Evening star., 1932-03-20

nicians were traders with the Greeks and
were always cruising about and they may have
told them of lands that they had seen But
they may have meant England, where they
went for tin, in Cornwall. Or they may have
meant Spain and not the mythical Atlantis"
at all.
But, unfortunately, though a number OF
novels are based on Atlantis. and it is perfect
ly possible that it did exist, we do not have
any real evidence today, though the anthro-
biologists have their theories about it, largely
on account Of the unexplained spread of eul-
ture from one far-distant continent to an
other
Discoveries" of these missing islands" that
always seem to be reported in such Spectacu-
lar fashion, are usually well know to the scien-
fists and seem to be phenomena that exist in
certain places, as m the North Pacific. People
have even gone up there to look at certain
place off Alaska, where an island appears every
now and then. 1t comes and it goes like the
366th island in Portland Harbor that "only
comes up every leap year."
1t seems to be a matter of history that sail
have reported islands in the South Pacific
which were never again seen by other persons.
We know that the crust of the earth changes,
but it is only at sea level that this is at all
appreciable. There seems to be vertical as
well as horizontal shifting, and the United
States Coast and Geodetic Survey is making
elaborate tests of the San Andreas rift up
on such faults" Stations are established on
either side of the rift, and the scientists are
able to sight" across with great accuracy and
obtain technical data for their computations.
The horizontal shifting of the earth is as great
as so miles in some cases and it has a north
and south movement, and along with this
vertical shifting as well.
Obviously this structural fault in the earth's
surface, as well as in great deeps. has an i'm
portant result upon modern life, with our
inability to cope with these vast forces of
nature. Paleontology, or the science of ancient
life, tells us that many millions of years ago
the earth crumpled up into what we now cali
the Rocky Mountains. Originally, in our
Western areas there was a low-lying swampy
lagoon which covered vast areas. That was
perhaps a million years back as nearly as we
may estimate, when dinosaurs were principally
important the chief animal life of that
section
There were many different kinds of dino
saurs, but all of them are now extinct though
they became so only gradually through the
ages, since it follows that the Rocky Mountains
were slowly pushing up toward their present
height AS they rose, and the former swamps
gradually vanished, the huge monsters vanished
slowly. and when the environment of swampS
and lagoons had completely disappeared. with
them had disappeared the dinosaurs.
Those ancient formations, laid down in that
low country OF SwampS, are quite thick in
some places. but would be unknown today if
the Rockies had not risen to their present
height as the fossil remains would have been
unknown, far down In the earth. But due
to these physical changes it has become pos
sible for science to recover these early traces
of long ago.
Long before the age of the dinosaurs, between
$50 to 200 millions of years back, there were
seas which extended through the Western and
Central States. One of these, known as the
FNrafo TS..lF
the Arctic Circle, up to period of about 80
million years ago. In period not as remote
the Allegheny Mountains formed part of what
We call the Cambian Sea, while the Devonian
and Ordivician Seas formed pretty much of
what we now know as the North American
Continent.
Continued on Seventeenth Page