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glaciers. The fjords have also been appealed to. Dana, as far back as 1849, was the first to appeal to ice as the excavator of fjords. Now these fjords exist in many places where, so far as we know, no ice or glacier ever existed at all. Falsan has shown that all along the southern shores of France, in Dalmatia, and on the shores of Asia Minor, fjords exist. Now the Austrian geologists who tramped in search of evidence of ice action all over European Turkey, could not find a trace of an old glacier. There is the remarkable fact also pointed out by Mr. Freshfield, that in Greenland, where the study has been carried on notably by one remarkable Englishman who lived there twenty years, and whose papers have been overlooked, and also by Peterssen, who both show that on the spot nothing like excavation by these enormous glaciers with their rapid motion can be found. My friend Dr. Blanford says if you do not appeal to glaciers, what about the boulder clay? I say boulder clay has not been formed by glaciers at all. I have been where glaciers are working hard, and, like a good many other people, have absolutely failed to find boulder clay being formed. Boulder clay necessitates an appeal to something more than glacial action, and certainly we find nothing in the moraines of glaciers in the least resembling boulder clay. There seem to me to be other facts and arguments which preclude absolutely this appeal to ice. Ice is exactly like the sand paper used by the sculptor after his assistant has chipped out the statue. What comes out of the bottom of a glacier, as was said by Mr. Freshfield, in the shape of the so-called glacier milk is largely the result of the rubbing down of the masses that have fallen down the crevasses from the backs of the glacier. A glacier can no more take blocks of stone out of its own bed than a man with his hands tied behind him can pull teeth out of his own head: and the products of erosion we see everywhere are caused by the rubbing of the stones that fall down the crevasses and chafe against the rocky bed. Thus we find that glaciers do not excavate, but only polish. Being a disciple of Professor Bonney, who has done so much to illustrate this question, I could not resist your invitation to say a few words.

Mr. W. M. CONWAY: Reference has been made to the Karakoram Mountains, and the Himalayas have been described as later than the great range of mountains behind them. I have recently visited a portion of that range, and seen the largest glaciers in that district, notably the Hispar, which is the largest of all. It has, in quite recent times, retreated 25 miles, and is now only 40 miles long. In the first place it has not left a U-shaped valley, but a remarkably V-shaped valley, and there is no trace of the valley having been gouged out; and in the second place, nowhere in the neighbourhood does there remain any lake whatever. This afternoon I saw two men looking in a print-shop window, arguing as to how an engraver had produced a certain effect with the burin; as a matter of fact the thing was a mezzotint. Their discussion reminded me of the arguments regarding lake basins. I think, if the geologists arguing about this matter made themselves familiar with glaciers by contact with many, it would ultimately occur to them that they had never seen one engaged in excavating. I, and many others, have been under glaciers, both in their upper, middle, and lower courses, and have never seen one excavating. They slope and slide in the smoothest possible manner, and here and there do a little scratching. It was looking at the print, and not being familiar with the process, that brought this theory into prominence.

Professor BONNEY: My friend, Sir Henry Howorth, Mr. Freshfield, and Mr. Conway have left me very little to say, but I will just touch upon one or two points very briefly. With regard to the St. Lawrence, I may point out that the basin of the Saguenay is formed by a submerged moranic boundary between the valley of the Saguenay and the main valley of the St. Lawrence. With regard to the absence of lakes from the Himalayas, and presence in the Alps, if basins were made by glaciers

the two results would be simultaneous; so the question of relative age will not come in. With regard to tarns in rock basins, these only occur under most favourable circumstances, where ice may have been expected to have had great erosive power. Now, the argument of my earlier papers was, that if glaciers do excavate, they should make tarns at intervals down the valley. Dr. Blanford forgot that mud from glaciers does not prove erosion, but only abrasion, a distinction which I have drawn; and I quite agree with Mr. Freshfield, a large quantity of mud comes from tributary streams, not from the glacier. Several of the Alpine lakes, in fact, the most important, occur at the ends of the courses of glaciers, where, according to most people, they would be quite impotent to excavate, in fact, where they approach their deathbeds. It would seem that glaciers are like some people, who idle away the best part of their life, and try to have a desperate expenditure of good deeds before they leave it. Another point, on which I do not agree with my friend, is that of Alpine valleys. These, as a rule, are not U-shaped, but V-shaped, only being U-shaped in a few very exceptional cases. I have followed up, I should think, half the valleys in the Alps. The upper Haslithal Valley is throughout V-shaped, yet it is ice-worn almost down to the level of the torrent. My argument amounts to this, that if we accept the hypothesis put forward by Professor Ramsay, we are landed in a crowd of practical difficulties.

The PRESIDENT: You will, I think, agree with me in the opinion that Professor Bonney's views have been well smitten and well defended, and will direct me in your name to return your very best thanks alike to him and everyone else who has taken part in the discussion.

PYTHEAS, THE DISCOVERER OF BRITAIN.

By CLEMENTS R. MARKHAM, C.B., F.R.S.

