The Last Glaciation: with Special Reference to the Ice Retreat in North-eastern North America

Abstract

THE past decade has seen a great revival of interest in the whole subject of climatic changes. There have been many books presenting as many theories, so diverse as to be mutually destructive. At the same time, a great amount of new knowledge has been gained both by exploration in distant corners of the earth and by the application of exact methods of investigation to the classic centres in Europe and North America. It was evidently time to pause for an impartial consideration of the fundamental facts of the problem, and, so far as the Quaternary glaciation is concerned, we can have no better guidance than that of Dr. Ernst Antevs, with his close knowledge of the work of De Geer in Sweden and his subsequent experience in the other great centre of glaciation in North America. These fundamental problems, which must be definitely solved before we can profitably indulge in more elaborate speculations, are twofold. First, was the Quaternary Ice Age synchronous in different parts of the world? Secondly, what were the peculiar climatic conditions which caused the great accumulation of snow and ice? Both of them are closely involved with the interpretation of the peculiar banded fluvio-glacial clays known as varves.

The Last Glaciation: with Special Reference to the Ice Retreat in North-eastern North America.

By Ernst Antevs. (American Geographical Society Research Series, No. 17.) (Shaler Memorial Series.) Pp. x + 292 + 9 plates. (New York: American Geographical Society, 1928.) 3.50 dollars.