The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci

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Page 980 of 1565.
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That the Northern bases of some Alps are not yet petrified. And this
is plainly to be seen where the rivers, which cut through them, flow
towards the North; where they cut through the strata in the living
stone in the higher parts of the mountains; and, where they join the
plains, these strata are all of potter's clay; as is to be seen in
the valley of Lamona where the river Lamona, as it issues from the
Appenines, does these things on its banks.

That the rivers have all cut and divided the mountains of the great
Alps one from the other. This is visible in the order of the
stratified rocks, because from the summits of the banks, down to the
river the correspondence of the strata in the rocks is visible on
either side of the river. That the stratified stones of the
mountains are all layers of clay, deposited one above the other by
the various floods of the rivers. That the different size of the
strata is caused by the difference in the floods--that is to say
greater or lesser floods.

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