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Now came I (and with fear I bid my strain
Record the marvel) where the souls were all
Whelm’d underneath, transparent, as through glass
Pellucid the frail stem. Some prone were laid,
Others stood upright, this upon the soles,
That on his head, a third with face to feet
Arch’d like a bow. When to the point we came,
Whe... | Divine Comedy, Cary's Translation, Hell | Dante Alighieri | 1265 | 1321 | ['en'] | 47 | {'Epic poetry, Italian -- Translations into English', 'Italian poetry -- To 1400 -- Translations into English', 'Hell -- Poetry'} | PG1005 | |
I clipp’d him round the neck, for so he bade;
And noting time and place, he, when the wings
Enough were op’d, caught fast the shaggy sides,
And down from pile to pile descending stepp’d
Between the thick fell and the jagged ice.
Soon as he reach’d the point, whereat the thigh
Upon the swelling of the haunches turns,
M... | Divine Comedy, Cary's Translation, Hell | Dante Alighieri | 1265 | 1321 | ['en'] | 47 | {'Epic poetry, Italian -- Translations into English', 'Italian poetry -- To 1400 -- Translations into English', 'Hell -- Poetry'} | PG1005 | |
Richard Prairie and PG Distributed Proofreaders
DISCOURSES:
BIOLOGICAL & GEOLOGICAL
ESSAYS
BY
THOMAS H. HUXLEY
1894
PREFACE
The con... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Yet the children of this world are wise in their generation; and both the
politician and the priest are justified by results. The living voice has
an influence over human action altogether independent of the intellectual
worth of that which it utters. Many years ago, I was a guest at a great
City dinner. A famous orat... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
On the other hand, of the affliction caused by persons who think that
what they have picked up from popular exposition qualifies them for
discussing the great problems of science, it may be said, as the Radical
toast said of the power of the Crown in bygone days, that it "has
increased, is increasing, and ought to be ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
For I think it will be admitted, that the germs brought to us by
meteorites, if any, were not ova of elephants, nor of crocodiles; not
cocoa-nuts nor acorns; not even eggs of shell-fish and corals; but only
those of the lowest forms of animal and vegetable life. Therefore, since
it is proved that, from a very remote e... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
T.H. HUXLEY.
HODESLEA, EASTBOURNE,
_April, 1894._
CONTENTS
I
ON A PIECE OF CHALK [1868]
(A Lecture delivered to the working men of Norwich during the meeting of
the British Association.)
II
THE PROBLEMS OF THE DEEP SEA [1878]
III
ON SOME OF THE RESULTS OF THE EXPEDITION OF H.M.S. "CHALLENGER" [1875]
IV
YEAST [1871... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Were the thin soil which covers it all washed away, a curved band of
white chalk, here broader, and there narrower, might be followed
diagonally across England from Lulworth in Dorset, to Flamborough Head in
Yorkshire--a distance of over 280 miles as the crow flies. From this band
to the North Sea, on the east, and th... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
What is this wide-spread component of the surface of the earth? and
whence did it come?
You may think this no very hopeful inquiry. You may not unnaturally
suppose that the attempt to solve such problems as these can lead to no
result, save that of entangling the inquirer in vague speculations,
incapable of refutatio... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
It is desirable for us to start from the knowledge of this fact, though
it may not seem to help us very far towards what we seek. For carbonate
of lime is a widely-spread substance, and is met with under very various
conditions. All sorts of limestones are composed of more or less pure
carbonate of lime. The crust whi... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
A suggestion which may naturally enough present itself is, that these
curious bodies are the result of some process of aggregation which has
taken place in the carbonate of lime; that, just as in winter, the rime
on our windows simulates the most delicate and elegantly arborescent
foliage--proving that the mere minera... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
At the same time, it became desirable to ascertain and to indicate the
nature of the sea-bottom, since this circumstance greatly affects its
goodness as holding ground for anchors. Some ingenious tar, whose name
deserves a better fate than the oblivion into which it has fallen,
attained this object by "arming" the bot... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 1: See Appendix to Captain Dayman's _Deep-sea Soundings in the
North Atlantic Ocean between Ireland and Newfoundland, made in H.M.S.
