. Frost & fire : natural engines, tool-marks & chips : with sketches taken at home and abroad by a traveller. ilar forms are produced in this world. So it is fair toconclude that these hmar shapes, these O craters, also re-sulted from a coml)ined action of heat, cold, and weight,which did their work, and have now ceased to work on thatsurface, though still active here. Visible forms then, whether accessiljle or not, mean FOEM. 21 previous movements, forces which caused them, and a tem-perature sufficient to make the movements possible in thematerial moved; and similar natural forms, wherever t
. Frost & fire : natural engines, tool-marks & chips : with sketches taken at home and abroad by a traveller. ilar forms are produced in this world. So it is fair toconclude that these hmar shapes, these O craters, also re-sulted from a coml)ined action of heat, cold, and weight,which did their work, and have now ceased to work on thatsurface, though still active here. Visible forms then, whether accessiljle or not, mean FOEM. 21 previous movements, forces which caused them, and a tem-perature sufficient to make the movements possible in thematerial moved; and similar natural forms, wherever theymay be, probably indicate similar action and af^ents, move-ments and forces. A delta is a water-mark ; a round crater a fire-mark ; andevery force which acts on a surface makes a tool-mark whichmay be learned. Each mark is like a letter. It has a form and a meaning,l)ut only for those who learn to read. To learn tlie character, the language, and the meaning ofinscriptions scidptured on the world by fire and frost is worthsome troulile. The geological alphabet—the first lesson to belearned is— Fio. 4. An Eastern Symbol. (IHAPTEE V ATMOSPJIKRIC FORMS. If ever there was a time when the solid surface of our worldwas a newly-formed hot crust of stone, there must have beenan atmosphere about it, whatever its composition may havel)een ; for our gases and fluids, air and water, only expand byheat. Movements in any gaseous shell must have resembledthose which now take place in the air from the action of heat,cold, and gi^avitation, whatever the surface-temperature mayliave been; and these atmospheric movements surely leftmarks upon the solid crust from the beginning, because theydo now. We have but to look above us to read some of the ancientcharacters, which are and have been written in air, and tolearn their meaning. They are forms which reveal a calm clear summer evening, after a thunder-shower,when the setting sun is near the horizon, and the wind isstill, gre
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