Geology and Topography of Western New York. 89 



tions, sweeping over the tops of the highest mountains, produced 

 '' by the flux and reflux of mighty deluges, caused by the sud- 

 den elevation of mountain chains in various parts of the globe ?"* 

 Sound philosophy forbids these violent presumptions, particularly 

 when the facts admit of explanations more consonant with the 

 natural order of events. 



The condition of a continent, gradually elevated from the 

 ocean, whether by volcanic action, or by the expansive force of 

 crystallization, or by any other cause whatever, would be such 

 as to account for all the geological phenomena hitherto attributed 

 to the mechanical action of water. Every portion of a continent 

 thus reclaimed, must, in succession, have been the bed, and then 

 the beach of an ocean. Every portion must have been subjected 

 to the action of the waves and the tides, when lashed into fury 

 by the raging storm ; and for a period of time only limited by 

 the greater or less rapidity of the elevatory process. 



When any considerable portion had become permanently ele- 

 vated above tidewater, it would form a water shed,- collecting 

 the rain into rivulets, which, finding their way to the ocean, 

 would cut out narrow channels for their beds. But the eff"ect of 

 these streams in the formation of valleys, by denuding and tear- 

 ing up the rocky strata, would be insignificant in comparison 

 with the action of the surge at those points where their waters 

 were disembogued. As each portion of such channels would 

 successively be exposed to their combined action, and must suc- 

 cessively form the bed of an estuary at the valley's mouth, we 

 can readily account for their excavation, to a greater or less extent, 

 in proportion to the hardness of the rocky bed, to the violence of 

 the waves and tides, and the duration of their action. In these 

 estuaries, the comminuted materials would assume nearly a hori- 

 zontal position, and when left dry, would resemble the alluvial 

 plains or " bottoms," which border most of our rivers. Should 

 a sudden rise of a few feet take place, the water would at first 



* Nearly every geological writer, excepting Lyell, whose works have fallen un- 

 der my observation, even without including those who have evidently been influ- 

 enced more by theological than scientific views, has drawn largely on these won- 

 derful deluges ; and the means by which they are supposed to have been produced, 

 are equally fanciful with the presumption itself. The passage from which the 

 above quotation is taken, (see Hitchcock's Geology of Mass., p. 242,) is perhaps 

 not a very extravagant specimen of this kind of hypothetical reasoning. See also 

 p. 218. 



Vol. XXXY.— No. 1. 12 



