VESTIGES OF THE MOSAIC DELUGE.
In chapters xlvi. and l. of this book, I have referred to certain
conversations I had with Sir Wm. Logan, on the existence of ocean
beaches, extending from Newfoundland to the North-West Territory, at an
altitude of from twelve to fifteen hundred feet above the present sea
level. Also of a secondary series of beaches, seven hundred feet above
Lake Ontario, at Oak Ridges, eighteen miles north of Toronto; and a
third series, one hundred and eighty to two hundred feet above the Lake,
which I believe also occur at many points on the opposite lake-shore. In
chapter xlvi. I mentioned the fact of my finding evidences of human
remains at the very base of one of these lower beaches, at Carlton, on
the Weston and Davenport Roads, near Toronto.
When I wrote those chapters, and until this present month of January,
1884, I was doubtful whether I should not be regarded as fanciful or
unreliable. I have now, however, just seen in _Good Words_ for this
month, an article headed "Geology and the Deluge," from the pen of the
Duke of Argyle, which appears to me conclusive on the points to which I
allude, namely, first, that there was spread over the whole northern
portion of this continent, a sea fifteen hundred feet above the land;
secondly, that the depth of water was reduced to a thousand feet, and
remained so during the formation of our Oak Ridges; and lastly, that a
further subsidence of eight hundred feet took place, reducing the sea to
the height of the Carlton beach; and that the latest of these
subsidences must have occurred after our earth had been long peopled,
and within historic times--probably at the date of the deluge recorded
by Moses.
His Grace says:--
"I think I could take any one, however unaccustomed he might be
to geological observation or to geological reasoning, to a place
within a few miles of Inverary, and point out a number of facts
which would convince him that the whole of our mountains, the
whole of Scotland, had been lying deeper in the sea than it does
now to a depth of at least 2,000 feet. . . . I believe that the
submergence of the land towards the close of what is called the
Glacial Period, was to a considerable extent a sudden
submergence, probably more sudden to the south of the country
than it was here, and that the Deluge was closely connected with
that submergence. . . . The enormous stretch of country which
lies between Russia and Behring's Straits is very little known,
and almost uninhabited. It is frozen to within a very few feet
of the surface all the year round. In that frozen mud the
Mammoth has been preserved untouched. There have been numerous
carcases found with the flesh, the skin, the hair and the eyes
complete. . . . Has this great catastrophe of the submergence
of the land to the depth of at least two or three thousand feet,
taken place since the birth of Man? In answer to this question I
must refer to the fact now clearly ascertained, that Man
co-existed with the Mammoth, and that stone implements are found
in numbers in the very gravels and brick earths which contain
the bones of those great mammalia."
I should be glad to quote more, but this is enough to account for the
circumstances I have myself noted, and to explain also, I think, the
vast deposit of mud which forms the prairies of the Western States, and
of the Canadian North-West; which has its counterpart in the European
prairie countries of Moldavia and Wallachia. But the Duke appears to me
to overlook the circumstance, that the vast accumulation of animal
remains in Siberia, mostly of southern varieties, to which he refers,
must have been swept there, not by an upheaval, but by a depression in
the northern hemisphere, and a corresponding rise in the southern,
whence all these mammoths, lions and tigers, are supposed to have been
swept. To account for their present elevated position, a second
convulsion restoring the depressed parts to their original altitude,
must apparently have occurred--at least that is my unscientific
conclusion. It would seem that we ought to look for similar
accumulations of animal matter in our own Hudson's Bay territory, where,
also, it is stated, the ground remains frozen throughout summer to
within three feet of the surface, as in Siberia.