- What each 
 states Compared with one another and with St John 
 Hopelessly Contradictory Miracle of the Ascension Silence 
 of Mark Probable Early Date of Gospels But not in their 
 Present Form. 
 
 SUPPLEMENTAL CHAPTER. Glndstone's "Daw 
 mond's "Natural Law in the Spiritual World." 
 
 Chapter LX. Christianity Without Miracles. 
 
 Practical and Theoretical Christianity Example and 
 Teaching of Christ-Christian Dogma Moral Objections In- 
 consistent with Facts Must be accepted as Parables Fall 
 and Redemption Old Creeds must be Transformed or Di 
 Mohammedanism-Decay of Faith-Balance of Advantages - 
 Religious Wars and Persecutions Intolerance Sacrifice- 
 Prayer Absence of Theology in Synoptic- Gospels Opposite 
 Pole to Christianity-Courage and Self-reliance Belief in 
 God and a Future Life-Based Mainly on Christianity-Sci- 
 ence gives no Answer Nor Metaphysics So-called Institu- 
 tions-Development of Idea of God-Best Proof afforded by 
 Christianity Evolution is Transforming it Reconciliation 
 of Religion and Science. 
 
 Chapter X. Practical Life. 
 
 ght is Right -Self-revrence- Courage- 
 :e of Press Respect for Women 
 
 tion Stoicism Conclusion, 
 of Creation" and "Proem to Genesis." Drum- 
 
 Published seml-montniy. $3 a year. Single numbers, 15 cents.
 
 OF POPULAR SCIENCE. 
 
 No. 119. 
 
 THE ELECTRIC LIGHT.- How the Electric Current is Produced. 
 How the Electric Current is made to yield the Electric Light. 
 
 By GKRALD MOLLOY, D.D., D.Sc., Fellow of the Boyal University. With 
 numerous illustrations. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. How the Electric Current is Produced. 
 
 First Discovery of Induced Currents Faraday's Exper- 
 
 iments described and repeated First machines founded on 
 
 Faraday's discovery Pixii. Saxton, Clarke New form of 
 
 Armature invented by Siemens-Machines of the Alliance 
 
 ' 
 
 Gramme's machine The principle of its action explain 
 Details of construction-The Volta Prize awarded to Gra 
 for his invention The machine of Siemens, how it differs 
 from that of Gramme Most other machines constructed on 
 one or other of these two types The dynamo does not create 
 energy, but convert* mechanical energy into electrical energy. 
 
 II. How the Electric Current is made to yield 
 
 the Electric Light. 
 
 Simplest form of Electric Light Principle of the Electric 
 Lifbt^Sir Humphry Davy's experiment-Two types of Elec- 
 tric Light-The Arc Ligbt-Duboscq's Lamp- New forma of 
 Arc Lamp-TheJablochkoft'Candle-The Incandescent Light 
 -Platinum Spiral-Why Carbon is preferred to Platinum- 
 A perfect vacuum Elements of Incandescent Lamp Prep- 
 
 aration of the filament Edison's 
 
 filament- 
 Light without heat The A 
 
 Carbonization of the fil 
 
 Lamp-Prep- 
 
 s process Swan's process 
 t Exhaustion of the gfass globe 
 
 : Light and the Incandescent 
 
 Light compared Comparison witli other kinds of light -How 
 far the Electric Light Is i 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 THE STORING OF ELECTRICAL ENERGY.-The Recent 
 Progress and Development of the Storage Battery. By the 
 
 same author. With numerous illustrations. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 tip*- 
 
 ment of the principle Eitter's secondary pile Grov 
 battery-Experiments of Gaston Plante-Tbe Plante 
 ary cell Faure's improvement What a storage batt 
 do Practical illustrations Convenience of the rtora 
 tery for the production of the electric light The storage bat- 
 tery as a motive power Application of the storage battery t" 
 tram-cars and private carriages The storage battery on its 
 
