Evidences of Ancient Glaciers in Central France

Abstract

MY attention has been recently called to a communication on the above subject which appeared in NATURE, vol. xiii. p. 31, from Dr. Hooker. Not having myself observed any traces of glacial action in the Mont Dore, and finding that M. l'Abbé Lecoq, whose examination of every portion of the district was most painstaking and exhaustive, has declared his conviction that no such traces exist, may I be permitted to remark that the evidence produced by Dr. Hooker does not appear very conclusive on the question? It consists of the occurrence of some large fragments of trachyte in the floor of the valley in which the Dordogne takes its rise, “the head of which occupies a noble amphitheatre immediately under the highest summit of Mont Dore,” which “seen from a height above, were presumably huts, haystacks, or glacially transported blocks.” The next day the doctor descended into the valley for a fuller examination of these blocks, and found himself “amongst a group of magnificent boulders that had evidently been deposited (?) by an ancient glacier which had flowed from the rocky amphitheatre at the head of the valley;” “others were seen further down the valley, its stream meandering among the blocks.”