Fourthly. The “moss,” which is a metal proper, tinged by oxidation. [N.B. Here is oxygen inside a pebble!]
Fifthly. The whole or a part of some extinct animal’s petrified structure.
Sixthly. One thing more, sometimes a drop of water.
Seventhly and lastly. Air, permeating the stone in fine pores and channels, one of the largest of which was in some cases a breathing-hole used by the zoophyte before he drew his last gasp.
Who shall therefore say that a PEBBLE from the sea-shore has nothing remarkable in it or about it, merely because the passing schoolboy can pick it up if he pleases, and, without looking at it for a moment, can fling it at the head of a gull, or dash it to atoms against a larger stone? It is a microcosm in itself; and if it lead us on to further inquiry and patient thought, it will amply repay our trouble, though we have loitered away a summer morn or an autumn evening among the Pebbles of the Beach.
CHAPTER X.
GUESSES AT THE PROBABLE FEATURES OF A PAST SCENE.—WHAT WAS THE EARTH’S COMMENCING ROTATION.—LAW OF THE TIDES AT SUCH A TIME, AND CORRESPONDING ACTION OF THE SEA UPON THE LAND.—ORIGINAL CHARACTER OF THESE FOSSIL FORMS.
Whatever may be thought of the apparent scope or tendency of some of the geological theories which are rife in the present day, no person who has really considered the subject in its principal bearings has any doubt that the surface of our globe, both as to the land and the water, was once very different from what it is now. All sound argument must allow this to be possible: all careful investigation pronounces it to be the fact.