1902-3.] The Pal^ochemistry of the Ocean. 535 



THE PAL^OCHEMISTRY OF THE OCEAN IN RELATION 

 TO ANIMAL AND VEGETABLE PROTOPLASM. 



By a. B. Macallum, M.A., M.B., Ph.D. 



Read ijth January, igoj. 



CONTENTS. 



I. — Introduction 535 



II. — The Origin of the Physiological Relations of the Chemical 



Elements in Blood Plasma 539 



III. — The Origin of the Relation of the Chemical Elements within 



Protoplasm itself 



IV. — The Composition of the Primeval Ocean 



540 

 542 



V. — The Relation of the Salts in the Ocean to Protoplasm . . . 552 



VI. — Evidence from the Lakes and Rivers of the Present Period. . . 555 

 VII. — Tables giving the Proportion of the Elements in a number of 



Rivers and Lakes 5^8 



VIII. — Summary of Conclusions. . , 560 



I. — Introduction. 



The history of the composition of ocean water is a question of 

 very great interest to the geologist, the physiographer and the 

 biologist. To the geologist and physiographer its importance lies 

 chiefly in the fact that it is associated with the history, on the one hand, 

 of erosion and denudation of land surfaces of the globe, and, on the 

 other, of the formation of all the sedimentary strata. The ocean, ever 

 since the first condensation of water on the rockcrust of the earth, 

 has acted as a gigantic solvent, and the salts it now holds in solution 

 represent what it has retained after its action for millions of years as 

 a leaching and filtering agent. The sedimentary rocks are thus but a 

 vast precipitate from the ocean of what had been partly suspended and 

 partly dissolved matter in it during all the geological periods. The 

 history of the composition of the ocean is, on this view, the complement 

 of the history of all the terrigenous changes necessary to fill out all 

 the pages of the record of events that have transformed the surface of 

 the earth. 



