Abstract
THIS interesting, if not very convincing book may be described as a fugue with the hypsographic curve as its principal theme; a hypothetical structural curve derived from it as the answering subject; the geo-chemical cycle of water, often repeated, as the counter subject; and a final stretto in which these and many related episodes are worked up into an all-embracing explanation of terrestrial relief. The author supposes the effects of denudation and deposition never to have taken place, and shows that the hypsographic curve is then transformed into a simple structural curve. He deduces from this that the structural relief of the earth's surface follows the statistical laws of chance, and therefore, ignoring the implications of isostasy, he rejects Wegener's well-known deduction from the hypsographic curve. Erosion has accentuated the upper concavity of the ‘original’ curve, and the continental plains and shelves have developed on the middle regions of the structural surface by the accumulation of sediments.
Le Relief de la terre: ses origines, ses lois, son évolution; principes nouveaux de géographie physique.
Par Paul Soulier. Pp. x + 432 + 3 planches. (Paris: Félix Alcan, 1925.) 30 francs.
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[Book Reviews]. Nature 118, 259 (1926). https://doi.org/10.1038/118259b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/118259b0