“THE GREAT ICE AGE”: (1) YEARS OF PREPARATION
1865-1871
The year 1865 saw James Geikie, as already stated, doing Survey work in
Ayrshire, and this, with its continuation, the laborious and sometimes
tedious mapping of the Lanarkshire coalfield, kept him in the west
till 1872. Of these years of patient toil, diversified by independent
research upon the drifts, by geological holidays, and by the making of
translations of Heine and other German poets, comparatively little has
been preserved. His correspondents in these early days were chiefly the
members of his own family, and most of his letters have been destroyed,
except where the presence of some cherished verses determined their
preservation. From the scanty records in the diaries, from the few
letters that remain, and from the published account of his surveys, it
is, however, possible to indicate broadly the course of his daily life.
In 1865 he was stationed in South Ayrshire, Girvan and Cumnock being
two of his centres there. The most notable event of the year, however,
was a visit to Norway in July to August. Unfortunately, only the barest
notes of this visit remain, and, except for the descriptions of fiord
scenery in _Prehistoric Europe_ and elsewhere, we do not know what
impressions were obtained.
It was apparently chiefly a steamboat journey, with short excursions to
glaciers and other areas of special interest to the traveller. Boat was
taken from Newcastle to Aalesund, then _viâ_ Molde and Christiansund
(where a brief note records an exquisite sunset about eleven, with
sunrise following at one) to Trondhjem. After a day in this town the
journey was continued to Rödö and Melövar. From this point a trip was
made in a boat with four men for twenty miles up the fiord to visit the
Fondalen ice-field. Several days were spent here, and various glaciers
were visited and presumably studied. A return was then made to Melövar,
and the steamer journey continued to Tromsö. After a day here James
Geikie went on to Skjervö, where he arrived at 2 A.M., as is carefully
recorded, and put up at a merchant’s house, no inn being available.
Here he was most hospitably received, and enjoyed his brief glimpse of
a Norwegian interior. Next day a boat was taken across the fiord to the
Jökul-fjeld, and an apparently profitable excursion, which included
icebergs and icefalls among the objects seen, ended at a fisherman’s
cot at midnight. Next day was spent idling about, because the wind was
adverse, which suggests that the boat was a sailing-boat, and the start
was not made till evening, so that the whole night was passed on the
water, Skjervö not being reached till six in the following morning. Two
days were spent here, and then the steamer taken to Loppen, from which
an excursion was made to Bergsfiord, where the glacier was visited.
Another excursion was made to Öksfjord, and the steamboat rejoined as
far as Hammerfest, the furthest point reached. On the return journey
the call at Christiansund permitted of an expedition, taken in company
with the geologist Dr Dahll, during which a “fierce controversy” took
place. Finally, a Dutch steamer brought the traveller from Bergen to
England after what must have been a most instructive tour.
The following year, 1866, found him still in Ayrshire. Little record
of it is left, beyond the tale of work, and the publication of his
first scientific paper. By this time he had moved to the north of
Ayrshire, where he was also in the following year. This year, 1867,
witnessed the appearance of his first glacial paper, this being “On
the Buried Forests and Peat Mosses of Scotland, and the Changes of
Climate which they indicate,” a subject which was to engage his
attention more or less closely for the remainder of his life. His spare
time was still occupied with the translations, many examples of which
occur in his letters to his sisters. Occasionally his muse took less
serious forms, as may be seen from the lines given on next page, which
appear in a letter much of which is taken up with translations from
“that lugubrious poet in whose stanzas the word _weinen_ is rarely
omitted--it may be sweetly rendered by the English whining.” The lines
mentioned follow some criticisms of the habits of the inhabitants of
an Ayrshire town, where the society, in James Geikie’s words, was
“eminently peeous and drouthie.” The lines are as follows:--
Takin’ toddy a’ the week,
Comes the Sabbath day,
Then to Kirk three times they gang,
And sleep the fumes away.
In the same letter he complains that in this particular town the
invariable question put to you by strangers whose acquaintance you
make is, “What church do you attend?” He adds that he had not acquired
the reputation of a regular church-goer, so that one suspects that
something less than the three times a day had to suffice in his case.
