Madam How and Lady Why; Or, First Lessons in Earth Lore for ChildrenKingsley, Charles
History
Madam How and Lady Why; Or, First Lessons in Earth Lore for Children
Kingsley, Charles
Geology -- Juvenile literature; Natural history -- Juvenile literature
What, that long bank of stones, with a house on it?
That is no house. That is a square lump of mud, the last remaining bit
of earth which was once the moraine of a glacier. Every year it crumbles
into the sea more and more; and in a few years it will be all gone, and
nothing left but the great round boulder-stones which the ice brought
down from the glaciers behind us.
But how does he know that it was once joined to the cliff?
Because that cliff, and the down behind it, where the cows are fed, is
made up, like the island, of nothing but loose earth and stones; and that
is why it is bright and green beside the gray rocks and brown heather of
the moors at its foot. He knows that it must be an old glacier moraine;
and he has reason to think that moraine once stretched right across the
bay to the low island, and perhaps on to the other shore, and was eaten
out by the sea as the land sank down.
But how does he know that the land sank?
Of that, he says, he is quite certain; and this is what he says.--Suppose
there was a glacier here, where we are sailing now: it would end in an
ice cliff, such as you have seen a picture of in Captain Cook's Voyages,
of which you are so fond. You recollect the pictures of Christmas Sound
and Possession Bay?
Oh yes, and pictures of Greenland and Spitzbergen too, with glaciers in
the sea.
Then icebergs would break off from that cliff, and carry all the dirt and
stones out to sea, perhaps hundreds of miles away, instead of letting it
drop here in a heap; and what did fall in a heap here the sea would wash
down at once, and smooth it over the sea-bottom, and never let it pile up
in a huge bank like that. Do you understand?
I think I do.
Therefore, he says, that great moraine must have been built upon dry
land, in the open air; and must have sunk since into the sea, which is
gnawing at it day and night, and will some day eat it all up, as it would
eat up all the dry land in the world, if Madam How was not continually
lifting up fresh land, to make up for what the sea has carried off.
Oh, look there! some one has caught a fish, and is hauling it up. What a
strange creature! It is not a mackerel, nor a gurnet, nor a pollock.
How do you know that?
Why, it is running along the top of the water like a snake; and they
never do that. Here it comes. It has got a long beak, like a snipe. Oh,
let me see.
See if you like: but don't get in the way. Remember you are but a little
boy.
What is it? a snake with a bird's head?
No: a snake has no fins; and look at its beak: it is full of little
teeth, which no bird has. But a very curious fellow he is, nevertheless:
and his name is Gar-fish. Some call him Green-bone, because his bones
are green.
But what kind of fish is he? He is like nothing I ever saw.
I believe he is nearest to a pike, though his backbone is different from
a pike, and from all other known fishes.
But is he not very rare?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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