134 Geological Remarks on the 



and other strata, which our authors have tlescribed in th6 

 basin of Paris, are the detached endings of similar and 

 connected strata, that lay to the south and west of Paris, 

 and may either be concealed by vast alluvial tracts (p. 40), or 

 i7)ay occupy countries where nice observations have not yet 

 been made ; or, whether such hummocks be occasioned by 

 irregular or compound denudation*, such as I have noticed 

 several instances of in Derbyshire, and as Mr. Smith has 

 observed about Bath, and Dr. William Richardson in the 

 north of Ireland f, it is of course difficult to determine, 

 Rm\ its discussion must be deferred, until a numerous train 

 of facts are better understood. 



Our authors, it will be seen, recur to a local inundation 

 or lake oi fresh- water % U)X explaining the deposition of 

 the matter composing their gypsous hillocks: to me, how- 

 ever, much better evidence seems wanting, of the probable 

 existence of such a lake or local pool of fresh-water than 

 they offer, and particularly of the several successive /re5/^- 

 and salt-water inundations which they mention, at pages 

 54 and 55. Has it, or can it be proved, that fish nearly or 

 exactly resembling in the genera, or even the species, those 

 that are noiP peculiar to cnhtrjresh- or salt- wafer, may not 

 have had other powers and habits in the old world P and 

 that all the animals and even birds hitherto known of the 

 primitive creation, and its vegetables also, may not have 

 been ado})ted by their great Author, to a sub-aqueous ex» 

 isience ? And again, Who has or perhaps can, determine, 

 whether the fluid surrf>undii'»g the earth, during its formation 

 which I have caHcd aqueous above, was either fresh or 

 salt, in the sense that we now use those terms? Does it not 

 seem more probable, that this fluid varied essentially from 

 time to time in its nature and composition, and whicli per- 

 haps occasioned the extinction of the beings adapted to its 

 prior state, as well as the alternations of the strata, espc- 

 pecially, if the matters of the strata were, ever in chemical 

 solution in it, as our authors seem to imply (p. 51), in 



* Perhaps the ba:^in of T:irh may He within the southern vcr^e of the 

 great 8i>uth-!.'a'tcrn denudation of En^^hind, that readies far into Hampshire, 

 and has apparently s:ilpt olF;.!! the chalk strata, from near Alton to Bologne 

 on the Frjnih coast. 



I See our 33ril volume — Eoit. 



^ U -secruK inrprobal^le that gynsum sh.ould be a produce of fresh-water, 

 when we refiect, that the red soils or gypsous marles of Knpland produce 

 boih sea s^'.t and g-ypsinn in vast ahu?!dHncc, and tiiat salt rocks and springs 

 are the common accompanin^.cnts r,t' g^'psuni in various oilier parts of the 

 work- 1 we are not told, whether there are any brackifch or salt springs with- 

 in the baaia of i'aris. 



speaking 