From this period probably dates an anecdote which he used to tell
himself of a somewhat unfortunate visit to a place of worship where,
tired out by his week’s work in the open air, and not perhaps greatly
interested in the discourse, he fell asleep so soundly as ultimately
to fall out of the pew--at the end of which he was sitting--headlong
into the aisle. He had the presence of mind to remain there with his
eyes closed, and was carried out by sympathetic acquaintances, who
thought he had been suddenly overtaken by serious illness. But when
the feet of the young men were already at the door, the apparently
unconscious patient opened his eyes and winked at one of his friends
to indicate that the fate of Eutychus had not overtaken him on this
occasion. The bearer opposite, with an innocence which did credit to
his piety, had not thought of the obvious explanation of the accident,
and in his astonishment nearly dropped his burden. History does not,
unfortunately, tell whether his loyalty enabled him to keep the matter
to himself and so preserve his friend’s reputation. For these, it must
be remembered, were days when a geologist invariably ran the risk of
being suspected of “unsoundness,” by the mere fact of his occupation,
and was, therefore, one for whom jesting on the threshold of a church
was particularly dangerous.
In this year of 1867 Mr (now Dr) John Horne joined the Survey, and
very shortly afterwards made James Geikie’s acquaintance. There thus
began a friendship which lasted to the end. Almost from the first Mr
Horne shared Geikie’s enthusiasm for glacial work, and so early as
2nd April 1868 a letter from the latter to one of his sisters records
the fact that “Young Horne has got me a lot of information, and I
shall certainly get a lot more.” From this time, indeed, James Geikie
constantly asked his colleagues for notes about the glacial phenomena
in the areas they were respectively surveying, and for friendship’s
sake was freely supplied with these. Thus in the course of time he
acquired a large amount of detailed information about the different
parts of Scotland, with answers to many questions which cropped up in
the course of his own investigations. It was not till his early papers,
and especially the publication of _The Great Ice Age_, had attracted
the attention of a wider circle of geologists, that this correspondence
was enlarged to include most parts of the civilised world. As we shall
see later, his early foreign letters gave him great pleasure, even
though, until he realised the value of a feeling for languages and
a good stock of dictionaries, he had often to ask for help in their
translation.
A few lines from a letter to Mr Horne, written from Eaglesham on 8th
May 1868, may help to show the kind of work he was doing, and reveal
also those characteristics which made his colleagues willing to give
him all the help they could:--
DEAR YOUNG MAN,--I hope you are still in the land of the living and
the place of hope wherever that may be. These lines I write unto you
not that your joy may be full but that you may know that I take (I
won’t say a fatherly) interest in your welfare, but any other kind of
interest you like but self-interest. What are you about, and how do
you like the work? Is the Drift blinding your eyes and do you yet see
as through a glass darkly? I suppose your Boulder-clay in the high
grounds will give you no bother. If you get any gravel will you be so
good as let me know whether it occurs in valleys whose watershed is
over or under 1000 feet?
Mr Horne was then working in the Nith valley, being stationed at
Thornhill. James Geikie by this time had moved from Ayrshire into
Renfrewshire and Lanarkshire.
But the great event of 1868, apart from the publication of two more
glacial papers, was a trip up the Rhine and on to Switzerland, of which
one of the note-books contains a very full and jovial record, which
has been supplemented by the recollections of some of the surviving
members of the party, who were all Survey men. The record is too long
to quote in full, but certain passages may be given. The opening gives
so lively a picture of the party, and of the rollicking spirits with
which they started, that it cannot be omitted. In connection with
the informality of tone, it must be remembered that the diary was
only a private record of a gay holiday. It is interspersed, quite
characteristically, by very neat diagrams and sketches, and details of
the geological observations, which were no doubt worked up afterwards.
_Wednesday, 29th July 1868._
Edinburgh to London--Peach, Skae, Horne, and Archie in company. Arrive
infernally hungry and dirty at St Catherine’s dock. Have to swear at
a cabman, etc. This of course was Thursday, 30th. Friday, 31st--Start
in the _Orion_ for Antwerp--ship none of the best, but passable. Of
course a number of English on board. None of them I know. Have a kind
of luncheon and satisfy hunger pangs. Brisk breeze gets up towards
the afternoon, and puts to flight notions of dinner in the respective
buzzums of Skae, Horne, and Archie. Peach and I wait so long that
our hunger vanishes. Ladies laid out in corpse-like fashion all over
the deck, and a good deal of basin work performed. Two very pretty
English girls on board--as pretty I think as I ever saw before.
Both hold up for a while, but after a time they give in and close
up their eyes like daisies. Skae off to bed--Horne having meanwhile
mysteriously disappeared. Archie follows suit. I smoke, and Peach in
despair hovers about the door of the feeding saloon in hopes of being
able to see something like preparations for tea. Tea at last! Only 5
out of nearly 150 passengers sit down--one of them a lady. Peach and
I make a furious onslaught to make up for loss of dinner. Horne, to
our surprise, enters, tastes a cup of tea and beats a hasty retreat.
