6 Review of (he first Volume ofM. J. A. De Luc's 



of Leige and other continental collieries, above the chalk, 

 and not to any part of the British series of strata, of which 

 thc chalks seem nearly the uppermost. 



The important question, as to whether the chalk under- 

 pays the south-eastern shore of the Baltic, might, I think, 

 receive an answer, by a minute examination of the strata 

 of the higher parts of the islands of Hiddensee and Um- 

 mantz on the west of Rugen and of Greifswaldiska Oe on 

 the south-east, which are said (p. 249), on the autho- 

 rity of M. Von Willich, to consist of calcareous strata, 

 which contain marine bodies, and are intermixed with* 

 strata of porcelain earth; since these would, seemingly, 

 answer to the very characteristic limestones and potter's- 

 clays of the basin of Paris, page 44, he, of your 35th 

 volume. 



If Mr. Farey be right, in asserting (p. 1 3Q of the above 

 volume), that three miles, (or 5280 yards) in thickness of 

 strata are known in England, below the chalk strata, of 

 which I have been speaking, without the intervention of 

 granites of any kind, or of any of what M. De Luc calls pri- 

 mordial stones, in such strata (as I have understood to be 

 the case), does it seem probable, that the numerous ca- 

 vernous blasts and torrents, to which M. De Luc resorts, 

 for projecting his primordial blocks towards the sky, whence 

 they fell to the earth's surface, could have failed to have pro- 

 jected along with them, numerous and large specimens of 

 the hard British limestones, sandstones, basalts, and others ?• 

 but of which we read nothing in the volume of geological 

 travels before us, except of a few flints. 



From numerous passages in this volume, and in the 

 Geology of M. De Luc lately published, it is plain, that at 

 the time of writing them, this veteran geologist was un- 

 acquainted with: the suggestions of Mr. Farey, in various 

 parts of your late volumes, as to the reversed action of 

 gravity, and the tidal currents, occasioned by a former and 

 large satellite of this planet, whereby the extensive and 

 vast abruptions, as Dr. William Richardson calls them* 

 (or the denudations as Mr. F. calls them), which the- 

 earth's surface in so many places has sustained, are sup- 

 posed to have been occasioned, as weil as the transportation 

 of its alluvia, and the excavation of its numerous valleys 

 also, if I mistake not the drift of Mr. Farey ; s arguments- 

 with Mr. Carr, in your 33d and 34th volumes. 



X very much wish, sir, that I could call the attention of 



* See page 1 14 and page 25% of our 33d volume. — Editor. 



M.De 



