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As the vapours in the olden day tended in toward the centre of our solar system, and the mass revolved, there is reason to believe that ringlike separations took place in it. Whirling in the manner indicated, the mass of vapour or dust would flatten into a disk or a body of circular shape, with much the greater diameter in the plane of its whirling.
When, however, strong glasses were applied to the exploration, these pleasing fancies were rudely dispelled. Seen with a telescope of the better sort, the moon reveals itself to be in large part made up of circular depressions, each surrounded by a ringlike wall, with nearly level but rough places between.
As the process of concentration went on, this disk is supposed to have divided into ringlike masses, some approach to which we can discern in the existing nebulæ, which here and there among the farther fixed stars appear to be undergoing such stages of development toward solar systems.
When, as elsewhere noted, a shock originates beneath the sea, the effect is suddenly to elevate the water over the seat of the jarring and the regions thereabouts to the height of some feet. This elevation quickly takes the shape of a ringlike wave, which rolls off in every direction from its point of origin.
Besides the pits above mentioned, there are numerous fractures in the surface of the plains and ringlike ridges; on the most of these the walls have separated, forming trenches not unlike what we find in the case of some terrestrial breaks such as have been noted about volcanoes and elsewhere. It may be that the so-called canals of Mars are of the same nature.
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