24 To the River Plate and Back 



and then again the fires of the sky lit up the sea and the 

 land. It was an amazing and a charming sight, to see 

 the world, bathed as in sunshine, rush into view out 

 of the darkness and then disappear. It was as if a 

 series of magnificent views were being projected upon a 

 dark screen by the hand of a celestial worker of wonders. 



The writer found his favorite perch at the prow of the 

 ship. There, either standing or sitting, he passed 

 many hours watching the waves and scanning the skies. 

 He was not without pleasant company. Many of his 

 shipmates discovered the same point of vantage, and 

 we discussed together many things which were suggested. 



The ocean is the gift of the nebula out of which the 

 earth was formed. There was a time when it did not 

 exist, except as an immense mass of heated vapor, 

 which the hot ball of matter, about which it clung, re- 

 fused to allow to rest upon its surface. But the earth 

 slowly grew cold; the raindrops which fell upon it 

 ceased to hiss and sizzle on its red-hot rocks. They 

 drenched the mountain tops; and after a while formed 

 brooks and rivers, seeking lower levels in obedience to 

 the law of gravity. Ponds, lakes, seas, and oceans 

 were accumulated in the hollows. It was a long pro- 

 cess. Millions of years passed before it was consum- 

 mated. As the water fell, it leached their salts from 

 the slowly disintegrating rocks, and carried them into 

 the seas. The ocean is a great dripping-pan, the 

 ultimate receptacle of the waste of the land. The ocean 

 is a grave ; at its bottom rest the remains of unnumbered 

 and innumerable things which once lived in its waters. 

 Much of the land to-day is sea-bottom from which the 

 water has been withdrawn. The marbles, the lime- 

 stones, and the chalks consist of the consolidated re- 

 mains of the dead which once tenanted the seas. 



