BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 



503 



certified by documentary evidence. Originally that temple was, no douht. builfc 

 above the level of the sea, its site then sank twelve feet, so as to submerge its 

 columns in a fresh-vrater deposit, whieh protected them from future injury. 

 The subsidence, however, continued, and there the sea swept over newly-formed 

 marshy surface, covering the columns of .Jupiter's Temple to a depth of nine feet 

 more, and exposing them to the depredations of that destructive bivalve, the 

 *' Lithodomus of Cuvier. from which they have greatly suffered. At one period, 

 then, they were sunk twenty-one feet below the sea level, leaving a little less 

 than half their original height above it ; but then another change took place, and 

 the flat shore where this temple stands gradually rose again, a document of the 

 reign of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, referring to a grant of land at Pozznoli 

 made to the University of that town, " where the sea is drying up," and another 

 of Ferdinand's alone a little later, speaking of the same locale, as one " where the 

 ground was dried up." Again, an earthquake that occurred in 1819 on the 

 delta of the Indus, was followed by very extraordinary and permanent changes 

 in the levels of the adjacent districts, the eastern channel of that river bounding 

 the province of Cutch suddenly deepening at Luckput from one to eighteen feet, 

 and at the same time creating a large inland lake, whilst Sindree, above Luckput, 

 together with its fort, gradually sunk below the newly created waters until its 

 angle towers alone appeared above their surface : but in exchange for this 

 depression, an elevation fifty miles long appeared rising from a previously flat 

 plain at a distance of about five miles from Sindre, which the inhabitants very 

 appropriately termed " Ullah Bund," or Mound of God. 



Perhaps, however, the most striking modem illustration of what has once taken 

 place in many portions of England, may at this time be witnessed in the United 

 States. In 1811 the valley reaching from the mouth of the Ohio to that of the 

 St. Francis. 300 miles long, was much convulsed, after which several new lakes 

 were formed; the largest of these is one near Xew Madrid, in Missouri, and 

 termed the sunk country," from whose placid surface rise the trunks of innu- 

 merable semi-submerged trees, ail dead, and whitening in the wind previous to 

 the final plunge they must all shortly make into that deadly element below, 

 wherein so many of their brothers have already sunk before them. It may be re- 

 marked, however, that volcanic agency was the cause of the first subsidences spoken 

 of, whereas no signs of such a power exist in the lowlands of Lincolnshire or on 

 its coast. But neither are they to be found in that of the American sunk 

 country ; nor do earthquakes usually leave any direct evidences of theii' mighty 

 agency behind them, although they often have been connected with permanent 

 changes of the earth's surface of a great and extraordinary character. Again, 

 even some natives of Lincolnshire may say. " But when had we earthquakes ?" I 

 will therefore instance a few. In 1048 there "was a serious convulsion in that 

 county; also another in 1117 that particularly affected the division of Holland, 

 greatly endangering and injui-ing Croyland Abbey, portions of which, then just 

 built, were with difficulty stayed up by vast timber props. In 11 So Lincoln was 

 much damaged by an earthquake. In 1418 a violent shock was again felt in the 

 southern parts of the country. In 1750 a shock was felt throug'ioui its whole 

 extent, and another in the Bourn district so late as the year 17t'2. It is not 

 necessary to point to any instances of elevation of land in Lincolnshire as a 

 counterpoise to the subsidence of others, for the purpose of corroborating this 

 theory, which I have ventui^ed to advance, because none was observable in the case 

 of the Missisippi Valley and other examples ; but I am inclined to think that a 

 slow upward movement has began to take place in large districts of Lincolnshire 

 long ago, and that by means of carefury-conducted scientific observations, this 

 will hereafter be certainly proved and accurately measured. The filling up of 

 channels and estuaries of large size that formerly existed, and the very rapid 

 growth of its coast, apparently in'iicate this, whilst the known gradual but 

 cc-ntinually increasing elevation of the Danish coast and pans of Norway, greatly 

 strengthen such a supposition. IN'or need such a hypothesis be considered 

 extravagant : there stands the fact of the existence of submarine forests. They 

 must have acquired their present position through some conTulsion of nature ; 