 A " marvelous box of electricity" What is meant by the 
 storing of energy Examples of energy stored up A sus- 
 pended weight A watchspring wound up A stretched cross- 
 bowA flywheel -KniTtfy stored up in clouds and rivers- 
 Energy stored up in a coal-mine Energy stored up in sep- 
 arated gases Storing of electrical energy not a new idea- 
 Energy stored up in a Leyden jar-In a thunder-cloud-In a 
 voltaic battery Principle of the storage battery- Experiment 
 showing production of secondary current Gradual develop- 
 
 RECENT PROGRESS AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE STORAGE BATTERY., 
 Unexpected difficulties-Modifications of the Faure cell- I plates-Newest form of cell-Buckling of the plates-The 
 
 "-"- al resistance diminished-New i !e of preparing the ' 
 
 -Ai " 
 
 -111! 
 
 No. 120. 
 
 THE MODERN THEORY OF HEAT, as Illustrated by the Phe- 
 nomena of the Latent Heat of Liquids and of Vapors. By 
 
 GERALD MOLLOY, D.D., D.Sc., Fellow of the Eoyal University. With nu- 
 merous illustrations. 
 
 L The Latent Heat of Liquids. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Modern theory of heat Heat a form of Energy Familiar 
 illustrations Count Kumford's experiment Argument 
 
 -Heat produced by expenditure 
 t Heat Black's experiments 
 
 Heat disappears when ice is melted Explanation of this fact 
 
 ly of Nature. 
 
 TO WHICH 
 
 II. The Latent Heat of Vapors. 
 
 Heat expended when water is boiled This fact coniidered 
 i the light of the modern theory Method of measuring the 
 1-Heat developed when steam is 
 [lustration Heating of building* 
 pended in evaporation Various illustra- 
 tionsCold produced by evaporation of ether Water frozen 
 by evaporation Leslie's experiment Carre 's apparatus Pro- 
 duction of solid carbonic acid-Freezing of mercury-Latent 
 Heat of clouds Effect in the economy of Nature Summary- 
 
 quantity of heat so expended Heat developed 
 condenJed-Bxperimenui illustration-Heath 
 m Heat ei 
 
 THE SUN AS A STOREHOUSE OF ENERGY.- Immensity of 
 the Sun's Energy. Source of the Sun's Energy. By the same 
 
 author. With numerous illustrations. 
 
 I. Immensity of the Sun's Energy. 
 Nearly all the energy available to man is derived from the 
 
 _in Water-jNiwer Wir 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 r Steam-power Mu 
 
 rind-Dowel 
 
 er-Tidal | 
 
 of the tidrs derived from rotation of the ._ 
 Only a small fraction of the energy which the earth derives 
 from the sun is used by man -And the energy which the 
 earth receives is only a small fraction of what the sun sends 
 
 forth Measurement of energy sent out by the sun Kxper- 
 iments of I'ouiUet and Herschel Apparatus employed 
 Method of adjustment Observations made Corrections- 
 Practical estimate of the energy sent out by the sun-What 
 n wonderful storehouse of energy the suu must be How is 
 
 II. Source of the Sun's Energy. 
 
 The aun is not a great fire Such a fire would be choked by 
 the products of conibustion-Aiid besides it would be burned 
 out in course of time Difference between incandescence and 
 combustion Practical illustrations How the aun is main- 
 tained in a state of incandescence Theory of Sir William 
 Thomson Meteors or Falling Stars- Heat developed when 
 such bodies fall into the sun- Illustration from a bullet strik- 
 ing a target This theory now abandoned Theory of Helm- 
 lioltz Heat of the sun produced tiv compression of his mass- 
 Heat lost by radiation is restored by further compretdon 
 This theory probable and sufficient-Bearing of the Nebular 
 Hvpotln -. i ;m Summary. 
 
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 THE HUMBOLDT LIBRARY 
 
 UTILITARIANISM. By JOHN STUART MILL, authr of "A System of Logic," 
 '.'Principles of Political Economy," "On Liberty," &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. General Remarks. 
 Chapter II. What Utilitarianism is. 
 Chapter III. Of the Ultimate Sanction 
 Principle of Utility. 
 
 Chapter IV. Of what sort of Proof the Principle 
 of Utility is susceptible. 
 
