This grand mineral view of so large a tract of country is the more
interesting, in that there has not occurred the least appearance of
volcanic matter, nor basaltic rock, in all that space, where so great
manifestation is made of those internal operations of the globe by
which strata had been consolidated in their substance, and erected into
positions the most distant from that in which they had been formed.

It is peculiarly satisfactory to me, and I hope also to my readers,
to have the observations of so able a philosopher and so diligent a
naturalist to offer in confirmation of a theory which had been formed
from appearances of the same kind in a country so far distant from those
of our author now described, as are the Alps of Savoy from those of
Scotland. It gives me a singular pleasure, in thus collecting facts for
the support of my opinion, to contribute all I can to recommend the
study of a work in natural history the most exemplary of its kind; and
a work which will remain the unalterable conveyance of precious
information when theories making a temporary figure may be changed.

To a person who understands the present theory, there can be no occasion
here to give the particular applications which will naturally occur in
reading those various descriptions. In these examples are contained
every species of bending, twisting, and displacement of the strata, from
the horizontal state in which they had been originally formed to the
vertical, or even to their being doubled back; and although M. de
Saussure had endeavoured to reason himself into a belief of those
inverted strata having been formed in their present place, it is evident
that he had only founded this opinion upon a principle which,
however just, may here perhaps be found misplaced; it is that of not
endeavouring to explain appearances from any supposition of which we
have not full conviction. I flatter myself, that when he shall have