the confined waters. Such changes of level and opening of fissures, as have accompanied earthquakes since the commencement of the present century, or such excavations of ravines as the receding cataract of Niagara is now effecting, might break the barriers. Notwithstanding

therefore that we have not witnessed within the last 3000 years the devastation by deluge of a large continent, yet as we may predict the future occurrence of such castastrophes, we are authorized to regard them as part of the present order of nature, and they may be introduced into geological speculations respecting the past, provided we do not imagine them to have been more frequent or general, than we expect them to be in time to come."-Principles of Geology, vol. i. p. 88.

It is on such grounds, that one of the most voluminous and learned among the recent English geologists disputes the Mosaic history of the deluge; and we have introduced the above extract to shew, that even men of argument on other subjects, often reason in the most ridiculous manner, and on grounds totally false, when they undertake to deny the truth of the Holy Scriptures.

Mr. Lyell's argument runs thus. "Because there are great lakes in North America situated 600 feet above the sea, and because the cataract of Niagara is receding towards these lakes at the rate of fifty yards in forty years; therefore we may anticipate great floods in future, and we therefore presume that they have happened again and again in past times." Consequently we must presume that all the changes the earth has undergone by water, have been produced by such catastrophes, and therefore Noah's flood never happened, and so the Mosaic history is not to be believed.

It is plain that Mr. Lyell's zeal to show that there has been no universal deluge made him forget, that in another part of his volume he states that the quantity of sediment which is every year deposited in lake Erie is such, that it will finally be filled up and become dry land, and as he does not expect the cataract of Niagara will drain this lake until the end of 30,000 years, we may hope that it will become solid within that period.

But independently of this oversight, no person of the least reflection, whether geologist or not, would for a moment believe that a lake, formed like a dish, and surrounded on all sides by solid limestone rocks ninety feet thick,

as Erie is, could be drained to its bottom in a few hours by the action of its own waters. Suppose the cataract of Niagara now at the outlet of lake Erie and moving into it at the rate of fifty yards in forty years, or a little more than a yard per year, we would inquire of Mr. Lyell how long a period would be consumed in draining it to the bottom, and whether the escape of its waters thus sudden, "would cause a tremendous deluge," as he asserts.

The title of Mr. Lyell's book being, " An attempt to explain the former changes of the Earth's surface, by reference to causes now in operation," is itself an attack on the sacred Scriptures, but we are happy to believe that Christianity is in little danger from his arguments.

Mountain Slides. Instances have happened in various parts of the world, where considerable changes have been produced in the surface of the globe, by the sliding of large portions of earth, together with fragments of rocks, from the declivities of mountains. These changes are readily distinguished from those occasioned by the general deluge, not only by their local and more recent appearance, but also by the direction in which these precipitated rocks remain with respect to the range of the mountain from which they have fallen. For the great currents of the deluge left their effects in lines corresponding with the ranges of most of the high mountains and considerable valleys, where they are still to be seen; whereas occasional slides leave their effects at the feet of the mountains, in piles, or in downward ranges.

Slide of the White Mountains. The White Mountains are situated in New Hampshire, and are the highest land in New England. The slide to be described took place in August, 1826, and was in consequence of the fall of an immense quantity of rain on the mountain.

On both sides of the river Saco, innumerable rocks and stone, many of them of sufficient size to fill a common apartment were detached, and in their descent swept down before them in one promiscuous and frightful ruin, forest shrubs, and the earth in which they grew. No tradition existed of any similar catastrophe at former times, and the growth of the forests on the flanks of the mountain clearly proved, that at least for a long interval, nothing similar had occurred. One of these moving masses was after

wards found to have slid three miles, consisting of rocks, earth, trees, &c., with an average breadth of a quarter of a mile. The excavations commenced generally in a trench a few yards in depth, and a few rods in width, and descended the mountain, widening and deepening until they became vast chasms. Forests of spruce and hemlock were apparently prostrated with as much ease as if they had been fields of grain. The valleys of the rivers Amunoosuck and Saco presented for many miles, an uninterrupted scene of desolation; all the bridges being carried away and the ground strewed with the wrecks of trees and rocks, and in many instances large quantities of soil. In some places the road was excavated to the depth of 15 or 20 feet; and in others it was covered with rocks, trees and soil to as great a height. In various places, as shown by the remaining marks, the water rose to the height of 25 feet above its ordinary level.

But these things are of little consequence when compared with the human suffering which this catastrophe occasioned, for a family of nine persons were destroyed on the night of the 28th, and not one lived to relate the circumstances.

