276 SEE-TEMPERATURE, SECULAR COOLING [April 20, 



covered by history. No doubt the general movement is one of 

 elevation, which corresponds to the sinking of the sea bottom im- 

 plied in the seismic sea waves observed to come ashore after the 

 terrible earthquakes by which the region is afflicted. 



As the mountains are of recent formation, and extend entirely 

 across Asia Minor, we may not hesitate in the belief that the 

 whole of that region has been elevated within recent geological 

 time. The sinking of the sea bottom prevailing in that part of the 

 Mediterranean has often carried down the shores with it ; but in a 

 number of cases elevation has also taken place. Strabo, among the 

 ancients, gives evidence bearing on this question ; and Professor 

 Suess, among the moderns, cites important changes which have 

 taken place since the age of the Greeks. In '' The Face of the 

 Earth" (Vol. II., pp. 448-453), Suess mentions the subsidence of 

 Smyrna and of the famous mausoleum in the Bay of Makri, as well 

 as changes of level at Mitylene, Mermiridje and other places. It 

 would be moderate to say that his explanations seem highly improb- 

 able, and it is really impossible that all of them can be correct. 

 They rest on no general principle, but rather on improvised hy- 

 potheses. 



The mausoleum at Makri can hardly have slid with the alluvial 

 soil into the bay, as he maintains; for, judging by the photograph 

 of the mauseleum which he gives, the alluvial base is not less than 

 a mile wide, and thus would not slip, unless the substratum of rock 

 were greatly inclined, which does not seem to be the case. The 

 adjacent 'sea appears to be shallow, and all these circumstances are 

 against the theory. Finally it is unlikely that the alluvium could 

 be sufficiently settled by an earthquake to bring the mausoleum down 

 to the level of the water, so that the tides would cover the lower part 

 of it. It must have stood originally not less than 20 feet above 

 the sea level, and 60 feet is a much more probable elevation. It is 

 thus practically certain that the shore was carried down in the 

 subsidence of the sea bottom, as happened when Helike sank be- 

 neath the waves in B. C. 373. In the case of the mausoleum the 

 submergence may have been either sudden, or gradual. Darwin 

 and Fitzroy observed the Chilean coast to subside slowly after it had 

 been pushed up by the earthquake of 1835, and these slow move- 