 Chapter V. Of the Connection between Justice 
 and Utility. 
 
 No. 122 and No. 123. 
 
 [No. 122 is a double number, 3O cents. 
 
 UPON THE ORIGIN OF ALPINE AND ITALIAN LAKES; AND 
 
 UPON GLACIAL EROSION. By Sir A. C. RAMSAY, F.R.S., President 
 of the Geological Society. JOHN BALL, M.R.I.A., F.L.S., &c. Sir RODERICK I. 
 MURCHISON, F.R.S., D.C.L., President of the Royal Geographical Society. 
 Prof. B. STUDER, of Berne. Prof. A. FAVRE, of Geneva. EDWARD WHYMPER. 
 With an Introduction and Notes upon the Origin and History of the Great Lakes 
 of North America, by Prof. J. W. SPENCER, State Geologist of Georgia. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Introduction, with Notes upon the Origin and 
 History of the Great Lakes of North America. 
 By J. W. SPENCER, Ph.D.. F.G.S., State Geologist 
 of Georgia 
 
 I. On the Glacial Origin of Certain Lakes in 
 Switzerland, the Black Forest, Great Britain, 
 Sweden. North America, and Elsewhere. By Sir 
 A. C. RAMSAY, F.R.S., President of the Geological 
 Society. 
 
 II. On the Formation of Alpine Valleys and 
 Alpine Lakes. By JOHN BALL, M.R.I. A., 
 F.L.S., &c. 
 
 III. Glaciers of the Himalayan Mountains and 
 New Zealand compared with those of Europe. 
 On the Powers of Glaciers in Modifying the Sur- 
 
 face of the Earth, and in the agency of Floating 
 Icebergs. By Sir RODERICK I. MURCHISON, 
 K.C.B., D.C.L., F.R.S., &c. 
 
 IV. On the Origin of the Swiss Lakes. By 
 Prof. B. STUDER, of Berne. 
 
 V. On the Origin of the Alpine Lakes and 
 Valleys. A letter addressed to Sir RODERICK I. 
 MURCHISON, K.C.B., D.C.L., &c., by M. ALPHONSE 
 FAVRE, Professor of Geology in the Academy of 
 Geneva, author of the Geological Map of Savoy. 
 
 VI. The Ancient Glaciers of Aosta. By ED- 
 WARD WHYMPER. 
 
 VII. Glacial Erosion in Norway and in High 
 Latitudes. By Professor J. W. SPENCER, Ph.D., 
 F.G.S., State Geologist of Georgia. 
 
 No. 124. 
 
 THE QUINTESSENCE OF SOCIALISM.- By Dr. A. 
 
 lated from the eighth German edition under the supervision of BERNARD BOSAN- 
 QUET. M.A., formerly Fellow of University College, Oxford. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. FIRST OUTLINES OF THE FUNDA- 
 MENTAL IDEA OF SOCIALISM. 
 
 Chapter II. THE MEANS OF AGITATION. 
 The Socialistic criticism of capital. Profit as 
 'appropriation of surplus value." Property as 
 theft. False interpretations of these allegations 
 refuted. Ultimate buying-out of the modern 
 plutocrats. 
 
 Chapter III. PROPOSED TRANSFORMATION OF 
 THE SEVERAL FUNDAMENTAL INSTITUTIONS OF 
 MODERN NATIONAL ECONOMY. 
 Determination of demand. Freedom of demand. 
 Organization of labor and capital into a system of 
 collective production. False interpretations re- 
 futed. The doctrine of value as depending on 
 sheer labor-cost useless for a practical organiza- 
 tion of labor and capital. 
 
 Chapter IV. TRANSFORMATION OF INSTITU- 
 TIONS (continued). 
 
 Abolition of all loan-capital, of credit, of lease, 
 of hire, and of the exchange. 
 
 Chapter V. TRANSFORMATION OF INSTITU- 
 TIONS (continued). 
 Abolition of trade in "commodities," and of the 
 
 market for them, and of the system of advertise- 
 ment and of display of wares. 
 