This family, named Willey, occupied a house at the foot of the mountain, a most lonely place, six miles from any other human habitation. It was a resting place for travellers. On the morning of the 28th, the house was found standing but not a human being was there. In the course of a few days, seven out of the nine bodies were found at a short distance below the house buried under the ruins of the mountain, and most of them shockingly mangled. It appeared that one of the heaviest slides from the top of the mountain had rushed in the most impetuous manner towards the house, but when within six feet of it had divided, and passed on each side, leaving the house untouched, but sweeping away the stables and horsAt this time it is supposed that the family left the house, and met their destruction; had they remained, all would have been safe.-Silliman's Journal for January, 1829.

es.

Flood in the Valley of Bagnes, in 1818. Bagnes forms a part of the main valley above the lake of Geneva, in Switzerland.

The Valley of of the Rhone, Through this

valley passes the river Dranse, which falls into the Rhone above the lake. In 1818, in consequence of the fall of avalanches, the Dranse was completely damned up, so that a barrier of ice remained across its channel, until the melting of the snow in the spring, formed a lake in its bed, a mile and a half in length, about seven hundred feet wide, and in some places, two hundred feet deep. To prevent the consequences apprehended from the sudden bursting of this barrier, the people cut a tunnel through it, several hundred feet in length, before the water had risen to any considerable height. When the water had accumulated so as to reach this tunnel or gallery, it ran through, and melting the ice it drained off about one half of the lake. But at length, on the approach of the hot season, the central portion of the remaining mass of ice gave way with a tremenduous crash, and the residue of the lake was emptied in half an hour. In the course of its descent, the water encountered several narrow gorges, and at each of these it rose to a great height, and then bursting its barriers, rushed forward with increased violence, sweeping along rocks, houses, trees, bridges, and cultivated lands. For the greater part of its course, the flood resembled a moving mass of rocks and mud, rather than of water. Some fragments of primary rock of enormous magnitude, and which from their dimensions, might be compared, without exaggeration, to houses, were torn out of a more ancient alluvion, and borne down for a quarter of a mile. The velocity of the water in the first part of its course, was thirty-three feet per second, which diminished to six feet, before it reached the lake of Geneva, where it arrived in six hours, the distance being 45 miles.

This flood left behind it on the plains of Martigny, thousands of trees torn up by the roots, together with the fragments of many buildings. Some of the houses in the town of Martigny were filled with mud up to the second story. After expanding in the plain, where the town stands, it passed into the Rhone and did no further damage. Many lives were destroyed by this flood, and the bodies of several persons were found on the surface of the Geneva lake, thirty miles from the place where they were swept away.

Inundations precisely similar, and from the same cause, are recorded to have happened in former periods. In 1595, the town of Martigny was destroyed by such a flood

and from sixty to eighty persons perished; and in a similar catastrophe which took place, fifty years before, one hundred and forty persons lost their lives.

For several months after the debacle just described, the river Dranse, having no settled channel, shifted its position continually from one side to the other of the valley, carrying away newly erected bridges, undermining houses, and continuing to be charged with as large a quantity of earthy matter as the fluid could hold in suspension.— See Ed. Phil. Jour. vol. i. p. 187: and Lyell's Geology, vol. i. p. 194.

Now although we have no disposition to deny that great changes have been wrought on the face of the earth by the power of running streams, the bursting of lakes, &c. yet all these effects combined, utterly fail to account for the appearances enumerated under the article "Deluge." The phenomena presented by the great valleys of the Alps, the Pyrenees, and the Jura, cannot be attributed to any cause, but a sudden and mighty torrent of water, such as no one has thought fit to ascribe to the bursting of a lake, and of which history contains no account, except that of the Noachian deluge.

CHANGES EFFECTED BY SPRINGS.

The theory of springs will be reserved for another place. At present, our object will be to show the effects which springs have had in changing the surface of the globe.

It is obvious that springs of pure water, unless uncommonly powerful, will produce but little effect on the surface along which they run, and with a few exceptions, their excavating effects are scarcely to be taken into account. But springs which contain carbonic acid gas, often hold considerable quantities of calcareous matter in solution, and which is deposited along their courses, producing what geologists term calcareous tufa, or travertine.

These deposites are generally porous, and mixed with leaves, bits of wood, mud, &c. but when more pure, they are so solid as to be employed for building stones. Many of these springs are thermal, or warm, and abound chiefly in volcanic countries.

In those parts of France and Italy which skirt the Ap