21)2 THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 



succession of ages. The human race has not existed 

 for a sufficiently long period to witness the grander 

 catastrophes or changes of what, nevertheless, there 

 are palpable traces remaining to attest the reality. 



We are the living witnesses, however, of changes 

 whose average rapidity permits our senses to follow 

 the phenomena, while our memory or our records 

 enables us to compare with ease the different phases 

 through which they pass. We observe that the sea 

 changes its level day after day, as if it oscillated 

 around a fixed point. We are witnesses to the silting- 

 up of ports by the action of marine currents ; to the 

 ravages of the sea when it hurls its waves against a 

 rocky coast ; and to the growth of the polypier, which 

 opposes an invincible rampart of stone against the 

 assaults of the ocean, and builds up islands from the 

 very bosom of the waters. We see the mountains 

 crumble down under the action of atmospheric agen- 

 cies ; the debris of continents washed down by rivers 

 into the sea, to fill up its abysses ; the floating ice- 

 chariots scattering the spoil of arctic lands over every 

 part of their route ; marine currents drawing in their 

 train whatever they encounter, and accumulating 

 upon their borders immense deposits of vegetable 

 and animal remains, as well as of sand and mud. 

 We see the foraminiferae, those pigmies of creation. 



