Problems of the Pacific 



335 



warpings and the flexures or fractures 

 of the earth-crust marked by other large 

 geographic features, all supposed to 

 grow out of a tendenc)' of the terrestrial 

 ball to approach the form of a tetra- 

 hedron with the slow shrinkage due to 

 secular cooling. This theory of a " tet- 

 rahedral earth ' ' is far too elaborate and 

 many-sided for summary in a sentence; 

 it must suffice to note that it was framed 

 by Lowthiau Green during a long resi- 

 dence on one of the islands in the great 

 ocean and under the inspiration of its 

 grandeur, that such geologists as 

 Gregory in England, and Emerson and 

 Hitchcock in this country, have viewed 

 it with favor, and that our fellow-citi- 

 zen, Preston (of the Coast and Geodetic 

 Survey), thinks "Nothing is more in 

 accordance with the action of physical 

 laws than that the earth is contracting 

 in approximately a tetrahedral form" 

 {ibid., p. 377). It is just to say that 

 certain other geologists and physicists 

 are less attracted by the enticing view 

 outlined by Lowthian Green; they hold 

 that the hypothesis requires greater 

 rigidity in the earth-crust than that at- 

 tested by various well-known facts of 

 geology. So, too, the view that the 

 Pacific basin is a moon-scar is rejected 

 by some thinkers; for example, our asso- 

 ciate, Gilbert, would have it that our lu- 

 minary of the night was probably formed 

 more largely by accretion of cosmic 

 matter than by robbing our planet of so 

 much of her substance. Yet, whether 

 the views — either or both — be accepted 

 or rejected, they are well worth weigh- 

 ing; they are products of great minds, 

 and must stimulate our powers of con- 

 templation and emphasize the magni- 

 tude of our greatest geographic feature. 

 If a trace of personal conviction may 

 be infused in the discussion of so broad a 

 field, it may be questioned, first, whether 

 either the astronomical or the physical 

 hypothesis is necessary, in view of the 

 great fact that the Pacific basin is pre- 

 ciselv like the other oceanic basins in 



kind, differing only in degree of mag- 

 nitude ; and, second, whether the legion 

 islands of the sea stretching from Hawaii 

 and Easter Island to the borders of the 

 Asian and Australian continents do not 

 prove that this greater part, at least, of 

 the vast basin is but a drowned land 

 whose higher peaks and volcanic vents 

 still rise above sea as monuments to its 

 former greatness. Certainly there are 

 many points of similarity between our 

 own Antillean and Bahamian outliers 

 and the seemingly boundless archipelago 

 stretching a third of the way round 

 the globe from Asia and Australia ; 

 certainly, too, the unavoidable infer- 

 ence that our lesser archipelago is a 

 series of culminating points of an an- 

 cient land gives warrant for a parallel 

 inference with respect to the insular 

 peaks projecting above the waters of the 

 Pacific ; and certainly, again, the geol- 

 ogist's necessity for a Paleozoic Atlantis 

 as- a source of the five-mile-thick for- 

 mations of the Appalachian zone must 

 be shared by those delvers in the rocks 

 seeking the source of the vaster sedi- 

 ments lying between the Himalayan 

 crests and the littorals of the Pacific. 

 It is not to be forgotten that whether 

 the low mountain be old or young, the 

 high mountain is always a young moun- 

 tain ; nor is it to be forgotten that the 

 volcano and the earthquake are symp- 

 toms of general geologic activity with 

 attendant geographic changes. So the 

 bleak heights of Thibet and the steep 

 footslopes below, which feed the mighty 

 Hoangho and the Yangtse so fully that 

 thej' in turn color the Yellow Sea with 

 their silts ; so, too, the recurrent earth- 

 quakes of Japan and neighboring islands ; 

 so also the island volcanoes, led by 

 Krakatoa, whose last outbreak shook 

 half the earth and blew dust-clouds to 

 the remotest lands — all these and many 

 other stupendous phenomena are among 

 the indications that the internal forces 

 and agencies of earth-making culminate 

 somewhere about the great archipelago 



