"It is visible that new strata have been successively formed by the same reiterated motion of the waters from the deposition of sediments and other constant causes from time immemorial; of which I find strong proofs in the different beds of fossils, shells, and other marine productions found in Roussillon near the village of Naffiac, about seven or eight leagues from the sea; these beds of shells which are inclined from the west to the east, and in different angles, are separated from each other by banks of sand and earth, are sometimes from one and a half to two or three feet in thickness. They appear as if sprinkled with salt in dry weather, and form together hillocks from twenty-five to thirty fathoms in height: now a long chain of hills of such an height can only be formed gradually, and at different successions of time. Such might be the effect of an universal deluge, which must have disturbed all nature; but which could not have given a regular form to these different beds of fossil shells, but would have jumbled them together without any order or regularity." On this subject I am perfectly of the same opinion as M. Barrere, excepting as to the formation of mountains, which I cannot agree ought to be entirely attributed to the causes which occasion the ocean to gain upon the land on some parts, and lose it upon others. As I am, on the contrary, of opinion, I could produce many convincing arguments to prove that most of the eminencies seen on the surface of the earth have been actually formed in the sea itself. First, because they have a correspondence of saillant and returning angles, which necessarily implies the cause we have assigned, that is, the motion of the currents. Secondly, because downs and hills, which are formed by the materials that the sea brings on its shores, are not composed of marble and hard stone, like common hills; the shells also in the former are generally only fossils, whereas in the latter, the petrifaction is compleat; besides the beds of earth are not so horizontal in downs as in the hills composed of marble and hard stone, but are more or less inclined, as in the hills of Naffiac, whereas in the hills and mountains, formed under the water by the sediment of the sea, the strata are always parallel, and very often horizontal, and the shells and other marble are entirely petrified. I have no doubt of proving that marble and other calcinable matters, which are almost all composed of madrepores, astroites, and shells, have acquired their hardness and perfection at the bottom of the sea; on the contrary, gravel, soft stones, incrustations, stalactites, &c. which are also calcinable and found in the earth, and formed since our continent has been discovered, cannot acquire this degree of hardness and petrifaction which marble or hard stones have.