coast oak (Quercus sessiliflora) was far more frequent than at present, judging by the evidence of the peat-bogs, and at that time, the shell deposits inform us (as shown by Professor M. Sars), the present marine animals of the west coast were found in the Christiania fjord. And there is every reason to assume that the present flora of the west coast immigrated thither at that period from the south of Sweden along the Christiania fjord to the west coast. New changes again set in, with new immigrants, and finally came the present age with its comparatively dry climate. But all these events are prehistoric, as is shown by the stone implements lying in the uppermost peat layer, close under the surface. Thus, the remains of plants and animals in clay, peat, and shell deposits inform us that the gaps in the extension of the species in Norway may be explained by the varying events of times long gone by. Since the Glacial Age the relation between sea and land in Norway has changed. Formerly the sea was in some places upwards of six hundred feet higher than at present.* The clay at that time deposited on the sea-bottom, and the shell deposits formed near the shore, contain, as Professors M. Sars and Kjerulf have taught us, remains of Arctic animals even in the southernmost parts of the country. There is a difference of opinion between savants whether this alteration of the shore-line is due to a rising of the land or the sinking of the sea, or to both. There is further some dispute about the manner in which the level became altered, some maintaining that it took place suddenly at intervals, whilst others believe that it is the result of a gradual and continuous process. The marks left by the sea seem at first glance to corroborate the first of these theories. Thus, in the lower parts of our valleys we find along the river-courses terraces of sand, pebbles, and clay, one behind and above the other right up to the highest old shore-line. The terraces, of which Kjerulf, pre-eminently amongst others, has given us particulars, have an even surface and a steep declivity outwards against the mouth of the valley. The depth of the peat in the parts which were formerly below the sea increases with the height above its surface, because the formation of the peat commenced long before the lowest-lying parts had risen above the surface. From the remains of plants found in the various peat layers we may therefore learn how the Norwe gian flora was composed during the various phases of the rising of the land. They contain sometimes remains of sea animals. Under a higher level of the sea the river carried down sand and gravel to its mouth, just as in the present day banks and bars are formed at the estuary of our rivers. And the terraces seem to indicate that the changes in the level were broken by periods of rest. During the latter the river had time to form a bank, which rose comparatively rapidly; the next period of rest gave occasion to the formation of another terrace, and so on. But this theory has to combat many obstacles, because the terraces lie often, as Professor Sexe has shown, even in valleys situated near each other, at different elevations. The professor is of opinion that step-like terraces may be formed even under a gradual and steady rising, if the carrying. power of the river is subjected to changes. Our theory may therefore probably also be applicable for explaining the terraces, because, if long periods with milder climate have alternated with others whose climate was more severe, it is evident that the volume of water, and thus the carrying. power of the current, may have altered. Perhaps the rivers have at certain times carried down floating ice, at others not, and the 'thaw in the spring must have increased the carrying-power. We can thus understand why the corresponding terraces in valleys near each other do not always lie at the same elevation. Their rivers differ in size, and when the carry. ing power diminishes a big river will retain the strength to form a terrace longer than a small one. Besides these terraces, which are particularly conspicuous in the short, steep valleys on the west coast of Norway, and on account of their regularity must excite the admiration of every one who sees them, there are other equally striking marks of the old sea-levels, viz., the socalled Strandlinjer - shore-lines - which are known chiefly through the researches of Professor Mohn and Dr. Karl Pettersen. When travelling through the fjords and sounds, particularly in northern Norway, one sees here and there horizontal lines drawn along the mountain-sides, sometimes several hundred feet above the sea. They are not always equally marked, but appear often remarkably clear; sometimes they look like roads or railway lines. They are always horizontal, or nearly so, and must, therefore, be remains of an old seashore. Often two parallel lines are seen running one above the other in the same place; and on closer inspection it will be It is therefore seen that an the facts which have been advanced in order to prove that the rising was broken by periods of rest may be easily explained, if we assume that the land rose gradually and steadily under periods alternating with milder and severer climates. The