The story of the universe. Volume 2 (of 4) : $b The earth : land and sea — John Shaqi
The story of the universe. Volume 2 (of 4) : $b The earth : land and sea
History
The story of the universe. Volume 2 (of 4) : $b The earth : land and sea
Astronomy; Earth (Planet); Natural history
The physical proof of this _deluge of the north of Europe_ exists
in the accumulation of unstratified deposits which covers all the
plains and low grounds of Northern Europe. On and in this deposit
are found numerous blocks which have received the characteristic
and significant name of erratic blocks, and which are frequently of
considerable size. These become more characteristic as we ascend to
higher latitudes, as in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, the southern
borders of the Baltic, and in the British Islands generally, in all
of which countries deposits of marine fossil shells occur, which
prove the submergence of large areas of Scandinavia, of the British
Isles, and other regions during parts of the glacial period. Some of
these rocks, characterized as _erratic_, are of very considerable
volume; such, for instance, is the granite block which forms the
pedestal of the statue of Peter the Great at St. Petersburg. This
block was found in the interior of Russia, where the whole formation
is _Permian_, and its presence there can only be explained by
supposing it to have been transported by some vast iceberg, carried
by a diluvial current. This hypothesis alone enables us to account
for another block of granite, weighing about 340 tons, which was
found on the sandy plains in the north of Prussia, an immense model
of which was made for the Berlin Museum. The last of these erratic
blocks deposited in Germany covers the grave of King Gustavus
Adolphus, of Sweden, killed at the battle of Lutzen, in 1632. He was
interred beneath the rock. Another similar block has been raised in
Germany into a monument to the geologist Leopold von Buch.
These erratic blocks, which are met with in the plains of Russia,
Poland, and Prussia, and in the eastern parts of England, are
composed of rocks entirely foreign to the region where they are
found. They belong to the primary rocks of Norway; they have been
transported to their present sites, protected by a covering of ice,
by the waters of the northern deluge.
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