The Journal of Geology, January-February 1893: A Semi-Quarterly Magazine of Geology and Related SciencesVarious
Science
The Journal of Geology, January-February 1893: A Semi-Quarterly Magazine of Geology and Related Sciences
Various
Geology -- Periodicals
(7) _Differential Subaërial Erosion._ If the drift deposited by one
ice-sheet were to be exposed for a considerable interval of time, and
if the ice in its subsequent advance failed to reach the limit of
its first invasion, the two areas should show different amounts of
subaërial erosion, since the one has been exposed to the action of air
and water much longer than the other. The line which marks the limit
of the later ice invasion should be the line of more or less sudden
transition from an area without, where stream erosion has been greater,
to an area within, where stream erosion has been less.
The point here made can not be met by the suggestion that the greater
erosion of the outer area was effected by the water issuing from the
ice which had retreated to the position now marked by the border of the
area of the lesser erosion. So far as we know, such waters would be
depositing, not eroding. Furthermore, much of the erosion of the outer
area would have such relation to drainage lines that waters issuing
from the ice could never have reached the localities where it is shown.
If the outer and older drift be found to have suffered ten times as
much stream erosion as the inner and newer, it is fair to assume that
it has been exposed something like ten times as long, if the conditions
for erosion are equally favorable in the two regions. The argument has
especial weight if it can be found that beneath the newer drift the
surface of the older is such as to indicate that it was deeply eroded
before the newer was placed upon it. The argument is stronger the
farther from the margin of the newer drift such erosion on the surface
of the underlying older drift can be proved to have taken place. In
other words, if, in addition to the greater surface erosion of the
older drift sheet as now exposed outside the limit of the newer drift,
we find a notable unconformity between the newer and the older drift,
and especially if this unconformity lie far enough north of the margin
of the newer drift, the argument becomes conclusive.
When differential erosion and drift unconformities are not in
themselves conclusive, they may have great corroborative value in
conjunction with differential weathering, forest beds, or other
indications of separate ice epochs.
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