Curiosities of Science, Past and Present / A Book for Old and Young

by John Timbs

THE BASIN OF THE ATLANTIC.

In its entire length, the basin of this sea is a long trough, separating the Old World from the New, and extending probably from pole to pole.

This ocean-furrow was scored into the solid crust of our planet by the Almighty hand, that there the waters which “he called seas” might be gathered together so as to “let the dry land appear,” and fit the earth for the habitation of man.

From the top of Chimborazo to the bottom of the Atlantic, at the deepest place yet recognised by the plummet in the North Atlantic, the distance in a vertical line is nine miles.

Could the waters of the Atlantic be drawn off, so as to expose to view this great sea-gash, which separates continents, and extends from the Arctic to the Antarctic, it would present a scene the most grand, rugged, and imposing. The very ribs of the solid earth, with the foundations of the sea, would be brought to light; and we should have presented to us at one view, in the empty cradle of the ocean, “a thousand fearful wrecks,” with that dreadful array of dead men’s skulls, great anchors, heaps of pearls and inestimable stones, which, in the dreamer’s eye, lie scattered on the bottom of the sea, making it hideous with sights of ugly death.