The place is close and stifling, and the sounds issuing from the
surrounding berths make appeals which cannot be resisted. Peach and I
make for the deck, where the fresh air revives us, and I finish off my
meal with a pipe.
There follow, by one of the sudden transitions in which the diary
abounds, notes on the colour of the water, and on the jellyfish seen.
A night’s sleep seems to have restored the party, for they landed at
Antwerp the following morning apparently all in good spirits, and after
a stroll round the town took train for Cologne, passing Liège, “which
lies beautifully in a lovely wooded valley,” _en route_. After a short
visit to Cologne--“here I was pleased to find Heine’s good Christopher
in the Dom”--the party went on by boat to Königswinter. “Sail up the
Rhine not very interesting, but the evening is exquisite and the
flat country looks well.” At Königswinter they spent some days--very
hot ones--climbing the Siebengebirge and geologising, with lighter
intervals. One of the interludes may be mentioned:--“Peach swam across
the Rhine in twelve minutes (before breakfast).”
After a day or two at Königswinter the party went down the Rhine to
Bonn, to see Prof. Zirkel there and to visit the museum. Bonn is
somewhat briefly dismissed:--“This is a lost day. I hate Bonn ...
hooked it back to Königswinter--and loafed about.” At Bonn the party
met Sir Roderick Murchison, then Director-General of the Geological
Survey, profanely called “the Duke” in the diary, for his mannerisms
made a strong appeal to the sense of humour of the more lively members
of the party. The veteran geologist--or at least so the juniors
asserted--graduated his greetings in careful accordance with the
official position of each. But the old chief’s genuine interest in
geology was shown by his eager questions about the recent results of
the Survey work in the Southern Uplands.
Finally Königswinter was left, “with regret,” for the Laacher See, a
detailed visit to the Eifel country being one of the great objects
of the tour. James Geikie’s early work in the Ochils had aroused his
interest in volcanic phenomena, and his geological notes in regard to
the next section of the tour are singularly full.
The party took steamer to Brohl, and then drove to the lake, being,
as is carefully recorded, cheated both by the boatman who took them
off the steamer and by the driver. Perhaps the fact accounts for the
next entry:--“I have seen prettier places than the Laacher See.” The
party had an introduction, obtained presumably through Prof. Zirkel, to
one of the fathers at Laach Abbey, and he and a companion accompanied
them on a tour round the lake, in order to point out the objects of
geological interest. A trip to the Bausenberg was also made. Next day
the members of the party walked to Niedermendig to see the famous
quarries there. Here they tasted the beer stored in the caverns, and
characteristically--for James Geikie did not have to wait for Mr
Chesterton to sing the merits of beer--the diary devotes nearly equal
space to the geology and the beverage. “It was deliciously cold and I
like the flavour. I had heard much of the coldness of this beer, viz.,
that no one could drink more than a small glassful at a time. But I
found no difficulty in taking down a good pint, and if I had not had
the mine to get out of, I could easily have stowed away double the
quantum.”
Some other interesting excursions were made in the neighbourhood of
the Laacher See, in company with the friendly monks, and then finally
the party set off in a farm wagon for a thirty-mile drive to Daun, in
the heart of the Eifel country, over very rough roads. The vehicle was
cheap, but this seems to have been its only merit, and the driver, a
prosperous peasant with money in the bank, as he explained to them,
had the disadvantage of not knowing the way. The journey took over
twelve hours, and when the tired party reached the village it was to
find that it was market-day there, and rooms were difficult to obtain,
so that the weary scientists had to seek lodgings where they could,
some in an inn, where they were “nearly eaten up with fleas,” and
others in a private house. After a day here, another long drive was
taken to Bertrich, where the better hotels, an indirect result of the
local medicinal springs, revived the drooping spirits of the diarist.
Unfortunately the bill next morning proved that the presence of the
visitors had another effect also, and the tone of the diary again
becomes subdued, till, after a long drive, the Moselle was reached, and
its scenery had a restorative effect.
At Cochem the geologists engaged a boat and two men to row them forty
miles down the Moselle to Coblentz. The first twenty miles, it is
carefully explained, were delightful; but darkness came on long before
the destination was reached, and it was midnight before an unwilling
dockkeeper allowed the boat to enter Coblentz. But in spite of the
fatigue and tedium of the long journey, the diarist expresses himself
as highly delighted with the trip.