"Cyclops_." Published by order of the Lords Commissioners of the
Admiralty, 1858. They have since formed the subject of an elaborate
Memoir by Messrs. Parker and Jones, publish... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
_Globigerinoe_ of every size, from the smallest to the largest, are
associated together in the Atlantic mud, and the chambers of many are
filled by a soft animal matter. This soft substance is, in fact, the
remains of the creature to which the _Globigerinoe_ shell, or rather
skeleton, owes its existence--and which is ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
But if the _Radiolaria_ and Diatoms are thus rained upon the bottom of
the sea, from the superficial layer of its waters in which they pass
their lives, it is obviously possible that the _Globigerinoe_ may be
similarly derived; and if they were so, it would be much more easy to
understand how they obtain their supply ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
In working over the soundings collected by Captain Dayman, I was
surprised to find that many of what I have called the "granules" of that
mud were not, as one might have been tempted to think at first, the more
powder and waste of _Globigerinoe_, but that they had a definite form and
size. I termed these bodies "_cocc... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
It may be worth while briefly to consider a few of these collateral
proofs that the chalk was deposited at the bottom of the sea. The great
mass of the chalk is composed, as we have seen, of the skeletons of
_Globigerinoe_, and other simple organisms, imbedded in granular matter.
Here and there, however, this hardened... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
No less certain it is that the time during which the countries we now
call south-east England, France, Germany, Poland, Russia, Egypt, Arabia,
Syria, were more or less completely covered by a deep sea, was of
considerable duration. We have already seen that the chalk is, in places,
more than a thousand feet thick. I t... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"The upper valve is almost invariably wanting, though occasionally found
in a perfect state of preservation in the white chalk at some distance.
In this case, we see clearly that the sea-urchin first lived from youth
to age, then died and lost its spines, which were carried away. Then the
young _Crania_ adhered to the... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The foundation of all this calculation is, of course, a knowledge of the
length of time the _Crania_ and the coralline needed to attain their full
size; and, on this head, precise knowledge is at present wanting. But
there are circumstances which tend to show, that nothing like an inch of
chalk has accumulated during ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The chalk, then, is certainly older than the boulder clay. If you ask how
much, I will again take you no further than the same spot upon your own
coasts for evidence. I have spoken of the boulder clay and drift as
resting upon the chalk. That is not strictly true. Interposed between the
chalk and the drift is a compar... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Thus you have, within the limits of your own county, proof that the chalk
can justly claim a very much greater antiquity than even the oldest
physical traces of mankind. But we may go further and demonstrate, by
evidence of the same authority as that which testifies to the existence
of the father of men, that the chal... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
I must ask you to believe that there is no less conclusive proof that a
still more prolonged succession of similar changes occurred, before the
chalk was deposited. Nor have we any reason to think that the first term
in the series of these changes is known. The oldest sea-beds preserved to
us are sands, and mud, and p... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
But, amongst these fading remainders of a previous state of things, are
some very modern forms of life, looking like Yankee pedlars among a tribe
of Red Indians. Crocodiles of modern type appear; bony fishes, many of
them very similar to existing species, almost supplant the forms of fish
which predominate in more anc... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Taking the many changes of any given spot of the earth's surface, from
sea to land and from land to sea, as an established fact, we cannot
refrain from asking ourselves how these changes have occurred. And when
we have explained them--as they must be explained--by the alternate slow
movements of elevation and depressi... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
How is the existence of this long succession of different species of
crocodiles to be accounted for? Only two suppositions seem to be open to
us--Either each species of crocodile has been specially created, or it
has arisen out of some pre-existing form by the operation of natural
causes. Choose your hypothesis; I hav... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
II
THE PROBLEMS OF THE DEEP SEA
[1873]
On the 21st of December, 1872, H.M.S. _Challenger_, an eighteen gun
corvette, of 2,000 tons burden, sailed from Portsmouth harbour for a
three, or perhaps four, years' cruise. No man-of-war ever left that
famous port before with so singular an equipment. Two of the eighteen
sixt... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"In the spring of the year 1868, my friend Dr. W.B. Carpenter, at that
time one of the Vice-Presidents of the Royal Society, was with me in
Ireland, where we were working out together the structure and development
of the Crinoids. I had long previously had a profound conviction that the
land of promise for the natural... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 1: The Depths of the Sea, pp. 49-50.]
