44 Origin of the Chalk and Flint Formation. 



thousand feet deep, covering Europe and North 

 America ; and this while the earth, according to Sir 

 William Thomson, was only very slowly cooling 

 down from a state of fiery fusion to its present 

 temperature. I have not exaggerated. These things 

 are according to the now fully accepted theories 

 of the most prominent of the late and present 

 geologists : — ice, from three times to eight times the 

 thickness of the great Antarctic ice-barrier, covering 

 a great part of North America, and the whole of 

 middle and Northern Europe, including Switzerland, 

 the British Isles, and Scandinavia, for hundreds of 

 thousands of years. This is given us as the scientific 

 substitute for the scriptural record of the universal 

 deluge ; but the superiority is not manifest to all. 

 It is evident also that the twenty millions, or two 

 hundred and forty millions of years for the cooling 

 down of the earth from fluid incandescence to its 

 present temperature, may now be dispensed with ; 

 and there are some other periods, such as those 

 hundreds of thousands, or a million of years, for the 

 freezing of the earth in glacial ages, and thawing 

 again, which may at some early period be similarly 

 found unnecessary. On this subject, to borrow the 

 sentiment of Cuvier, " I am well aware that some 

 naturalists lay prodigious stress on the thousands of 

 years which they can call into action by a dash of 

 their pens," but I myself do not indulge in that 

 facility, nor incline to acquiesce in it. 



GILBERT AND BIVINGTON, LIMITED, ST. JOHN'S SQUABE, LONDON. 



