Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1872-02-16
THE NEXT DELUGE.

theory that explains difficult phenomena,
however imperfect it may be, is sure of a
welcome And theory that helps us to-
ward an explanation, though confessedly
not the best or the final one, is held to be
of value TO science, and is dignifed by
scientific men with the natne of "proyls-
ional hypothesis"
Doubtless there is too much, especially
in this country of this greedy acceptance
OF hypothesis But it is not our purpose
at present to challenge too severely the
theory that we have on hand. We are
content to present it, IN outline, as an in
teresting piece of geological speculation.
How can we account, men have asked
with wonder, "for the buried elephants
in the extreme north, or for the striation
of the rocks that every college boy has
noticed in New England? What power
scattered the ponderous stones known as
'erratic boulders' all over the Northern
Hemisphere, urging them far up on the
sides of mountatn-ranges that have a
wholly different formation from their
own? What slow or sudden mysterious
power submerged, without mixture of
earth or rock, or rubbish, the vast antedi-
luvian forests that make the seams of our
coal-beds? In what balance were the seas
weighed when their mass was poured upon
the Southern Hemisphere, and the land
arose in the north?" To these questions
geology has given, as yet, no full or def
mite answer. But a French mathemati-
clan, NJ. Alphonse Adhemar, propounds
what he believes to be the full eXplana
tion of these and of other great mysteries
in the present condition of the globe.
His view is based upon astronomical
facts, as follows; and, without entering
into his subtle processes of demonstra-
finp Iuo mo nocilrr q ha
ment: "The earth has, besides its spin
ming motion upon its axis, an oscillatory
movement of the same axis, that is pre-
cisely similar to that of top which 'wab-
bles while its point spins upon the same
spot of ground. The top 'wabbles through
single circuit in second or less; the
ponderous earth-top requires no less than
twenty-one thousand years for this swing
of its axis. This period is that of the
procession of the equinoXes. During
one-half of this period the north,pole is
more inclinedtoward the sun; during the
o'her half the southp pole. AT present our
ovn hemisphere, the northern, has the
advantage, being more turned toward the
sun; so that the sum of our spring and
summer seasons exceeds by six days that
of our autumn and winter. The reverse
is The case in the Southern Hemisphere,
where the cold has six days longer sway
during each year than in the north. And
this advantage rests alternately with either
hemisphere for the vast period of ten
thousand five hundred and ten years"
The sum of six days cold per year may
seem to be small thing but this factor,
when repeated through hundred cen
turics, NJ. Adhemar believes to produce a
force sufficient to change the whole face
of the globe. Let us 90 back in imagina
tion A, 900 years, when the average heat of
the Northern Hemisphere, then most in
clined toward the sun, was approaching
its highest degree.
During vast preceding period, :"
says NJ. Adhemar, "the ice around the
north-pole had slowly increased until an
Immense cap, or polar glacier, had been
formed, extending as far toward the south
as coo north latitude, while the south
pole was comparatively free from ice.
With the slow increase of the summer
heat in the Northern Hemisphere, grad
dual melting of the northern ice-cap took
place Year afteryear. century after cen
tury, the sun gained slowly upon these
frozen mountains; the waters, released
from them by the gradual thaw, ran down
to rejoin the ocean. AS the vast cap of
ice was reduced in size, the melting
waters moved southward, a gradual change
1t moved slowly toward the south, draw
ing after it the mass of the waters,
and laying bare a part of the
continent of the Northern Hemisphere
The seas gradually Tctreated from one
hemisphere, and gradually took possession
of another. In this slow movement there
was nothing of the nature of a catastrophe
or grand cOnvulsiOn. Each of the earth's
poles was loaded with vast serried noun
tains of ice, but of unequal dimensions !;
and the slow current of the melting mass,
flowing southwark produced only gentle
changes in the physical condition of the
earth. After the lapse of seven thousand
years, however, the suns heat had sutii
ciently sOftened the north-pOlar ice to per-
nit of its entire disruption. A grand
and the fragments of the ice-mountains,
Obeying the attraction of gravity, rushed
in body toward the south. Torn from
his bed, the Ocean carried with him his
mud, with which the diluvium of the
Northern Hemisphere was formed. Gil
gantic torrents, mingled with earth, sand,
and pebbles, deposited the alluviums of
the great valleys. The erratc powders,
floating upon the fragments of the ice, or
hurled southwark by the-main force of
the deluge, were strewed over the
plains or heaped up on the mountain
sides of Northern Europe and
America. The animals that the growing
heat of the north had permitted to wan
der into regions near the pole were over
whelmed by the waters. With all animal
life, the forests were simultaneously over
whelmed. The roaring waters of the del.
uge-drft stripped the shores of Asiatc
Russia, Nova Zembla, Lapland, Norway,
and Denmark, pouring the floral spoils
into the North Sea, and distributing it
into the great coal-basins of Scotland,
there to be transformed by heat and pres
sure into the coal that is mined to-day on
the Firth of Forth, in Durham, south of
the Cheviots, and elsewhere in Western
Europe. Norway, Sweden and Denmark,
being without deposit-basins at the coal
period, failed to receive an ounce of the
vegetable fuel When the southwark rush
of the seas was finished, the continents of
the Northern Hemisphere had assumed
their present outlines, emerging from the
seas under which the attraction of the
great polar mountain of ice had buried
them; while the Southern Hemisphere,
receiving the mass of tho released seas,
be ame, as it is to-day, the so-called
oceanic hemisphere, containing but a
third as much land-surfaee as the north
ern or terrest ial hemisphere"
II story and tradition, as well as sci
ence, point to the actual occurrence of
such deluge as the one that we have de,
scribsd This great catastrophe, that oc-
CURED four thousand years ago, and to
which the traditions of many religions
point. was, according TO NJ Adhemar, no
other than the deluge of Noah
word may here he required to explain
the pOssi'iiity of so sudden and irresisti
be rushing OF the waters TO the south
upon the disruption of the northern ice
mountain. To comprehend the mechanism
of this gigantic process it should be borne