The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-06-06

regions, drowning the lower attitudes with a tremendous outpouring of the
 polar waters, upon which floating ice
 brought the boulders that are scat tered over our northern domain.
 When our countrymen began their study of field geology some of the lead ing European geologists were teaching that a granite core characterized all mountain ranges and that the remains of the mammoth and other large ani- malls found in Siberia were transported there by floods from the region of the Equator. Benjamin rrankIin .nderend- entl yevolved the theory thak the inte- rior of the earth consisted of molten matter on which the other portion of Icrust foated. He said he had seen "oys- ter shells mixed in the stone," which in- dicated an elevation of the land above sea level, and this he conceived could not take place if the earth were solid. Who ever thinks of Thomas Jefferson
 as q paleontologist7 But no heat of politics. no fresh denuf citations of him. self and his policy, prevented him from carving on his geological studies even in the White House He sent for over 800 specimens of fossil bones from the famous Big Bone Lick of Kentucky and spread them In one of the large rooms of the Presidential mansion. The | exploration of this lick was made at his | own expense and hs found time tc | write and read papers on fossils. Meteorites were another perplexing topic. It was not till 1908 that Pro- lessor Kingsley. after his study of a meteorite that fell in Connecticut q year earlier, evolved a theory that these bodies are strangers which come to tho earth from space. It may not be true. but Jefferson is said to have remarked of this deduction: a
 F. IL | iii 4 L Ar...
 kee professors will lie than to admit that stones can fall from Heaven."
 The famous Dr. Cotton Mather saw in the discovery of the bones of a mas tadon near Albany a confirmation of the account given in Scripture of a race of antedeIuvian giants. They must have been giants, indeed, for the thigh bone which Dr. Mather mistook for that of a man was seventeen feet in length. Another mastadon exhumed near Newburg in 1901 was regarded as unquestionably carniverous. a blunder that frightened Dr. Dunter Into writing that i've cannot but thank Heaven that the whole generation Is probably ex- tinct."
 The unscientific character of much of the work done In those early days may be inferred from the following quotation describing the narrows of the Connecticut river:
 NO living cerature was ever known to pass through this narrow except an Indian woman, who drifted into 1t in a canoe. Perceiving her danger she drank the whole bottle of rum she had with her and then lay down in her canoe to meet her destiny. She marvelously went through with safety. and was taken out of the canoe some miles below quite intoxicated"
 ! We know that the famous Natural Bridge in Virginia is all that is left of the roof of a limestone cavern, but 1t was puzzling question in the early part of the last century. Jefferson arr gued that the formation af the bridge was due to some sudden convlusion.
 Francis William Gilmer. though scarcely known to geological science, proved himself far in advance of the workers of his day by his theory that 1t was what was left of a cavern which had been formed by the solvent ae- ton of meteoric waters in limestone. The Rev. Mr. Cornelius dissented from all the views expressed and said he could see no difficulty in supposing that the bridge had proceeded from the hand of the Almighty as 1t is."
 The geological pinoeers made many blunders. but Huxley wrote that the attainment of scientific truth had been brought about, to great extent, with the help of scientific error. With all their blunders. fierce disputes and many weaknesses. these first men in the field laid well the foundations on
 which the present science of the earth danends