. The earth and its inhabitants .. . Wof Gr 25 MQee. NORTHERN SCOTLAND. 341 Along many parts of the coast the water in the lochs resembles that of LochStennis, in the Orkneys, which is briny at one end and fresh at the other; andLike it they have two distinct faunas and floras.* What, then, is the cause of the contrast between the two coasts of Scotland, acontrast which may also be observed with regard to the Baltic and Atlantic coastsof Scandinavia? Why have the ancient gulfs opening out upon the GermanOcean been filled up with alluvium and drift, whilst the innumerable indenta-tions on the w
. The earth and its inhabitants .. . Wof Gr 25 MQee. NORTHERN SCOTLAND. 341 Along many parts of the coast the water in the lochs resembles that of LochStennis, in the Orkneys, which is briny at one end and fresh at the other; andLike it they have two distinct faunas and floras.* What, then, is the cause of the contrast between the two coasts of Scotland, acontrast which may also be observed with regard to the Baltic and Atlantic coastsof Scandinavia? Why have the ancient gulfs opening out upon the GermanOcean been filled up with alluvium and drift, whilst the innumerable indenta-tions on the west have retained their primitive forms ? It is once more theglaciers to which this phenomenon must be attributed. In the glacial age, as inour own days, the moisture-laden winds came from the west and south-west, andprecipitation, mostly in the form of snow, was consequently most considerable alongthe western slopes. But they were not torrents which carried the waters back into Fig. 166.—Loch 1 . 250, 2 Miles. the sea; they were glaciers. On the eastern slope the smaller amount of precipita-tion only suflBced to maintain small glaciers, which never descended beneath theupper valleys, and gave birth to rivers winding through the plain. The contrastin the hydrographical features of the two slopes could not have been the eastern coast the sea threw up ridges of sand at the mouths of the gulfs,in which the rivers deposited their alluvium, gradually filling them up, andobliterating the original irregularities in the outline of the coast. On the west, onthe other hand, the enormous rivers of ice occupied the valleys through whichthey took their course, and, instead of filling them up with alluvium, they scoopedthem out still deeper. Every river of ice and every affluent which dischargeditself into it, from the right or left, thus shielded the inequalities in the groundfrom obliteration ; and when the climate grew milder, and the glaciers melted* Hugh
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectgeography, bookyear18
