CAMBRIDGE MUTUAL IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION. Geology.

Waikato Times, Volume XXI, Issue 1775, 20 November 1883, Page 4

CAMBRIDGE MUTUAL IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION. Geology.

At, ttye, meeting of the association on Tuesday wook last the following essay was ro.id by Mr Hyatt: —" It has boon said by one who was oniinent b»th us a geologist and as i/'Christhui minister—the late JJr. Fyu Smith, authoi of "The i elation hjtwein ,th i l'Holy Scriptures and some parts of {zoological Science, "-Ui.it no ni.ui should : sot himself up ai a teacher of geology until he h.^ studied the subject for forty year.. ' Upon the face of tin's it would be nb-urd foi mo to leave you under the nnpu'ss-ion that J "am going to teach yon my own thoughts on ko great a subject, which, not bjing much of a practical geologist, 1 have ojdy studied histoiically. I merely piopose to p'.e you a slioit and simple sketch of the sublet .is a- whole, t igother with somo of tlie concltimoils ai rived at by tlio loading geologists of the day. The scione • <>f geology may be iblincd us .in «u<iuuy into t'm n.itur.il history of the. earth. It seeks t,> know of w h.,t mtorials the eaith is composed, and m what manner th.>se materials are an.wged ; and, in doing so, it aU> endoavouis to deciphei the past history of the planet, which has beenwiitteu by the Divine Hand of an Omnipotent Architect on tbe_ diffeient strata of the rocks iv fossil wilting, never to be obliterated by the withering hand of time, but to be read and understood moie and more by eveiy succeeding genon.t on, with the advancing stiides of modern science. Geology is so closely connected ■with kindred sciences of geography, botany, zoology, astronomy, meteorology, and chemistry, that it is sometimes difficult to describe the boundary line between them. It also includes the sub-sciences of physical geography, mineralogy, and paleontology. Though looked upon by many a.s merely a kind of accomplishment or pleasant recreation, it is one of the most useful branches of physical science. Its indispensable utility to'the miner is self-appaient. Ho also to the engineer in excavating tunnels and canals, to the aichitoct and builder in choosing their matenal, and the fanner in estimating the capabilities of his soil, and in draining it; how \ahublo is a knowledge of this niteiesting science V 1 low niton has an estate been sold tin ,i tenth <>f its hidden mineral \alue aloneV How often has a tunnel through -oft material had t> be expeushely walled in, instead of b;mg excavated through th" solid lock close at hand .' How often has the fanner go.ie to the exj)ense of cutting miny iisi'leis chains instead of one in tho right pi ieo v All through a want of knowledge of tho nature andstiuctiue of the laud they woie connected with. And yet, useful as it is, no benefit which has been confei red upon mankind by modeiu ci\ ili/ation has been more maligned and peisecuted. The earnest geological truth-seekei has been hailed, like all other public benefactor, with Mich epithets as 'sceptic,' 'inlidel,' 'atheist,'and even worse; and that, too, sometime» by those who proclaimed thomselves to be the messengers of ti nth. But these aie things of the past, and scientific tuith now reigns Mipreinoly in hor own sphere. I shall take the liberty of quoting tho following paragraph fioni Page's 'xVclviincod (Teolwy, 1 " Geology ih, indued, one of tho youngest of thu natural science*, and tho voaxou in obvious. Man in his primitive fitM?6>i MiMrtt-j wololy on tho mvfucu of thu ♦Well utld ik mli'f.-tqo products. It jn not till ha Huh Hindu Minit) itjogruft" iv civilizafriin 1 thaii ho diiUcts his attention to the product* iif frhiJ iuteiitU 1. In hi 1- h'lst or Bsivugß r*t«i'A 1, He* if nloely a liuiuei, a Ji.shor, a gatherer of ft'iliK l<e ik'U'i' Hmlds h hut of stone, nor kindle- a Hi'l 1 iv Coal, uveu should these appear m uniting abuiidanco aiouud him. K\un when lie has passed into tho nomadi'j uid agiicultur.il stage, with hi- holds and flocks, and tmv patches of husbandly, lie domes little fioni the eaith—foiinni" his iiii]il<jnionts of wood and bone and smface stones: and but rarely—and this in fa\omable luiahtie--extracting a niodi'jnni of u>i>i)"i and