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are gradually borne down the slope in tbe soil-cap
and piled in tbe A'alley below. The only other question
is bow the soil is afterwards removed and the
blocks left hare. This, I have no doubt, is effected by
the stream in the valley altering its course from time
to time, and washing away the soil from heneath.
This is a process which in some of the great ‘ stone-
rivers ’ in the Ealkland Islands must have taken an
enormous time. I fear that the extreme glacialists
will see in it a danger to this universal application
of their beloved theory to all cases of scratching
and GD -rooA'inoO;. I have known too much of the
action of ice to have the slightest doubt of its power;
hnt I say that ice bad no hand whatever in the production
of these grand ‘ moraines ’ in the Ealkland
Islands.
In the West Ilighlands of Scotland, and in many
other parts of the world, I have often noticed th a t
Avhen a hill of snch a rock as clay-slate comes down
with a gentle slope, the outcrop of the vertical or
highly inclined slates covered Avith a thick layer of
vegetable soil or drift containing emhedded blocks
and boulders derived from higher levels, the slates are
frequently first slightly bent downwards, then
abruptly curved and broken, and frequently the lines
of the fragments of the fractured beds of slate can he
tra c e d , for a yard or tAVO in the soil-cap gradually
becoming parallel Avith its surface, and passing down
in the direction of its line of descent. These movements
are probably extremely sIoav ; I Avell remember
many years ago observing a case somewhere in the
West of Scotland, Avhere a stream had exposed a fine
section of the soil-cap Avith the lines of broken doAA'n