r h > I I **# •• ' ^ ^B E R K JE L E Y\ LIBRARY UNIVEftS*$ OF 1 S^ CALIFORNIA^/ THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESENTED BY PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID ESSAY ON THE THEORY OF THE EARTH. ESSAY OK THE THEORY OF THE EARTH. BY BARON G. CUVIER, PERPETUAL SECRETARY OF THE FRENCH INSTITUTE, PROFESSOR AND ADMINISTRATOR OF THE MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, GEOLOGICAL ILLUSTRATIONS. BY PROFESSOR JAMESON. FIFTH EDITION, TRANSLATED FROM THE LAST FRENCH EDITION, WITH NUMEROUS ADDITIONS BY THE AUTHOR AND TRANSLATOR. WILLIAM BLACKWOOD, EDINBURGH; AND T. CADELL, STRAND, LONDON. MDCCCXXVII. Printed by P. Neill PREFACE TO THE FIFTH EDITION. GEOLOGY, now deservedly one of the most popular and attractive of the physical sciences, was, not many years ago, held in little estimation ; and even at present, there are not wanting some who do not hesitate to maintain, that it is a mere tissue of ill ob- served phenomena, and of hypotheses of boundless extravagance. The work of Cu- VIER now laid before the public, contains in itself not only a complete answer to these ig- norant imputations, but also demonstrates the accuracy, extent, and importance of many of the facts and reasonings of this de- VI PREFACE. lightful branch of Natural History. Can it be maintained of a science, which requires for its successful prosecution an intimate ac- quaintance with Chemistry, Natural Philo- sophy and Astronomy, — with the details and views of Zoology, Botany, and Mineralogy, and which connects these different depart- ments of knowledge in a most interesting and striking manner, — that it is of no va- lue? Can it be maintained of Geology, which discloses to us the history of the first origin of organic beings, and traces their gradual developement from the monade to man himself, — which enumerates and de- scribes the changes that plants, animals, and minerals — the atmosphere, and the waters of the globe- — have undergone from the ear- liest geological periods up to our own time, and w^hich even instructs us in the earliest history of the human species, — that it offers no gratification to the philosopher ? Can even those who estimate the value of science, not by intellectual desires, but by practical ad- PREFACE. Vll vantages, deny the importance of Geology, certainly one of the foundations of agricul- ture, and which enables us to search out materials for numberless important economi- cal purposes ? Geology took its rise in the Academy of Freyberg, with the illustrious WERNER, to whom we owe its present interesting condition. This being the case, we ought not, (as is at present too much the practice), amidst the numerous discoveries in the mineral king- dom which have been made since the system of investigation of that great interpreter of nature was made known, forget the master, and arrogate all to ourselves. In this Island, Geology first took firm root in the north : in Edinburgh the Wernerian geognostical views and method of investigation, combined with the theory of HUTTON, the experiments and speculations of HALL, the illustrations of PLAYFAIR, and the labours of the Royal and Wernerian Natural History Societies, ex- viii PREFACE. cited a spirit of inquiry which rapidly spread throughout the Empire ; and now Great Bri- tain presents to the scientific world a scene of geological acuteness, activity, and enter- prise, not surpassed in any other country. On the Continent the writings of CUVIER, distinguished equally by purity and beauty of style, and profound learning, have proved eminently useful in aiding the progress of Geology. In this country CUVIER was first made known as a geologist by the publication of the present essay, which, from its unexam- pled popularity, has made his name as fami- liar to us as that of the most distinguished of our own writers. ROBERT JAMESON. COLLEGE MUSEUM, EDINBURGH, 25th November 1826. ADVERTISEMENT TO FOURTH EDITION THIS Fourth Edition of the celebrated Essay on the Theory of the Earth, con- tains, besides many additional facts and statements in regard to the Natural History of the Earth, also learned discussions by CUVIER, on the newness of the present con- tinents, as confirmed by the history of na- tions ; and on the proofs regarding the anti- quity of nations alleged to be contained in their astronomical and other monuments. ROBERT JAMESON. COLLEGE MUSEUM, EDINBURGH, %d April Fossil organic remains are the relics of a primeval world long since gone past, proclaiming with a loud voice the instability of earthly affairs, and impressing upon the minds of those who seriously con- sider them, sentiments of piety and feelings of devotion. If the an- tiquary digs from among the ruins of Herculaneum a piece of an- cient money, a vase, or a statue, we rejoice with him, in finding the mode of life, the manners and arts of an ancient people, placed before our eyes : If he finds an old record, illustrative of the history of his country, however limited in extent that country may be, we are grateful to him for the particle of knowledge he has added to our store ; but if, among the ruins of the common country of the hu- man race, we linger at the great sepulchre of animated beings des- troyed by the hand of fate, who can look upon it without sentiments of piety ! It is not here the statues of Polycletus that we admire, but the admirable monuments of the workmanship of Nature, taken from the ruins of the great Herculeum overwhelmed by the ocean, that we look upon with feelings of the deepest wonder and devotion. PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. THE attention of naturalists was early di- rected to the investigation of the fossil organic remains so generally and abun- dantly distributed throughout the strata of which the crust of the Earth is composed. It is not, as some writers now imagine, en- tirely a modern study ; for even so early as the time of Leibnitz, we find that philoso- pher drawing and describing fossil bones. After this period it continued to interest individuals, and engage the particular at- tention of societies and academies. The Royal Society of London, by the Memoirs Xll PREFACE TO THE of Sloane, Collinson, Lister, Derham, Baker, Grew, Hunter, Jacobs, Plott, Camper, and many others, afforded satisfactory proofs of the importance attached to this branch of Natural History by philosophers in Eng- land ; and the Memoirs of M. Graydon, in the Transactions of the Royal Irish Acade- my, shew that it was not entirely neglected in Ireland. On the continent of Europe the natural history of petrifactions was also much studied, as appears from the Memoirs of Hollman, Beckman, and Blumenbach, in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Gottingen ; — of Gmelin, Pallas, Herrmann, Chappe, in the Memoirs of the Imperial Academy of Sciences of Petersburg ; — of Geoffroi, Buffon, Daubenton, Faujas St Fond, and others of the old French Acade- my of Sciences ; — of Astruc and Riviere, of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Mont- pellier ; — of Collini of the Academia Theo- doro-Palatina, at Manheim, &c. But the geognostical relations of the rocks in which THIRD EDITION. Xlll these organic remains are contained were but ill understood, until Werner pointed out the mode of investigating them. His in- teresting and important views were circu- lated from Freyberg, by the writings and conversations of his pupils, and have con- tributed materially to the advancement of this branch of Natural History in Germany, France, and also in Great Britain. Pe- trifactions are no longer viewed as objects of mere