386 president's address — section e. 



colierent globe ? However formed, tiiere it is, a monumental basin 

 differing in type from tke beds of all the other oceans. We hare 

 evidence that its surface was in the past less extensive and more 

 broken by land. Long ago we have a dim vision of a greatly-extended 

 Antarctica, continent or archipelago, forming a bridge of connection 

 between Australia and New Zealand and South America. Later, there 

 is evidence of a long' peninsula stretching down from Papua to New 

 Zealand. And this is important, because along the line of the 

 peninsula lay the old border of the ocean. For, around the borders of 

 the ocean runs a cuiwed line of disquietude, of strain, of rupture in 

 the earth's crust. Along this line the coasts are shaken by earth- 

 quakes, and breached by volcanoes. In general, the signs point to 

 subsidence of the whole ocean bed. The submergence of the old 

 Antarctica, of the Papua to New Zealand peninsula, the numerous 

 atolls kept just above water, the Great Barrier Reef, the drowning of 

 the estuaries, which gave us the deep harbours of Eastern Australia, 

 the continuation of the Andes in a chain of islands to the south, finally 

 sinking below the ocean level, indicate widespread subsidence on a 

 grand scale. In antagonism to tliis secular sinking, and to the great 

 agencies of sub-aerial denudation, which are stri-^dng to drag our lands 

 under the sea, we have the upheaving activities of the vulcano-seismic 

 girdle. This is the great fighting line, where the mighty struggle of 

 the opposing forces of Nature is taking place. Along this we hear the 

 alarums and drums of cosmic war. 



From Japan to New Zealand, from San Francisco to Valparaiso, 

 the earthquake is known and dreaded. So serious is the phenomenon 

 to Japan that, in addition to establishing stations in Formosa, 

 Saghalien, China, and Korea, she has already more than 1,000 

 observing stations at home, and spends large sums each year in seis- 

 mological investigation. In 1901 at Gifu Ken the losses by one earth- 

 quake were equal to those in a great battle. There were nearly 5,000 

 killed, 12,000 wounded, .and 90,000 houses were wholly or partially 

 destroyed. [Alas ! as I am writing, the newspapers bring the cables, 

 announcing the fearful destruction in the Straits of Messina, where 

 the losses a're those of a great war, and not of a single battle.] Surely 

 such possibilities should make the Government of New Zealand take 

 warning to study carefully the seismic movements, and to learn the 

 best forms of protected building-. On the opposite shore, in April, 

 190{', we were appalled by the fearful display of seismic energy in 

 California. In sixty-five seconds a rupture was produced along the 

 line of an old fault, a crack which extended obliquely across the 

 Coast Ranges for some 400 miles, and along this the shock was felt 

 in its violence over a width of 50 miles of country. The horizontal 

 displacement of the ground at the line of fracture was on the average 

 8 to 10 ft., and the vertical, at its greatest, reached 4 ft. It takes 

 the pull of a ton weight to snap a bar of granite 1 in. square. What 

 must have been the force required to snap a mass 400 miles long, and, 

 pi'obably 10 or more miles deep? Fortunately, the number of lives 

 lost did not exceed 1,000, but the damage to property, by the earth- 

 quake and subsequent fire, was estimated at £60,000,000. At all 

 events, the British insurance companies were called on to meet claims 

 amounting to £12,000,000. That California must expect frequent rer 

 petitions of shock is fully recognised by the American men of science. 



