Page:Physical Geography of the Sea and its Meteorology.djvu/156

 130 air depends; and which, in the beautiful adaptations that we are endeavouring; to point out, affords new and striking evidence that they all have their origin in one omniscient idea, just as the different parts of a watch may be considered to have been constructed and arranged according to one human design. In some parts of the earth the precipitation is greater than the evaporation: thus the amount of water borne down by every river that runs into the sea (§ 270) may be considered as the excess of the precipitation over the evaporation that takes place in the valley drained by that river. In other parts of the earth the evaporation and precipitation are exactly equal, as in those inland basins such as that in which the city of Mexico, Lake Titicaca, the Caspian Sea, etc., etc., are situated, which basins have no ocean drainage. If more rain fell in the valley of the Caspian Sea than is evaporated from it, that sea would finally get full and overflow the whole of that great basin. If less fell than is evaporated from it again, then that sea, in the course of time, would dry up, and plants and animals there would all perish for the want of water. In the sheets of water which we find distributed over that and every other inhabitable inland basin, we see reservoirs or evaporating surfaces just sufficient for the supply of that degree of moisture which is best adapted to the well-being of the plants and animals that people such basins. In other parts of the earth still, we find places, as the Desert of Sahara, in which neither evaporation nor precipitation takes place, and in which we find neither plant nor animal to fit the land for man's use.

303. Adaptations—their beauties and sublimity.—In contemplating the system of terrestrial adaptations, these researches teach one to regard the mountain ranges and the great deserts of the earth as the astronomer does the counterpoises to his telescope—though they be mere dead weights, they are, nevertheless, necessary to make the balance complete, the adjustment of his machine perfect. These counterpoises give ease to the motions, stability to the performance, and accuracy to the workings of the instrument. They are "compensations". Whenever I turn to contemplate the works of nature, I am struck with the admirable system of compensation, with the beauty and nicety with which every department is adjusted, adapted, and regulated according to the others; things and principles are meted out in directions apparently the most