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Rh abyss, that these placid waters now bury in their secret chambers. Yet the same effort of imagination must be made, before the geologist can realize, that every acre of surface whose landscape now delights him, with wood and flower, bud and insect, once produced nothing but algæ, and nourished the slimy things of the great deep innumerable. In either extreme, vitality asserts its power, and in a few short years obliterates the rude formative traces, whether they be by fire or by water.

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