648 meunier: theory of volcanoes 



dappled with trachytes and rhyolites; Bohemia rests on vast 

 and highly varied outflows ; in the Hohgau, basalts are associated 

 with phonolites; the Siebengebirge around Bonn, the Drachen- 

 fels, Mount Meissner in Hesse, the so-called Kaiserstuhl region 

 in the Breisgau, the vicinity of Mainz and of Cassel, the Eifel, 

 and above all the vicinity of the Laacher See, are made up of 

 outflows, and their analogues occur throughout the central 

 plateau of France, in Puy-de-D6me, Mont-Dore, Cantal, Velay 

 and Vivarais, and also in Catalonia, near Olot and Castel-Follit. 

 The Carpathians, the Caucasus, the region of the Great Ararat, 

 and Allagoz belong to the list, which we may here bring to a 

 close, long before it is complete. 



If we remember that the other parts of the world are not less 

 rich in volcanic manifestations than Europe, and if we recall 

 that the ocean basins also are dotted with them — the Indian 

 Ocean as well as the Pacific and Altantic showing everywhere 

 eruptive centers, most of them as yet imperfectly known; if, 

 finally, we remember that in the absence of rain and wind the 

 pulverulent ejections of the volcanoes would cover the earth's 

 surface around every fiery vent in such a way as to mask all the 

 anterior formations under this volcanic snow, we shall arrive 

 at the conclusion that the earth would exhibit all the charac- 

 teristics shown so clearly and sharply on the disk of the moon. 

 So far as I am aware, this is the first time, since observers have 

 been busy with the lunar problem, that its explanation crops 

 out of itself as a logical consequence of a hypothesis elaborated 

 independently of any astronomic considerations. 



In conclusion I may be allowed to dwell on the last remark, 

 which suggests a reflection in the line of comparative geology: 

 That science has grown up on the common frontier of geology 

 (or science of the earth) and physical astronomy (or science of 

 the heavens), exactly as comparative anatomy has grown up on 

 the common frontier of human anatomy (or science of the human 

 body) and animal anatomy (or science of the bodies of animals). 

 The resemblance extends even to the increase of knowledge and 

 to the philosophic generalizations by which both of the com- 

 pared sciences benefit. The great general laws of animal organ- 



