The suburban citizen., 1900-10-20
The SAT- M TIE SEA.
An Incredible Amount of 1t and It Coz
There Very simply.

Antfe very eANhpAgs
A certain nervous child is reported
to have wept on first seeing the ocean.
and for no other reason than that
there was 80 much of it,"
There is, indeed, no lack Of sea on
this little planet Of ours-nearly three
times as much salt water surface as
there is dry land, And the salt in 1t Is
on almost incredible quantity. Rough
ly speaking, if you take the salt out
Of the sea you deprive it Of thirtieth
of its weight. On this basis, One-thir-
tieth Of the entire weight Of all the
sea water in the world is salt, and as
salt and water bulk about the same,
we may estimate also that, by bulk,
one-thirtieth Of the huge mass Of the
oceans is pure salt. What does this
bring to us?
Taking the $50 odd million square
miles Of the five oceans to average q
mile and a half deep, we have in them
alone 200,OO0,000 cubic miles Of salt
water. A thirtieth of this should give
us the bulk Of the salt contained in
the great waters of the globe.
Rounding the figures, we get some
thing like 100000 cubic miles of salt.
If it were all taken out and spread
over the surface of the six continents
they would be covered with its snowy
powder to a depth of twice the height
Of ST. Paul's. TO put it another way,
If all the earth were salt water, there
would be enough of the tlavoring prin.
ciple In it to make two moons Of solid
salt but very little smaller than our
present satellite.
But these comparisons are almost toe
huge for handling; let us take some
thing smaller The rolling waters Of
the English Channel are familiar to
all Londoners How much salt is there
In them? Close upon a hundred cubic
miles. Made into convenient block
and swung over the metropolis by a
giant derrick, it would grind London
to dust.
How did all this salt get into the
English Channcl-hoW did that 1000,
600 cubic miles Of it get into the five
oceans2 1t is n big question, and it
has a wonderful answer--an answer
that goes back to the beginning OF
things. When the earth was a half
cooled body all the water now upon
ii was floating above the hot surface
in mighty clouds Of steam. AS the
earth went on cooling its chemical
processes set free vast masses Of what
the chemist knows as chloride of So
dium, what we call common salt This
lay on the ground in kind of frosty
deposit. When the earth got cool
enough the floating clouds came down
in deluge that may have lasted for
ages, and, melting the salt deposits as
they rolled over the ground in count.
less rivulets, swept with it into the
deepest holows Of the earth's surface
and formed the salt seas. So the sea
has always been salt
But the salt in the sea is not all the
salt there is in the world. There is
large quantity in the rocks and the
soil, Il fraction Of which is carried year
by year into the oceans by the rivers.
Yet the ocean is not getting saltier.
This Is because the sea creatures take
up salt into the structure Of their
bones and shells. and when they die
and leave these to lie upon the ocean
bed the salt remains locked up, as it
were Nature S a famous accountant,
ana balances ont her profit ana loss to
the uttermost farthlng - London EX-
press.