 Chapter VI. TRANSFORMATION OF INSTITU- 
 TIONS (continued.) 
 
 Abolition of metallic money as the medium of 
 exchange, and its replacement as "standard of 
 value" by units of ''social labor-time" ("labor- 
 money"). The value-estimate of the Socialistic 
 State compared with the present market-price. 
 
 Chapter VTL TRANSFORMATION OF INSTITU- 
 TIONS (continued.) 
 
 The Socialistic determination of value in ex- 
 change, and freedom of labor in the Socialistic 
 State. 
 
 Chapter VTIL TRANSFORMATION OF INSTITU- 
 TIONS (continued). 
 
 Income, and the use of income in the formation 
 of property, and in consumption. Private prop- 
 erty and the law affecting it. Family life and 
 marriage. Savings-banks and insurance system. 
 Expenditure on charitable,humanitarian,religious, 
 and other ideal purposes. 
 
 Chapter IX. CONCLUSION. 
 Summary of criticisms. 
 
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 No. 135. 
 
 DARWINISM AND POLITICS.-By DAVID G. RITCHIE, M.A., Fellow and 
 Tutor of Jesus College, Oxford. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 "The Struggle for Existence "in Mai thus and 
 Darwin. How the idea is applied to politics. Is 
 the struggle "beneficent"? 
 
 The Evolution Theory as applied to Human So- 
 ciety by Darwin, Strauss, Spencer, Maine, Clodd. 
 
 Ambiguity of the phrase "Survival of the Fit- 
 test." Complexity of Social Evolution. 
 
 Does the Doctrine of Heredity support Aristoc- 
 racy? 
 
 Does the Evolution Theory justify Laissez faire ? 
 Struggle between ideas for survival. Conscious- 
 ness as a factor in Evolution. Testimony of Prof. 
 
 TO WHICH IS ADDED 
 
 ADMINISTRATIVE NIHILISM.- By Prof. THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY, F.R.S 
 
 Huxley and Strauss. Ambiguity of "Nature." 
 Conscious ' ' Variations. ' ' 
 
 Why fix ideas in institutions ? Custom : its use 
 and abuse. Institutions and "the social factor" 
 generally are neglected in the popular acceptation 
 of the doctrine of Heredity. Mr. Gallon's views 
 considered. Darwin's own opinion. 
 
 Are the Biological Formulae adequate to express 
 Social Evolution ? 
 
 Applications (1) The Labor Question. (2) The 
 Position of Women. (3) The Population Question. 
 
 No. 126 and No. 127. [Two double numbers, 3O cents each. 
 
 PHYSIOGNOMY AND EXPRESSION.- By PAOLO MANTEGAZZA, Senator; 
 Director of the National Museum of Anthropology, Florence ; President of the 
 Italian Society of Anthropology. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I. THE HUMAN COUNTENANCE. 
 
 Chapter I. Historical Sketch of the Science 
 of Physiognomy and of Human 
 Expression. 
 
 Chapter II. The Human Face. 
 
 Chapter III. The Features of the Human Face. 
 
 Chapter IV. The Hair and the Beard. Moles. 
 Wrinkles. 
 
 Chapter V. Comparative Morphology of the 
 Human Face. 
 
 PART II. THE EXPRESSION OF EMOTIONS. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Alphabet of Expression. 
 
 Chapter VII. The Darwinian Laws of Expression 
 
 Chapter VIII. Classification of Expressions. 
 General View of all Phenomena 
 of Expression. 
 
 Chapter IX. The Expression of Pleasure. 
 
 Chapter X. The Expression of Pain. 
 
 Chapter XI. Expression of Love and of Benev- 
 olence. 
 
 Chapter XII. Expression of Devotion, of Ven- 
 eration, and of Religious Feeling. 
 
 Chapter XIII. Expression of Hatred, of Cruelty, 
 and of Passion. 
 
 Chapter XIV. The Expression of Pride, Vanity, 
 Haughtiness, Modesty, and Hu- 
 miliation. 
 
 Chapter XV. Expression of Personal Feelings, 
 Fear, Distrust. Description of 
 Timidity, according to the old 
 Physiognomists. 
 