University, Christiania. A. BLYTT. From St. James's Gazette. THE FIRST WATER-MEADOW. THREE centuries ago water meadows were unknown in England; and here fol. lows a brief account of how the first of them was made. discovered that they are hollowed out of the rock itself. They have a surface sometimes many feet broad, and are bounded behind by a more or less steep mountain wall, forming thus horizontal incisions in the same. The shore-lines have also been brought to prove that the rising was broken by periods of rest during which the sea had time to hollow out the rock; but I am of opinion that they could be formed too, under a gradual rising, if the climate be subjected to periodi cal changes. The shore-lines belong to the northern parts of the country and the deep fjords, where the winter cold is more severe, and they are only found in districts where there is a tide. They seem to have been blasted out by the influence of the cold. At high tide the sea water fills the holes and fissures in the rock, and Master Rowland Vaughan, a gentleman when the tide recedes it is left in the of Herefordshire, was a courtier and solsame. In severe winters the water will dier of no mean figure in the "spacious freeze, and thus burst the rock. During times of great Elizabeth." He was enthe rising of the land, shore-lines will be gaged for some years in the wars of Ire. broken out in this manner, as long as the land; but an unconquerable yearning for erosion is able to keep pace with the ris- home made him decline service in the ing. When the climate becomes milder, Low Countries. In this he was supported a time will come when the erosion is un- by his wife; and, both having a great love able to continue. Then the shore-lines for the country and a passion for its purwill be lifted up above the level of the sea, suits, they withdrew into the beautiful and out of the reach of the blasting in- Herefordshire valley on the Welsh border fluence of the water. If next, after thou-in which lay Vaughan's patrimonial estate. sands of years, when the land has perhaps He was a man of some information, and risen fifty or a hundred feet, a period fol- of such ingenuity and resource in agricul lows with a severer climate, a new shore-ture that there came to be a saying in his line is formed below the former. The shell-banks, too (ie., deposits of shells of marine animals living in shallow water near the shore) lie, as Kjerulf has shown, in the Christiania fjord at different levels, the oldest at heights of from five hundred and forty to three hundred and fifty feet, and the youngest between two bundred feet and fifty feet above the present level of the sea. But between three hundred and fifty and two hundred feet none has been found. In the neighboring Swedish province of Bohus they are found at all elevations, even between three hundred and fifty and two hundred feet, and it must therefore be assumed that local causes, as, for instance, the ice formation in the more closed Christiania fjord, destroyed the shell-banks when they reached the shore line, at a period when the land lay from three hundred and fifty to two hundred feet lower in relation to the sea than at present. According to the evidence of the peat-bogs, there is reason to believe that this part of the rising occurred under a more severe climate. part of the country, "If Master Vaughan had these and these grounds he would do this and this." But he was mainly pos sessed by one idea. He was bent upon improving the immethodical systems of irrigation which then prevailed. His demesne was in a country of running brooks; but irrigation was so poorly practised that a few weeks' drought often neutralized all the promise of the year. It grieved him to the heart: "Having so many rivers, brooks, fountains, and springs, which ran idly into the sea; without weare, sluice, stay, stanke, or dam, to turn some part of them upon grounds that needed them." Vaughan had an old servant, a joiner by trade; with whom many a consultation was held as to the mode of compassing that which lay so near the master's heart. But a more able engineer than either was to suggest the plan that was adopted. The way in which Vaughan was led to consult this skilful artificer is best told in his own words, as set down in the little book published by him in 1610. "In the month of March (some fifteen years be withal. All which, with silence, I past fore) I happened to find a mole or wont's | his daughters had to trick the Maypole nest raised on the brim of a brook in my mead, like a great hillock; and from it there issued a little stream of water (drawn by the working of the mole) down a shelving ground one pace broad and some twenty in length. The running of this little stream did at that time wonderfully content me, seeing it pleasing green, and that other land on both sides was full of moss and hide-bound for want of water. This was the first cause I undertook the drowning of grounds." The interior of a mole's borough is a most skilful piece of workmanship. Its various galleries, trenches, and runs are formed with almost mathematical regularity; and the "work" when seen in section has the appearance of a regular fortification in miniature. Moles are pertinacious in their quest for worms and grubs; and in