2/6 THE BORDERLAND OF SCIENCE. 



difficult or impossible to examine the coast very 

 closely.' 



A singular, and indeed fallacious, argument has been 

 advanced by Capt. Maury in favour of the theory that 

 the Antarctic regions are occupied by a great continent. 

 4 It seems to be a physical necessity,' he argues, ' that 

 land should not be antipodal to land. Except a small 

 portion of South America and Asia, land is always 

 opposite to water. Mr. Gardner has called attention 

 to the fact that only one twenty-seventh part of the 

 land is antipodal to land. The belief is, that on the 

 polar side of 70 degrees north we have mostly water, 

 not land. This law of distribution, so far as it applies, 

 is in favour of land in the opposite zone.' Surely a 

 weaker argument has seldom been advanced on any 

 subject of scientific speculation. Here is the syllogism : 

 we have reason to believe (though we are by no means 

 sure) that the Arctic regions are occupied by water ; 

 land is very seldom found to be antipodal to land ; 

 therefore, probably, the Antarctic regions are occupied by 

 land. But it is manifest that, apart from the weakness 

 of the first premiss, the second has no bearing whatever 

 on the subject at issue, if the first be admitted : for 

 we have no observed fact tending to show that water is 

 very seldom antipodal to water, which would be the 

 sole law to guide us in forming an opinion as to the 

 regions antipodal to the supposed Arctic water. On 

 the contrary, we know that water is very commonly 

 antipodal to water. We have only to combine what is 

 known respecting the relative proportions of land and 