curiosity, as things isolated and unrelated to the rocks of which the crust of the Earth is composed ; on the contrary, they are now considered as one of the most important features in the strata of all re- gions of the earth. By the regularity and determinate nature of their distribu- tion, they afford characters which assist us in discriminating not only single beds, but also whole formations of rocks ; and in this respect they are highly interesting to the geognostical inquirer. To the geologist this beautiful branch of Natural History opens XIV PREFACE TO THE • up numerous and uncommonly curious views of nature in the mineral kingdom : it shews him the commencement of the forma- tion of organic beings, — it points out the gradual succession in the formation of ani- mals, from the almost primeval coral near the primitive strata, through all the wonder- ful variety of form and structure observed in shells, fishes, amphibious animals, and birds, to the perfect quadruped of the al- luvial land ; and it makes him acquainted with a geographical and physical distribution of organic beings in the strata of the globe, very different from what is observed to hold in the present state of the organic world. The zoologist views with wonder and amazement those hosts of fossil animals, sometimes so similar to the present living species, at other times so far removed from them in form and structure. He compares the fossil orders, genera and species, with those now inhabiting the earth's surface, or living in its waters, and discovers that there THIRD EDITION. XV is a whole system of animals in a fossil state different from the present. Even the physiologist, in the various forms, connec- tions, and relations of the parts of those animals, obtains new facts for his descrip- tions and reasonings. Such, then, being the nature of this branch of Natural History, it is not surprising that, when once understood, it should have many and zealous cultivators, and occupy the talents of men of learn- ing and sagacity. In our time, Cuvier, the celebrated Professor of Natural History in Paris, has eminently distinguished himself by his numerous discoveries, accurate de- scriptions, and rational views, on this sub- ject. His great work on Fossil Organic Re- mains, of which a new edition is now in pro- gress, is the most splendid contribution to Natural History furnished by any individual of this age. The Essay on the Theory of the Earth, now translated, is the introductory part of XVI PREFACE TO THE the great work of Cuvier. The subject of the deluge forms a principal object of this elegant discourse. After describing the principal results at which the theory of the earth, in his opinion, has arrived, he next mentions the various relations which con- nect the history of the fossil bones of land animals with these results ; explains the principles on which is founded the art of as- certaining these bones, or, in other words, of discovering a genus, and of distinguish- ing a species, by a single fragment of bone : and gives a rapid sketch of the results to which his researches lead, of the new genera and species which these have been the means of discovering, and of the different formations in which they are contained. Some naturalists, as Lamarck, having main- tained that the present existing races of quadrupeds are mere modifications or va- rieties of those ancient races which we now find in a fossil state, modifications which may have been produced by change of cli- THIRD EDITION. XV11 mate, and other local circumstances, and since brought to the present great difference, by the operation of similar causes during a long succession of ages, — Cuvier shews that the difference between the fossil species and those which now exist, is bounded by cer- tain limits ; that these limits are a great deal more extensive than those which now distinguish the varieties of the same species, and consequently, that the extinct species of quadrupeds are not varieties of the pre- sently existing species. This very interest- ing discussion naturally leads our author to state the proofs of the recent population of the world ; of the comparatively modern origin of its present surface ; of the deluge, and the subsequent renewal of human so- ciety. In order to render this Essay more com- plete and satisfactory, I have illustrated the whole with an extensive series of observa- tions, and have arranged them in such a b XV111 PREFACE. manner that they will be readily accessible, not only to the naturalist, but also to the general reader. Since the publication of the former edi- tion of this Essay, many curious discoveries have been made in regard to fossil organic remains : — some of these are included in the Illustrations at the end of the Essay, others want of room forces us to omit. R. JAMESON, COLLEGE OF EDINBURGH, April 1817. CONTENTS. Page PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS,, ------ ^g^ib,! Plan of the Essay, - - -: im/^whi^/'f-etl* gffrt -jerjwn - 4 First Appearance of the Earth, -c,rfj -^Mmi,** - - - 6 First Proofs of Revolutions on the Surface of the Globe, - 6 Proofs that such Revolutions have been numerous, - - 10 Proofs that these Revolutions have been sudden, - - - 14 Proofs of the Occurrence of Revolutions before the Exist- ence of Living Beings, ---------16 Examination of the Causes which act at present on the Surface of the Globe, .if.*n^4 _«%" ,- 23 Of Slips, or Falling Down of the Materials of Mountains, 25 Of Alluvial Formations, >>*W*ia!*M«Kft -T& i»m: J* - - 26 Of the Formation of Downs, ---------28 Of the Formation of Cliffs, or Steep Shores, '8 'few- - - 29 Depositions formed in Water, - - - - - - . ^ «.4«i ;, 30 Of Stalactites, 31 Of Lithophytes, - - - -^torfMtt* .r.&fpita4. ***** - - 32 Of Incrustations, ----»..----. -32 Of Volcanoes, ;amc*K - 34 Constant Astronomical Causes, --------36 Older Systems of Geologists, 38 XX CONTENTS. Page More Recent Systems, -----------41 Diversities of all the Systems, ---------44 Causes of these Differences, ---------46 Nature and Condition of the Problem, ------ 46 Progress of Mineral Geology, ---------49 Importance of Fossil Remains in Geology, 51 High importance of the Fossil Bones of Quadrupeds, - - 53 Small probability of discovering new Species of large Qua- drupeds, - -->*•;* -~ ->-- - - - - - - - - - 56 Inquiry respecting the Fabulous Animals of the Ancients, 69 Difficulty of determining the Fossil Bones of Quadrupeds, 82 Principle by which this determination is effected, -*Ky»*ri 83 View of the general Results of these Researches, - - - 94 Relations of the Species of Fossil Animals, with the Strata in which they are found, - - - iOiciwiaaO adl.io J9 95 Proofs that the extinct Species of Quadrupeds are not Va- rieties of the presently existing Species, - - - - - 102 Proofs that there are no Fossil Human Bones, - - - - 114 Physical Proofs of the Newness of the present Continents, 121 Additions of Land by the action of Rivers, - - i. Uiv«£l 123 Progress of Downs,- - - - - - iur-,- 264 Dolphin, -r< - - - - - : •- •'• '•"*£' «•" . "V - ib. Lamantin, - - - - - - - - - * -v - - 265 Morse, • .- - - - - 265 Palaeotherium, - 266 Lophiodon, 268 XXii CONTENTS. Page Anoplotherium, ----- 270 Anthracotheria, ------- -fj-7fpjy.- 272 Cheropotamus, ----------- - ib. Adapis, >r<-'if i»; - ! rf Jtn:vrif>n.r itfJ'laiif.f l>ritni(HlllrMt>ni><-t>lylrtli>ni> first a/rpeM-tmcc 01^ f'os and, oi '-XiwvrzZ Ot^iparffuj- SluJLr, Carols' & Veetable.? flr ftiftdfr Sandstone , with t^oal .Fi.thes. Fosjrt STieZLr, CoraLf, Lacertoz , Jurilej Jil J Cn>coiiilr,\- &< . f//.w erttorcLrTizre, fiuZdmy steniz .\ Du-tv/fdvnoH* Plunte . 