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without further consideration and examination of the evidence. 

 I feel sure, therefore, that if he had had before him the 

 numerous facts since made known, of erratic blocks carried 

 by the ice to heights far above their place of origin in North 

 America, and even in our own islands, as described at p. 75 

 and p. 90 of my "Studies" (vol. i.), with evidence of such 

 action now occurring in Greenland (p. 91), of the Moel 

 Tryfan beds having been forced up by the glacier that filled 

 the Irish sea, he would have seen, I feel sure, that his objec- 

 tions were all answered by actual phenomena, and that the 

 gradual erosion of Lago Maggiore was far within the powers 

 of such enormous accumulations of ice as must have existed 

 over its site. 



The following letter I quote entire, because it calls atten- 

 tion to a very original but much neglected book which, 

 though probably not wholly sound in its theoretical basis, 

 contains suggestions which may help towards the solution of 

 a still unsolved problem. 



"May 3, 1871. 

 " Dear Sir Charles, 



" I have just been reading a book which has struck 

 me amazingly, but which has been somewhat pooh-pooh'd by 

 the critics, and which therefore you may not have thought 

 worth looking at. It is W. Mattieu Williams's ' Fuel of the 

 Sun.' Whether the theory is true or false, the book is the 

 work of a man of original genius. Its originality is so 

 startling that I have found it to require reading twice to take 

 it in thoroughly ; and it is so different from all modern theories 

 of the sun that I can quite see why such a work by an out- 

 sider should not have received due attention. If sound, it 

 completely solves the problem of the perpetuity of the sun's 

 heat, and gives geologists and Darwinians any amount of 

 time they require. It seems to be reasonable, it is beautifully 

 worked out, it is quite intelligible, and till shown to be a 

 fallacy I hold by its main doctrine. I hope you will read 

 it, and, if you see no fallacy in it, get Sir John Herschell to 



