89 
gradual I Tis passing strange that philosophy should so 
persistently regard the unstable element, which must indicate 
upon its superlicial contour any change of the equilibrium 
TUCnntainittg a given centre of gravity, as "a fixed hydrostatic 
level," by which to measure the supposed elevations or de- 
pressions of the solid land. If the case were reversed in this 
age, and Newton's theory of solar attraction, acting. unequally 
upon an otherwise unaccounted for, and but -imagined equa- 
torial bulge, held to corroborate a notion hazarded that the 
globe was, and is, a ball of liquid lire, Upon which our earth is 
but the hardened crust, — how incredulous would philosophy 
display itself ! 
The North British Review, No. lxix., page 77, states that 
" in a raised beach at Leith, fragments of Roman pottery, 
along with bones apparently of deer, and littoral (sea- 
margin) shells have been discovered at a height of twenty- 
five feet above the sea," and suggests that "so great a 
change within so recent a period tempts us to pause before 
we give assent to the enormous intervals of time which 
some geologists demand for the accomplishment of other 
changes that have elapsed since the advent of man." 
" The discovery of the Mastodon Uigauteus iu Orange 
County, State of New York, now in Dr. Warren's museum, 
in Boston, with live or six bushels of pine and maple twigs 
in excellent preservation in the cavity of its abdomen, and 
with the vegetable libre still undeeayod in the hollows of its 
teeth, settled the question of the remote antiquity of that 
mastodon's last meal. . . . The tradition of the Indians 
is explained, who report that their fathers had seen in the 
forests large deer, never lying down, but leaning against a 
tree while they slept — tree-eaters with a hand (trunk) on 
their faces. " 
In the Book of Enoch, rescued from oblivion by Brace, 
the traveller, in Abyssinia, there is evinced on the ]>art of 
its author acquaintance with astronomical phenomena. Its 
authenticity lias been, denied on the ground that it has 
apparently been composed by two individuals, one of whom 
must have resided south-west of the Erythrean Sea, that is, 
of the Persian Gulf, Bed Sea, and that part of the ocean 
which washes the shores of Arabia ; therefore the place 
delineated by him must have been south of the Abyssinian 
mountains, and in or about north latitude 9° and longitude 
30". lie describes the longest days as containing twelve 
parts out of — eighteen, the whole number into which the day 
was then divided. Now twelve are to eighteen, as sixteen 
to twenty -four hours in our mode of computation. Ergo, 
