8 8 Notice of Active and Extinct Volcanos. 



are oxygen and chlorine, and some add iodine, and an ima- 

 ginary body called fluorine. 



If we extend the idea of combustion, as several authors 

 are disposed to do, to all cases of intense chemical action, 

 especially if attended with the extrication of light and heat, 

 we shall include the agency of the combustibles and met- 

 als upon each other, as well as upon the proper supporters 

 of combustion. For our present purpose, it is quite immate- 

 rial which view is embraced. 



If we suppose that the first condition of the created ele- 

 ments of our planet, was, in a state of freedom ; the globe 

 being a mass of uncombined combustibles and metals ; 

 when the waters, the atmosphere and chlorine, and iodine 

 and perhaps hydrogen were suddenly added ; it will be ob- 

 vious from what we now know of the properties, of these el- 

 ements, that the collision would awaken dormant energies, 

 whose first operation would be a general and intense igni- 

 tion, and a combustion of the whole surface of the planet. 

 Potassium, sodium and phosphorus would first blaze , and would 

 immediately communicate the heat necessary to bring on 

 the action between the other metals and combustibles in re- 

 lation to the oxygen and chlorine, and in relation to each 

 other. Thus, a general conflagration would be the very 

 first step in chemicaLaction, and life not having yet dawned 

 on the planet — this conflagration would be the step most ad- 

 mirably fitted to prepare the globe for the living beings by 

 which it was to be peopled. 



Thus, would be formed the alkalies, the earths and stones 

 and rocks, — the metallic oxids properly so called — the sul- 

 phurets and phosphurets of the metals — the carburet of 

 iron — the acids, including the muriatic, and ultimately the 

 salts, and chlorides, alkaline, earthy and metallic, and many 

 other compounds resulting either from a primary or seconda- 

 ry action. 



In such circumstances, there would also be great commo- 

 tion — steam, vapors and gases would be suddenly evolved in 

 vast quantities, and with explosive violence ; the imponder- 

 able agents, heat, light, electricity, and magnetism, and at- 

 traction, in various forms, would be active, in an inconceiva- 

 ble degree, and the recently oxidated crust of the earth 

 would be torn with violence, producing fissures and caverns 

 dislocations and contortions, and obliquity of strata ; and it 

 would every where bear marks of an energy then general, but 