Coblentz did not make a favourable impression on the travellers, and
the diary contains some caustic remarks on the Prussian soldiers, with
whom the town was full, and on the Prussian officers whose manners at
table in the hotel were a trial to persons accustomed to place reliance
upon a fork rather than a knife as an implement for conveying food
into the mouth. The subject is one which recurs more than once, for
James Geikie, who was singularly susceptible to feminine charm, seemed
to resent strongly the general lack of it among the German ladies
met with, and could not reconcile himself to the sight of a Fräulein
disposing of peas by a method whose only advantage was its rapidity.
If the sound reflection that a lady who habitually uses a broad-bladed
knife for this purpose is rarely so clumsy as to slit her mouth
completely from ear to ear in the process occurred to him, it evidently
afforded no consolation, and he found it difficult to sit out a meal
in a German hotel if peas entered into the menu. He himself attempted
no missionary work, however, though he records meeting two “Yankees,”
one of whom “had induced one or two German ladies to use their forks
instead of their knives for pitching in the victuals. They were
surprised, they told him, that the fork could do the work so nicely!”
At Coblentz two of the party, Messrs Horne and Skae, turned back,
while the rest went on to Goarshausen, where they passed a delightful
couple of days. “It is one of the prettiest spots in all the Rhine
country.” The next stop was at Heidelberg, where the customary sights
were visited, and the scarred countenances of the students commented on
with true British disgust; the journey was then continued _viâ_ Basle,
Berne, Thun, and Interlaken to Grindelwald. Here the famous guide Peter
Michel was engaged, and the party spent “a most interesting day” on
the glaciers. “The ice phenomena were well seen, but best on the lower
glacier.” So successful was the excursion that it was resolved, though
all were inexperienced, to make the crossing of the Strahlegg to the
Grimsel. Bad weather made it necessary to stop two nights at the Bäregg
hut, and of these and the day’s imprisonment an amusing description
is given. On the second day the weather cleared and the chalet was
left at five, and, after a tiring day, the party reached the Grimsel
at six in the evening, some of the members being much fatigued. Some
interesting observations were made _en route_. From the Grimsel the
party made their way down the Rhone valley to Lake Geneva, and at this
point the diary ends abruptly. The excursion, it is clear, was one of
great interest, and coupled with the previous visit to Norway, must
have played an important part in helping James Geikie to visualise the
Europe of the Ice Age.
The next three years, 1869, 1870, and 1871, were spent for the most
part in hard and continuous work on the coalfields, though in all three
years the published papers, no less than the letters, show that all the
energy which could be spared from the daily routine was being given to
glacial work.
In the spring of 1869 James Geikie started work at Carluke, and an
entertaining letter to his mother has been preserved, dated from here
on 4th April. It is long and largely about family affairs, but a few
quotations may be made, for the tone throws light upon the character
both of mother and son. The letter begins abruptly as follows:--
This being a day of rest not only for the beasts that do the work of
men, but also for the men that do the work of beasts, it behoveth me
thy son to throw aside the cares of the world and the many humbugs
that do so easily beset me, and to refresh my soul and peradventure
thine also by inditing these few words, to the intent that thou, O my
maternal parent! may know of a surety that I thy son am well, and that
thy two daughters who sojourn with me here in the wilderness are even
as I am....
Write unto me, O my maternal parent! and tell me how it fareth with
thy trees which yield fruit of their kind, and with the flowers which
thou dost tend in the house that is heated with pipes and hot water
in the pipes. And say unto my paternal parent that he hath forgotten
me--that I am even as one of the dead--that I long to see the writing
of his hand.
Here many friends visit me not--but I am not grieved--and my
waistcoats grow tight about me....
Thy daughters salute thee and the paternal--so I salute ye all in
like manner. My blessing abide with ye--and in the bonds of love I
subscribe myself.--Yours affectionately.
Other family letters in the same year are written from Hamilton,
one, dated 19th July, containing the information in regard to his
translations that “I have so many now that I think if I go on for a
month or so longer I shall have enough to make a small volume.”
The allusion to fruit-trees, in the letter quoted above, it is
interesting to note, was especially to a pear-tree which grew in the
garden of the house in Duncan Street where the family lived at this
time. The house is one of two which a few years ago were converted by
the Edinburgh School Board into a special school, and in the course
of the alterations the jargonelle pear-tree, which figures in many of
the family letters, was cut down. It seems to have been a prolific
bearer in its prime, and in one of his letters James Geikie alludes to
receiving a basket of the fruit, and at the same time to the prolonged
silence of the members of the family, which he explains as the result
of the “pear-disease,” _i.e._, the absorption of his sisters in the
task of consuming the fruit. He himself sends some rhymes in return for
his share.