 Chapter XVI. The Expression of Thought. 
 
 Chapter XVII. General Expressions. Repose 
 and Action, Disquietude, Im- 
 patience, Expectation, Desire. 
 
 Chapter XVIII. Racial and Professional Ex- 
 pression. 
 
 Chapter XIX. The Moderators and Disturbers 
 of Expression. 
 
 Chapter XX. Criteria for the Determination 
 of the Strength of an Emotion 
 by the degree of the Expression 
 
 Chapter XXI. The Five Verdicts on the Human 
 Face. 
 
 Chapter XXII. Criteria for Judging the Moral 
 Worth of a Physiognomy. 
 
 Chapter XXIII. Criteria for Judging the Intel- 
 lectual Value of a Face. 
 
 Gestures 
 hes. 
 APPENDIX. The Eyes, Hair, and Beard, in the 
 
 Italian Races. 
 
 Chapter XXFV. The Physiognomy of Gestui 
 and the Expression of Cloth 
 
 This work, by Professor Mantegazza, a brilliant and versatile author, and the leading Italian anthro- 
 pologist, has already been translated into several European languages. Professor Mantegazza, whose 
 name is well known to readers of Darwin, has cooperated in the present English edition of his work by 
 writing a new chapter specially for it. 
 
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 No. 128 and No. 129. 
 
 [Two double numbers, 3O cents each. 
 
 THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION OF THE EIGHTEENTH 
 
 CENTURY IN ENGLAND. Poplar Addresses, Notes, and other Frag- 
 ments. By the late ARNOLD TOYNBEE, Tutor of Balliol College, Oxford. 
 Together with a short memoir by B. JOWETT, Master of Balliol College, Oxford. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. 
 
 RlCABDO AND THE OLD POLITICAL ECONOMY. 
 
 IT. 
 
 The change that has come over Political Econ- 
 omy. Ricardo responsible for the form of that 
 Science. The causes of his great influence. The 
 economic assumptions of his treatise. Ricardo 
 ignorant of the nature of his own method. 
 Malthus's protest. Limitations of Ricardo's doc- 
 trine recognized by Mill and Senior. Observation 
 discouraged by the Deductive Method. The effect 
 of the Labor Movement on Economics. Modifica- 
 tions of the Science by recent writers. The new 
 method of economic investigation. 
 
 The philosophic assumptions of Ricardo. They 
 are derived from Adam Smith. The worship of 
 individual liberty. It involves freedom of com- 
 petition and removal of industrial restrictions. 
 The flaw in this theory. It is confirmed by the 
 doctrine of the identity of individual and s'ocial 
 interests. Criticism of this doctrine. The idea 
 of invariable law. True nature of economic laws. 
 Laws and Precepts. The great charge brought 
 against Political Economy. Its truth and its 
 falsehood. 
 
 I. Introductory. 
 
 H. England in 1760. 
 
 III. England in 1760. 
 
 IV. England in 1760. 
 
 V. England in 1760. 
 
 Yeomanry. 
 
 VI. England in 1760. 
 Wage-earners. 
 
 THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION. 
 
 VII. The Mercantile System and Adam Smith. 
 VIII. The Chief Features of the Revolution. 
 IX. The Growth of Pauperism. 
 X. Malthus and the Law of Population. 
 XL The Wage-fund Theory. 
 XII. Ricardo and the Growth of Rent. 
 XIII. Two Theories of Economic Progress. 
 XIV. The Future of the Working Classes. 
 
 - Population. 
 Agriculture. [Trade. 
 -Manufactures and 
 -The Decay of the 
 
 The Condition of the 
 
 POPULAR ADDRESSES. 
 
 1. Wages and Natural Law. 
 
 2. Industry and Democracy. 
 
 3. Are Radicals Socialists? 
 
 The Education of Co-operators. 
 
 The Ideal Relation of Church and State. 
 
 Notes and Jottings. 
 
 No. 130 and No. 131. [Two double numbers, 30 cents each. 
 