Plain men may be puzzled to understand why Dr. Wyville Thomson, not being
a cynic, should relegate the "Land of Promise" to the bottom of the deep
sea, they may still more wonder what manner of "milk and honey" the
_Challenger_ expects to find; and their perplexity may w... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 2: The emotional side of the scientific nature has its
singularities. Many persons will call to mind a certain philosopher's
tenderness over his watch--"the little creature"--which was so singularly
lost and found again. But Dr. Wyville Thomson surpasses the owner of the
watch in his loving-kindness towards ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
To the coral-fishers of the Mediterranean, who seek the precious red
coral, which grows firmly fixed to rocks at a depth of sixty to eighty
fathoms, both the dredge and the trawl would be useless. They, therefore,
have recourse to a sort of frame, to which are fastened long bundles of
loosely netted hempen cord, and w... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
It is obvious that between the dredge, the trawl, and the tangles, there
is little chance for any organism, except such as are able to burrow
rapidly, to remain safely at the bottom of any part of the sea which the
_Challenger_ undertakes to explore. And, for the first time in the
history of scientific exploration, we... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
In regard to matters of fact, Zimmermann's chief aim is to show that
among terrestrial mammals, some occur all over the world, while others
are restricted to particular areas of greater or smaller extent; and that
the abundance of species follows temperature, being greatest in warm and
least in cold climates. But mari... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 3: "Enfin plus has encore, c'est-à-dire alors loin des côtes,
le fond des eaux ne paraît plus être habité, du moms dans nos mers, par
aucun de ces animaux" (1. c. tom. i. p. 237). The "ces animaux" leaves
the meaning of the authors doubtful.]
Audouin and Milne Edwards were the first to see the importance of ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
On the coasts of the British Islands, Forbes distinguishes four zones or
regions, the Littoral (between tide marks), the Laminarian (between
lowwater-mark and 15 fathoms), the Coralline (from 15 to 50 fathoms), and
the Deep sea or Coral region (from 50 fathoms to beyond 100 fathoms).
But, in the deeper waters of the A... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 5: _The Depths of the Sea_, p. 30. Results of a similar kind,
obtained by previous observers, are stated at length in the sixth
chapter, pp. 267-280. The dredgings carried out by Count Pourtales, under
the authority of Professor Peirce, the Superintendent of the United
States Coast Survey, in the years 1867,... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
In certain parts of the sea bottom in the immediate vicinity of the
British Islands, as in the Clyde district, among the Hebrides, in the
Moray Firth, and in the German Ocean, there are depressed areas, forming a
kind of submarine valleys, the centres of which are from 80 to 100
fathoms, or more, deep. These depressio... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"In the deepest of the regions of depth of the Aegean, the representation
of a Northern Fauna is maintained, partly by identical and partly by
representative forms.... The presence of the latter is essentially due to
the law (of representation of parallels of latitude by zones of depth),
whilst that of the former spec... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 7: See above, "On a Piece of Chalk," p. 13.]
"Two years ago, M. Sars, Swedish Government Inspector of Fisheries, had
an opportunity, in his official capacity, of dredging off the Loffoten
Islands at a depth of 300 fathoms. I visited Norway shortly after his
return, and had an opportunity of studying with his... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 8: The Depths of the Sea, pp. 51-52.]
As we shall see, the assumption that the temperature of the deep sea is
everywhere 39° F. (4° Cent.) is an error, which Dr. Wyville Thomson
adopted from eminent physical writers; but the general justice of the
reasoning is not affected by this circumstance, and Dr. Thoms... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Taking these facts in conjunction with the positive evidence of the
existence, during the Cretaceous epoch, of a deep ocean where now lies
the dry land of central and southern Europe, northern Africa, and western
and southern Asia; and of the gradual diminution of this ocean during the
older tertiary epoch, until it i... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
I have now indicated some of the chief lines of Biological inquiry, in
which the _Challenger_ has special opportunities for doing good service,
and in following which she will be carrying out the work already
commenced by the _Lightning_ and _Porcupine_ in their cruises of 1868 and
subsequent years.
