The glacial phenomena of this region present a striking
resemblance in their general relations to those of the Alps and the
Jura. The Grampian range on the northern side of Strathmore valley
occupies the same position in reference to that of the Sidlaw Hills
opposite, as does the range of the Alps to that of the Jura, while the
intervening valley may be compared to the plain of Switzerland. As from
the Bernese Oberland and from the valleys of the Reuss and Limmath
gigantic glaciers came down and stretched across the plain of
Switzerland to the Jura, scattering their erratic boulders over its
summit and upon its slopes at the time of their greater extension, and,
as they withdrew into the higher Alpine valleys, leaving them along
their retreating track at the foot of the Jura and over the whole plain,
so did the glaciers from Glen Prossen and parallel valleys on the
Grampian Mountains extend across the valley of Strathmore, dropping
their boulders not only on the slopes and along the base of the Sidlaw
Hills, but scattering them in their retreat throughout the valley, until
they were themselves reduced to isolated glaciers in the higher valleys.
At the same time other glaciers came down from the heights of
Schihallion on the west, and, descending through the valley of the Tay,
joined the great masses of ice in the valley of Strathmore, thus
combining with the eastern ice-field, just as the glacier from Mont
Blanc and the valley of the Rhone formerly combined in the western part
of Switzerland with those of the Bernese Oberland.
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