222 HOUSE, GARDEN, AND FIELD 



age and the animals which inhabited them have not been 

 revealed to us. 



All men are now agreed that the matter of which these 

 chalk-hills are composed was laid down at the bottom 

 of the sea ; that the fossil remains of the chalk belong to 

 extinct species ; and that the chalk-hills have taken their 

 present form in consequence of the waste of rain and 

 rivers. What long and bitter controversies these simple 

 inferences from observed facts called forth, controversies 

 which lasted down to our own time ! Rather than accept 

 such propositions, men could be found to maintain that 

 the earth with all its rocks and fossils was formed at once, 

 just as it stands ; that the fossils are not the remains of 

 real animals, but the result of a " formative tendency," 

 whatever that may be ; and that the chalk was raised 

 into rounded hills by a kind of effervescence or fermenta- 

 tion. One is inclined to say strong things about those 

 who, even when the facts were forced upon their notice, 

 tried to escape from unwelcome truth by hypotheses so 

 preposterous, but when we run over the names of the 

 naturalists, physical philosophers and historians who pro- 

 posed explanations like these, we see that it is prudent not 

 to use harsh words. The history of scientific progress 

 warns us that we too may be unconsciously entertaining 

 delusions just as laughable. Let us abstain from reviling 

 those whose delusions have been found out, and pray that 

 when our turn of trial comes, we may not be so unlucky as 

 to be obstinate on the wrong side. 



Chalk, when free from surface-deposits, makes dry hills, 

 yielding pasturage for sheep, and often nothing more. 

 Much hygroscopic water, that is, water which is not free 

 to flow, is nevertheless lodged in the capillary spaces of 

 the surface-chalk, and this keeps the vegetation green. 

 Scantiness of water is one chief reason why there are so 

 few towns on the chalk, and why all the large ones have 

 some means of subsistence other than agriculture, such 

 as sea-bathing, a seaport, or a navigable river. The clays 



