Le betail ne sauroit paturer
dans de telles prairies; mais l'industrieux montagnard fait y
faucher[29].
[Note 29: M. de Saussure endeavours to explain those appearances of
transported blocks of granite by another cause; this is a certain
_debacle_ of the waters of the earth, which I do not understand. M. de
Luc again attempts to explain it by violent explosions; I suppose he
means those of a volcano. But he has not given us the evidence upon
which such an opinion may be founded, farther than by saying that those
blocks could not have come there by the natural operations of the
surface. By this must be meant, that, from the nearest summit of
granite, there is not, at present, any natural means by which these
blocks might be transported to that place. But it is not with the
present state of things that we are concerned, in explaining the
operations of a distant period. If the natural operations of the surface
change the shape of things, as is clearly proved by every natural
appearance, Why form an argument against a former transaction, upon the
circumstances of the present state of things? Our author does not
seem to perceive, that, from this mode of reasoning, there is is an
insuperable objection to his violent explosions having been employed in
producing those effects.
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