GENERAL FEATURES OF THE EARTH. 37 



37. (3.) East and "West Indies. — The general courses m the 

 East. Indies have been mentioned in $ 35. In the West Indies and 

 Central America there is a repetition of the curves in the East 

 Indies. The course of the range along Central America corresponds 

 to Sumatra and Java ; the line of Florida and the islands to the 

 southeast makes another range in the same system. 



The East and West Indies are very similar in their relations to 

 the continents and oceans. About the East Indies Asia lies to the 

 northwest and Australia to the southeast, just like North and 

 South America about the West Indies ; and the North Pacific and 

 Indian Ocean have the same bearing about the former as the North 

 Atlantic and South Pacific about the latter. The parallelism in the 

 bends of the great chains is, hence, only a part in a wide system of 

 geographical parallelisms. 



38. (4. ) The American continents. — In North America the north- 

 west system is seen in the general course of the Rocky Mountains, 

 the Cascade Range and Sierra Nevada; in Florida; in the line of 

 lakes, from Lake Superior to the mouth of the Mackenzie ; in the 

 southwest coast of Hudson's Bay ; in the shores of Davis' Straits and 

 Baffin's Bay ; and with no greater divergences from a common course 

 than occur in the Pacific. The northeast system is exemplified 

 in the Atlantic coast from Newfoundland to Florida, and, still 

 farther to the northeast, along the coast of Greenland ; and to the 

 southwest along Yucatan, in Central America. The Appalachian 

 Mountains, the river St. Lawrence to Lake Erie, and the north- 

 west shore of Lake Superior, repeat this trend. 



There are curves in the mountain-ranges of eastern North Ame- 

 rica like those of eastern Asia. The Green Mountains run nearly 

 north-and-south, but the continuation of this line of heights across 

 New Jersey into Pennsylvania curves around gradually to the 

 westward. The Alleghanies, in their course from Pennsylvania to 

 Alabama and Tennessee, have the same curve. There appears also 

 to be an outer curving range, bordering the ocean, extending from 

 Newfoundland along Nova Scotia, then becoming submerged, though 

 indicated in the sea-bottom, and continued by southeastern New 

 England and Long Island. 



Between this range and that of the Green Mountains lies one of 

 the great basins of ancient geological time, while to the westward 

 of the Green Mountains and Alleghanies was the grand interior basin 

 of the continent. The two were to a great extent distinct in their 

 geological history, being apparently independent in their coal- 

 deposits and in some other formations. 



In South America the north coast has the same course as the 



