Further Researches on the Physics of the Earth, and Especially on the Folding of Mountain Ranges [Etc.]

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1908. Excerpt: ... Fig. 8. Relief Map of Europe. (From Frye's Complete Geography, by permission of Ginn and Co., Publishers.) The reader should notice how the principal mountain chains face the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. There is a trough in the sea bottom off the Scandinavian coast to which Professor Schiaparelli has called attention. by which these mighty uplifts have been produced. The complex folding of the mountains to the east of Tibet shows that the Pacific aided the Indian Ocean in producing this great uplift, but we cannot yet determine the relative importance of the parts played by the two oceans. 28. On the Origin of the Alps and on the Extreme Crumpling and Folding which They Exhibit.--The remarkable crumpling and folding noticed in the Alps has long been a matter of surprise and wonder to the naturalist. This phenomenon has always presented great difficulty to those who have attempted to explain the origin of the Alps. In the paper on the "Cause of Earthquakes" ( 14, 16, 18, 23) we have outlined the theory of how the Alps were formed by the sea, and criticised the old theories as totally inadequate to account for the observed crumpling. We propose here to develop the new theory a little further, and to show how it accounts for all the facts observed in a range such as the Swiss Alps, which are generally recognized as about the most complex system of mountains known upon the globe. If the new theory will explain the Swiss Alps, it will obviously explain any other mountain system in the world. The test of the theory as applied to the Alps may therefore be regarded as an experimentum crucis. Fig. 9. Complex Folding. Section Across the Alps from the Neighborhood of Zurich toward Como; about 110 miles. (Heim and Prestwich.) Fig. 10. Section t...