'ir.rt ccffpeartatc^ at^fossH. JictruajLJ" of' or extinct Hippopotamus, .'Jif[>i,r, Fossil Remains or ' the, Jfiarum, Species first appear in this rormettutn I^Mfe Mb /'A. i •/•/•: r. B&TFTIANS. ESSAY ON THE THEORY OF THE EARTH PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. IN my work on Fossil Bones, the object which I proposed was to discover to what animals the osseous remains, with which the superficial stra- ta of the glohe are filled, may have belonged. In pursuing this object, I had to follow a path in which but little progress had hitherto been made. As an antiquary of a new order, I was obliged at once to learn the art of restoring these monuments of past revolutions to their original forms, and to discover their nature and relations ; I had to collect and bring together in their ori- ginal order, the fragments of which they consist- ed ; to reconstruct, as it were, the ancient beings to which these fragments belonged ; to reproduce them with all their proportions and characters ; A 2 THEORY OF THE EARTH. and, lastly, to compare them with those which now live at the surface of the glohe : — an art al- most unknown, and which presupposed a science whose first developments had scarcely yet heen traced, that of the laws which regulate the co- existence of the forms of the different parts in organised beings. I had therefore to prepare my- self for these inquiries, by others of a far more extensive kind, respecting the animals which still exist. Nothing, except an almost complete review of creation in its present state, could give a cha- racter of demonstration to the results of my in- vestigation into its ancient state ; but, from this review, I had at the same time to expect a great body of rules and affinities not less satisfactorily demonstrated ; and it became obvious, that, in consequence of this essay upon a small portion of the theory of the earth, the whole animal king- dom would necessarily be in some measure sub- jected to new laws. Thus I was encouraged in this twofold investi- gation, by the equal interest which it promised to possess, both with regard to the general science of anatomy, the essential basis of all those which treat of organised bodies, and with regard to the physical history of the globe, the foundation of mineralogy, geography, and even, it may be said, of the history of Man, and of all that it most con- cerns him to know with regard to himself. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 3 If it be so interesting to us to follow, in the infancy of our species, the almost obliterated traces of extinct nations, why should it not also be so, to search, amid the darkness of the infancy of the Earth, for the traces of revolutions which have ta- ken place anterior to the existence of all nations ? We admire the power by which the human mind has measured the motions of the celestial bodies, which nature seemed to have concealed for ever from our view. Genius and science have burst the limits of space ; and observations, explained by just reasoning, have unveiled the mechan- ism of the universe. Would it not also be glorious for man to burst the limits of time, and, by means of observations, to ascertain the his- tory of this world, and the succession of events which preceded the birth of the human race? Astronomers have undoubtedly advanced more rapidly than naturalists ; and the present pe- riod, with respect to the Theory of the Earth, bears some resemblance to that in which some philosophers fancied that the heavens were formed of polished stones, and that the moon was of the size of the Peleponnesus ; but after ANAXAGO- RAS, came COPERNICUS and KEPLER, who pointed the way to NEWTON ; and why should not natural history also one day have its New- ton? A 2 THEORY OF THE EAUTH. Plan of this Essay. W:HAT I especially propose to present in this discourse, is the plan and the result of my lahours regarding Fossil Bones. I shall also attempt to trace a rapid sketch of the efforts that have heen made up to the present day, to restore the history of the revolutions of the glohe. The facts which I have been enabled to discover, form, without doubt, only a small portion of those which would be necessary to complete this ancient history ; but several of them lead to decisive consequences, and the rigorous manner in which I have proceeded in their determination, affords me reason to think that they will be regarded as points definitively fixed, and which in their aggregate will form an epoch in science. Lastly, I trust their novelty will be a sufficient excuse for me, if I claim for them the earnest attention of my readers. My object will first be to shew by what rela- tions the history of the fossil bones of terrestrial animals connects itself with the theory of the earth, and for what reasons a peculiar importance is to be attributed to it, with reference to this subject. I shall then unfold the principles upon which is founded the art of determining these bones, or, in other words, of recognizing a genus, and of distinguishing a species, by a single frag- ment of bone, — an art, on the certainty of which THEORY' OF THE EARTH. 5 depends that of my whole work, I shall give a rapid account of the new species, and of genera previously unknown, which the application of these principles has led me to discover, as well as the different kinds of deposits in which they are contained. And as the difference between these species and those which exist at the present day is bounded by certain limits, I shall show that these limits much exceed those which now distin- guish the varieties of the same species. I shall therefore make known to what extent these va- rieties may go, whether from the influence of time, or from that of climate, or, lastly, from that of do- mestication. In this way I shall be enabled to conclude, and to induce my readers to conclude with me, that great events were necessary to produce the more considerable differences which I have discovered. I shall next mention the particular modifica- tions which my researches must necessarily intro- duce into the hitherto received opinions regard- ing the revolutions of the globe; and, lastly, I shall inquire how far the civil and religious his- tory of different nations corresponds with the re- sults of observation with regard to the physical history of the Earth, and with the probabilities which these observations afford concerning the period at which societies of men may have found fixed places of abode, and fields susceptible of 6 THEORY OF THE EARTH. cultivation, and at which, therefore, they may have assumed a durable form. First Appearance of the Earth. When the traveller passes over those fertile plains where gently flowing streams nourish in their course an abundant vegetation, and where the soil, inhabited by a numerous population, adorned with flourishing villages, opulent cities, and superb monuments, is never disturbed, except by the ravages of war, or by the oppression of the powerful, he is not led to suspect that Nature also has had her intestine wars, and that the sur- face of the globe has been broken up by revolu- tions and catastrophes. But his ideas change as soon as he digs into that soil which now presents so peaceful an aspect, or ascends to the hills which border the plain ; his ideas are expanded, if I may use the expression, in proportion to the expansion of the view, and begin to embrace the full extent and grandeur of those ancient events, when he climbs the more ejevated chains, whose base is skirted by these hills, or when, by following the beds of the torrents which descend from those chains, he penetrates, as it were, into their interior. First proofs of Revolutions on the surface of the Globe. The lowest and most level parts of the earth, exhibit nothing, even when penetrated to a very THEORY OF THE EARTH. 