gravel which may still be seen, and which has agglomerated; and of stones of various districts, natures, and colours and hardness, making one single conglomerate.  And a little beyond the sandstone conglomerate a tufa has been formed, where it turned towards Castel Florentino; farther on, the mud was deposited in which the shells lived, and which rose in layers according to the levels at which the turbid Arno flowed into that sea.  And from time to time the bottom of the sea was raised, depositing these shells in layers, as may be seen in the cutting at Colle Gonzoli, laid open by the Arno which is wearing away the base of it; in which cutting the said layers of shells are very plainly to be seen in clay of a bluish colour, and various marine objects are found there.  And if the earth of our hemisphere is indeed raised by so much higher than it used to be, it must have become by so much lighter by the waters which it lost through the rift between Gibraltar and Ceuta; and all the more the higher it rose, because the weight of the waters which were thus lost would be added to the earth in the other hemisphere.  And if the shells had been carried by the muddy deluge they would have been mixed up, and separated from each other amidst the mud, and not in regular steps and layers—­ as we see them now in our time.

The marine shells were not produced away from the sea.

988.

As to those who say that shells existed for a long time and were born at a distance from the sea, from the nature of the place and of the cycles, which can influence a place to produce such creatures—­to them it may be answered:  such an influence could not place the animals all on one line, except those of the same sort and age; and not the old with the young, nor some with an operculum and others without their operculum, nor some broken and others whole, nor some filled with sea-sand and large and small fragments of other shells inside the whole shells which remained open; nor the claws of crabs without the rest of their bodies; nor the shells of other species stuck on to them like animals which have moved about on them; since the traces of their track still remain, on the outside, after the manner of worms in the wood which they ate into.  Nor would there be found among them the bones and teeth of fish which some call arrows and others serpents’ tongues, nor would so many [Footnote:  I. Scilla argued against this hypothesis, which was still accepted in his days; see:  La vana Speculazione, Napoli 1670.] portions of various animals be found all together if they had not been thrown on the sea shore.  And the deluge cannot have carried them there, because things that are heavier than water do not float on the water.  But these things could not be at so great a height if they had not been carried there by the water, such a thing being impossible from their weight.  In places where the valleys have not been filled with salt sea water shells are never to be seen; as is plainly visible