CORAL REEFS. 387 



experience ; but here, as in so many other cases, we are 

 compelled to adopt new measures of time and space, when 

 dealing with the physical conditions of the globe before man 

 became a tenant of its surface. 



If there be areas of upheaval as well as of subsidence in 

 these coral seas, we may expect to find coral islands raised 

 in places above the level of which these zoophytes effect 

 their works. Accordingly, we have instances furnished by 

 Captain Beechey, Mr. Jukes and others, of coral masses some 

 hundred feet above the sea ; with the same assurance of their 

 having been raised from below, that we possess in the case 

 of any tertiary stratum containing sea-shells. In connection 

 with this topic, however, we must notice one objection to Mr. 

 Darwin's views which may seem to have some force, viz., 

 that if masses of coral of such enormous thickness exist under 

 the sea, we might fully expect to discover them in some 

 situation or other among the great strata of the globe ; 

 knowing, as we do, how large a portion of these have been 

 submarine in origin and raised afterwards into their present 

 position. Admitting the weight of the objection, that no 

 such coral masses are found on our continents, we may qualify 

 it by remarking, first, that we are not assured as to the relative 

 period in the records of creation when the reef-building corals 

 began their work in the seas ; secondly, that it is not impos- 

 sible that some of the great oolitic, cretaceous, or other cal- 

 careous formations may actually represent coral deposits, 

 formed as these are by the agglutination of various materials, 

 and exposed for ages to physical conditions of which we can 

 scarcely appreciate all the effect ; and thirdly, that the geo- 

 logical character of the lands in the coral oceans is still very 

 imperfectly known, and we may yet discover such masses at 

 greater elevation than any yet found, and exhibiting possibly 

 gradations yet unsuspected into the character of the older 

 calcareous rocks. 



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