7 great depth, but horizontal strata composed of sub- stances more or less varied, and containing almost all of them innumerable marine productions. Si- milar strata, with the same kind of productions, compose the lesser hills to a considerable height. Sometimes the shells are so numerous as to con- stitute of themselves the entire mass of the rock ; they rise to elevations superior to the level of every part of the ocean, and are found in places where no sea could have carried them at the present day, under any circumstances ; they are not only en- veloped in loose sand, but are often inclosed in the hardest rocks. Every part of the earth, every hemisphere, every continent, every island of any extent, exhibits the same phenomenon. The times are past when ignorance could main- tain, that these remains of organized bodies are mere sportings of nature, productions generated in the womb of the Earth, by its own creative powers ; and the efforts made by some metaphy- sicians of the present day, will not probably suc- ceed in bringing these exploded opinions again into repute. A scrupulous comparison of the forms of these remains, of their texture, and often even of their chemical composition, does not disclose the slightest difference between the fossil shells and those which still inhabit the sea: the preserva- tion of the former is not less perfect than that of the latter; most commonly we neither observe 8 THEORY OF THE EARTH. detrition nor fracture in them, nothing, in short, that announces a violent removal from their original places ; the smallest of them retain their sharpest ridges, and their most delicate spines. They have, therefore, not only lived in the sea, hut they have also been deposited by it. It is the sea which has left them in the places where they are now found. But this sea has remained for a certain period in those places ; it has covered them long enough, and with suffi- cient tranquillity to form those deposits, so re- gular, so thick, so extensive, and partly also so solid, which contain those remains of aquatic ani- mals. The basin of the sea has therefore under- gone one change at least, either in extqnt, or in situation. Such is the result of the very first search, and of the most superficial examination. The traces of revolutions become still more ap- parent and decisive, when we ascend a little high- er, and approach nearer to the foot of the great chains. There are still found many beds of shells ; some of these are even thicker and more solid ; the shells are quite as numerous, and as well pre- served, but they are no longer pf the same spe- cies. The strata which contain them are not so generally horizontal ; they assume an oblique po- sition, and are sometimes almost vertical. While in the plains and low hills it was necessary to dig deep, in order to discover the succession of the THEORY OF THE EARTH. 9 beds, we here discover it at once by their exposed edges, as we follow the valleys that have been ' produced by their disjunction. Great masses of debris form at the foot of the cliffs, rounded hills, the height of which is augmented by every thaw and tempest. These inclined strata, which form the ridges of the secondary mountains, do hot rest upon the horizontal strata of the hills which are situ- ate at their base, and which form the first steps in approaching them ; but, on the contrary, dip under them, while the hills in question rest upon their declivities. When we dig through the horizontal strata in the vicinity of mountains whose strata are inclined, we find these inclined strata re-appearing below ; and even sometimes, when the inclined strata are not too elevated, their summit is crowned by horizontal ones *. The in- clined strata are therefore older than the hori- zontal strata ; and as they must necessarily, at least the greater number of them, have been formed in a horizontal position, it is evident that they have been raised f , and that this change in their direction has been effected before the others were superimposed upon them $. * See Note A, at the end of thia Essay, t See Note B. J The opinion maintained by some geologists, that cer- tain strata have been formed in the inclined position in which 10 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Thus the sea, previous to the deposition of the horizontal strata, had formed others, which, by the operation of problematical causes, were broken, raised, and overturned in a thousand ways ; and, as several of those inclined strata which it had formed at more remote periods, rise higher than the ho- rizontal strata which have succeeded them, and which surround them, the causes by which the inclination of these beds was effected, had also made them project above the level of the sea, and formed islands of them, or at least shoals and in- equalities ; and this must have happened, whether they had been raised by one extremity, or whe- ther the depression of the opposite extremity had made the waters subside. This is the second re- sult, not less clear, nor less satisfactorily demon- strated, than the first, to every one who will take the trouble of examining the monuments on which it is established. Proofs that such revolutions have been numerous. But it is not to this subversion of the ancient they are now found, admitting it true with regard to some particular strata which might have been crystallized, as Mr Greenough supposes, like the deposit which encrusts the in- side of vessels, in which water containing gypsum has been boiled, cannot at least apply to those which contain shells or rolled stones, which could not have waited, so suspended, the formation of the cement by which they were to be ag- glutinated. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 11 strata, nor to this retreat of the sea after the for- mation of the new strata, that the revolutions and changes which have given rise to the present state of the Earth are limited. When we institute a more detailed compari- son between the various strata and those remains of animals which they contain, we presently per- ceive, that this ancient sea has not always depo- sited mineral substances of the same kind, nor re- mains of animals of the same species ; and that each of its deposits has not extended over the whole surface which it covered. There has ex- isted a succession of variations; the former of which alone have been more or less general, while the others appear to have been much less so. The older the strata are, the more uniform is each of them over a great extent ; the newer they are, the more limited are they, and the more subject to vary at small distances. Thus the displacements of the strata were accompanied and followed by changes in the nature of the fluid, and of the matters which it held in solution ; and when cer- tain strata, by making their appearance above the waters, had divided the surface of the seas by islands and projecting ridges, different changes might take place in particular basins. Amidst these variations in the nature of the general fluid, it is evident, that the animals which lived in it could not remain the same. Their 12 THEORY OF THE EARTH. species, and even their genera, changed with the strata ; and, although the same species occasion- ally recur at small distances, it may he announced as a general truth, that the shells of the ancient strata have forms peculiar to themselves; that they gradually disappear, so as no longer to he seen at all in the recent strata, and still less in the presently existing ocean, in which their cor- responding species are never discovered, and where several, even of their genera, do not occur : that, on the contrary, the shells of the recent strata are similar, in respect to their genera, to those which exist in our seas ; and that, in the latest and least consolidated of these strata, and in certain recent and limited deposits, there are some species which the most experienced eye could not distinguish from those which are found in the neighbouring seas. There has, therefore, been a succession of va- riations in the economy of organic nature, which has been occasioned by those of the fluid in which the animals lived, or which has at least corres- ponded with them ; and these variations have gradually conducted the classes of aquatic ani- mals to their present state, till, at length, at the time when the sea retired from our continents for the last time, its inhabitants did not differ much from those which are found in it at the present day. