1 3 GEOLOGY AND HISTORY 



CHAPTER II 

 THE WORLD BEFORE MAN 



MAN is of recent introduction on the earth. For 

 millions of years the slow process of world-making 

 had been going on, with reference to physical struc- 

 ture and to the lower grades of living creatures. 

 Only within a few thousand years does our globe 

 seem to have been fitted for its highest tenant. The 

 evidence of this is to be found in any text-book of 

 geology. I propose here merely to present the his- 

 tory of the earth in a series of word-pictures, introduc- 

 tory to our special subject. 



Our first picture may be that of a nebula, vast 

 and vaporous, containing the mixed and unconsoli- 

 dated materials of the sun and planets a void and 

 desolate mass, slowly aggregating itself under the 

 influence of gravitation. 



Our next may be that of an incandescent globe, 

 molten and glowing, and surrounded by a vast vapor- 

 ous envelope, but tending by degrees to a condition 

 in which it shall have a solid crust, on which the 

 greater part of the watery vapour suspended in its 

 atmosphere is to be condensed into a heated ocean. 



