and Sweden became dry land; a considerable tract was
added to their northern extremity on the Arctic shore;
while a broad band of Silurian deposits, lying now
between Finland and Russia, enlarged that region.
The Silurian epoch has been referred by Elie de Beaumont
to the system of upheaval called by him the system
of Westmoreland and Hundsrueck,—again merely
in reference to the spots at which these upheavals
were first studied, the centres, as it were, from which
the investigations spread. But in their geological
significance they indicate all the oscillations and
disturbances of the soil throughout the region over
which the Silurian deposits have been traced in Europe.
The Devonian epoch added greatly to the outlines of
the Belgian island. To it belongs the region
of the Ardennes, lying between France and Belgium,
the Eifelgebirge, and a new disturbance of the Vosges,
by which that region was also extended. The island
of Bretagne was greatly increased by the Devonian
deposits, and Bohemia also gained in dimensions, while
the central plateau of France remained much the same
as before. The changes of the Devonian epoch
are traced by Elie de Beaumont to a system of upheavals
called the Ballons of the Vosges and of Normandy,—so
called from the rounded, balloon-like domes characteristic
of the mountains of that time. To the Carboniferous
epoch belong the mountain-systems of Forey, (to the
west of Lyons,) of the North of England, and of the
Netherlands. These three systems of upheaval
have also been traced by Elie de Beaumont; and in
the depressions formed between their elevations we
find the coal-basins of Central France, of England,
and of Germany. During all these epochs, in Europe
as in America, every such dislocation of the surface
was attended by a change in the animal creation.
If we take now a general view of the aspect of Europe
at the close of the Carboniferous epoch, we shall
see that the large island of Scandinavia is completed,
while the islands of Bohemia and Belgium have approached
each other by their gradual increase till they are
divided only by a comparatively narrow channel.
The island of Belgium, that of Bretagne, and that
of the central plateau of France, form together a triangle,
of which the plateau is the lowest point, while Belgium
and Bretagne form the other two corners. Between
the plateau and Belgium flows a channel, which we may
call the Burgundian channel, since it covers old Burgundy;
between the plateau and Bretagne is another channel,
which from its position we may call the Bordeaux channel.
The space inclosed between these three masses of land
is filled by open sea. To trace the gradual closing
of these channels and the filling up of the ocean
by constantly increasing accumulations, as well as
by upheavals, will be the object of the next article.
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THE MUSICIAN.