MOVEMENTS AND DEFORMATIONS OF THE EARTH'S BODY. 577 



33° N. and S. latitude. The high-latitude tension would be sufficient 

 to cause the earth to gape more than two hundred miles at the poles, 

 if there were simple ideal shrinkage. The amounts and the distribu- 

 tion of thrust and shrinkage are sho^vn in Fig. 453. If the change of 

 rotation were no more than from 14 hours to the present rate, there 

 would still be 52 miles of thrust in the equatorial belt, and 40 miles of 

 shortage in the meridional circles. There are no clear signs of such a 

 remarkable distribution of thrust and tension as this hypothesis requires. 

 Moimtains are about as abundant and as strong north of 33°, the 

 neutral line, as south of it, and they extend to high latitudes. The 



Fig. 453.— Polar projection of the earth's hemisphere showing the theoretical high- 

 latitude tension and low-latitude compression involved in a change of rotation trom 

 3.82 hours to the present rate. The figure is drawn to true scale as seen from a point 

 above the pole, and in consequence the equatorial tract is foreshortened. The black 

 triangles show compression reduced in length by foreshortening; the white show ten- 

 sion in essentially true proportions to the high-latitude areas. The neutral line be- 

 tween the areas of compression and of stretching lies at 33° 20' latitude. 



Archean rocks, in which this agency should have been most effective 

 because of their early formation, are crumpled and crushed in the high 

 latitudes much the same as in low latitudes. Furthermore, if there 

 had been appreciable change in the form of the earth to accommodate 

 itself to a slower rotation, the water on the surface, being the most 



