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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



changes. It was soon recognized that 

 transformations, such as are now tak- 

 ing place, with indefinite time, might do 

 all that has been hitherto ascribed to 

 catastrophes. A careful study of the 

 varieties and rates of contemporaneous 

 change seemed to establish the conclu- 

 sion that such action is sufficient to ac- 

 count for all geological results. Those 

 sudden and tremendous demonstrations 

 of which we have no experience were 

 discredited ; catastrophes went out of 

 fashion, and uniformitarianism became 

 the dominant idea in geology. 



Mr. King holds that this doctrine 

 has been carried too far. Prof. Thomp- 

 son and his school have tried to corner 

 the geologists on the question of time, 

 maintaining on physical grounds that 

 they must check their periods and du- 

 ration, which would necessitate the 

 quickening of the activities, and thus 

 induce a return-movement toward ca- 

 tastrophism. Mr. King does not argue 

 the case from this point, but puts it on 

 the ground of direct geological evidence 

 that rates of action and change, of 

 which the world at present knows 

 nothing, liave been in play at former 

 times on the American Continent. The 

 following passages are illustrative of 

 his views : 



" I bave thus hastily mentioned a few of 

 the most imijortant geological crust-changes 

 in America whose rates are demonstrably 

 catastrophic. Besides surface-changes in- 

 volving subsidence, upheaval, faulting, and 

 corrugation, all of which may be executed 

 on a scale or at a rate productive of destruc- 

 tion of life, catastrophes may be brought 

 about by sudden, great changes of climate, 

 or by intense Volcanic energy. In the latter 

 field there are obviously no catastrophes of 

 the first order. Geological maps of the globe 

 liave progressed far enough to demonstrate 

 tliat considerable areas are, and always have 

 been, free from actual ejection of volcanic 

 materials. On the contrary, numerous great 

 regions, notably the western third of our 

 own continent, and the shores of the Pacific, 

 were once literally deluged with volcanic 

 fires. An examination of the ejected rock 

 shows that modern eruptions, by which the 

 volcanic cones of the present period are 



slowly built up from slight overflows piling 

 one upon another, is not the method of the 

 great Miocene and Pliocene volcanic periods. 

 There were then outbursts hundreds of miles 

 in extent, in which the crust yawned, and 

 enormous volumes of lava rolled out, over- 

 whelming neighboring lands. Volcanoes 

 proper are only isolated chimneys, imposing 

 indeed, but insignificant when compared 

 with the gulfs of molten matter which were 

 thrown up in the great massive eruptions. 

 Between the past and present volcanic phe- 

 nomena there is not only a difference of de- 

 gree, but of kind. It is easy to read the 

 mild exhibition of existing volcanoes as a 

 uniformitarian operation, namely, the growth 

 of cones by slight accretions ; but such rea- 

 soning is positively forbidden in the past. 



" If poor, puny little Vesuvius could im- 

 mortalize itself by burying the towns at its 

 feet, if the feeble energy of a Lisbon earth- 

 quake could record itself on the gravestones 

 of thousands of men, then the volcanic pe- 

 riod in Western America was truly catas- 

 trophic. 



" Modern vulcanism is but the faint, 

 flickering survival of what was once a world- 

 wide and immense exhibition of telluric en- 

 ergy one whose distortions and disloca- 

 tions of the crust, whose deluges of molten 

 stone, emissions of mineral dust, he.ited 

 waters, and noxious gases, could not have 

 failed to exert destructive eff'ect on tlie life 

 of considerable portions of the globe. It 

 cannot be explained away upon any theory 

 of slow, gradual action. The simple field 

 facts are ample proof of the intensity and 

 suddenness of tertiary vulcanism. 



" Of climatic catastrophes we have the 

 record of at least one. When the theory of 

 a glacial period came to be generally accept- 

 ed, and the destructive effects of tlie inva- 

 sion of even middle latitudes by polar ice 

 were realized, especially when the devastat- 

 ing eff'ects of the floods which were charac- 

 teristic of the recession of the ice came to 

 be studied, uniformitarianism, pure and sim- 

 ple, received a fatal blow. I am aware that 

 British students believe themselves justified 

 in taking uniformitarian views of the bowl- 

 der till, but they have yet to encounter phe- 

 nomena of the scale of our quaternary exhi- 

 bitions. 



" A most interesting comparison of the 

 character and rate of stream erosion may be 

 obtained by studying, in the Western Cor- 

 dilleras, the river-work of three distinct pe- 

 riods. The geologist tliere finds preserved, 

 and wonderfully well exposed : 1. Pliocene 

 Tertiary river-valleys, with their bowlders, 



