Page:Physical Geography of the Sea and its Meteorology.djvu/101

Rh with the regions of precipitation, so he who looks into the physical geography of the sea should search for the regions of evaporation, and for those springs in the ocean which supply the reservoirs among the mountains with water to feed the rivers; and, in order to conduct this search properly, he must consult the winds, and make himself acquainted with their circuits. Hence, in a work on the Physical Geography of the Sea and its Meteorology, we treat also of the Atmosphere.



200. Likened to a machine.—There is no employment more ennobling to man and his intellect than to trace the evidences of design and purpose, which are visible in many parts of the creation. Hence, to the right-minded mariner, and to him who studies the physical relations of earth, sea, and air, the atmosphere is something more than a shoreless ocean, at the bottom of which he creeps along. It is an envelope or covering for the distribution of light and heat over the surface of the earth; it is a sewer into which, with every breath we draw, we cast vast quantities of dead animal matter; it is a laboratory for purification, in which that matter is recompounded, and wrought again into wholesome and healthful shapes; it is a machine for pumping up all the rivers from the sea, and for conveying the water (§ 191) from the ocean to their sources in the mountains; it is an inexhaustible magazine, marvellously stored. Upon the proper working of this machine depends the well-being of every plant and animal that inhabits the earth. How interesting, then, ought not the study of it to be! An examination of the uses which plants and animals make of the air is sufficient to satisfy any reasoning mind in the conviction that when they were created, the necessity of this adaptation was taken into account. The connection between any two parts of an artificial machine that work into each other, does not render design in its construction more patent than is the fact that the great atmospherical machine of our planet was constructed by an Architect who designed it for certain purposes; therefore the management of it, its movements, and the performance of its offices, cannot be