Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 26.djvu/947

 sequence of their submarine situation ; but this is very different from the ice-grooving of the subglacial boulders.

5. Life in the Old Waters — The rarity of life in many of the glacial beds need not be wondered at when we consider what I have said regarding the capricious and even sporadic distribution of life in the fjords of Greenland. It is possible also, as Lyell suggests, that animal life was originally scarce ; for " we read of the waters being so chilled and freshened by the melting of icebergs in some Norwegian and Icelandic fjords that the fish are driven away and all the mollusca killed" 1. He also points out most justly that, as the moraines are at the first devoid of life, if transported by icebergs to a distance, and deposited where the ice melts, they may continue as barren of every indication of life as they were where they originated. That the freshening of the water of fjords does destroy or prevent animal life developing, I have already shown ; but I doubt whether the chilling has much, if any effect ; and the recent researches of Carpenter, Jeffreys, Thomson, and others show that the idea which was suggested, that the sea might then be too deep for animal life, is without foundation ; for life seems, as far as our present knowledge goes, to have no zero ; besides, the shells found in the glacial formations are not deep-sea shells. Again, we must be careful to avoid concluding that the plant- and animal life on the dreary shores or mountain-tops of the old glacial Scotland was poor. In Greenland, the outskirting islands support a luxuriant phanerogamic vegetation of between 300 and 400 species of plants 2 ; the sea is full of fishes and invertebrates, which shelter in forests of Algae. Plants even ascend to the height of 4000 feet. Millions of seals and whales, and of many species, sport in these waters, or are killed in thousands every spring on the pack-ice or land-floes. Every rock is swarming and noisy with the cries of water-fowl ; reindeer browse in countless herds in some of the valleys ; the Arctic fox barks its hue ! hue ! from the dreariest rocks in the depth of winter ; and the polar bear is on the range all the year round. Land-birds from southern regions come here for a nesting-place 3, and from the snowy valleys the Greenlanders will bring in the depth of winter sledge-loads of ptarmigan into the Danish posts. Life is so abundant that the Danish Government find it profitable to keep up trading-posts there, and the collecting and preserving of the skins, oil, and ivory of the native animals afford profitable employment to a considerable population. Independently of the fish eaten, the seals used as food and clothing, and the oil consumed in the country, it may not be

1 Lyell's ' Antiquity of Man,' p. 268.

2 The present writer, in little more than two months, amid many other occupations, collected on the shores and in the vicinity of Disco Bay alone, 129 species of flowering plants and vascular cryptoganus, more than 40 mosses (39 are described in the paper already mentioned ; but several additional have been since detected among the. collection), 11 Hepaticae, more than 100 Lichens, about 50 Algae, and several Fungi (see ' Transactions of the Edinburgh Botanical Society,' vol. ix.).

3 About 115 species of birds are found in Greenland.

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