142 SCIENCE AND IMMORTALITY 



The ejection of carbonic acid by volcanoes is a 

 phenomenon still better known, and even from 

 springs and from the craters of dead volcanoes 

 considerable amounts of carbonic acid are given 

 off. The Grotto of Dogs at Solfatara is well 

 known ; and there is a valley in Java named the 

 Valley of Death because of the amount of carbonic 

 acid which arises in a certain deep bosky hollow. 

 The carbonic acid issues so copiously that tigers, 

 deer, and wild-boar are frequently suffocated. In 

 Western America there is a similar dell called 

 Death Golch, where grizzly bears, elk, squirrels, 

 and other animals frequently perish. On the 

 shores of the Laacher See there is a spot equally 

 perilous. And no doubt all over the world 

 carbonic acid is excreted in large quantities. Even 

 mineral springs represent a large output. Dr 

 Phipson calculated that a small chalybeate spring 

 near Naubau, in the principality of Waldeck, dis- 

 charged about half a hundredweight in twenty- 

 four hours, and there are thousands of such 

 springs. 



There can be no difficulty at all, then, in believ- 

 ing that a large part of the atmosphere and of the 

 ocean was not residual but excretory in origin, and 

 there can be little doubt at all that in the Car- 

 boniferous period the atmosphere was much 

 richer in carbonic acid, and that the carbonic acid 