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 13 We say for the last time, because, if we exa- mine with still greater care those remains of or- ganised bodies, we discover, in the midst of even the oldest strata of marine formation, other strata replete with animal or vegetable remains of ter- restrial or fresh- water productions ; and, amongst the more recent strata, or, in other words, those that are nearest the surface, there are some in which land animals are buried under heaps of ma- rine productions. Thus, the various catastrophes which have disturbed the strata, have not only caused the different parts of our continents to rise by degrees from the bosom of the waves, and di- minished the extent of the basin of the ocean, but have also given rise to numerous shiftings of this basin. ' It has frequently happened, that lands which have been laid dry, have been again covered by the waters, in consequence either of their be- ing ingulphed in the abyss, or of the sea having merely risen over them. The particular portions also, of the Earth, which the sea abandoned in its last retreat, — those which are now inhabited by man and terrestrial animals, — had already been once laid dry, and had then afforded subsistence to quadrupeds, birds, plants, and land produc- tions of all kinds : the sea which left it had, therefore, covered it at a previous period *. * See Note C. 14 THEORY OF THE EARTH. The changes in the level of the waters have not, therefore, consisted solely in a more or less gradual, or more or less general retreat ; there have been various successive irruptions and re- treats, the final result of which, however, has been a universal depression of the level of the sea. Proofs that these Revolutions have been sudden. It is of much importance to remark, that these repeated irruptions and retreats of the sea have neither all been slow nor gradual ; on the contrary, most of the catastrophes which have occasioned them have been sudden ; and this is especially easy to be proved, with regard to the last of these catastrophes, that which, by a two- fold motion, has inundated, and afterwards laid dry, our present continents, or at least a part of the land which forms them at the present day. In the northern regions, it has left the car- cases of large quadrupeds which became enveloped in the ice, and have thus been preserved even to our own times, with their skin, their hair, and their flesh. If they had not been frozen as soon as killed, they would have been decomposed by putrefaction. And, on the other hand, this eter- nal frost could not previously have occupied the places in which they have been seized by it, for they could not have lived in such a temperature. It was, therefore, at one and the same moment i THEORY OF THE EARTH. 15 that these animals were destroyed, and the coun- try which they inhabited became covered with ice. This event has been sudden, instantaneous, with- out any gradation ; and what is so clearly demon- strated with respect to this last catastrophe, is not less so with reference to those which have pre- ceded it. The breaking to pieces, the raising up and overturning of the older strata, leave no doubt upon the mind that they have been reduced to the state in which we now see them, by the action of sudden and violent causes ; and even the force of the motions excited in the mass of waters, is still attested by the heaps of debris and rounded pebbles which are in many places interposed be- tween the solid strata. Life, therefore, has often been disturbed on this earth by terrible events. Numberless living beings have been the victims of these catastrophes ; some, which inhabited the dry land, have been swallowed up by inundations ; others, which peopled the waters, have been laid dry, from the bottom of the sea having been sud- denly raised ; their very races have been extin- guished for ever, and have left no other memorial of their existence than some fragments, which the naturalist can scarcely recognize. Such are the conclusions to which we are ne- cessarily led by the objects that we meet with at every step, and which we'can always verify, by ex- amples drawn from almost every country. These 16 THEORY OF THE EARTH. great and terrible events are every where distinct- ly recorded, so as to be always legible by the eye skilled to decypher their history in the monu- ments which they have left behind. But what is still more astonishing and not less certain, life has not always existed upon the globe ; and it is easy for the observer to distin- guish the point at which it has begun to deposit its productions. Proofs that there have been Revolutions anterior to the existence of living beings. If we ascend to higher points of elevation, and advance towards the great ridges, the craggy sum- mits of the mountain chains, we shall presently find those remains of marine animals, those in- numerable shells, of which we have spoken, be- coming more rare, and at length disappearing alto- gether. We arrive at strata of a different na- ture, which contain no vestiges of living beings. Nevertheless, their crystallization, and even their stratification, shew that they have been also in a liquid state at their formation ; their inclined posi- tion, and the cliffs into which they are broken, shew that they also have been forcibly^ moved from their original places; the oblique manner in which they dip under the shelly strata, that they have been formed previously to these latter ; and lastly, the height to which their rugged and bare THEORY OF THE EARTH. 