The Earth as Modified by Human Action: A Last Revision of "Man and Nature"C. Scribner's sons, 1885 - 629 páginas |
Outras edições - Ver todos
The Earth as Modified by Human Action: A Last Revision of "Man and Nature" George Perkins Marsh Visualização completa - 1898 |
The Earth as Modified by Human Action: A New Edition of Man and Nature George Perkins Marsh Visualização completa - 1882 |
Termos e frases comuns
abundant acres action agricultural Alps American ancient animals annual Apennines Ardèche artificial ascribed atmosphere banks basin Becquerel birds canals century channel climate coast consequently considerable countries course covered cubic yards cultivated deposits depth desert destruction dikes discharge draining dunes earth effects Egypt Elisée Reclus Europe evaporation extent fact feet fertile floods flow forest France geographical geological ground growth height Hence human humidity hundred important inches increase influence insects inundations irrigation Italy lake land Lappmarken larvæ less Lombardy maritime pine miles millimetres moisture mountains natural Nile Northern observed Paris pine plains plants precipitation present probably produced proportion protection provinces quadrupeds quantity rain river rock roots sand season shores snow soil Southern species springs square miles strata stratum streams superficial supply supposed surface sylviculture temperature thousand timber tion torrents transported trees Val di Chiana valley vegetable wild wind winter woods Zuiderzee
Passagens mais conhecidas
Página 394 - And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
Página 43 - The earth is fast becoming an unfit home for its noblest inhabitant, and another era of equal human crime and human improvidence, and of like duration with that through which traces of that crime and that improvidence extend, would reduce it to such a condition of impoverished productiveness, of shattered surface, of climatic excess, as to threaten the depravation, barbarism, and perhaps even extinction of the species.* Physical Improvement.
Página 288 - I will give only a single instance, which, though a simple one, has interested me. In Staffordshire, on the estate of a relation where I had ample means of investigation, there was a large and extremely barren heath, which had never been touched by the hand of man; but several hundred acres of exactly the same nature had been enclosed twenty-five years previously and planted with Scotch fir. The change in the native vegetation...
Página 375 - It is certain that a desolation, like that which has overwhelmed many once beautiful and fertile regions of Europe, awaits an important part of the territory of the United States, and of other comparatively new countries over which European civilization is now extending its sway, unless prompt measures are taken to check the action of destructive causes already in operation.
Página 54 - But we are, even now, breaking up the floor and wainscoting and doors and window frames of our dwelling, for fuel to warm our bodies and seethe our pottage, and the world cannot afford to wait till the slow and sure progress of exact science has taught it a better economy.
Página 221 - The spot is in the middle of a very steep pasture, inclining to the south. Eighty years ago the owner of the land, perceiving that young firs were shooting up in the upper part of it, determined to let them grow, and they soon formed a flourishing grove. "As soon as they were well grown, a fine spring appeared in place of the occasional rill, and furnished abundant water in the longest droughts. For forty or fifty years the spring was considered the best in the Clos du Doubs.
Página 191 - ... of the woods has been followed by a diminution in the annual quantity of rain and dew. Indeed, it has long been a popularly settled belief that vegetation and the condensation and fall of atmospheric moisture are reciprocally necessary to each other, and even the poets sing of Afric's barren sand, Where nought can grow, because it raineth not, And where no rain can fall to bless the land, Because nought grows there.
Página 3 - Vast forests have disappeared from mountain spurs and ridges ; the vegetable earth accumulated beneath the trees by the decay of leaves and of fallen trunks, the soil of the alpine pastures which skirted and indented the woods, and the mould of the upland fields, are washed away ; meadows, once fertilized by irrigation, are waste and unproductive...
Página 247 - ... death. Vast deposits of flinty pebbles, many feet in thickness, which have rolled down and spread far over the plain, surround large trees, bury even their tops, and rise above them, leaving to the husbandman no longer a ray of hope. One can imagine no sadder spectacle than the deep fissures in the flanks of the mountains, which seem to have burst forth in eruption to cover the plains with their ruins. These gorges, under the influence of the sun which cracks and shivers to fragments the very...
Página 223 - The pond owes its existence to a stream which has its source in the hills which stretch some miles to the south. Within the time mentioned, these hills, which were clothed with a dense forest, have been almost entirely stripped of trees; and to the wonder and loss of the mill-owners, the water in the pond has failed, except in the season of freshets, and what was never heard of before, the stream itself has been entirely dry.