36 rROCEEDINGS. 



exist during the past geological epochs— it does not 

 follow that the one always stood and the other flowed 

 where they now do. In the case of the former we know that 

 this was not the case. The recent periods at which the 

 Alps, the Andes, and the Himalayas were upraised is now 

 well known. It is not impossible that similar mountain 

 ranges may have sunk into and now repose in the undu- 

 lating depths of the Pacific Ocean. 



Prof Boyd Dawkins held that the doctrine of the 

 permanence of oceanic areas is only true in a very restricted 

 sense, and as applying to such deep areas as those over 

 4,000 fathoms north of the Island of St. Thomas in the 

 North Atlantic, and off the coast of Japan in the North 

 Pacific. As the surface of the cooling globe followed the 

 contracting nucleus it must have been thrown into folds, in 

 which the re-entering folds would be the primeval oceans,, 

 and the salient folds the land. And this folding of the 

 surface would only be intensified along the old lines by a 

 still further shrinkage of the nucleus. From these a priori 

 considerations he held that the main centres of the land 

 and the sea had been where they are now through all geo- 

 logical time. The evidence of a considerable change in the 

 relations of land to sea is proved both by the marine 

 soundings and the history of the stratified rocks. The 

 soundings made by the "Dacia," in 1883, off the mouth of 

 the Congo, reveal the existence of a vast cailon plunging 

 from the 100 fathom line into depths greater than the i,ooa 

 fathom line {see Joiirn. Soc. Telegr. Engineers XVI., p. 479). 

 It is a submerged canon of the same order as that of the 

 Colorado river, and has been cut by the river Congo at a 

 time when the West Coast of Africa in that district stood 

 more than 6,000 feet above its present level. This is merely 

 one out of a vast number of cases which might be cited in 

 proof that the submarine contours, to a depth of 1,000 

 fathoms, arc due to the operation of sub-aerial agencies, by 



