18 



It may well be that the chains of African mountains 

 correspond to this conformation of the Cordilleras, and 

 the mountains passing in a direct line, as we have seen, 

 across Europe and Asia ; but, inasmuch as these moun- 

 tains are but imperfectly known as yet, I shall leave all 

 reference to them till a more favourable time, when 

 more precise scientific researches in the dark continent 

 will have been carried out a time evidently not now 

 distant. 



As a boat under sail rolls from one side to another, 

 as a fish in passing through the water, from time to 

 time turns laterally from side to side, so, precisely, does 

 our earth, in revolving round the sun, fluctuate at the 

 poles. Its fluctuations do not exceed 23Vs degrees and 

 are called, in the language of physical geography the 

 eclectic. 



The phenomenon of the electic is explained in phy- 

 sical geography by the fact that the earth moves round 

 the sun not in a direct perpendicular to the Equator, 

 but with an inclination of its axis turning sometimes the 

 North and sometimes the South Pole nearer to the sun, 

 at an extreme rake of 23 l /s degrees. 



But this theory is evidently wrong, because together 

 with it. we must admit a third terrestrial movement ; 

 that is, one along the line of the Equator, and two in the 

 direction of the North and South Poles. Such phenomena 

 are not to be observed in Nature. No animated crea- 

 ture walks half the year with its head foremost, the 

 other half with its tail. For this would be necessary 

 double sets of organs of propulsion, of directly contrary 

 nature ; and this we never see. In this case too, both 

 hemispheres must be of similar construction and uplands 

 and precipices must change places e very-half year ! It 

 is clear that the ecliptic is the result of the earths roll, 

 and the extent of its fluctuations North and South cor- 

 respond to the perpendicular of the suns rays falling on the 

 Cordilleras. 



That the eclectic of the planets proceeds from their 



