278 Dr. Mae Culloch on the 
marine remains demonstrates that of its superficial one. For 
want of more accurate information, we may here take these as 
Signor Brocchi has given them, for the extreme limits both 
ways; and thus we can estimate what Italy was before the 
change, and how much of it has been the consequence ofa vol- 
canic elevation more recent than those extensive changes of the 
same nature which caused and determined the present general 
distribution of the land. 
The extreme height of the Apennines is said to be about 
9000 feet, and, on the present supposition, the whole of that 
chain, from this height down to that of 1200, must be supposed 
to have formed a ridge rising above the sea. I need not extend 
these conjectures to the side of the Alps, as the reader can 
easily pursue these speculations at his leisure. It is probable, 
that at the period at which modern Italy was produced, the 
whole of the central chain experienced a fresh elevation to the 
altitude of at least 1200 feet, and over a superficial space which 
reaches from Otranto at one end of the country to Piedmont, 
and to the foot of the Alps generally, on the other side ; since 
the neighbourhood of Vicenza and Verona presents the same 
appearances. 
Others may imagine, if they please, that only those parts 
were thus elevated which now possess the submarine alluvium ; 
yet this would make no difference in the general views ; since 
that force which was sufficient to move so large a part of Italy 
mightas easily have moved the whole. This isa circumstance that 
might however be put to the proof, by examining the stratifica- 
tion of the Apennines in a proper manner. Some dislocation 
or discontinuity in the order of the stratification will be found 
at a certain elevation, if this supposition be correct ; and I may 
here point out to those geologists who may have an opportunity, 
the interesting circumstances of various kinds, which still await 
them in Italy, from the views of the nature of that country which 
Ihave here given. Were it of any use to accumulate conjec- 
tures, it might even be suggested that the whole of that country, 
even to the highest point of the Apennines, was raised at one 
single period from beneath that ocean in which we know that 
