whose summits occur fish remains, were formed by the deluge. Yet this same catastrophe may very readily have formed other mountains which do not contain sand and fish remains, the difference being occasioned by the nature of sediments existing in particular localities. Such, then, is the process of mountain-making. And the reason why mountain chains must have been formerly sea-bottom, or deposited in marine basins [before their upheaval], is that the volume of fossiliferous and arenaceous sediments is far too considerable to be ascribed to the agency of rivers, or of any other body of water inferior to the sea itself. . . .
[The continuation of this passage is devoted to seismic and volcanic phenomena, which are discussed more particularly in a subsequent section (Distinzione vii. parte iv.). The author expresses himself upon these questions, as well as upon the meaning of fossils, erosive action of water in molding land surfaces, scintillation of the stars, etc., in eminently scientific manner. His elder contemporaries, Albertus Magnus and Vincent of Beauvais, also note the existence and teaching of fossil remains. Similar inferences are drawn by Cecco d'Ascoli, the ill-fated author of l'Acerba and envious rival of Dante in the latter part of the thirteenth and first quarter of the fourteenth century.]
