The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

92 SCANDINAVIA.the western portion of Malar itself being thus almost completely cut off fromthe main basin by one of these singular formations remarkable for its extremeregularity.Upheaval of the Land.The development of the &sar and the marine alluvia deposited on the presentupheaved lands arc evidences of the movements that have passed over theScandinavian area since the glacial epoch.At fii>t the land subsided, and the sealevelrose from 500 to 700, in some places even 1,000 feet, as shown by themarine deposits with the remains of arcticanimals resting on rocks scored by theaction of ice.Then a reverse movement set in, and the land was upheaved, bearingupwards the asar previously deposited by the running waters. During thesevicissitudes of level the Scandinavian relief must have been changed, for theoutlines of the upheaved islands and peninsulas do not always correspond with thoseof the lands engulfed in the deep. Thus a vast Silurian region, at the beginning ofthe glacial epoch stretching along the Swedish seaboard immediately north andnorth-west of the Aland archipelago, did not again emerge with the reappearanceof the plains on the Baltic coast. The former existence of this Silurian land isrecalled by the numerous calcareous and sandstone boulders transported by theglaciers or floating ice as far south as the neighbourhood of Stockholm.It is alsoshown especially by the rich soil of limestone origin covering all the coast districtsbetween Gefle, Wester As, and Stockholm. This fertile soil is the outcome of theconstant erosive action of floating ice on the layers of limestone, clays, and schistsformerly occupying the present water area east of Gefle.These shiftings of level were formerly supposed to have been caused by suddenterrestrial cataclysms coincident with sudden revolutions of the whole planetarysystem ; but this view has at last given place to the theory of slow change. Thenatives of the Bothnian seaboard had long been aware of thegradual increase ofthe coast-line, encroaching continually on the sea.The old men pointed out thevarious places washed by the waves in their childhood ; and farther inland thenames and position of long- forsaken havens ; buildings at one time standing on theseashore; the remains of vessels found far from the coast ; lastly, written records andsnatches of popular song, coidd leave no doubt regarding the retreat of the marinewaters. The first Luled, founded by Gustavus Adolphus, seemed to have retiredseveral miles westwards in a century and a half, thus becoming a rural town, andnecessitating the building of a new seaport farther east. Yet when, in 1730,Celsius ventured to suggest the hypothesis, not of an upheaval of the land, but ofa slow subsidence ofthe Baltic, he was charged with impiety by the Stockholmtheologians, and even in Parliament the two orders of the clergy condemned hisabominable heresy. Nevertheless a mark scored in 1731 by Celsius and Linnrcusat the base of a rock in the island of Lofgrund, near Gefle, indicated in thirteenyears a difference of level estimated at 7 inches.Although it would be impossible altogether to reject the hypothesis of Celsiusregarding the subsidence of the waters, still it seems evident that it is the land