BOOK read of in ancient history; the ancient celebrity, in ScandiXVIII. navia, of countries which could not even have existed, if Diminution of the Baltic, by the new grounds. we admit the hypothesis of Celsius, the absolute silence of popular traditions, and of ancient Scaldic poetry, which would not have failed to preserve some brief recollections of so great and so memorable a change. In short, if the Baltic sea has diminished, such an occurrence must be referred to those remote periods, involved in the obscurity of ages, when perhaps some very great catastrophe caused a general drying of the ocean, which covered a great part of the earth. But if such a change has taken place, it is certainly an event altogether unconnected with the order of nature under which we live, and with a successive diminution of the present sea.* A less bold hypothesis may be proposed with regard to the Baltic sea. We may attribute solely to the clearing of clearing of Finland, and some extensive Russian provinces, as well as to the successive destruction of forests in the north, a successive diminution in the quantity of river water flowing into the Baltic sea; consequently this sea, once a little more elevated than the northern sea, and that of the ocean, will have sunk to the general level of other seas. Not only does the clearing of the ground sometimes diminish, and at other times increase, the quantity of running water in a country; but it also changes the atmospherical constitution; it renders it, generally speaking, warmer, consequently it augments the evaporation which daily takes place at the surface of the waters. We think that this explanation will be sufficient to account for all the changes which are observed in the level of inland seas. Local changes. Example. We have seen the effects produced by the Baltic sea: we have seen the island of Hveen, the celebrated residence of Tycho Brahe, diminished by the violence of the waves; whilst a few leagues from thence, near the southern point * Bring (since named Lagerbring) de Fundamentis Chronologiæ Sueo-Gothicæ, p. 48, 50, 55, 73, 76. Rhyzelius, Episcopia Sueo-Gothica, ii. 148. Suhm, Esquisse de l'Origine des Peuples, p. 11, &c. of Scania, an island is formed, composed of sand: some BOOK grass having taken root there, has raised and consolidated XVIII. it; and it increases every year, without any sinking of the neighbouring sea. The straits through which lakes and infand seas discharge themselves, may be compared to large rivers, which often experience local changes upon their banks. the frost. The frost contributes to elevate certain parts of the Bal- Effects of tic coast. When the lakes and large rivers are frozen, the porous earth which borders them, forms, with the neighbouring water, one single mass of ice. If now, waters which are not frozen, happen to join the mass also not frozen, of either lakes or rivers, the crust of ice must be raised, and the frozen earth must be raised along with it; the void which is formed below these raised masses is filled by mud and gravel from the bottom of the lakes and rivers. Thus after the thaw, the porous earth is left lying on a more elevated level than it had at first. These facts may be observed every year in East Bothnia. The marine ice, suddenly broken by some oscillation of the sea, lifts up whole rocks, and carries them further upon the land. In Sweden, there are two rocks which owe to this cause a more elevated position than they once had. Kalm, who has Observamade such accurate observations on North America, says, Western that there are considerable additions made to the land in the America. province of New Jersey, along the rivers, but he attributes them to the clearing of the country. Uncultivated ground covered with rocks, moss, and briars, is proof against the influence of running water; whilst cultivated land presents to the action of the water a surface rendered moveable by the plough, and decomposed by the air and the sun, the small and light particles of which are easily carried along by the waters. This observation appears to us to be very correct, and perfectly conformable to what we see * Bergmann, Géographie Physique, ii. 244, sqq. Runeberg, Dissertation, &c. dans les Mém. de l'Académie de Stockholm, tions upon BOOK in the north, especially in the clayey and muddy ground.* XVIII. It is useless to enter into a minuter detail concerning other General conclusion. old wrecks of ships. quarters of the world. The augmentations of soil near Tehama in Arabia, and the alleged submersion of the Bridge of Adam, which, it is said, joined the island of Ceylon to India, would furnish us with a decided contrast. From the Voyage of Nearchus we should learn, that notwithstanding the immense tides, the coasts at the mouth of the Indus have not been sensibly changed since the time of Alexander. Were we to believe the Chinese annals, we should on the other hand have clear proofs of the progressive desiccation of the globe. But the coasts on the north-west of America, would present us with traces of the encroachments of the ocean. In short, all the facts that have been collected, when carefully examined and carefully weighed, bring us to no other conclusion than this-that the existing sea is completely stationary, and that its level falls and rises from local and temporary causes, without any change in its general