But biology, in t... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
As the mean temperature of the superficial layer of the crust of the
earth may be taken at about 50° Fahr., it follows that the bottom layer
of the deep sea in temperate and hot latitudes, is, on the average, much
colder than either of the bodies with which it is in contact; for the
temperature of the earth is constan... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
In this way, it would seem inevitable that the surface waters of the
northern and southern frigid zones must, sooner or later, find their way
to the bottom of the rest of the ocean; and there accumulate to a
thickness dependent on the rate at which they absorb heat from the crust
of the earth below, and from the surfa... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
It seems extremely difficult to account for this difference in any other
way, than by adopting the views so strongly and ably advocated by Dr.
Carpenter, that, in the existing distribution of land and water, such a
circulation of the water of the ocean does actually occur, as
theoretically must occur, in the universal... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Again, if the Gibraltar indraught is the effect of evaporation, why does
it go on in winter as well as in summer?
All these are questions more easily asked than answered; but they must be
answered before we can accept the Gibraltar stream as an example of a
current produced by indraught with any comfort.
The Mediterra... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
In 1850, Captain Penny collected in Assistance Bay, in Kingston Bay, and
in Melville Bay, which lie between 73° 45' and 74° 40' N., specimens of
the residuum left by melted surface ice, and of the sea bottom in these
localities. Dr. Dickie, of Aberdeen, sent these materials to Ehrenberg,
who made out[2] that the resid... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 3: Now Sir Joseph Hooker. 1894.]
Among the scientific instructions for the voyage drawn up by a committee
of the Royal Society, however, there is a remarkable letter from Von
Humboldt to Lord Minto, then First Lord of the Admiralty, in which, among
other things, he dwells upon the significance of the researc... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 4: _Ueber die noch jetzt zahlreich lebende Thierarten der
Kreidebildung und den Organismus der Polythalamien. Abhandlungen der Kön.
Akad. der Wissenchaften._ 1839. _Berlin_. 1841. I am afraid that this
remarkable paper has been somewhat overlooked in the recent discussions
of the relation of ancient rocks to... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"As the majority of these plants consist of very simple vegetable cells,
enclosed in indestructible silex (as other Algae are in carbonate of
lime), it is obvious that the death and decomposition of such multitudes
must form sedimentary deposits, proportionate in their extent to the
length and exposure of the coast ag... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
With respect to the distribution of the _Diatomaceoe_, Dr. Hooker
remarks:--
"There is probably no latitude between that of Spitzbergen and Victoria
Land, where some of the species of either country do not exist: Iceland,
Britain, the Mediterranean Sea, North and South America, and the South
Sea Islands, all possess A... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"Along the shores of Graham's Land and the South Shetland Islands, we
have a parallel combination of igneous and aqueous action, accompanied
with an equally copious supply of _Diatomaceoe_. In the Gulf of Erebus
and Terror, fifteen degrees north of Victoria Land, and placed on the
opposite side of the globe, the sound... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"All along the edge of the ice-pack--everywhere, in fact, to the south of
the two stations--on the 11th of February on our southward voyage, and on
the 3rd of March on our return, we brought up fine sand and grayish mud,
with small pebbles of quartz and felspar, and small fragments of mica-
slate, chlorite-slate, clay... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The observations which have been detailed leave no doubt that the
Antarctic sea bottom, from a little to the south of the fiftieth
parallel, as far as 80° S., is being covered by a fine deposit of
silicious mud, more or less mixed, in some parts, with the ice-borne
_débris_ of polar lands and with the ejections of vol... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The first exact information respecting the nature of this mud at depths
greater than 1,000 fathoms was given by Ehrenberg, in the account which
he published in the "Monatsberichte" of the Berlin Academy for the year
1853, of the soundings obtained by Lieut. Berryman, of the United States
Navy, in the North Atlantic, b... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"10. By the mass-forming _Infasoria_ and _Polythalamia_, secondary are
not distinguishable from tertiary formations; and, from what has been
said, it is possible that, at this very day, rock masses are forming in
the sea, and being raised by volcanic agencies, the constitution of
which, on the whole, is altogether sim... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"2. The second hypothesis is far more feasible, and is strongly supported
by the fact that many _Polycistineoe [Radiolaria]_ and _Coscinodisci_ are
well known to live at the surface of the ocean. Mr. Macdonald, Assistant-
Surgeon of H.M.S. _Herald_, now in the South-Western Pacific, has lately
sent home some very valu... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"I abstain, however, at present from drawing any positive conclusions,
preferring rather to await the result of more extended observations."[6]
[Footnote 6: Appendix to Report on Deep-sea Soundings in the Atlantic
Ocean, by Lieut.-Commander Joseph Dayman. 1857.]
