THE SEA AND THE ATMOSPHEliB. 15 



to their stature ; the cocoa-nuts of Tahiti will grow rapidly upon 

 it; and the palms and bananas of Japan will change it into 

 flowers. The oxygen we are breathing was distilled for us some 

 short time ago by the magnolias of the Susquehanna and the 

 great trees that skirt the Orinoco and the Amazon ; the giant 

 rhododendrons of the Himalayas contributed to it, and the roses 

 and myrtles of Cashmere, the cinnamon-tree of Ceylon, and the 

 forest, older than the flood, that lies buried deep in the heart of 

 Africa, far behind the Mountains of the Moon, gave it out. The 

 rain we see descending was thawed for us out of the icebergs 

 which have watched the Polar Star for ages, or it came from 

 snows that rested on the summits of the Alps, but which the 

 lotus lilies have soaked up from the Kile, and exhaled as vapour 

 again into the ever-present air." 



40. TJie operations of ivater. — There are processes no less 

 interesting going on in other parts of this magnificent field of 

 research. Water is nature's carrier. With its currents it con- 

 veys heat away from the torrid zone and ice from the frigid ; or, 

 bottling the caloric away in the vesicles of its vapoiu*, it first 

 makes it impalpable, and then conveys it, by unknown paths, to 

 the most distant parts of the earth. The materials of which the 

 coral builds the island, and the sea-conch its shell, are gathered 

 by this restless leveller from mountains, rocks, and valleys in all 

 latitudes. Some it washes down from the Mountains of the 

 Moon, or out of the gold-fields of Australia, or from the mines 

 of Potosi, others from the battle-fields of Europe, or from the 

 marble quarries of ancient Greece and Eome. These materials, 

 thus, collected and carried over falls or down rapids, are trans- 

 ported from river to sea, and delivered by the obedient waters 

 to each insect and to every plant in the ocean at the right time 

 and temperature, in proper form, and in due quantity. 



41. Its marvellous powers. — Treating the rocks less gently, it 

 grinds them into dust, or pounds them into sand, or rolls and 

 rubs them until they are fashioned into pebbles, rubble, or 

 boulders : the sand and shingle on the sea-shore are monuments 

 of the abrading, triturating power of water. By water the soil 

 has been brought down from the hills and spread out into valleys, 

 plains, and fields for man's use. Saving the rocks on which the 

 everlasting hills are established, everything on the surface of our 

 planet seems to have been removed from its original foundation and 

 lodged in its present place by water. Protean in shape, benignant 