The year 1870 finds him still busy on the coalfield, his diary for that
year being full of notes of appointments with people connected with the
pits, while he seems to have been constantly moving from place to place
in Lanarkshire.
Two letters from Prof. Ramsay in July of this year have an historical
interest. The first suggests a joint tour on the Rhine to solve a
geological problem, and is followed almost at once by another, saying,
“Now I fear my Rhine journey is blown to the winds.... This most wicked
and accursed war will upset half the Continent of Europe, and it is by
no means impossible that we may be dragged into it”--upon which one
feels disposed to make the comment that if we had been it is possible
that infinite suffering might have been saved forty-four years later! A
letter from James Geikie to Mr Horne, written later in the same year,
says:--“My holidays, I think I told you, were all botched. I could not
get abroad, and I had nowhere particular to go at home.”
At this time he was stationed at Salsburgh by Holytown, where he made
several friends, notably Dr Grossart, with whom afterwards he kept up a
correspondence for many years.
In the letter to Mr Horne quoted above he says:--“I have been doing
a little at those German translations, and have now finished the
volume, and am on the outlook for a publisher who won’t cheat me. I
wish to have the thing published this winter”--a wish which was not,
however, fulfilled for many winters. In the same letter he adds:--“I
am still among coal ... but Xmas is coming, and then one will have an
opportunity of washing the dirt away. I like this place very well. The
house is clean, and the district is moory--just on the outskirts of the
great coalfield. I mean to work out as much as I can from here so as to
shorten my stay in Glasgow, of which (I) got tired. After all there is
nothing like the free fresh air of the country.”
The next year, 1871, saw the finishing up of the coalfield work,
and simultaneously the beginnings of a gathering together of the
accumulated mass of glacial material which was a year or two later to
take shape in _The Great Ice Age_. Letters in the early part of the
summer to Mr Horne contain detailed plans for a tour in the Hebrides
“for the purpose of ascertaining the direction of ice-striæ, and
quizzing the drifts.” It proved impossible for his friend to join him,
and the tour was made in company with Mr William Galloway, one of many
friends made in the west.
Mr Galloway has kindly supplied a few notes on the tour. The two sailed
from Glasgow to Stornoway by the Crinan Canal, and walked to the north
point of the island, carrying their belongings with them. Both had a
special purpose in view, James Geikie being engaged, of course, in
studying glacial action, while his friend had been commissioned to
investigate the possibility of establishing a meteorological station
at the lighthouse on the Butt of Lewis. On their way back to Barvas
they came across an old highland woman who made cups and saucers
of unbaked clay. James Geikie was much interested in her work, and
ordered a set. It was despatched to Lady (then Mrs) Ramsay, the wife
of Prof. Ramsay, then Senior Director of the Geological Survey (_cf._
Part II.), as a sample of prehistoric ware from the Outer Hebrides.
The joke was explained later, but not before, or so it is asserted,
some high archæological authorities in London had been taken in by the
“primitive” appearance of the work.
The travellers, presumably on the homeward journey, began a joint
composition in heroic verse describing their adventures; but this
masterpiece seems never to have been committed to paper, and perhaps
never progressed very far.
The tour was apparently short, for James Geikie writes from Bathgate,
under date 28th November:--“This last year has been a year of close
work and some anxiety, and not having had any holiday to speak of I
feel jaded and down in the mouth.”
In all his letters of this year he speaks of his laborious work among
the collieries, and his note-books are filled with the usual details
of appointments made and notes of information received from different
quarters. The following spring saw him in more congenial surroundings
in the Border counties, and this chapter may fitly end with the
completion of his coalfield work. It may be added, however, that
letters from Ramsay, received at the close of the year, and dealing
with the problems raised by James Geikie’s paper on “Changes of Climate
during the Glacial Epoch,” a paper of which Ramsay thought highly, show
clearly what the years of preparation had done for him, despite their
almost ceaseless toil.
It must not be supposed, however, that life was made up of nothing but
toil, alleviated by occasional holidays. For many years a considerable
amount of the Survey work was done in London, and parts of many winters
were spent there. In addition to the Survey men, James Geikie had
a considerable number of friends and acquaintances in London, his
father’s musical connections opening various musical and artistic
circles to him. Both in scientific and artistic circles his social
gifts were much appreciated, and he himself must have found the winter
glimpses into a wider social life than he could find either in the
country districts or in the smaller towns of Scotland a most welcome
change.