volume. If, notwithstanding this historical truth, we find, on the continent, and even at a considerable height, anchors and Remarks wrecks of vessels, we can explain these phenomena by adupon the mitting a tradition recorded in the inspired pages of Moses, and ably defended by Deluc. When the soil of our present continents formed the bottom of the ocean, there existed another continent peopled with inhabitants; a continent which disappeared in consequence of a great catastrophe, which at the same time left dry the existing habitable earth. The antediluvians, therefore, navigated above the level of our present fields: they pursued the whale where we now reap our harvest; they cast anchor upon our mountains, which were then rocks and islands in the bosom of the sea. Whatever may be the fate of this hypothesis, Deluc has clearly shewn that these ancient wrecks cannot establish a progressive diminution of the existing sca.† + Deluc, Lettres Physiques et Morales, ii. Lettres 89 et 90. Let us now contemplate the ravages of another element. BOOK The name of volcano, taken from that which the Romans XVIII. gave to the God of Fire, now designates those mountains Volcanoes. which vomit forth flames, smoke, and torrents of melted matter. The chimney through which the smoke and melted matter issue, terminates in a vast cavity in the form of a truncated and inverted cone. This mouth of the volcano is termed the crater. volcanic The eruption of a volcano is a most frightful and most Descripmajestic phenomenon. The signs which are the forerun- tion of ners of the explosion, announce that the invisible combat eruptions. of the enraged elements has already commenced. These are, violent moveinents which shake the earth afar off, prolonged bellowings, subterranean thunders, which roll in the sides of the agitated mountain. Very soon the smoke, which is almost continually emitted from the mouth of the volcano, increases, thickens, and ascends, under the form of a black column. The summit of this column, yielding to its own weight, sinks down, becomes rounded, and presents itself under the appearance of the head of a pine tree, having the lower part for its trunk. This hideous tree does not long remain immoveable: the winds agitate its blackened mass, and disperse it in branches, which form so many trains of clouds. At other times the scene opens with more brilliancy. A stream of flame rises beyond a collection of clouds, keeps immoveable for some time, and then appears like a pillar of fire which rests upon the ground, and threatens to set the sky in a blaze. A black smoke environs it, and from time to time intercepts the dazzling brightness. A number of lightnings appear to flash from the midst of the burning mass. On a sudden, the brilliant cascade seems to fall back into the crater, and its fearful splendour is succeeded by profound darkness. The effervescence, however, goes on in the interior abysses of the mountain; ashes, dross, and burning stones, are projected in diverging lines, like the spouts of fireworks, and fall around the mouth of the volcano. Enormous fragments of rocks appear to be heaved against the skies by the arms of the new Titans. BOOK A torrent of water is often thrown out with impetuosity, XVIII. and rolls, hissing over the inflamed rocks. There is then the lava. raised from the bottom of the crater a liquid and burning matter, similar to metal when in fusion. This fills the whole of the crater, and reaches to the very edges of the opening. An abundant quantity of dross floats on its surface, which ultimately appears and vanishes as the liquid mass rises or falls in the crater where it seems to boil. This scene, of so majestic a character, is but the prelude of Ravages of real disasters. The liquid matter overflows, runs down the sides of the volcano, and descends to its base. There it sometimes stops, and appears like a fiery serpent recoiling upon itself. More frequently it dilates itself, and gushes out from beneath a kind of solid crust which is formed upon its surface: it advances like a large and impetuous river, destroys whatever it meets with in its course, flows over those obstacles which it cannot overturn, passes along the ramparts of the shaken cities, invades a space of country of several leagues in extent, and transforms in a moment flourishing fields into a burning flame. Equal ravages may be sustained, though the liquid matter called lava, does not issue exactly from the top of the volcano: it is sometimes. too compact and too weighty to be elevated to the summit; its violent efforts then occasion new ruptures in the side of the mountain, through which the igneous torrent rushes out.* Geography noes. A great chain of ignivomous mountains stretches around of volca- the great ocean. Terra del Fuero, Chili, Peru, all the Great vol- chain of the Andes, are full of volcanoes. We distinguish in Peru, those of Arequipa and of Pitchinca; and that of Coto Paxi, whose flames, in 1738, rose higher than 2000 feet, and whose explosion was heard at the distance of 120 canic chain. of the globe. Plin. jun. Epist. lib. ii. p. 16. Pindar, Pyth. I. v. 35-50; Virg. Eneid. III, v. 571-582. Claud. Rapt. Proserp. I. v. 151-176. Della Torre, Histoire du Vésuve, en Italien. Hamilton, Lettres sur les Eruptions du Vésuve. Dolo mieu, Mémoirs sur les îles Ponces; Id, Voyage aux îles Lipari, &c. &c, |