174 Notices of Memoirs — Button, on Mountains. 



partly to this upward pressure, but often in great part to the over- 

 flowing of the superheated rocks on the surface. 



There is, however, one other point that has still to be taken into 

 account. If we calculate the mass of the ocean we shall find that it 

 is sufficient, if the surface of the earth were level, to cover it entirely 

 to a depth of at least two miles. Now, if it is true that the earth 

 has been formed by the slow condensation of gaseous matter, we 

 can see no possible reason why any of the gaseous materials should 

 be confined in the interior solidifying portions, and by their attempts 

 to escape cause eructations, or bubbles that could raise any part of 

 the solid mass more than two miles high. In other words, I do not 

 see how there could be any boiling or swelling up sufficient to form 

 land above the surface of the ocean. If then there was no land in 

 this primeval ocean for denudation to act upon, what was it that 

 first disturbed the equilibrium of the crust and so led the way to 

 those stupendous changes that we know have since taken place? 

 But one answer can I think be given to this question, viz. the origin 

 of life. Chemists are agreed that carbonate of lime was in solution 

 in this primeval ocean, and when life, or rather life capable of 

 secreting carbonate of lime, appeared, it would abstract this sub- 

 stance out of the ocean and deposit it on particular areas, and thus, 

 by disturbing the equilibrium, would prepare the world to be the 

 habitation for those countless myriads of organized beings which 

 now swarm over it. 



I will hazard one more supposition. Over this primeval ocean 

 the winds must have swept with great regularity, and currents must 

 have followed in their wake. Now these currents would naturally 

 take two directions, one N.E. and S.W., and the other at right 

 angles to it. If, therefore, we suppose life to have originated at 

 any one point, it would gradually spread in a N.E. and S.W.,' or 

 N.W. and S.E. direction, and the first calcareous deposits, and con- 

 sequently the first land, would take these directions also. This 

 would give the direction of other deposits, and although much 

 obliterated by the complications that have since taken place, we can 

 possibly, even now, trace in the directions of our mountain chains 

 some remnant of this primeval arrangement. But this is sheer 

 speculation. 



Such is an outline of what I propose to call the Herschel-Babbage 

 theory, after the two distinguished philosophers who originated it ; 

 it has the advantage over all other theories of the same nature of 

 being capable of being proved or disproved by observations in the 

 field. When firmly established, as I believe it will be, it will throw 

 a new light on geology, for it gives significance to the thickness and 

 composition of every rock, and to its geographical position ; it gives 

 significance to every bend and fold in the strata, to every fault and 

 volcanic dyke ; and it will also be found to furnish us with a key 

 that will decipher many of the hitherto obscure passages in geologi- 

 cal history. 



