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WONDERS OF THE EARTH.

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PARLEY EXPLAINS HOW THE STRATA OF THE EARTH ARE PLACED.

I am now going to tell you, my young friends, about some of the wonderful things in the earth, sea, and sky. A great number of them I have seen myself in my travels through various countries, and others I have only read of; but I shall tell you nothing that is not strictly true, for I do not wish so much to astonish you as to make you take pleasure in contemplating the works of God, and to increase your knowledge of His goodness, wisdom, and power.

I shall begin with some of the wonders of the earth which, as I suppose you know, belong to the branch of natural history which is called geology; and to enable you to understand what follows, I must first explain how the materials which compose the ground you tread upon are arranged.

If you hastily travel over any extensive tract of country, such as that between New York and Philadelphia, or between London and Bristol, you might think that all the different substances, clay, chalk, limestone, and granite, were irregularly mixed together. This is, however, not the case, when taken on a great scale; for if you more carefully examine, you will find that the various sorts of earth are disposed in layers, or strata, and that a uniform order of arrangement is nearly preserved.