tin f<>. the f.tbiication of <i few ami much \alned tools and v.oap nis of biome. It is not till he has attained to some degn • of <j\ih-a-tion that he lie^in- t> di iv his comfoits and luxiuies fiom the eaith, a< well a- to li\e U])on it; and it 1-- then, and then only, that he can 1m said to beomo acquainted uith the-tincture, of the eaith as a woiking and piactical geologist. But while obtaining his <r,,ld and sihei, his tin and lead, his coppei and iron, fioni its ciu-t foi the fabrication of his implements and niachineiy; while leanng his edifices of its lock-, and adorning his pel son w it!i its p-ms anrl piecious mot.ils, it is not till after loiit .ures that ho bagnis to peicene the c. ith he inhabits has had a hi-to, \ —a Ion;' hi-ton of change and piogies —that sea and land ha\obeene\ei changing plates ; tliat % eatable and animal life has b 'on mi ascending from simple and lowly oi<>anised i to moie complex ..ml moie highh oiganised foi ins, and then lie lieeome- .i -t-ientilu and theoietical, a- well a- a woiking and piactical, geologist In conim",i mteicouise, ■we aie apt to til." t!i" scene-aiound us as being permanent, and, inde"d, iv coinp.uison with the, -hoi t s(,i\ nf m,in among tlieni, we aie moie than ]nst.tied. What a -mall fraction of time aie the " tlneo scoio and ton' 1 yeais allotted to man' And how much smallei when \lowod with the backgiound of eternity. We often speak of the •'everlasting lulls," but the mighty mountains aio crumbling into dust! They aio earned away by numb >iless n\ois and cataracts, and aio cast into the depths of the ocean, wheie new continents ,uo slowly but siuely foinnng, one day to bo uphea\cd intodiy land. Poimlmis di-tiitt- aie ioiit and wiecked, and pel haps ..übside in .some coinulsion of natuie. Tlie oceans bed is laid baie, and the ancient coasts no longei re-echo with the, e\eilasting ioar of the ocean. But what is the use of my attempting to describe in my own feeble words what Tennyson has -o ably and beautifully pictured in' the follow ing lines — " There lolls the eki p whrrr (jrew tlie tice, 0 c.irth what eh uijrcs thou lirst >■(•< n ' Tlhto were th« lon s r strt 11 m irs li.ith been 1 hi- slilln.'ss (if (he cntr.il s( a llic hill*, arc sh iclows, .mcl tlicj llow Vroni form to tomi, mel tuitlnni; stands Hie) melt like mi a, llic solid I hhK, J^ike clcnds they shake themselves ami ro " In Pope's Homei the eucioathment of the ocean upon the land is onib idled m the following beautiful allegoiy :—: — " The god of oe o m, in irclnn^ stern before, "With his huge trident wound;, the ttcmblmg shore ; Vast stones and piles Irom their foundation licivc, And whelms thosnioke\ nun in the wno Now smoothed with sand, and ku lied b) the flood, No fragment tells where once tlio wondci stood." Need T add moie to desciibe the continuous alteinations of land and water that have pieserved the life of the plant thiough the thousand centm ics of the past .' Who can feel so deeply as the geologist tho literal truth of that familiar hymn A\liich hays ;— " Cbiingc and decaj in all around 1 see '" ily hearers are doubtless awaie that "wo geneially classify the uiunbcilcss kinds of locks under tlneo heads, w,. : Sodiinentaiy, Igneous and IVletamoi pluc. T cannot illustrate the foi [nation of the sednnentaiy looks bcttei than by lefmnng ,xon to the sceneiy at the K.uapno budge. "When* the creek joins the Waiknto you will notice, paiticulaily aftei a flood, how the sediment of the stieain is laid down in stiata as tho suiftnc-s of tho ciinent is checked, and if you examine tho chfFs mound you, you will sec how exactly tho same thing has taken plate in tunes pa t. With the aid of time and pi ossiuo, those cliffs might h.ue been changed into -olid rock, instead of beii'g the, spoi t of wind and rain as they are. With ie'.;aid to plutomc and volcanic foiinations, 1 need only say that they have been formed under tlio iniluenco of great heat, and deposited in a state of fusion, tho diuYionte between the two being, th.it the foimer ha\e been formed below tho surface, and under gicater piessure, %\hilo the lattei have been de]>osited on the sin f.ice, in tho -hape <>f la\a stieains fioni \olcanoos. These locksaie mostly fiini, dmablo, and en stalised, and often iesi«t decay