Читать книгу The Evacuation of England: The Twist in the Gulf Stream онлайн

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“There is no exact geological identity here, although there is the strictest geographical homology. Each is the backbone of a continent, each upheaved and variously modified, igneously invaded sediments, derived from some pre-existent continent. They may be brought into a just comparison, but they are not strictly parts of one phenomenon. They are, however, more closely related to each other, than the Antillean areas are to either. This Antillean area, I shall here call the Columbian Continent, as the great discoverer landed at its two east and west extremities—the land-fall on San Salvador in the Bermudas, and on the coast of Honduras in Central America, as well as at Cuba, and at the mouths of the Orinoco—and his bones rested for a long time in the soil of San Domingo. It—this Columbean Continent—is a significant intercalation. It unites North and South America, but it unites them subject to the phases of its own generation.

“Let us understand this. There is a system of growth, a law, if I may so term it, of geomorphic sameness in the development of large, or for that matter, small geological territories. The familiar story of the growth of our North American continent has been often told. It is a commonplace of text books. The wide, triangular Archæan nucleus to the north, the oldest rocks—outlines and outliers down the east, and the same in the west—drew the framing limits of the continent at the first, to be filled in, up and out, by the momentous additions through the ages of advancing time. In Europe less well or simply defined boundaries, the growth together rather of divided islands, prevailed, and the picture of development was quite varied, from the picture in this western world. Again in Africa, with edges of uplift and centres of depression another geological tale with its incidents and accessories infinitely modified, comes into view. And in this prevalence of structural style, we, geologically speaking, find a prevalence of certain geological phases or conditions.