On Gradualism

Letter
June 11th

It would be myopic to declare that there was no substance to Professor Sedgewickâ€™s observations. Mountains are born of small tectonic pressures over unimaginable tracts of time. Such as the tracts of time did beget those creatures that walk this planet. But not here. Not in the trench. Something is so terribly askew with the whole of it. Depth and age are tied here as anywhere, yes, but not linearly. Not comparatively. A geologist could strike the crust of the Earth until he is gray of beard and never find rock so old. There is plainly something different about the trench. The steady gradualism we see on the surface is a collapsed notion down here. The only option left to a naturalist is to observe and revise.

-C. Erasmus Dourwind