Dr. Wallich, Professor Wyville Thomson, and Dr. Carpente... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 8: "Preliminary Notes on the Nature of the Sea-bottom procured
by the soundings of H.M.S. _Challenger_ during her cruise in the Southern
Seas, in the early part of the year 1874."--_Proceedings of the Royal
Society_, Nov. 26, 1874.]
"Mr. Murray has combined with a careful examination of the soundings a
const... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
* * * * *
"In specimens taken with the tow-net the spines are very usually absent;
but that is probably on account of their extreme tenuity; they are broken
off by the slightest touch. In fresh examples from the surface, the dots
indicating the origin of the lost spines may almost always... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Whatever may be the mode of life of the _Foraminifera_, to which the
calcareous element of the deep-sea "chalk" owes its existence, the fact
that it is the chief and most widely spread material of the sea-bottom in
the intermediate zone, throughout both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans,
and the Indian Ocean, at depths ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
It would appear that this infiltration of _Foraminifera_ shells with
_Glauconite_ does not take place at great depths, but rather in what may
be termed a sublittoral region, ranging from a hundred to three hundred
fathoms. It cannot be ascribed to any local cause, for it takes place,
not only over large areas in the G... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Professor Thomson gives the following account of this capital
discovery:--
"According to our present experience, the deposit of _Globigerina_ ooze
is limited to water of a certain depth, the extreme limit of the pure
characteristic formation being placed at a depth of somewhere about 2,250
fathoms. Crossing from these... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"Although we have met with the same phenomenon so frequently, that we
were at length able to predict the nature of the bottom from the depth of
the soundings with absolute certainty for the Atlantic and the Southern
Sea, we had, perhaps, the best opportunity of observing it in our first
section across the Atlantic, be... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
giving a total of 1,900 miles of red clay to 720 miles of _Globigerina_
ooze.
"The nature and origin of this vast deposit of clay is a question of the
very greatest interest; and although I think there can be no doubt that
it is in the main solved, yet some matters of detail are still involved
in difficulty. My first ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"We conclude, therefore, that the 'red clay' is not an additional
substance introduced from without, and occupying certain depressed
regions on account of some law regulating its deposition, but that it is
produced by the removal, by some means or other, over these areas, of the
carbonate of lime, which forms probably... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
* * * * *
"It seems evident from the observations here recorded, that _clay_, which
we have hitherto looked upon as essentially the product of the
disintegration of older rocks, may be, under certain circumstances, an
organic formation like chalk; that, as a matter of fact, an area on th... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
I think it probable that we shall have to wait some time for a sufficient
explanation of the origin of the abyssal red clay, no less than for that
of the sublittoral greensand in the intermediate zone. But the importance
of the establishment of the fact that these various deposits are being
formed in the ocean, at the... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The bearing of the conclusions which are now either established, or
highly probable, respecting the origin of silicious, calcareous, and
clayey rocks, and their metamorphic derivatives, upon the archaeology of
the earth, the elucidation of which is the ultimate object of the
geologist, is of no small importance.