dry weather burrow instinctively in the direction of water. What had happened, therefore, was alike simple and natural. The animal had com. pleted its habitation; but, throwing out yet another gallery, had unwittingly "tapped the brook, which immediately flooded the burrow, and was conducted through its numerous channels until it found its way to the surface. This incident was Vaughan's inspiration; and to work he and his hench-timately brought a thousand acres under man went. The least detail of their proceedings would be too intricate for production here. The whole country-side was amazed as the news of Master Vaughan's extraordinary proposals was noised abroad. Of course the first necessity was to conciliate the neighbors; and his difficulties herein were curiously like those which may be experienced by any honest country gentleman ambitious of "improvements" in the present day. Here is a touch which is evidently enough of nature: "I acquaint ed them with my purpose. The one, being a gentleman of worth and good-nature, gave me leave to plant one end of my weir on his side the river; the other, my tenant, being very aged and simple, by no persua sion I could use would yield his consent, alleging it would mar his grounds- yea, sometimes his apple trees; and men told him water would raise the rush, and kill his cowslips, which was the chiefest flower But the scheme was pursued to comple tion, and the laugh reverted to the winning side. "As the river Nilus drowns Ægipe from the Abisine mountains, enriching the country, so did the muddy flouds from the upper part of the golden valley improve my estate beyond beleefe." Vaughan ul the water-meadow system, the produce of which it increased threefold; and so was his purpose "to raise a golden world for the commonwealth, in the golden vale of Hereford – abundantly fulfilled. Many a less curious and deserving book than this of Vaughan's has been reprinted with all the dignity which "extra margin" and the adoption of a learned society can confer. Its honest simplicity is thoroughly refreshing. The writer truly says, "What is here bluntly expressed was first of all sharply conceived, with much whetting of wit, and no less filing of invention." In a postcript is given an invitation, which shows that Vaughan had other claims to be regarded as a man of original ideas. It runs thus: "Those that are desirous to see a mill sawing timber, here shall their desires be fully satisfied, seeing a mill by a water-course keep a dozen sawes on work together." For EIGHT DOLLARS, remitted directly to the Publishers, the LIVING AGE will be punctually forwarded for a year, free of postage. Remittances should be made by bank draft or check, or by post-office money-order, if possible. If neither of these can be procured, the money should be sent in a registered letter. All postmasters are obliged to register letters when requested to do so. Drafts, checks, and money-orders should be made payable to the order of. LITTELL & Co. Single Numbers of THE LIVING AGE, 18 cents. SONNETS FROM THE SWEDISH OF STAGNELIUS. [The most eminent sonneteer whom Sweden has produced is Erik Johan Stagnelius, who was almost precisely a contemporary of Shelley, and slightly resembled him in temperament. He was born in 1793 in a parsonage on the island of Oland, his father becoming, in the son's childhood, Bishop of Kalmar. The poet had a brilliant if some- | what eccentric career at the University of Lund. He wrote early, and soon surpassed all that had written Swedish verse before him. He enjoyed a great success in various departments of lyrical and dramatic literature, and though he was melancholy and capricious, and of a delicate constitution, his death at the age of twenty-nine, in the beginning of 1823, was a surprise to every one. He was found dead, but how he died remains a complete mystery. The fame of Stagnelius is eclipsed, in his own country, only by that of Tegnér, and his sonnets, though exceedingly mystical and often obscure, are certainly the most original in the language. As no English version of them has ever been printed, I have attempted to translate the following examples, at the request of my friend Mr. S. Waddington.] O CAMP of flowers, with poplars girdled round, Whose horn of plenty flatteringly subdued My heart into a trance, whence, with a rude And horrid blast, fate came my soul to hound: Who was the goddess who empowered you all Thus to bewitch me? Out of wasting snow And lily-leaves her headdress should be made! Weep, my poor lute! nor on Astræa cali. She will not smile, nor I, who mourn below, Till I, a shade in heaven, clasp her, a shade. "How cold upon my passion blows the wind, Over the old sweet fields-so sweet that I Could wander more, yet for all memory Not sweet enough. Beloved, ah! have I sinned, That all but these dumb fields looks so unkind And I, without e'en one familiar face, Must see the darkness in the sunny place, And set my feet here, wandering still in mind?" Then glancing up, if heaven might look sweet Upon his sorrow, one bright star he spied. But, as he gazed, his hungry eyes grew dim, And the star seemed so many worlds from him. Heart-sick, he turned; and in the pool be. side Lo! the same star was shining at his feet. Macmillan's Magazine. |