"Let us see that we understand each other right.

Unless I mistake you, your hypothesis is that a fragment of the earth, comprising the Mediterranean and its shores from Gibraltar to Malta, has been developed into a new asteroid, which is started on an independent orbit in the solar regions.

Is not that your meaning ?" "Precisely so," the lieutenant acquiesced.
"Well, then," continued Servadac, "it seems to me to be at fault in this respect: it fails, and fails completely, to account for the geological character of the land that we have found now encompassing this sea.

Why, if the new land is a fragment of the old--why does it not retain its old formation?
What has become of the granite and the calcareous deposits?
How is it that these should all be changed into a mineral concrete with which we have no acquaintance ?" No doubt, it was a serious objection; for, however likely it might be that a mass of the earth on being detached would be eccentric in its movements, there was no probable reason to be alleged why the material of its substance should undergo so complete a change.

There was nothing to account for the fertile shores, rich in vegetation, being transformed into rocks arid and barren beyond precedent.
The lieutenant felt the difficulty, and owned himself unprepared to give at once an adequate solution; nevertheless, he declined to renounce his theory.