Geological Observations on South America — John Shaqi
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
From Coy Inlet, where the high summit-plain trends inland, a plain
estimated at 350 feet in height, extends for forty miles to the river
Gallegos. From this point to the Strait of Magellan, and on each side
of that Strait, the country has been much denuded and is less level. It
consists chiefly of the boulder formation, which rises to a height of
between one hundred and fifty and two hundred and fifty feet, and is
often capped by beds of gravel. At N.S. Gracia, on the north side of
the Inner Narrows of the Strait of Magellan, I found on the summit of a
cliff, 160 feet in height, shells of existing Patellae and Mytili,
scattered on the surface and partially embedded in earth. On the
eastern coast, also, of Tierra del Fuego, in latitude 53 degrees 20′
south, I found many Mytili on some level land, estimated at 200 feet in
height. Anterior to the elevation attested by these shells, it is
evident by the present form of the land, and by the distribution of the
great erratic boulders on the surface, that two sea-channels connected
the Strait of Magellan both with Sebastian Bay and with Otway Water.
(“Geological Transactions” volume 6 page 419.)
CONCLUDING REMARKS ON THE RECENT ELEVATION OF THE SOUTH-EASTERN COASTS
OF AMERICA, AND ON THE ACTION OF THE SEA ON THE LAND.
Upraised shells of species, still existing as the commonest kinds in
the adjoining sea, occur, as we have seen, at heights of between a few
feet and 410 feet, at intervals from latitude 33 degrees 40′ to 53
degrees 20′ south. This is a distance of 1,180 geographical miles—about
equal from London to the North Cape of Sweden. As the boulder formation
extends with nearly the same height 150 miles south of 53 degrees 20′,
the most southern point where I landed and found upraised shells; and
as the level Pampas ranges many hundred miles northward of the point,
where M. d’Orbigny found at the height of 100 feet beds of the Azara,
the space in a north and south line, which has been uplifted within the
recent period, must have been much above the 1,180 miles. By the term
“recent,” I refer only to that period within which the now living
mollusca were called into existence; for it will be seen in the Fourth
Chapter, that both at Bahia Blanca and P. S. Julian, the mammiferous
quadrupeds which co-existed with these shells belong to extinct
species. I have said that the upraised shells were found only at
intervals on this line of coast, but this in all probability may be
attributed to my not having landed at the intermediate points; for
wherever I did land, with the exception of the river Negro, shells were
found: moreover, the shells are strewed on plains or terraces, which,
as we shall immediately see, extend for great distances with a uniform
height. I ascended the higher plains only in a few places, owing to the
distance at which their escarpments generally range from the coast, so
that I am far from knowing that 410 feet is the maximum of elevation of
these upraised remains.
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