17 peaks rise above all these shelly strata, that their summits had already emerged from the waters, when the shelly strata were forming. Such are those celebrated Primitive Mountains which traverse our continents in different direc- tions, raising themselves above the clouds, sepa- rating the basins of rivers from one another, af- fording, in their perennial snows, reservoirs which feed the springs, and forming, in some measure, the skeleton, and as it were the rough framework, of the Earth. The eye perceives from afar, in the indenta- tions with which their ridge has been marked, and in the sharp peaks with which it is bristled, indications of the violent manner in which they have been elevated. Their appearance, in this re- spect, is very different from that of those rounded mountains, and hills with long flat surfaces, whose less ancient masses have always remained in the situation in which they were quietly deposited by the waters of more recent seas. These indications become more obvious as we approach. The valleys have no longer those gently-sloping sides, those salient and re-entering angles corresponding on either side to each other, which seem to denote the beds of ancient streams. They widen and they contract without any ge- neral rule ; their waters, at one time, expand in- to lakes ; at another, fall in torrents ; and some- B 18 THEORY OF THE EARTH. times their rocks, suddenly approaching from each side, form transverse dikes, over which the waters tumble in cataracts. The dissevered strata, while they shew on one side their edges perpendicular- ly raised, on the other present large portions of their surface lying obliquely ; they do not corres- pond in height, but those which, on one side, form the summit of the cliff, often dip underneath on the other, and are no longer visible. Yet, amidst all this confusion, distinguished naturalists have been able to demonstrate, that there still reigns a certain order, and that those immense deposits, broken and overturned though they be, observe a regular succession with regard to each other, which is nearly the same in all the great mountain chains. According to them, Gra- nite, of which the central ridges of the greater number of these chains consist, and which thus surmounts every other rock, is also the rock which is found deepest in the solid crust of the globe, It is the most ancient of those which we have found means of examining in the place assigned them by nature ; and we inquire not at present, whether it owes its origin to a general fluid, which formerly held every thing in solution, or may have been the first consolidated by the cooling of a great mass in fusion, or even in a state of vapour *. * The conjecture of the Marquis de la Place, that the THEORY OF THE EARTH. 19 x" Foliated rocks rest upon its sides, and form the lateral ridges of these great chains ; schists, por- phyries, sandstones, and talcose rocks, intermingle with their strata ; lastly, granular marhles, and other limestones destitute of shells, resting upon the schists, form the outer ridges, the lower steps as it were, the counterforts, of these chains, and are the last formations, by which this unknown fluid, this sea without inhabitants, would seem to have prepared materials for the mollusca and zo- ophytes, which were presently to deposite upon these foundations vast heaps of their shells and corals. We even find the first productions of these mollusca and zoophytes appearing in small num- bers, and scattered at greater or less distances, in the last strata of these primitive formations, or in that portion of the crust of the globe to which geologists have given the name of Transition rocks. Here and there we meet with beds containing shells, interposed between certain granites of later materials of which the globe is composed, have perhaps ex- isted at first in the elastic form, and have successively as- sumed a liquid consistence on cooling, and have at length been solidified, is well supported by the recent experiments of M. Mitscherlich,, who has composed, of all sorts of sub- stances, and crystallized by the heat of intense furnaces, se- veral of the mineral species which enter into the composi- tion of primitive mountains. — Note D. B 2 20 THEORY OF THE EARTH. formation than the others, between schists of va- rious kinds, and between some newer beds of gra- nular marbles. Life, which was in the end to obtain entire possession of the globe, seems, in these primordial times, to have struggled with the inert nature which formerly predominated; and it was not until a considerable time after, that it obtained the ascendancy over it, and acquired for itself the exclusive right of continuing and ele- vating the solid envelope of the Earth. Hence, it is impossible to deny, that the masses which now constitute our highest mountains, have been originally in a liquid state ; and that they have for a long time been covered by waters in which no living beings existed. Thus, it has not been only since the appearance of life that changes have been operated in the nature of the matters which have been deposited ; for the mas- ses formed previous to that event, have varied, as well as those which have been formed since. They have also experienced violent changes in their position, and a part of these changes must have taken place at the period when these masses existed by themselves, and were not covered over by the shelly masses. The proof of this lies in the overturnings, the disruptions, and the fissures, which are observable in their strata, as well as in those of more recent formations, and which THEORY OF THE EARTH. 21 are in the ancient strata even in greater number and better defined. But these primitive masses have also under- gone other revolutions since the formation of the secondary strata, and have, perhaps, given rise to, or at least have partaken of, some of those changes which these strata themselves have expe- rienced. There are actually considerable portions of the primitive formations uncovered, although placed in lower situations than many of the secon- dary formations ; and we cannot conceive how it should have so happened, unless the primitive .strata in those places had forced themselves into view, after the secondary strata had been formed. In certain countries, we find numerous large blocks of primitive substances scattered over the surface of secondary formations, aud separated by deep valleys, or even by arms of the sea, from the peaks or ridges from which they must have been derived. We must necessarily conclude, therefore, either that these blocks have been ejected by eruptions, or that the valleys (which must have stopped their course) did not exist at the time of their being transported ; or, lastly, that the motions of the waters by which they were transported, exceeded in violence any thing that we can imagine at the present day*. * The Travels of Saussure and Deluc present a multi- tude of facts of this description. These geologists imagined, 22 THEORY OF THE -EARTH. Here, therefore, we have a collection of facts, a series of epochs, anterior to the present time, of that they could only have been produced by enormous eruptions. De Buch and Escher have recently em- ployed themselves upon this subject. The memoir of the latter, inserted in the Nouvelle Alpina of Steinmiiller, vol. i. presents the general results in a remarkable man- ner. The following is a comprehensive view of them : Such of these blocks as are scattered over the low parts of Switzerland and Lombardy, come from the Alps, and have descended along their valleys. They occur every where, and of all sizes, up to 50,000 cubic feet, over the great extent of country which separates the Alps from the Jura mountains ; and they rise upon the sides of the latter facing the Alps, to a height of 4000 feet above the level of the sea. They are found at the surface, or in the superficial layers of debris, but not in the strata of sandstone, molasse, or conglomerate, which fill up almost every where the interval in question. They are sometimes isolated, sometimes in heaps. The height of their situation is not connected with their magni- tude ; the smaller ones alone appear sometimes a little worn, but the large ones are not so at all. Those which belong to the basin of each river are found, upon examination, to be of the same nature as the mountains of the tops or sides of the high valleys in which the tributary streams of this river take their rise. They are already seen in these upper val- leys, and are particularly accumulated at the places which are situated above some of the contractions of these valleys. They have passed over the lower hills, when their height has not been more than 4000 feet ; and then they are seen upon the other side of the ridges, in the cantons between the Alps and Jura, and even upon the latter itself. It is opposite the mouths of the valleys of the Alps that they are seen in the THEORY OF THE EARTH. 