 THE ORIGIN OF THE ARYANS.-Au Account of the Prehistoric 
 
 Ethnology and Civilization of Europe. By ISAAC TAYLOR, M.A., Litt. D., Hon. 
 
 LL.D. Illustrated. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. The Aryan Controversy. 
 
 Chapter II. The Prehistoric Races of Europe. 
 1. The Neolithic Age. 4. The Celts. 
 
 2. The Methods of Ar 
 
 thropology. 
 
 3. The Races of Britain. 
 
 5. The Iberia 
 
 6. The Seandinavis 
 
 7. The Liguriaus. 
 
 Chapter III. The Neolithic Culture. 
 
 1. The Continuity of De- 7. Dress. 
 
 velopment. 
 
 2. Metals. 
 
 3. Weapons. 
 
 4. Cattle. 
 
 5. Husbandry. 
 
 6. Food. 
 
 8. Habitations. 
 
 9. The Boat. 
 
 10. The Ox- Wagon. 
 
 11. Trades. 
 
 12. Social Life. 
 
 13. Relative Progress. 
 
 Chapter IV. The Aryan Race. 
 
 1. The Permanence of Race. 
 
 2. The Mutability of Language. 
 
 3. The Finnic Hypothesis. 
 
 4. The Basques. 
 
 5. The Northern Races. 
 
 Chapter V. The Evolution of Aryan Speech. 
 
 1. The Aryan Languages. 
 
 2. Dialect and Language. 
 
 3. The Lost Aryan Languages. 
 
 4. The Wave-Theory. 
 
 5. Language and Race. 
 
 6. The Genesis of Aryan Speech. 
 
 Chapter VI. The Aryan Mythology. 
 
 The last ten years have seen a revolution in the opinion of scholars as to the region in which 
 the Aryan race originated, and theories which not long ago were universally accepted as the well- 
 established conclusions of science now hardly find a defender. The theory of migration from Asia 
 has been displaced by a new theory of origin in Northern Europe. In Germany several works have 
 been devoted to the subject ; but this is the first English work which has yet appeared embodying the 
 results recently arrived at by philologists, archaeologists, and anthropologists. This volume affords a 
 fresh and highly interesting account of the present state of speculation on a highly interesting subject. 
 
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 No. 132 and No. 133. [Two double numbers, 3O cents eah. 
 
 THE EVOLUTION OF SEX.- By Prof. PATRICK GEDDES and J. ARTHUR 
 THOMSON. With 104 illustrations. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 BOOK I. MALE AND FEMALE. 
 
 Chapter I. The Sexes and Sexual Selection. 
 
 Chapter II. The Sexes, and Criticism of Sexual 
 Selection. 
 
 Chapter III. The Determination of Sex (Hy- 
 potheses and Observations. 
 
 Chapter IV. The Determination of Sex (Con- 
 structive Treatment). 
 
 BOOK II. ANALYSIS OP SEX. ORGANS, TISSUES, CELLS. 
 
 Chapter V. Sexual Organs and Tissues. 
 Chapter VI. Hermaphroditism. 
 Chapter VII. The Sex-elements (General and 
 Historical. 
 
 Chapter VIII The Egg-cell or Ovum. 
 Chapter IX. The Male-cell or Sperm. 
 Chapter X. Theory of Sex: Its Nature and 
 Origin. 
 
 Chapter XI. Sexual Reproduction. 
 Chapter XII. Theory of Fertilization. 
 Chapter XIII. Degenerate Sexual Reproduction, 
 or Parthenogenesis. 
 
 BOOK III. PROCESSES OP REPRODUCTION. 
 
 Chapter XTV. Asexual Reproduction. 
 Chapter XV. Alternation of Generations. 
 
 BOOK IV. THEORY OP REPRODUCTION. 
 
 Chapter XVI. Growth and Reproduction. 
 
 Chapter XVII. Theory of Reproduction (con- 
 
 tinned). 
 Chapter XVIII. Special Physiology of Sex and 
 
 Reproduction. 
 
 Chapter XIX. Psychological and Ethical As- 
 pects. 
 Chapter XX. Laws of Multiplication. 
 
