THE EARTH FRAME 



209 



of another earth line is afforded us by the hori- 

 zon. This horizon curve can be seen to the 

 best advantage from the cross-trees of a ship in 

 mid-ocean. There the circle that sweeps about 

 one is quite complete ; and the line one sees is 

 the edge where the world slips down beyond 

 our vision. Again, how perfectly that curve is 

 drawn ; and on a clear day how embracing is 

 its sweep ! A similar, but perhaps not such a 

 perfect, effect can be seen on the alkaline plains 

 looking out from some tall butte across the 

 lowly buffalo grass, with the wavering heat of 

 the plains rising upward instead of the ocean 

 moisture. It is a smaller circle, a smaller earth 

 line, that is thus revealed to us ; but what a 

 hint it gives us of the greater lines which must 

 be merely its enlargement ! 



The demarkations of light and dark against 

 the sky are about the only glimpses of the earth- 

 curves that are vouchsafed to us ; but the prin- 

 cipla of rotundity the curved line so often 

 called " the line of beauty " is shown to us in 

 almost all the earth formations. The zoophite, 

 that builds a rounded cell in the rounded coral, 

 making by aggregation the round island in the 

 Southern seas, is typical of all creation. The 

 law of the circle that curves the waves of light 