23 which the successive steps may be perfectly ascer- tained, although the duration of their intervals cannot be defined with precision. They are so many fixed points, which serve to regulate and di- rect our inquiries respecting this ancient chro- nology. Examination of the Causes wJiich act at present on the surface of the Globe. Let us now examine those changes which are taking place at the present day upon the globe, in- vestigating the causes which still act in its surface, mid endeavouring to determine the possible extent of their effects. This portion of the history of the Earth is so much the more important, that it has greatest quantity, and at the greatest heights ; those of the intervening spaces have not been carried so high. Among the chains of the Jura mountains, which are more remote from the Alps, they are only found in places which are op- posite the openings of the nearer chains. From these facts, the author draws the conclusion, that the transportation of these blocks has taken place at a period subsequent to the deposition of the sandstones and conglo- merates, and has perhaps been occasioned by the last of the revolutions which the globe has experienced. He compares the transportation in question to that which still takes place from the agency of torrents ; but the objections presented by the consideration of the great size of the blocks, and the deep valleys over which they must have passed, appear to us to militate greatly against this part of his hypothesis. — Note E. 24 THEORY OF THE EARTH. long been considered possible to explain the more ancient revolutions on its surface by means of these still existing causes ; in the same manner as it is found easy to explain past events in political his- tory, by an acquaintance with the passions and intrigues of the present day. But we shall pre- sently see, that unfortunately the case is different in physical history : — the thread of operations is here broken ; the march of Nature is changed ; and none of the agents which she now employs, would have been sufficient for the production of her ancient works. There still exist, however, four causes in full activity, which contribute to alter the surface of our continents. These are, rains and thaws, which waste down the steep mountains, and precipitate the fragments to their bottoms ; running waters, which carry off these fragments, and deposit them in places where their current is abated ; the sea, which undermines the foundations of elevated coasts, forming steep cliffs, and which throws up great banks of sand upon the low coasts; and, last- ly, volcanoes, which pierce through the solid strata from below, elevate these strata, or spread over the surface vast quantities of ejected matter *. * Regarding the changes of the surface of the earth,, known from history or tradition, and consequently dependent on causes still in operation, see the German work of M. de Hof, THEORY OF THE EARTH. 25 Of Slips, or Falling down of the Materials of Mountains. In every place where the broken strata present their edges on abrupt surfaces, there fall down to their base, every spring, and even after every storm, fragments of their materials, which are rounded by rolling upon each other. These col- lected heaps gradually assume an inclination deter- mined by the laws of cohesion, and thus form, at the bottom of the cliff, taluses, of greater or less eleva- tion, according as the fragments which have fal- len are more or less abundant. These taluses constitute the sides of the valleys in all elevated, mountainous regions, and are covered with a rich vegetation, whenever the fragments from the up- per parts begin to fall less abundantly ; but their want of solidity subjects themselves also to slips, when they are undermined by rivulets. On these occasions, towns, and rich and populous dis- tricts, are sometimes buried under the ruins of a mountain ; the courses of rivers are interrupted, and lakes are formed in places which were be- fore the abodes of fertility and cheerfulness. For- tunately these great slips happen but seldom, and entitled " Geschechte der Natiirliche Veranderungen der Erdoberflache," 2 vols. 8vo. Goth. 1822 and 1824. The facts contained in it are collected with equal care and erudition. 26 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the principal use of those hills of debris, is to fur- nish materials for the ravages of torrents. Alluvial Formations *. The rains which fall, the vapours which are condensed, and the snows which are melted, up- on the ridges and summits of mountains, de- scend, by an infinite number of rills, along their slopes, carrying with them some portions of the materials of which these slopes are composed, and tracing slight furrows by their passage. These rills soon unite in the deeper gutters with which the surface is marked, run off by the deep valleys which intersect their bottom, and thus form streams and rivers, which carry back to the sea the waters it had formerly supplied to the atmosphere. On the melting of the snows, or when a storm takes place, these mountain torrents become suddenly swollen, and rush down the declivities with a ve- locity proportioned to their steepness. They dash violently against the bases of those taluses of fallen fragments which cover the sides of all the high valleys, carrying off the already rounded fragments of which they are composed, and which thus become smoothed, and still farther po- lished, by attrition. But in proportion as they reach the more level valleys, where their * Note F. THEORY OF THE EARTH 27 violence is diminished, or when they arrive at more expanded basins, where their waters are permitted to spread, they throw out upon their hanks the largest of those stones which they had rolled down. The smaller fragments are deposit- ed still lower ; and nothing reaches the great canal of the river excepting the minutest par- ticles, or the most impalpable mud. It often happens, also, that before these streams unite to form great rivers, they have to pass through large and deep lakes, in which their mud is deposited, and from which their waters come forth limpid. The lower rivers, and all the streams which descend from the less elevated mountains and hills, also produce effects, upon the districts through which they flow, more or less analogous to those of the torrents from the higher mountains. When these rivers are swollen by great rains, they attack the base of the earthy or sandy hills which they meet with in their course, and carry their fragments to be deposited upon the lower grounds, and which are thus, in some degree, raised by each succeed- ing inundation. Finally, when the rivers reach great lakes or the sea, and when that rapidity, which carried off and kept in suspension the par- ticles of mud comes to cease entirely, these parti- cles are deposited at the sides of their mouths, where they form low grounds, by which the shores are prolonged. And if these shores are such, that 28 THEORY OF THE EA11TH. the sea also throws up sand upon them, and thus contributes to their increase ; there are created, as it were, provinces, and even entire kingdoms, which usually become the most fertile, and speedily the richest, in the world, if their rulers permit human industry to exert itself in peace. Formation of Downs.