384 SEE— THE NEW THEORY OF EARTHQUAKES | November 15, 



to 12 feet in this period. In the paper on the temperature of the 

 earth, p. 286, we have shown that the shrinkage due to cooHng in 

 10 million years, according to Daniell, would not exceed 612 feet; 

 and, taking this effect to be uniform, the shrinkage in 2,000 years 

 would be only 0.12 of a foot, or exactly 0.0 1 part of the calculated 

 elevation due to earthquakes. Now in the above calculation of the 

 expansion due to earthquakes, we may have taken the disturbed 

 area too large; but one uplift in four great disturbances does not 

 seem to be an over estimation of the effects of elevation. The 

 sinking of the sea bottom, however, goes on, and less frequently 

 the land along the shore is carried down also; and possibly the 

 elevation is relatively less than we have computed. As this calcu- 

 lated expansion is 100 times the shrinkage, we might reduce the 

 size of the uplifted areas to 100 miles square, and still the ex- 

 pansion would exceed the contraction by 25 times. We could 

 again reduce the areas to 50 miles square and make the uplift over 

 6 times the contraction. If, however, the uplifts be restricted to the 

 areas covered by the land, the effect would be quadrupled. To 

 make the expansion just equal to the contraction we should have 

 to reduce the amount of the average vertical uplifts from 2 feet to 

 I inch, or make the 2- foot uplifts 24 times less frequent, so that 

 only one would occur in 96 great earthquakes. 



This seems to be excessively small, and I think it practically 

 certain that the expansion of the globe is from 10 to 100 times 

 more rapid than the contraction, in the evaluation of which we have 

 used Daniell's maximum estimate. 



When we contemplate the mountains and plateaus, we see that 

 an expansion of our globe is indicated by its general aspects. For 

 it is in this manner that the mighty mountains have been upraised, 

 and the vast plateaus uplifted, without greatly depressing large 

 areas of the sea bottom. As the earth is almost totally devoid of 

 shrinkage due to secular cooling, the maximum estimate being 

 1.44 inches in 2,000 years, this most probably indicates a secular 

 expansion of our planet. In any given age the expansion is not 

 equally effective all over the terrestrial spheroid, but the present 

 distance of many mountains and plateaus from the sea shows that 



