3»]ost is irrecl^jimably (;on« , as the whole gradually sinks , the water gains 

 »foot by foot on the shore , till the l.isl and lii[5hest peak is iinally siib- 

 » luerged." 



This tlicoi'v iuvolves the (most probably true) assumption, 

 thafc tlie iuterior iiiass of the globe is in a state of flui- 

 dity and muy also be for the nonce adraitted as accounting 

 for the origin of lagoon reefs, but it is utterly incapable of 

 affording a reasonable answer to the question which has to be 

 put upon it. Hovv is it that the lagoon islands have remaincd 

 above tlie level of the ocean, and the bottoms of lagoons re- 

 mained stationary and consequently becoming filled up with 

 the growth and debris of coral, during all the time that thcir 

 basements have been sinking? Mr. Dakwin hiraself admits that 

 the coral builders can build no higlier, than the level of low 

 water, //spring tides" he says, but Ave might allow him that 

 of the neaps, without enabling him to answer the question as 

 for dust and sand and fragments; these must have had a res- 

 ting place, that is a reef elevated beyond the limit of the co- 

 ral builders, hef ore being accumulated to alibrd materials for 

 het sea and wind to carry on to the surface, inside of the 

 reef, and afLer the elevation of those surfaces became such, 

 that the sea could no longer surge over that surface, it could 

 have received no farther accession to its elevation from that 

 agent, and after it became covered with vegetation, dense and 

 lofty enough to arrest the force of the wind , neither could that 

 agent any longer add to the elevation, by bringing these ma- 

 terials on to it, except, on the mere margins of the isles, or 

 islets. Hence, the theory must be pronounced as being the 

 reverse of //satisfactory."" Moreover a moderable attentive in- 

 vestigation of the ' Cocos islets aflbrds ample reasons for bc- 

 lieving, that they have stood, up to the present time, above 

 the level of the ocean, during hundreds, if not thousands of 

 ycars, without liaving meauwhile had so mucli as one inch of 

 these earthy materials laid on to the main areas of their sur- 

 foces, and farther, in the coursc of this paper, we 'shall observe 

 good rcasons for concluding, that neither has their generui ba- 

 ï^ement sunk at all, diiring that long lapse of time. 



