“The Principles of Geology”, by Sir Charles Lyell, published first in three volumes, appeared in the years 1830-1833, and may be said to mark the beginning of modern geology. Later reduced to two volumes, an eleventh edition of the work was issued in 1872 (Appleton) and may be profitably read and studied to-day by all students of geology. Those familiar with the German language will derive both pleasure and profit from a perusal of Neumayr’s “Erdgeschichte” (2d ed. revised by Uhlig. Leipzig and Vienna, 2 vols., 1895-1897), and especially the first volume, “Allgemeine Geologie.” A recent French work to be recommended is Haug’s “Traité de Géologie” (Paris, 1907).
Some texts of physical geography may well be consulted, especially Emm. de Martonne’s “Traité de Géographie Physique.” Colin, Paris, 1909, pp. 910, pls. 48, and figs. 396.
NOTE. An explanatory list of abbreviations used in the reading references follows the List of Illustrations.
=The lithosphere and its envelopes.=—The stony part of the earth is known as the _lithosphere_, of which only a thin surface shell is known to us from direct observation. The relatively unknown central portion, or “core”, is sometimes referred to as the centrosphere. Inclosing the lithosphere is a water envelope, the _hydrosphere_, which comprises the oceans and inland bodies of water, and has a mass 1/4540 that of the lithosphere. If uniformly distributed, the hydrosphere would cover the lithosphere to the depth of about two miles, instead of being collected in basins as it now is. Though apparently not continuous, if we take into account the zone of underground water upon the continents, the hydrosphere may properly be considered as a continuous film about the lithosphere. It is a fact of much significance that all the ocean basins are connected, so that the levels are adjusted to furnish a common record of deposits over the entire surface that is sea-covered.
Enveloping the hydrosphere is the gaseous envelope, the _atmosphere_, with a mass 1/1200000 that of the lithosphere. The atmosphere is a mixture of the gases oxygen and nitrogen in parts by volume of one of the former to four of the latter, with a relatively small percentage of carbon dioxide. Locally, and at special seasons, the atmosphere may be charged with relatively large percentages of water vapor; and we shall see that both the carbon dioxide and the vapor contents are of the utmost importance in geological processes and in the influence upon climate. Unlike the water which composes the hydrosphere, the gases of the atmosphere are compressible. Forced down by the weight of superincumbent gas, the layers of the atmosphere at the level of the sea sustain a pressure of about fifteen pounds to the square inch; but this pressure steadily decreases in ascending to higher levels. From direct instrumental observation, the air has now been investigated to a height of more than twelve miles from the earth’s surface.