Geological Observations on South AmericaDarwin, Charles
Science
Geological Observations on South America
Darwin, Charles
Beagle Expedition (1831-1836); Geology -- South America; Mollusks, Fossil -- South America; Paleontology
The clay-slate cleaves in the same W.N.W. and E.S.E. direction, as on
Navarin Island, on both sides of the Beagle Channel, on the eastern
side of Hoste Island, on the N.E. side of Hardy Peninsula, and on the
northern point of Wollaston Island; although in these two latter
localities the cleavage has been much obscured by the metamorphosed and
feldspathic condition of the slate. Within the area of these several
islands, including Navarin Island, the direction of the stratification
and of the mountain- chains is very obscure; though the mountains in
several places appeared to range in the same W.N.W. line with the
cleavage: the outline of the coast, however, does not correspond with
this line. Near the bifurcation of the Beagle Channel, where the
underlying metamorphic schists are first seen, they are foliated (with
some irregularities), in this same W.N.W. line, and parallel, as before
stated, to the main mountain-axis of this part of the country. Westward
of this main range, the metamorphic schists are foliated, though less
plainly, in the same direction, which is likewise common to the zone of
old erupted trappean rocks, forming the outermost islets. Hence the
area, over which the cleavage of the slate and the foliation of the
metamorphic schists extends with an average W.N.W. and E.S.E. strike,
is about forty miles in a north and south line, and ninety miles in an
east and west line.
Further northward, near Port Famine, the stratification of the
clay-slate and of the associated rocks, is well defined, and there
alone the cleavage and strata-planes are parallel. A little north of
this port there is an anticlinal axis ranging N.W. (or a little more
westerly) and S.E.: south of the port, as far as Admiralty Sound and
Gabriel Channel, the outline of the land clearly indicates the
existence of several lines of elevation in this same N.W. direction,
which, I may add, is so uniform in the western half of the St. of
Magellan, that, as Captain King has remarked, “a parallel ruler placed
on the map upon the projecting points of the south shore, and extended
across the strait, will also touch the headlands on the opposite
coast.” (“Geographical Journal” volume 1 page 170.) It would appear,
from Captain King’s observations, that over all this area the cleavage
extends in the same line. Deep-water channels, however, in all parts of
Tierra del Fuego have burst through the trammels both of stratification
and cleavage; most of them may have been formed during the elevation of
the land by long- continued erosion, but others, for instance the
Beagle Channel, which stretches like a narrow canal for 120 miles
obliquely through the mountains, can hardly have thus originated.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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