Eureka daily sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1871-1887, 1877-07-14
SATURDAY. JULY IA, 1877.
CLARENCE KING on EVOLUTION.

CLARENCE KING ON EVOLUTION.
Clarence King. one Of Americas
youngest and most distinguished sci
entists, lately delivered before the
sheffield scientific school, a depart
ment Of Yale College, a remarkable
paper, and one which j. likely to at
tract the universal attention OF the
scientific world. We find this very
remarkable address reviewed at great
length In the metropolitan Journals, and
can only regret that our space forbids a
deserved Of its leading fea-
lures. The speaker boldly challenged
the soundness of the views OF Darwin
and Marsh and Huxley, regarding the
doctrine of evolution.
tine of the most prominent writer's
Of the Uniformitarian school, or grad
ual development, defines the doctrine
thus: This philosophic school teaches,
and that truly, that the great changes
undergone by the earth's crust, must
have been produced, not by convul-
siops and c~atsclysms of nature, but
by those ordinary agencies that we see
at work every day around US, such as
rain, snow, frost, ice, chemical action,
etc. The more radical believers in
cataatrophism hold that there has been
q series of violent crust changes of the
globe, involving so much energy as to
destroy all life, ann hat a series OF
new creations followed. Species be-
came suddenly extinct, the chain of
development was broken, not only for
some but for many, and the record of
this life suddenly extinguished, is the
true reading Of the fossils which have
been catacombed in the rocks. King
does not accept either view. He says:
At the close Of the Palaozoic the two
bordering land areas of Atlantis and
Pxcitis, since the beginning of the
Cambrian permanent and perhaps OK
tended continents, began to sink.
They rapidly went down, and at last
completely disappeared, their places
being taken by the present Atlantic
and Pacific Oceans, while b sea-fioOr
Of the American ocean, which had
been for the most part permanent
oceanic area ever since the submer-
gence of the Archean America, emery
cd and and becaiue the new continent
Of America, which has lasted with
local vicissitudes up TO tho present.
The east and west were, indeed, sepa-
rated by q mediterranean sea, the sole
relic Of the American ocean which
occupied . narrow north and south
depression.
In this midway, or mediterranean
sea. the condition vas nearly uniform
itarAn-that is, there is no evidence of
violent dislocation. Yet the species
which had lived through the vast
length OF the coal period, were com
pletely extinguished, and new forms
made their appearance, when new con
ditions of life were broughtin.
In a quasi authoritarian way, %, 900
or $1,000 feet OF sediment had accumu-
lStedAin. the Pacific. and $4,000 in the
Mediterranean sea when these re-
gions, which, during their reception of
sediment, had been areas of subsid-
ence, suddenly uphesved, the doming
up Of the middle OF the continent
sea and uniting the two land masses
into one.
The catastrophe which removed this
ses resulted in the folding up Of mount
ain ranges 10000 aud 10000 feet in
height, thereby essentially changing
the whole climate Of tho continent. OF
the land life of the Mesozoic age we
have abundant remains. Thanks to
the pal@ont0logists, the wonderful rep
lillian and avian fauna OF the MesozOic
wye II now familiar to us all. But af-
ter the catastrophe and the change Of
climate which must necessarily have
ensued, this fauna totally persisted.
The rate Of this pOst-C retaceOus change
was, in other words, catastrophe.
During the tertiary period. fresh wa
ter lakes of wide extent occupied the
western half Of the continent. The ter
tiary rivers emptied into them. The
great plains from the borders of the
gulf north for thousands of miles were
a broad lake with a s~ub-tropical eli
mate. In that lake sedimentary beds
have accumulated 1000 to 1900 feel
thick. Suddenly the level floor was
tilted, causing . difference of height OF
1000 feet between the south and west
shores, pouring the water into the gull
and leaving the great plains with the
present surface. but with a total change
Of climate. This is one Of the smaller
and later catastrophisms which may
have occurred after the appearance Of
human life on this continent. After
showing how the western half Of this
continent had been marked by violent
catastrophes, and that. indeed, the rec
ord Of the planet itself was u Of ca
tastrophes. the question il raised
"what effect would these have
upon the gradual development OF
life according to tho doctrine Of
Evolutionf" The successive hy-
pothesis which, linksd together. form