A hun... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Accepting it provisionally, we arrive at the remarkable result that all
the chief known constituents of the crust of the earth may have formed
part of living bodies; that they may be the "ash" of protoplasm; that the
"_rupes saxei_" are not only _"temporis,"_ but "_vitae filiae_"; and,
consequently, that the time duri... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
But, as a matter of fact, the amount of convergence of series, in
relation to the time occupied by the deposition of geological formations,
is extraordinarily small. Of all animals the higher _Vertebrata_ are the
most complex; and among these the carnivores and hoofed animals
(_Ungulata_) are highly differentiated. Ne... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The metamorphism contemplated by the great modern champion of rational
geology is, mainly, that brought about by the exposure of rocks to
subterranean heat; and where no such heat could be shown to have
operated, his opponents assumed that no metamorphosis could have taken
place. But the formation of greensand, and st... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
But this conclusion in nowise conflicts with the deductions of the
physicist from his no less clear and certain data. It may be certain that
this globe has cooled down from a condition in which life could not have
existed; it may be certain that, in so cooling, its contracting crust
must have undergone sudden convulsi... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
When this action has continued, with more or less violence, for a certain
time, it gradually moderates. The evolution of bubbles slackens, and
finally comes to an end; scum and lees alike settle at the bottom, and
the fluid is once more clear and transparent. But it has acquired
properties of which no trace existed in... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"ALCOHOL.--Chymicis est liquor aut pulvis summé subtilisatus, vocabulo
Orientalibus quoque, cum primis Habessinis, familiari, quibus _cohol_
speciatim pulverem impalpabilem ex antimonio pro oculis tingendis denotat
... Hodie autem, ob analogiam, quivis pulvis tenerior ut pulvis oculorum
cancri summé subtilisatus _alco... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
All these words are said by philologers to be derived from roots
expressive of the intestine motion of a fermenting substance. Thus "hefe"
is derived from "heben," to raise; "barm" from "beren" or "bären," to
bear up; "yeast," "yst," and "gist," have all to do with seething and
foam, with "yeasty" waves, and "gusty" b... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
At this time, Van Helmont made a first step, by pointing out that the
peculiar hissing and bubbling of a fermented liquid is due, not to the
evolution of common air (which he, as the inventor of the term "gas,"
calls "gas ventosum"), but to that of a peculiar kind of air such as is
occasionally met with in caves, mine... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"Hence, since from must of grapes we procure alcohol and carbonic acid, I
have an undoubted right to suppose that must consists of carbonic acid
and alcohol. From these premisses we have two modes of ascertaining what
passes during vinous fermentation: either by determining the nature of,
and the elements which compos... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
However this may be, there can be no doubt that the constituent elements
of fully 98 per cent. of the sugar which has vanished during fermentation
have simply undergone rearrangement; like the soldiers of a brigade, who
at the word of command divide themselves into the independent regiments
to which they belong. The b... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"Saepissime examinavi fermnentum cerevisiae, semperque hoc ex globulis per
materiam pellucidam fluitantibus, quarm cerevisiam esse censui, constare
observavi: vidi etiam evidentissime, unumquemque hujus fermenti globulum
denuo ex sex distinctis globulis constare, accurate eidem quantitate et
formae, cui globulis sangu... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
It was very soon made out that these yeast organisms, to which Turpin
gave the name of _Torula cerevisioe_, were more nearly allied to the
lower Fungi than to anything else. Indeed Turpin, and subsequently
Berkeley and Hoffmann, believed that they had traced the development of
the _Torula_ into the well-known and very... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The three views here before us may be familiarly exemplified by supposing
the sugar to be a card-house. According to Stahl, the ferment is somebody
who knocks the table, and shakes the card-house down; according to
Fabroni, the ferment takes out some cards, but puts others in their
places; according to Thénard, the fe... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 4: "Das enträthselte Geheimniss der geistigen Gährung
(Vorlänfige briefliche Mittheilung)" is the title of an anonymous
contribution to Wöhler and Liebig's _Annalen der Pharmacie_ for 1839, in
which a somewhat Rabelaisian imaginary description of the organisation of
the "yeast animals" and of the manner in w... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
"La cause du phénomène physique qui accompagne la vie de la plante réside
dans un état physique propre, analogue à celui du noir de platine. Mais
il est essentiel de remarquer que cet état physique de la plante est
étroitement lié avec la vie de cette plante."[5]
[Footnote 5: _Etudes sur les Mycodermes_, Comptes-Rendu... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The yeast plant is a mere sac, or "cell," containing a semi-fluid matter,
and Schwann's microscopic analysis resolved all living organisms, in the
long run, into an aggregation of such sacs or cells, variously modified;
and tended to show, that all, whatever their ultimate complication, begin
their existence in the co... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
[Footnote 6: Later investigations have thrown an entirely new light upon
the structure and the functional importance of the nucleus; and have
proved that Schwann did not over-estimate its importance. 1894.]
