BY FREDERICK DAN VERS POWER, F.G.S. 39 



In the first place I do not consider that any one theory will 

 account for all our mountain ranges. There are several 

 labourers at work ; but my contention is that the chief of 

 these is the pressure of the ocean waters. The other agents 

 are not ignored; due weight has been given to the contraction 

 of the earth, rotation of our world, denudation, sedimenta- 

 tion, etc. Now, I do not for one moment suppose that as 

 our earth cooled it possessed a smooth surface. Our know- 

 ledge of molten slags, both natural and artificial, tells us that 

 there are several cooling centres, and these would at once set 

 up currents, which, assisted by the evolution of 

 gases, together with the lunar and solar attractions 

 and the rotation of the earth, would form inequalities 

 on the surface of the globe which served as the neuclei of 

 our continents and oceans ; the world would not then be 

 universally covered with water, as I gather Mr. Stephens 

 premises, for elementary elevations and depressions would be 

 formed long before the earth was cool enough to allow water 

 to condense on its surface. Our continental plateau once 

 formed, and water made to occupy the basins, the pressure of 

 that water immediately begins to act and increases as its 

 quantity was augmented. At first, no doubt, the cooling of 

 the crust would have a greater effect in raising land ttan the 

 pressure of water. Yolcanic action would also be a main 

 feature, and the tendency of our rotating earth to throw 

 bodies towards the east, which is made so obvious by our 

 trains and steamboats at the present day, would have a 

 greater effect on the cooling mass than on our more solid 

 crust; but under the conditions then existing disintegration 

 would be more rapid than at a later period, for the rocks 

 would not be protected by vegetation to the extent that they 

 were later on besides, violent storms, humid atmosphere, 

 and the large quantity of carbonic acid in the air would soon 

 work havoc among the hills, forming much sediment which 

 would act on the comparatively thin crust in a somewhat 

 similar manner to which the immense weight of the ocean 

 does now. 



Dr. W. B. Carpenter, C.B., F.E.S., in a paper read before 

 the Eoyal Institution of Great Britain on 23rd January, 

 1880, entitled " Land and Sea considered in relation to 

 Geological Time," says that the total volume of ocean water 

 to that of land is as 36 to 1 ; that most land is in the 

 northern hemisphere and most water in the southern ; that 

 the bed of the ocean is comparatively flat, not basin shaped ; 

 it descends suddenly from a comparatively shallow bottom to 

 a very deep one ; that we must distinguish between the real 

 and ostensible borders of the ocean basin, an elevation of 100 

 fathoms would generally show the real continental platforms, 

 and would join many islands to the mainland, while if the 



