the Structure of the Earth. 6 1 



the upheavingof rocks, which apparently once possessed an in- 

 ferior place : phenomena, for the explanation of which theories 

 yet devised have proved unsatisfactory or insufficient. 



I am aware that divers points remain to be discussed, before 

 the hypothesis here hinted could be presented as a plausible 

 one. But it is needless to enter upon the disquisition, and exa- 

 mine and dispose of subsidiary questions, while the main facts 

 are not yet ascertained. It is, then, with a view rather to incite 

 inquiry, than to propose a system, that the thought has been 

 here thrown out. 



Experiments upon water, under varied degrees of great com- 

 pression, are much wanted, with reference to other qualities of 

 the condensed liquid, besides its density, especially its solvent 

 power, its permanent fluidity at an unaltered temperature, how- 

 ever great be its compression, and its capacity of heat. The 

 same may be said of air. 



Meantime, it is as allowable to suppose the interior of the 

 earth to be composed of condensed fluids, upholding lighter 

 solids, as to imagine it a compact, impermeable, solid mass, 

 upon which fluids rest. Let well-conducted experiments deter- 

 mine which is the most probable supposition, upon the presump- 

 tion as a postulate, that the entire mass of the earth consists of 

 substances alike to those with which we are acquainted, being 

 such as its shell, accessible to research, exhibits. H. T. C. 



Art. VI. Extract of a Letter from Captain William 

 Spencer Webb, 29th March, 1819. Communicated to 

 the Editor by H. T. Colebrooke, Esq. 



My last letter was dated from Sirinagar, and immediately 

 after its despatch I accompanied a party of pilgrims to the 

 temple of Kedur-Nifh ; one of those shrines, if 1 may so call it, 

 to which a visit is enjoined by the Hindu religioq. You have 

 heard so much about mountain-roads, torrents, and precipices, 

 that 1 need not particularize those which we encountered on this 

 route : suffice it, that we reached the end of our journey without 

 accident of material consequence; and, it being yet early in the 

 season, encountered a good deal of snow near the termination of 