From purely morphological investigations, Turpin and Schwann, as we have
seen, arrived at the notion of the fund... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
As far back as 1850, Cohn wrote, apparently without any knowledge of what
Payen had said before him:--
"The protoplasm of the botanist, and the contractile substance and
sarcode of the zoologist, must be, if not identical, yet in a high degree
analogous substances. Hence, from this point of view, the difference
betwee... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Dr. Stirling, for example, made my essay the subject of a special
critical lecture,[9] which I have read with much interest, though, I
confess, the meaning of much of it remains as dark to me as does the
"Secret of Hegel" after Dr. Stirling's elaborate revelation of it. Dr.
Stirling's method of dealing with the subjec... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
As we have seen, the study of yeast has led investigators face to face
with problems of immense interest in pure chemistry, and in animal and
vegetable morphology. Its physiology is not less rich in subjects for
inquiry. Take, for example, the singular fact that yeast will increase
indefinitely when grown in the dark,... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Sometimes the faces along which the coal splits are not smooth, but
exhibit a thin layer of dull, charred-looking substance, which is known
as "mineral charcoal."
Occasionally one of the faces of a lump of coal will present impressions,
which are obviously those of the stem, or leaves, of a plant; but though
hard mine... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
This is the microscopic structure of an ordinary piece of coal. But if a
great series of coals, from different localities and seams, or even from
different parts of the same seam, be examined, this structure will be
found to vary in two directions. In the anthracitic, or stone-coals,
which burn like coke, the yellow m... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
But, in one and the same slice, every transition can be observed from
this structure to that which has been described as characteristic of
ordinary coal. The latter appears to rise out of the former, by the
breaking-up and increasing carbonization of the larger and the smaller
sacs. And, in the anthracitic coals, this... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The living club-mosses are, for the most part, insignificant and creeping
herbs, which, superficially, very closely resemble true mosses, and none
of them reach more than two or three feet in height. But, in their
essential structure, they very closely resemble the earliest
Lepidodendroid trees of the coal: their stem... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Some, once more, have imagined that coal was of submarine origin; and
though the notion is amply and easily refuted by other considerations, it
may be worth while to remark, that it is impossible to comprehend how a
mass of light and resinous spores should have reached the bottom of the
sea, or should have stopped in ... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
Dr. Dawson's results are the more remarkable, as the numerous specimens
of British coal, from various localities, which I have examined, tell one
tale as to the predominance of the spore and sporangium element in their
composition; and as it is exactly in the finest and purest coals, such as
the "Better-Bed" coal of L... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
In a tropical forest, at the present day, the trunks of fallen trees, and
the stools of such trees as may have been broken by the violence of
storms, remain entire for but a short time. Contrary to what might be
expected, the dense wood of the tree decays, and suffers from the ravages
of insects, more swiftly than the... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
But, in this case it may be asked, why does not our English coal consist
of stems and leaves to a much greater extent than it does? What is the
reason of the predominance of the spores and spore-cases in it?
A ready answer to this question is afforded by the study of a living
full-grown club-moss. Shake it upon a piec... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
The structural facts are such as to leave no alternative but to adopt the
view of the origin of such coal as I have described, which has just been
stated; but, happily, the process is not without analogy at the present
day. I possess a specimen of what is called "white coal" from Australia.
It is an inflammable materi... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
I am almost disposed to doubt whether it is necessary to make the
concession of "wet and swampy"; otherwise, there is nothing that I know
of to be said against this excellent conspectus of the reasons for
believing in the subaërial origin of coal.
But the coal accumulated upon the area covered by one of the great
fore... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 | |
In the first place, the great phantom of geological time rises before the
student of this, as of all other, fragments of the history of our earth--
springing irrepressibly out of the facts, like the Djin from the jar
which the fishermen so incautiously opened; and like the Djin again,
being vaporous, shifting, and ind... | Discourses: Biological & Geological: Essays | Huxley, Thomas Henry | 1825 | 1895 | ['en'] | 13 | {'Geology', 'Biology'} | PG10060 |
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