Of a Country on the Climate. 



207 



rather to distinct characters of geological structure and con- 

 figuration than to unmodified solar influence. First, withregard 

 to configuration: let us suppose a complete change m the whole 

 of the features of the country. If, instead of the Great 

 Dividino- Range, there were a chain of mountams extend- 

 ino- from Cape Otway northwards for 500 or 700 miles, with 

 an altitude of 14,000 or 16,000 feet, which is far above the 

 line of perpetual snow in these latitudes, as they are circum- 

 stanced, we should have corresponding alterations m the 

 course and extent of the rivers, some of which might, m the 

 discharge of their waters, rival the lesser streams of Kussia 

 or America. The lower currents of air, flowing from the 

 south, highly charged with moisture, would be condensed as 

 they approached the snow-clad heights, and copious showers 

 of rain would fall at all seasons of the year. Hot winds 

 would be unknown. In winter we should have ice on the 

 rivers very near the level of the sea. The results of such a 

 change in the features of the country would extend to the 

 nei<^hbouring islands, and the snowy height of Mount Erebus, 

 with the vast extent of land lying around the Antarctic 

 circle might not be unaffected.* 



But let us suppose another change, equally great, ot 

 a different character. I have previously described this country 

 as being low and level, with extensive plains and chains of 

 hills of inconsiderable height. By a modification of the 

 formative causes producing such results, the whole extent of 

 Victoria might have been raised gradually and evenly to the 

 present elevation of its plains. Instead of the contorted 

 shales and sandstones, and the protruding Plutomc rocks, we 

 we might have had a series of perfectly horizontal strata, f 

 Instead of the guUeys and ranges, the diversity of hill and 

 plain the result of this would be a level tract of sandy waste, 

 without one hill to break the dreary monotony of the outline. 

 The present rivers and creeks would be replaced by swamps 

 and lakes of fresh and brackish, and salt water, fully exposed 

 to the intense solar heat of these latitudes. Vegetation not 



* It is perhaps, necessary to state, that the eflfect here spoken of would tend 

 to moderate the intense cold of the Antartic regions. Very high lands, m 

 Australia, would radiate solar heat over an immense space, whole high lands 

 much farther south would lower the temperature very sensibly. _ 



+ This is not a violent supposition. The bilurian strata m Eussia are inva- 

 riably horizontal. Sir R. I. Murchison has ably explained the geological struc- 

 ture of that vast country, and he particularly mentions the recurrence of j^Zams 

 ofpalmozoicformatiom-Vsx^ strata being honzontal.-See Murchison s Siluria, 

 pp. 16, 19, 322, 323. 



