NATURAL PHILOSOPHY.

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bring down the history of a floating island having existedon this spot, the vegetables growing on this might be sup-posed to have furnished this vegetable matter, now existingin an altered state; whereas, we have seen, that the greatestpart of this mass was composed of such matter, at the timeit existed as a floating island.

This mass of decayed leaves and roots of plants, and oftrees, as described by the ingenious observer, “ was un-doubtedly a mass of long-buried vegetable matter, part of astratum of peat passing through the bituminous fermentation.The opportunity of its separation having been given by thesuperincumbent strata, and having been so reduced by theexcavation which formed the lake, as not to have a sufficientthickness or strength to resist the expansive powers of thedetached gaseous matters, which, for the completion of theprocess, would have been required to be closely confined.

“ That this bituminous fermentation was actually goingon, may be reasonably inferred from the nature of the gaswhich was disengaged, its peculiar odour, and imputed in-flammability; strongly denoting the presence of hydrogen;the separation and subsequent fixation of which have beenassumed as important steps in this process. Another cir-cumstance yields very strong collateral proof that this ope-ration had proceeded to a certain length. The specificgravity of all bituminous substances is generally less thanthat of the vegetable substances from whence they have beenformed;” this he alleges to have been the case, when woodhas endured the process. As this operation has gone on,the substance has become specifically lighter, and cavitieshave been formed by, and distended with detached hydro-gen, which must have also increased the levity of the mass,and enabled it, even with the superincumbent weight ofearth, to make it ascend through the water.

It may be here remarked, although it must be veryapparent, insomuch so, as to render an^ remark superfluous,—that the eruption of these gaseous matters in considerablequantities, is sufficient to account for the agitation of thewaters, and for the other phenomena, which are describedas appearing to produce some powerful elevating force un-derneath.

From the variety of observations, the result of the steadyand experienced inquiry of different minds, which havepreceded, without going further, we think it is sufficientlyestablished to warrant our coming to this conclusion, that—peat is a species of acervation or congregation of vegetablesubstances casually deposited, still retaining a sufficiency of