E. W. CLAYPOLE — CONTINENTS AND DEEP SEAS. 15 



still adheres. He shows that while the Cretaceous marine beds of northern India 

 contain many species found in Europe, that of southern India contains very few 

 forms indicating the existence of aland barrier separating the seas. The Trichin- 

 opoly fauna, he says, recurs in Assam 1,200 miles to the northeast and in Natal 4,000 

 miles to the southwest, and " it appears almost a necessary inference that these points 

 were on the south coast of a tract of land that extended across the Indian ocean." 

 His views have since been confirmed by Neumayr and Duncan. 



Mr. Blanford also discusses at some length the evidence in favor of a connection 

 between South America and Africa, dwelling especially on the fact that two families 

 of fresh-water fishes are found only in South America, New Zealand, Tasmania and 

 southern Australia. He inclines to the belief in an earlier connection between south- 

 ern Africa and South America, and evidentl}' deems a "southern continent," with 

 considerable northward extensions, a probability. It is obvious that such a change 

 would at once explain the facts already mentioned of the occurrence of stratified 

 rocks in the Falklands, South Georgia and Desolation island. 



There are other arguments which might be brought forward, but they can be only 

 mentioned. For example, the immense Paleozoic deposits in eastern North America 

 and in western and northwestern Europe are far too large to have been supplied from 

 any existing Paleozoic land. The increasing thickness of the former to the eastward 

 and northward, and of the latter to the west and northwest, are strong indications 

 that their origin must be sought in that direction. Accordingly, in this region — thai 

 is, in the area of the present north Atlantic — not a few geologists are inclined to place 

 a Paleozoic continent which has since disappeared, but which was then the quarry 

 whence came the material that has built up these massive strata on both sides of the 

 Atlantic. 



It is hardly necessary to point out, in conclusion, that if the Archean rocks are, 

 as generally regarded, only metamorphosed sediments, their presence below the Paleo- 

 zoic strata must prove that all the surface over which they are known to occur was at 

 the time sea-bottom. As this will include all the portions at present known, it is 

 clear that much wider changes are indicated by this fact than even those above 

 quoted. Apparently as we go back in time the evidence of depression and elevation 

 becomes more and more clear and strong — a result which is quite in harmony with 

 what might be anticipated. 



In the present condition of the evidence it seems, therefore, unwise to" hold with 

 any confidence the doctrine of the permanence of the ocean-basins and of the great 

 continental masses. The future may bring to light new facts and stronger support, 

 but what is now attainable warrants much distrust. 



On the whole it is probable that depression and elevation result from causes 

 which we cannot at present reach, and that both occur without any apparent con- 

 tinuity or localization. When we review the innumerable changes of this kind that 

 have taken place in tilmost every known, part of the world we are more inclined to 

 regard the ocean depths as those parts of depressed areas which, being situated out of 

 the reach of the land-wash, have never been subject to deposition and consequent 

 filling. If we may infer from what we observe, it appears probable that whenever 

 such areas by any change are brought within the reach of the waste of a shore-line 

 and buried beneath thick sediment, reelevation sets in and they are converted into 

 land, there being seemingly a connection between sedimentation and elevation. 



On this view the depths of the ocean may be the result not of a general subsidence 

 over the whole area at once but of many small and local subsidences which have run 