 Chapter XXI. The Reproductive Factor in 
 Evolution. 
 
 A work which, for range and grace, mastery of material, originality, and incisiveness of style and 
 treatment, is not readily to be matched in the long list of books designed more or less to popularize 
 science. Scottish Leader. 
 
 A model of scientific exposition. Scotsman. 
 
 No. 134. [Double number, 30 cents. 
 
 THE LAW OF PRIVATE RIGHT.-By GEORGE H. SMITH, authoi -of 
 "Elements of Right, and of the Law," and of Essays on "The Certainty of the 
 Law, and the Uncertainty of Judicial Decisions," "The True Method of Legal 
 Education," &c., &c. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 I. Explanation of the Design and Scope of the 
 
 Work. 
 
 II. Of the Definition of the Law. 
 III. Of the Division of the Law. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 Of the Nature of the Law of Private 
 Right. 
 
 Chapter I. 
 Analytical Outline of the Law of Private Right. 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 Of the Nature of Right, and of the Law of Private 
 Right, and their Relation to Each Other. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 Of the Law of Private Right as Histor- 
 ically Developed. 
 
 Chapter I. 
 Of the Historical Development of Jurisdiction. 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 Historical Development of the Law (as opposed 
 to Equity). 
 
 Chapter III. 
 Historical Development of Equity. 
 
 PART III. 
 
 Of the Nature and of the Method anil 
 Principles of Right. 
 
 Chapter I. 
 Definition of Rights. 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 The Same Subject Continued, and herein, of the 
 Standard of Right and Wrong. 
 
 Chapter III. 
 Of the Method and First Principles of Right. 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 
 Of the Limit to the Liberty of the Individual. 
 Imposed by the Rights of the State. 
 
 Chapter V. 
 
 Natural Rights Demonstrated from the Above 
 Principles. 
 
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 Nos. 135, 136, 137, 138. [Four double numbers, 30 cents each. 
 
 CAPITAL: A Critical Analysis of Capitalist Production. By 
 
 KARL MARX. Translated from the third German edition by SAMUEL MOORE 
 and EDWARD AVELING, and edited by FREDERICK ENGELS. The only American 
 Edition. Carefully Revised. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 COMMODITIES AND MONEY. 
 
 Chapter I. Commodities. 
 
 (a) Elementary or Accidental Form of Valv 
 
 (b) Total or Expanded Form of Value. 
 
 (c) The Genei-al Form of Value. 
 
 (d) The Money Form. 
 Chapter II. Exchange. 
 
 Chapter III. Money, or the Circulation of Com- 
 modities. 
 
 1. Tke Measure of Values. 
 
 2. The Medium of Circulation. 
 
 3. Money: hoarding, means of payment, uni- 
 
 versal money. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 THE TRANSFORMATION OF MONEY INTO CAPITAL. 
 
 Chapter IV. The General Formula for Capital. I Chapter VI. The Buying and Selling of Labor- 
 Chapter V. Contradictions in the General Form- power, 
 ula of Capital. 
 
 PART III. 
 
 THE PRODUCTION OF ABSOLUTE SURPLUS VALUE. 
 
 Chapter VII. The Labor-process and the Process 
 
 of Producing Surplus Value. 
 Chapter VIII. Constant Capital and Variable 
 
 Chapter IX. The Rate of Surplus Value. 
 
 Chapter X. The Working Day. 
 
 Chapter XI. Rate and Mass of Surplus Value. 
 
 Capital. 
 
 PART IV. 
 
 THE PRODUCTION OF RELATIVE SURPLUS VALUE. 
 
 Chapter XII. The Concept of Relative Surplus I Chapter XTV. Division of Labor and Manufac- 
 
 Value. ture. 
 
 Chapter XIII. Co-operation. | Chapter XV. Machinery and Modern Industry. 
 
 PART V. 
 
 THE PRODUCTION OF ABSOLUTE AND OF RELATIVE SURPLUS VALUE. 
 