long after the adjoining sandstones have boon washed aw ay. Thus they often add an abiupt pictiue->queness to the landhcaije, as, for instance, in the Scottish Highlands. The thiid clas.s, the inetamoi phic rocks, as their name implies, have undergone a great and mysterious change they weie deposited beneath the silent watei sof an ancient ocean. Though long a puzzle to geologists, the geneial conclusion now is that they have been changed and crystalled by their coining in coutact with the heated masses of the plutonic illations deep down in the ciust of tho earth. Sometimes the heat has been sufficiently intense to , wholly obliteiate all marks of stratification and all fossils, as in the case of that beautifully puio marble used by the sculptor. The inferior kinds of maible are not so pure, and .still contain remnants of fossils and other fmeign matter. All maibles are limestone, which has been crystalized) by, subterranean heat. And here it might be interesting to notice a particular kindiof limestone called Nuinmulitic Jiuje^oije, fvwn fact} th»t it* k "lmcst

entirely composed of tho remains of a small .she'l-h'.sh c.il'orl NuinnmlitoH, from their round, fiat hhape, winch pives thorn tho appearance of coins of different sizes. H<»\v incredible it seotn.s tlii>t this limestone forms, in tho chain of the Pyrenees, niany entire mountains of great height. What an enormous linio must h.i\e been necessary to form stiiiU as in Kgvpt, many hundred* of fuel thick, out of tho lema us of these little sheik. It i- of this st(Hi» thnfc the ancient pyramids wito built. Chalk also is formed oi minute shells, pices of coral, and frag, inenti of .sponge-*. Most <>f v* have hoard, .uid p»rlups hive soon, tin: white chtfs of Old K-igla.id, but have wo ever tried to cilcul.ite the \.ist number of theso minute oiganisins of which they wo entirely composed ''. Tv tho beginning of this p.ipcr I i Mii.uked th.it geology teaches us tlie earth s history. It does ho in the diffeient formations of which T have Iron speaking, but in nop.uticiil.irly by the fossil remains of ovtinot animal-, and plants which arc found embedded in the dili'eient rocks. In tho pluto.iic formations thcie are no fossils. In the most .mcient of the stiatifiod rocks are fomul only tho lowest foinm of animal life, but as wo pi need tow.uds the more lecont formations, we find mom and more comploN oig.iuis.ns, both in the fauna and flora. As the building up of the Oiirth progressed, the Creator peopled it with higher orders of beimrs to which it was fitted, until it was pieparod for the ci owning act of the natural creation, when " Jehovah God formed man of the dust of the ground." The science which treats of ancient life of the globo is called P.ilacantology, Coal was formed in an early period of the earth's history, when the land was mostly low and swampy, and inhabited chiefly by reptiles. The luxuriant vegetation of this period very much resembled that of New Zealand .it the present day. I have placed a few fossil ferns of the coal period upon the table to which I invite your attention. Many of the creatures which lived in pre-Adamite periods wore of immense size, but 1 shall only have tune to baiely mention one or two. Tho ichthyosaurus was an ennrmou* reptile of tlio lias period, with a lizard's head, ciocodile's teeth, and the trunk and tail of a qu.ubupod. Kossil skeletons of this leptilo have been found 30 feet in length. The niegalosatnus was an enormous li/iud of tho cretaceous period; its length exceeded 40 feet, and in bulk it was i o iu.il to an elephant 7 foot high. Tho nianini >th was ,i qu ulrupod of the post pliooeno p-iiod ; about Hi feet in height, with piob'l-.cio, two immense spu.il tusks, and is suppoocd to ha\o had a hahy covering. In the ye.v IM)3 one of these creature-! \\\\* discovered frozen up in tho ice of Siberia. It must ha\e been pioseivod them foi thousands of ye.-u-. Its flesh, howevoi, was af toi wai ds do\ oui ed by beai s and dogs, but the skeleton is now in St. Petersburg Museum. We may learn a lesson fiom this, vi/., that if the flesh of the mammoth can be pit'-ouod for thousands of years by freezing, as it undoubtedly has boon, then Aucklandois need not despair <>f sending mutton to England in good order and condition."