J. Hooker found Diatomaceae in countless numbers between the parallels
of 70 degrees and 80 degrees south, where they gave a color to the sea, and
also the icebergs floating in it. The death of these bodies in the South
Arctic Ocean is producing a submarine deposit, consisting entirely of the
silicious particles of which the skeletons of these vegetables are composed.
This deposit exists on the shores of Victoria Land and at the base of the
volcanic mountain Erebus. Dr. Hooker accounted for the fact that the
skeletons of Diatomaceae had been found in the lava of volcanic mountains,
by referring to these deposits at Mount Erebus, which lie in such a position
as to render it quite possible that the skeletons of these vegetables should
pass into the lower fissures of the mountain, and then passing into the
stream of lava, be thrown out, unacted upon by the heat to which they have
been exposed. See Dr. Hooker's Paper, read before the British Association
at Oxford, July, 1847.] -- Tr.
We thus find from the most recent observations that animal life predominates
amid the eternal night of the depths of ocean, while vegetable life, which
is so dependent on the periodic action of the solar rays, is most prevalent
on continents. The mass of vegetation on the Earth very far exceeds that of
animal organisms; for what is the volume of all the large living Cetacea and
Pachydermata when compared with the thickly-crosded colossal trunks of
trees, of from eight to twelve feet in diameter, which fill the vast forests
covering the tropical region of South America, between the Orinoco, the
Amazon, and the Rio de Madeira? And although the character of different
portions of the earth depends on the combination of external phenomena, as
the outlines of mountains -- the physiognomy of plants and animals -- the
azure of the sky -- the forms of the clouds -- and the transparency of the
atmosphere -- it must still be admitted that the vegetable mantle with which
the earth is decked constitutes the main feature of the picture.
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