464 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



idea of its contents. It would, therefore, be a waste of space, and an unfair in- 

 fliction on our readers, to go seriatim through its pages. In a few words, we 

 may say that Mr. Belt considers the auriferous quartz veins of Australia to be 

 due to pure igneous action — to have been injected in a molten state as we 

 now see them. The difficulties which every chemical geologist has suggested 

 to this now entirely exploded view— of which it is only fair to say the writer 

 has some notion — he sets aside, in a few off-hand sentences. The great ques- 

 tions of the comparative action of heat with regard to other agencies in the for- 

 mation of the earth's crust, which are at present actively occupying the attention 

 of the greatest living natural philosophers, he disposes of in a very summary 

 manner — so summarily, in fact, that he may be said to " polish them off." He 

 resuscitates that form of complacent sentence with which writers of former 

 years were wont to dispose of any objection to the most ultra-igneous doc- 

 trines ; and no doubt feels himself secure under this imitation of the style and 

 views of eminent authorities. He should remember, however, that geology is 

 the most progressive of sciences, and that what was considered very sound 

 and orthodox a dozen years ago may, in the present day, be a gross anachronism ; 

 indeed, a more familiar acquaintance with the recent expressions of these emi- 

 nent Nestors of our science, would have taught him that they are now content 

 to express themselves in much more guarded language. 



As ordinary metalliferous veins were evidently not injected in an igneous 

 condition in the state we now see them, Mr. Belt accounts for this discrepancy 

 between observed facts and his hypothesis by affirming that all the phenomena 

 giving evidence of aqueous and other actions in veins, are due to causes subse- 

 quent to their origin, and thus disposes of these phenomena : — " having sepa- 

 rated from the inquiry the facts due to secondary agencies, we find the residual 

 phenomena strictly such as might have been produced by igneous action." 

 Such is Mr. Belt's theory, according to which quartz gold veins are metallife- 

 rous veins in their normal unaltered condition, while ordinary metallic lodes are 

 the same things altered by secondary action. We are not so very much sur- 

 prised at such an extraordinary hypothesis from a man who has admittedly no 

 knowledge of ordinary metalliferous veins ; but may we not fairly ask how a man 

 so unacquainted with his subject could feel justified in rushing into print upon 

 it ? The inspection of half a dozen Cornish lodes must have scattered such a 

 theory to the winds ; and surely if the subject was worth writing on it was 

 worth this slight preliminary trouble. 



As we have said before, we have no doubt Mr. Belt is a most painstaking 

 man, and a highly respectable person, who expresses himself very decorously 

 in an excellent imitation of the ponderous scientific style. But he is evidently 

 a man of but one idea. He got the idea in Australia that quartz gold veins 

 were easiest accounted for by assuming their igneous injection, and, in accord- 

 ance with this assumption, he endeavours to compress the whole phenomena of 

 metalliferous lodes, picking his data out of rather old books, a large propor- 

 tion of which are no great authority themselves. In former days, we had 

 "theories of the earth" — Huttonian theories, Wernerian theories — written 

 exactly in this spirit, and we know how injurious their effect was on the pro- 

 gress of geology. In the domain of science, small men must, at least at present, 

 be satisfied with the role of observers of facts ; big men can alone usefully 

 attempt to grapple general theories — even they often enough burn their fingers 

 there. At any rate, before Mr. Beit again favours the world with his views on 

 metalliferous lodes, or on gold quartz veins, we recommend him to see a lode — 

 if it be only one — in some great mining district ; and to study some recent and 

 really valuable work on auriferous deposits, such as that of Oscar Lieber. 



