Actions of Volcanoes. 275 
had all the local circumstances attending each case observed 
over so large a tract of country been stated by this author, the 
present explanation would not have been required; nor would 
the point which it is my object to prove, have called for this 
discussion. 
That point is, that Italy in general is covered by one marine 
stratum, in which the organic remains lie in an alluvial bed, 
untransported and undisturbed ; and that above this there lies a 
terrestrial stratum which contains the remains of land animals 
analogous to those which are found in most other parts of 
Europe. 
It remains to explain this state of things, or to give a theory 
of the alluvial deposits of Italy. That theory, if just, ought to 
be applicable to all similar cases of marine alluvia found high 
above the level of the sea, should such be hereafter discovered 
in other places; and it will thus furnish us with a new key for 
the solution of a certain set of geological phenomena, for which 
no other branch of any of the general theories provides an 
adequate explanation. It is important to remark how accurately 
this partial theory ramifies from the general one, which accounts 
for the elevation of the strata by a subterranean force; and 
how valuable a test of any theory it is, to be thus provided with 
the means of explaining appearances that could not have been 
anticipated when it was formed. Had Lazzaro Moro taken a 
wider and more accurate view of the circumstances by which he 
was surrounded, the present explanation would not have been 
required. 
In investigating the causes of the present positions of solid 
rocks containing organic remains, we are only enabled to assign 
them in a general manner, and by analogy, because they have 
left no positive collateral evidence of their action. This may 
probably be in a great measure attributed to the great distance 
of these events in point of time, and to the changes which the 
exposed surface of the earth has since undergone. In the pre- 
sent case, however, we see the germs of these very submarine 
strata exposed before their consolidation, and probably present- 
ing the appearances which they do, merely because they are of 
T2 
