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CHAPTER XIV. 
PROCEEDINGS, 1859 — 1870, 
Between 1859-61, a series of papers were communicated by Capt. 
Drayson, the Astronomer, etc., at the Royal Military Academy, Wool- 
wich, in which he endeavoured to show that the land was raised from 
the sea by the expansion of the crust of the earth, and that the glacial 
period, as generally recognised by geologists, was due to the extreme 
inclination of the orbit of the poles of the earth towards the plane of 
the sun. He quotes Kepler's third law, that the masses of the planet 
vary as the square roots of the distance, and endeavours to prove 
that the density of the earth was at one time considerably greater 
than it is now ; and if that be* so, it follows that the earth's orbit 
must have been less, and that it would have had a correspondingly 
closer proximity to the sun. The density of the rocky crust of the 
earth is equal to about 2h times that of water, the mean density of 
the whole earth five times the density of water. To the pressure 
upon the central masses and their condensation is due the increased 
weight, and before the expansion of the crust of the earth it must 
have been much greater than at the present time. He adduces the 
opinion of eminent geologists that during the formation of the gneiss 
and micacious beds there is no proof of any land having emerged from 
the water, and it was not until the close of the primary period that 
any of the continents began to emerge from this universal sea. If 
therefore at this early period of the earth's history, there had been 
no elevation of land, the pressure upon the internal and central 
parts of the globe must have been at its maximum, consequently, 
according to the law of Kepler, the earth must have been much 
nearer to the sun during the evolution of the rocks above the old red 
