372 
NATURE 
[Sep¢. 8, 1870 
established system of geological formations” (p. 141). 
Fourthly, ‘‘that the granite crust, though cracked at 
various points, from contraction on cooling, has a limit to 
which those rents descend, below which, from intense 
heat, and the hasty and unindurated state that the external 
border of the molten mass must be in, the contraction has 
not taken place; and being in an arched shape, and rest- 
ing on a liquid far more buoyant than water, that no 
fracture of the crust to the surface of the igneous mass 
has ever taken place, and that no amount of matter could 
be concentrated on the surface of the earth to produce 
that effect” (p. 82). Fifthly, that what any geologist 
would recognise as the débrzs of broken granite decom- 
posed in place, Mr. Catlin refers to eruption from 
his subterranean granite crust, thus:—“ In the Rocky 
Mountains and the Andes granite is very rarely seen, 
and when met (at the mountain’s base, as it most 
often is, or on its summit), it is uniformly seen in 
amorphous masses of various sizes, with shapes plainly 
telling its history, that it has been shattered and torn 
from its bed by subterranean explosions or other dis- 
turbance, and lifted by (or has followed) the rising mass 
to the summits of the highest mountains, and flowing out 
from these, is found at the mountain’s base, where it has 
rolled, while the mountain’s top is gneiss” (p. 86). Sixthly, 
that water, getting to the molten mass below the author’s 
granite, has expanded, and not only erupted the granitic 
boulders, but blown out great cavities, into which vast 
areas of surface (as the Mexican Gulf and Caribbean Sea) 
have fallen, making catastrophes, and leaving “ subsided 
rocks ”; whilst elsewhere the cavern-roofs have been held 
up as “lifted rocks.” Seventhly. That the mountain floods 
rush into and along these cavities, leaving but little to 
reach the plains (p. 11) ; that such “ submontagne currents” 
as these, “heated by the volcanic furnaces they have 
passed” (p. 4), rush out into the Caribbean Sea, and make 
the Gulf Stream. Eighthly. The Caribbean subsidence de- 
luged the whole Antilles and many Aztec cities, dispersed 
some of the aborigines among the heights of Mexico and 
the Rocky Mountains, and sent some Caribs to Guiana, 
Venezuela, and Honduras, whilst others were transported 
to Florida, Newfoundland, and Scandinavia, in frail craft 
on the broad back of the new-made Gulf Stream, that still 
favours us with such of nature’s blessings as it has to 
give. 
Though not always urging his own suppositions without 
some doubt, Mr. Catlin is dogmatic enough in condemning 
the present views of ethnologists and geologists when not 
coincident with his own, as must be too often the case, 
judging from the foregoing exposition of the main points 
of his baseless and inconsistent hypothesis. 
“T was born in the midst of the Apalachian Ranges, 
and amongst them spent my hunting and fishing days ; 
and neither there nor in twice crossing both the Rocky 
Mountains and Andes chains, have I seen anything but 
the sedimentary and volcanic rocks, excepting here and 
there beds of shoved-up boulders of granite, raised in 
the manner already described.” Thus the author writes 
at p. 92; and the mountain-life in youth and hard travel- 
ling in middle age, here indicated, are as plainly shown 
forth in the curious book before us, as a very imperfect 
geological knowledge is shown by the latter part of the 
sentence and its explanations as found at other pages, 
Mr. Catlin’s love of wild scenery, his recognition of the 
wonderful and mysterious in nature, his limited range in 
modern geology, his adherence to some old theories, his 
disapproval of later geological discoveries, and his 
assumption of hypothetical notions that have sprung up 
in his own active, wondering, and impressible mind, clearly 
witness that, “as a reader of geological works, and a 
spectator of many stupendous orographic structures ” 
(p. 200), he has been self-taught on a very limited basis of 
natural science. Nevertheless, he conscientiously believes 
that he offers something towards the explanation of the 
geographico-geological structure of America, and of the 
history of the human millions who have inhabited those 
broad lands, with strange lives and languages, and have 
either disappeared for ever or have left degraded rem- 
nants, still decreasing under the deadly influences of the 
European. The world knows how warmly and persistently 
Mr. Catlin has laboured for the benefit of the Indians ; 
not merely preserving their traditions and scraps of 
history, their languages, religions, customs, and features, 
but in damming back, if possible, the evils that befall 
them from their Christian neighbours. He has, indeed, 
spent the greater part of a long and toilsome life in 
helping them directly or indirectly ; and the remembrance 
of their unfailing hospitality and kindness is with him in 
striking contrast with the treachery and cruelty they have 
suffered, and with the indifferent treatment he has himself 
received from his own people in the matter of Indian 
research, as detailed at pages 190 e¢ seg. and in the 
Appendix. T. RUPERT JONES 
THE MODERN BUDDHIST 
The Modern Buddhist: being the views of a Siamese 
Minister of State on his own and other Religions. 
Translated, with remarks, by Henry Alabaster, Inter- 
preter of H.B.M. Consulate-Generalin Siam, (London: 
Trubner and Co., 1870.) 
HIS is an extremely interesting little book. The 
minister whose views it records—Chao Phya 
Thipakon—conducted the foreign affairs of his country 
from 1856 till two years ago, when he was stricken with 
blindness and was obliged to retire into private life. It 
was then that he published the work—“ a book explaining 
many things ”—the moreimportant parts of which are here 
translated. We need scarcely say that, looked at from 
our point of view, some of his beliefs are sufficiently 
strange, and that he sometimes expresses opinions on 
subjects which are altogether beyond the range of science. 
At the same time he has in many respects advanced far 
beyond the great mass of his co-religionists. He will 
accept nothing merely because it has been handed down 
by tradition, but demands proofs which will stand the test 
of rigid examination. In endeavouring to explain such 
phenomena as rain, epidemic diseases, the tides, &c., he 
will have nothing to do with spirits, good or bad ; he takes 
his stand on observed facts, and although his explanations 
may sometimes be inadequate, they are generally quite 
in the spirit of modern Western investigation. So far as 
he understands them, he heartily accepts the European 
doctrines of astronomy. All this strikes a European 
reader as very incompatible with certain aspects of the 