 Chapter XVI. Absolute and Relative Surplus I Chapter XVIII. Various Formulae for the Rate 
 
 Value. . . , 
 
 Chapter XVII. Changes of Magnitude in the price of Surplus Value. 
 
 of Labor-power and in Surplus Value. 
 
 PART VI. 
 
 WAGES. 
 
 Chapter XIX. The Transformation of the Value I Chapter XX. Time-wages, 
 (and respectively the Price) of Labor- I Chapter XXI. Piece- wages, 
 power into Wages. I Chapter XXII. National Differences of Wages. 
 
 PART VII. 
 
 THE ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL. 
 
 Chapter XXIII. Simple Reproduction. I Chapter XXV. The General Law of Capitalist 
 
 Chapter XXIV. Conversion of Surplus Value Accumulation, 
 
 into Capital. 
 
 PART VIII. 
 
 THE SO-CALLED PRIMITIVE ACCUMULATION. 
 
 Chapter XXVI. The Secret of Primitive Accu- 
 
 aulatior 
 
 Chapter XXVII. Expropriation of the Agricul- 
 tural Population from the Land. 
 
 Chapter XXVIII. Bloody Legislation against the 
 Expropriated from the End of the 15th 
 Century. Forcing down of Wages bv Acts 
 of Parliament. 
 
 Chapter XXIX. Genesis of the Capitalist Farmer. 
 
 Chapter XXX. Reaction of the Agricultural 
 Revolution on Industry. Creation of the 
 Home Market for Industrial Capital. 
 
 Chapter XXXI. Genesis of the Industrial Cap- 
 italist. 
 
 Chapter XXX1L Historical Tendency of Cap- 
 italistic Accumulation. 
 
 Chapter XXXIII. The Modern Theory of Col- 
 onization. 
 
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 No. 139. 
 
 LIGHTNING, THUNDER, AND LIGHTNING-CONDUCTORS.- By 
 
 GERALD MoLLOY, D.D., D.Sc. Illustrated. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 LIGHTNING AND THUNDER. 
 
 Identity of Lightning and Electricity Frauk- 
 liu's Experiment Fatal Experiment of Richmau 
 Immediate Cause of Lightning Illustration from 
 Electric Spark What a Flash of Lightning is 
 Duration of a Flash of Lightning Experiments 
 of Professor Rood Wheatstone's Experiments 
 Experiment with Rotating Disk Brightness of a 
 
 Flash of Lightning Various Forms of Lightning 
 Forked Lightning, Sheet Lightning, Globe Light- 
 ning St. Elmo's Fire Experimental Illustration 
 Origin of Lightning Length of a Flash of Light- 
 ningPhysical Cause of Thunder Rolling of 
 Thunder Succession of Peals Variation of In- 
 tensityDistance of a Flash of Lightning. 
 
 LECTURE II. 
 
 LIGHTNING-CONDUCTORS. 
 
 Destructive Effects of Lightning Destruction 
 of Buildings Destruction of Ships at Sea De- 
 struction of Powder Magazines Experimental 
 Illustrations Destruction of Life by Lightning 
 The Return Shock Franklin's Lightning-rods 
 Introduction of Lightning-rods into England The 
 Battle of Balls and Points Functions of a Light- 
 
 ning-conductor Conditions of a Lightning-con- 
 ductorMischief Done by Bad Conductors Evil 
 Effects of a Bad Earth Contact Danger from Rival 
 Conductors Insulation of Lightning-conductors- 
 Personal Safety in a Thunder-storm Practical 
 Rules Security afforded by Lightning-rods. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 RECENT CONTROVERSY ON LIGHTNING-CONDUCTORS. 
 
 Theory of Lightning-conductors Challenged 
 Lectures of Professor Lodge Short Account of 
 his Views and Arguments Effect of Self-induction 
 on a Lightning-rod Experiment on the Discharge 
 of a Leydeu Jar Outer Shell only of a Lightning- 
 rod acts as a Conductor Discussion at the Meet- 
 wig of the British Association, September, 1888 
 
 Statement by Mr. Preece Lord Rayleigh and Sir 
 William Thomson Professor Rowland and Pro- 
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 ARE THE EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE INHERITED? 
 
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