THE discovery of the British Isles in the third century before Christ, by a Greek scientific explorer, was the last link in a chain of events which commenced with the establishment of the Ionian colonies in Asia Minor. We may trace these events as they succeed each other, with ever growing interest, for we shall find that their motive was always a noble thirst for geographical discovery and exploration. The original impulse came from those Ionian colonies in Asia Minor, whose people were gifted with all the Grecian genius for scientific research, for imaginative speculation, and for maritime enterprise. They are said to have established themselves on this coast in about 1060 B.C., to have formed themselves into twelve autonomous cities, to have advanced in civilisation, and to have extended their influence in various directions, during a long period of peace and prosperity, extending over several centuries. Their coast reached for about 80 miles from Phocæa on the north, to Miletus on the south, bordering on Caria; and the Ionian territory included the islands of Chios and Samos. Deeply indented by bays, it is formed into numerous harbours, and the dozen cities were clustered round their shores. First on the north, between the Cumaan and Hermæan Gulfs, was Phocæa, a colony from Ionian Phocis. Then came

the rocky promontory, on which rose the shaggy forest of Mount Mimas, with the island of Chios by its side, and on the shores of the promontory and island were clustered the cities of Clazomene, Erythræ, Teos, and Chios. From Mount Mimas, a great bay sweeps round to Mount Mycale and the island of Samos, and on or near its shores were the cities of Lebedos and Colophon, and the holy city of Ephesus. Point Trogilium, at the end of Mount Mycale, separates this bay of Ephesus from the southern bay where stood the cities of Priene, Myus, and Miletus, with Samos on its fertile island, off Mycale.

The twelve Ionian cities formed a sort of union, and their delegates periodically met at Panionion, on the slopes of Mount Mycale, to celebrate their games, which were managed by the neighbouring city of Priene. This was a loose bond, and did not prevent all intestine feuds, but it served to maintain a feeling of common origin and of common interest among the citizens of the twelve Ionian colonies. Another such bond was found in the worship of their goddess Artemis at Ephesus. This was an Asiatic divinity whose worship the Ionians found established among the original inhabitants when they arrived. It was a personification of the fructifying powers of nature, to whom the Greeks applied the name of their own goddess Artemis, combining with her worship that of her brother Apollo, the sun-god.

From a very early period these Ionians of Asia Minor were distinguished for the energy and ability with which they conducted their commercial ventures, and not less for their intellectual progress. Of the seven wise men of Greece, two, Thales and Bias, belonged to cities of the Ionian colonists. Thales predicted the solar eclipse which put an end to the battle between the Medes and Lydians, fixed the year at three hundred and sixty-five days, determined the course of the sun, and was the first to form a theory of the universe. He was a native of Miletus, as were his disciples Anaximander and Anaximenes, who were the first to measure time by a sundial. Heracleitus was a citizen of Ephesus, Xenophanes of Colophon, and Anaxagoras, who had an observatory on Mount Mimas, was of Clazomene. In later times, Samos produced more than one astronomer.

Led and helped by such brilliant intellects, the Ionian sailors soon covered the Ægaan with their ships, and began to venture on more distant voyages. Thales taught them to steer by the Little Bear like the Phoenicians, instead of the Great Bear, while Anaximander gave them some idea of geography, and constructed maps and a celestial sphere. Their ships were enlarged and built on improved principles, and commerce enriched their cities. The invention of money is attributed to the Lydian kings, but the Ionian seaports were among the first to adopt its use. The electrum staters of Phocæa, and her smaller coins,

* Both were wrong. The star nearest the Pule in those days was a Draconis. ]

impressed, on one side only, with a seal or a seal's head, were circulated throughout the known world. The coin of Erythra was stamped with a rose, that of Clazomene with a winged boar, Teos with a seated griffin, Chios with a seated sphinx, and Colophon with a lyre. Coins of the sacred city of Ephesus were stamped with a bee, the emblem of Artemis. The coin of Samos showed a lion's face, of Myus a bird, and of Miletus a lion or lion's head. Lebedos and Priene had no early coins, being small cities with little trade.

At different times Miletus, Samos, and Phocæa took the lead. Miletus, with her four harbours, enjoyed great prosperity, and established many colonies, chiefly on the Hellespont and in the Euxine. Abydos, Lampsacus, Cyzicus, Sinope, and Amisus owned her as their mother city. Samos, with her famous temple to Hera, was also a great maritime power under Policrates, and it was a Samian ship that first reached the eastern extremity of the Mediterranean,* B.C. 639. But it was Phocæa that held the supremacy of the sea for the longest timefrom about B.C. 602 to 560.

Phocæa stood on a peninsula between the Cumaan and Hermaan gulfs, at a distance of about 20 miles north of Smyrna. The city possessed two excellent harbours, called Naustathmus and Lampter, and in front of them was the island of Baccheion, adorned with temples and other public buildings. Herodotus says that the Phocæans were the first Greeks who undertook distant voyages. Their sailors were acquainted with the Adriatic, the Tyrrhenian, and the Iberian Seas; and they were the first to visit Tartessus, a kingdom in the south of Spain, where the King Arganthonius was warmly attached to them, B.C. 639. This proves that the Phocæans undertook their expeditions without any predatory motives, and with the great objects of discovery and the extension of trade. Hence their relations with the people they visited were friendly and peaceful. They established a settlement at Alalia on the east coast of Corsica, in B.C. 566; but their great work was the foundation of the rich and powerful colony of Massalia (Marseilles) in B.C. 600.

When the Phocæans arrived on the south coast of Gaul, the country was ruled by a chief named Nannus. It was in about the year 600 B.C. when Euxenus, the Phocæan, opened friendly intercourse with him. The Grecian stranger was present at a banquet, given by the Gaulish chief, when it was arranged that his daughter Petta was to give a cup of wine to the suitor she preferred. She presented it to Euxenus. They were married, and the lady received the Grecian name of Aristoxena, bringing the site of Massalia as her dower. Their son was named Protis, and the family of Protiadea flourished at least down to the time of Aristotle. Brought to the Grecian colonists by one fair

*Herodotus,' Melpom., iv. 5.

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