A NEW THEORY OF THE DELUGF.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 185, 24 August 1871, Page 7

A NEW THEORY OF THE DELUGF.

From the Melbourne " Daily Telegraph--' we learn that Mr Willam Walker, alias Tom Cringle, has started " A Theory of the Deluge," if we may so designate the chimera, and on the proposal the " Telegragh " makes the following remarks : — Mr William Walker is away from us ; but that is nothing. Age does not wither, nor latitude stale his inficate varity. In London he is Tom Cringle still. He has devoted his attention of late to cychcal deluges, and has published his views in a handsome little volume which he has made due haste to send us, and which we are grateful to recieve, notwithstanding the shock its contents are calculated to convey. The uncomfortable conclusion at which Mr Walker has arrived is, that " Noah's flood " was the result of a disturbance of the equilibrium of the ocean — the inevitable consequence of a change of its centre of gravity, which will cocur again.. He quotes M. de Hon, to the effect that fourteen such deluges have occurred, and his own iudependant observations point to the arrival of the fifteenth. Australia is rising, the " ice cap " at the North Pole is increasing, the world,which we know, has a singular list already, will get tilted a little more, and the water will rush to the other side. The result is feelingly depicted. "The South- Pacific" the South Atlantic, and the Antarctic Oceans will be suddenly poured across the equator, and submerge the Northern Hemisphere ; the high grounds rising above the level of the southern oceans will form the archipelego of a new Polynesia. Australia, by the

G-reat Barrier Beef being laid dry, will be joinad.to New Guinea, and thus acqire a new eastern reaboard 1200 miles long, between which and the present Australian coast will be a wide valley, now the navigable channel for ships bound northwards, which would soon be covered with cocoanuts, palms, and other beautiful flora of the Southern Hemisphere; England, Scotland and Ireland will become what they were i before the last catastrophe, which happened in the opposite. direction." The perils of our friends in England should, indeed, induce a general application for passage warrants. A few families, Mr. Cringle anticipates, may escape to the mountain ranges, but they will survive " only to fall back into a state of torpid barbarism, which shows no gleam of hope in its utter desolation." London Bridge itself will not be left for the historic New Zealander to muse upon. The time, it appears from the " profound work " of Mons. Alphonse Joseph Adhemar, entitled "Revalations de la Mer," may be accurately calculated. The oceanic cataclysm — a good word, Mr Walker, a very good word- —will occur 6300 years hence.Mr Cringle's cycle is completed, therefore, in a little under 9000 years, calculating from Noah's Deluge, according to chronology, of the learned Usher. We shall only stop to point out that our author differs from the illustrious Mr Muddle in Maryatt's novel, whosecycle was fixed at 33,49-l< years. • Mr Muddle's catastrophe is the furthest off, and we prefer that.