264 THE EVOLUTION OF CONTINENTS. 
ward movement, and carried with it whatever floated on 
its bosom. 
Another fact, important in this connection, remains to 
be spoken of. For many reasons it it probable that, 
owing to the great pressure, a large part of the earth’s 
interior solidified, or at least became pasty and viscid 
before there was any crust on its surface. This solid in- 
terior was not wholly at rest, there were elevations and 
depressions on its surface, for it seems to bea law of 
nature that upward movements occur in all bodies pass- 
ing through the stages of cosmic development. ‘The 
study of the nebulous mass from which sprang the solar 
system leads to the same conclusion. Then there are the 
irregularities in the forms of present nebule, the fre- 
quent upheavals in the sun; the relatively greater move- 
ments which in recent times have caused the ‘‘shoul- 
ders’’ of Saturn to rise more than one thousand miles; 
the great uprisings which have occurred in our earth 
since geology began, all combine to establish the fact 
that vast irregular upward movements are a part of the 
plan of world-building. There is, then, so far as I can 
see, nothing to forbid the belief—but much to establish | 
it—that portions of the solid nucleus rose above the 
rest. 
If, then, there existed a triangular mass such as I have 
described, which moved slowly westward, we may think 
of it as a great cake of ice floating on a river of very 
moderate velocity, and obedient to the same laws, 
and subject to the same accidents as other cakes of the 
same material. If, when passing over some shallow 
spot, it lodged upon a shoal or elevation of small area, 
but too large and firm to be pushed aside, and situated 
on one side of the axis of the mass, the impetus previ- 
ously gained, aided by the current, would cause a par- 
tial, or complete,—according to circumstances—rotation 
around the fixed point. We may then believe that if 
148 
