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IV.—On Changes of Climate during the Glacial Epoch
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 May 2009
Extract
In my last communication to the Magazine I made an attempt to correlate the Scottish Glacial deposits with the equivalent accumulations in Switzerland, Northern Europe, and North America, my purpose being to show that the same order of succession holds good in all those regions where the “Drifts” have been examined, and that in each case there is no proof whatever of any warm period having intervened since the deposition of the clays with Arctic shells and the decrease and disappearance of local glaciers. In the present and a subsequent paper I propose to treat of the superficial deposits of Ireland and England, more especially those of the latter country.
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page 106 note 1 Mr. Hull was the first (1863) to point out clearly the threefold division of the drift of Lancashire into Upper and Lower Boulder-clay with the intervening Middle Sands (see his Memoir, Mem. Lit. and Phil. Soc. of Manch. 1865, p. 449). Mr. Binney had, however, previously mentioned the existence of sand-beds in the Boulder-clay, but these beds he believed to be of inconstant occurrence.
page 107 note 1 Much of the “pinel” described by Mr. Mackintosh is also in all likelihood the same kind of deposit as the Scottish Till.
page 109 note 1 It may be as well to remark that I offer no opinion as to the contemporaneity or non-contemporaneity of the Lancashire Middle Sands, and the Middle Glacial group of Mr. Wood. The balance of evidence appears to be against the synchronism of these deposits, but the question will, no doubt, be settled by-and-by—the zeal with which the deposits are being overhauled by Mr. Wood and his confreres in East Anglia, and by Mr. De Ranee, Mr. Mackintosh, and others in the North of England, leaves one in no doubt about this. All I hold is that the beds grouped under No. 1 were laid down during the same great epoch, and are thus the equivalents of the Scottish Till and interglacial beds.
page 109 note 2 It is possible, however, that some portion of the deposits in group 5 may belong to this period.
page 109 note 3 I follow, of course, the sequence given by Mr. Wood. See Geol. Mag., Vol. VII., p. 18.
page 109 note 4 See Notes on some of the Drift in Ireland by G. H. Kinahan. Dublin Quart. Journal of Science, vol. vi., p. 249. I am indebted to Mr. Kinahan for some MS. notes on the Irish drift.
page 109 note 5 Geol. Mag., Vol. VI., p. 542.
page 109 note 6 See Mr. Kinahan's paper, loc. cit. Possibly, however, some of the deposits referred to by Mr. Kinahan may belong to the “Middle Sand series.”
page 110 note 1 Geol. Mag., Vol. VIII., p. 294.
page 110 note 2 But for various reasons I am not prepared to agree with my colleague's suggestion that the “Limestone Gravel” of Ireland represents this Middle Sand group, or was ever covered by Boulder-clay. I believe that the Middle Sand series of Ireland (“Manure Gravels”) will be found, as they are traced inland, to thin out against the gradually rising ground. It is so with the marine interglacial beds of the maritime districts of Scotland; and in all likelihood with those of the north-west of England also. The erratics resting upon the gravel ridges exactly tally with those occupying a similar position in Scotland, Northern Europe, and North America.
page 110 note 3 Mr. Kinahan mentions the occurrence of marine terraces on Slieve Aughta at a height of 1200 feet. The Rev. Mr. W. Close also refers to shelly sands at a similar height on Three Rock Mountain.
page 110 note 4 Mr. Kinahan describes a “rocky moraine drift” which, in part at least, may be the representative of the Scottish “moraine rubbish” mentioned in my last communication to the Magazine.
page 111 note 1 The evidence derived from the Glacial deposits of East Anglia would make it appear that at the beginning of the cycle the arctic and temperate periods were also less strongly contrasted than they subsequently became.
page 111 note 2 I have stated in the text my belief that the Macclesfield beds and those of Moel Tryfan ought to be referred to the period of great submergence, during which the kame series or esker drift was accumulated; they are in all probability the equivalents of the high-level shelves of drift met with in Ireland and Scotland, and likewise in North America.