"Men will yet explain this effect by natural laws," I said.
"Yes," he answered; "when they learn the facts; and they will then be able to solve certain phenomena connected with diffusion processes that they can not now understand. Did I not tell you that after the fact had been made plain it was easy to see how Columbus stood the egg on its end? What I have demonstrated by experiment is perhaps no new principle in hydrostatics. But I have applied it in a natural manner to the explanation of obscure natural phenomena, that men now seek unreasonable methods to explain."
"You may proceed with your narrative. I accept that when certain liquids are connected, as you have shown, by means of porous substances, one will pass into the other, and the surface of the lighter liquid in this case will assume a position below that of the heavier."
"You must also accept," said he, "that when solutions of salt are subjected to earth attraction, under proper conditions, the solids may by capillary attraction be left behind, and pure water finally pass through the porous medium. Were it not for this law, the only natural surface spring water on earth would be brine, for the superficial crust of the earth is filled with saline solutions. All the spring-fed rivers and lakes would also be salty and fetid with sulphur compounds, for at great depths brine and foul water are always present. Even in countries where all the water below the immediate surface of the earth is briny, the running springs, if of capillary origin, are pure and fresh. You may imagine how different this would be were it not for the law I have cited, for the whole earth's crust is permeated by brine and saline waters. Did your 'philosophy' never lead you to think of this?"
Continuing, my guest argued as follows: "Do not lakes exist on the earth's surface into which rivers and streams flow, but which have no visible outlet? Are not such lakes saline, even though the source of supply is comparatively fresh? Has it never occurred to you to question whether capillarity assisted by surface evaporation (not evaporation only as men assert) is not separating the water of these lakes from the saline substances carried into them by the streams, thus producing brine lakes? Will not this action after a great length of time result in crystalline deposits over portions of the bottoms of such lakes, and ultimately produce a salt bed?"
"It is possible," I replied.
"Not only possible, but probable. Not only probable, but true. Across the intervening brine strata above the salt crystals the surface rivers may flow, indeed, owing to differences in specific gravity the surface of the lake may be comparatively fresh, while in the quiet depths below, beds of salt crystals are forming, and between these extremes may rest strata after strata of saline solutions, decreasing in gravity towards the top."
Then he took his manuscript, and continued to read in a clear, musical voice, while I sat a more contented listener than I had been previously. I was not only confuted, but convinced. And I recalled the saying of Socrates, that no better fortune can happen a man than to be confuted in an error.