whole rocks weather more rapidly than their waste is removed. The
destruction of the land is going on as fast as the waste can be
carried away.

We have now learned to see in the mantle of waste the record of
the destructive action of the agencies of weathering on the rocks
of the land surface. Similar records we shall find buried deeply
among the rocks of the crust in old soils and in rocks pitted and
decayed, telling of old land surfaces long wasted by the weather.
Ever since the dry land appeared these agencies have been as now
quietly and unceasingly at work upon it, and have ever been the
chief means of the destruction of its rocks. The vast bulk of the
stratified rocks of the earth's crust is made up almost wholly of
the waste thus worn from ancient lands.

In studying the various geological agencies we must remember the
almost inconceivable times in which they work. The slowest process
when multiplied by the immense time in which it is carried on
produces great results. The geologist looks upon the land forms of
the earth's surface as monuments which record the slow action of
weathering and other agents during the ages of the past. The
mountain peak, the rounded hill, the wide plain which lies where
hills and mountains once stood, tell clearly of the great results
which slow processes will reach when given long time in which to
do their work. We should accustom ourselves also to think of the
results which weathering will sooner or later bring to pass. The
tombstone and the bowlder of the field, which each year lose from
their surfaces a few crystalline grains, must in time be wholly
destroyed. The hill whose rocks are slowly rotting underneath a
cover of waste must become lower and lower as the centuries and