* The effects which the sea produces, without the co-operation of rivers, are much less benefi- cial. When the coast is low, and the bottom sandy, the waves push the sand toward the shore, where, at every reflux of the tide, it becomes par- tially dried ; and the wind, which almost always blows from the sea, drifts it upon the beach. Thus are formed those hillocks of sand, named Downs, which, if the industry of man does not fix them by suitable plants, move slowly, but in- variably, toward the interior of the country, and overwhelm fields and dwellings, because the same wind that raises the sand of the beach up- on the down, throws that of its summit in the op- posite direction from the sea. When the nature of the sand, and that of the water which is raised with it, are such as to form a durable cement, the shells and bones, thrown upon the beach, be- come incrusted with it. Pieces of wood, trunks *NoteG. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 29 of trees, and plants growing near the sea, are en- veloped in these aggregates ; and thus are pro- duced what might he denominated indurated downs, such as we see upon the coasts of New Holland, and of which a precise idea may be formed from the description given of them by Peron *. Formation of Cliffs or Steep Shores. On the other hand, when the coast is high, the sea, which is thus prevented from throwing up any thing, exercises a destructive action upon it. Its waves, by sapping the foundation, cause the superincumbent portion of the face of the cliff, thus deprived of support, to be incessantly falling down in fragments. These fragments are tumbled about by the billows, until the softer and more di- vided parts disappear. The harder portions, from being rolled in contrary directions, assume the form of boulders and pebbles ; and these, at length, accumulate in sufficient quantity to form a ram- part, by which the bottom of the cliff is protected against farther depredations. Such is the action of water upon the solid land ; and we see, that it consists almost entirely in re- ducing it to lower levels, but not indefinitely. * Voyage aux Terres Australes, t. i. p. 161. 30 THEORY OF THE EARTH. The fragments of the great mountain ridges are carried down into the valleys ; their finer parti- cles, together with those of the lower hills and plains, are borne to the sea ; alluvial depositions extend the coasts at the expence of the high grounds. These are limited effects, to which ve- getation in general puts a stop, and which, besides, presuppose the existence of mountains, valleys, and plains, in short, all the inequalities of the globe ; and which, therefore, cannot have given rise to these inequalities. The formation of downs is a phenomenon still more limited, both in regard to height and horizontal extent ; and has no rela- tion whatever to that of those enormous masses into the origin of which it is the object of geology to inquire.* Depositions formed in Water. Although we cannot obtain a precise knowledge of the action exerted by water within its own bosom, it is yet possible to determine its limits to a certain degree. Lakes, pools, marshes, and sea-ports, into which rivulets discharge their waters, more especially when these descend from near and steep hills, de- posit large quantities of mud, which would at length fill them up entirely, if care were not taken to clean them out. The sea also throws quanti- * Note H. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 31 ties of slime and sediment into harbours and creeks ; into all places, in short, where its waters are more tranquil than ordinary. The currents also heap up at their meeting, or throw out at their sides, the sand which they are continually raising from the bottom of the sea, forming it in- to banks and shallows. Stalactites. Certain waters, after dissolving calcareous sub- stances by means of the superabundant carbonic acid with which they are impregnated, allow these substances to crystallize after the acid has evapo- rated ; and, in this manner, form stalactites, and other concretions. There are strata, confusedly crystallized in fresh water, which are sufficiently extensive to be compared with some of those which have been deposited by the ancient sea. The famous Travertine quarries of the neighbour- hood of Rome, and the rocks of the same sub- stance, which are formed, and continually varied in figure, by the river of Teverona, are generally known. These two modes of action may be com- bined ; the deposits accumulated by the sea may be solidified by stalactite. Thus, when springs abounding in calcareous matter, or containing some other substance in solution, happen to fall into places where these deposits are formed, we then find aggregates in which marine and fresh-water '32 THEORY OF THE EARTH. productions may be blended. Of this description are the banks in the island of Guadeloupe, which, along with human skeletons, present land and sea shells mingled together. Of the same nature also is the quarry described by Saussure, in the neighbourhood of Messina, in which the sand- stone is seen forming by the consolidation of the sand thrown up by the sea. Litliopliytes. In the torrid zone, where lithophytes of many species abound, and are propagated with great ra- pidity, their strong trunks are interwoven and ac- cumulated so as to form rocks and reefs ; and rising even to the surface of the water, shut up the entrance of harbours, and lay frightful snares for navigators. The sea, throwing up sand and mud upon the tops of these shoals, sometimes raises their surface above its own level, and forms islands, which are soon covered with a rich vegetation. Incrustation. It is also possible, that, in particular places, large quantities of the animals inhabiting shells, leave their stony coverings when they die, and that these, cemented together by slime of greater or less con- sistence, or by other cementing substances, form extensive deposits or shell banks. But we have no evidence that the sea can now incrust those shells THEORY OF THE EARTH. with a paste as compact as that of the mar- bles, the sandstones, or even the coarse limestone (calcaire grossier) in which we see the shells of our strata enveloped. Still less do we any where find the sea depositing those more solid and more siliceous strata which have preceded the forma- tion of the shelly strata. In short, all these causes united, would not change, in an appreciable degree, the level of the sea ; nor raise a single stratum above its surface ; and still less would they produce the smallest hillock upon the surface of the earth. It has been asserted that the sea has undergone a general diminution of level ; and proofs of this are said to have been discovered in some parts of the shores of the Baltic.* But whatever may be the causes of these appearances, we are certain that they are not general in their operation ; and that, in the greater number of harbours, where any alteration * It is a common opinion in Sweden, that the level of the sea is becoming lower, and that many places may even be forded or passed dry-shod, which were formerly impractica- ble. Eminent philosophers have adopted this popular opi- nion ; and M. von Buch goes so far as to suppose that the whole of Sweden is gradually rising. But it is singular, that no one has made, or at least published, a series of accu- rate observations, calculated to confirm a fact that had been announced so long ago, and which would leave no doubt up- on the mind, if, as Linnaeus asserts, this difference of level were so much as four or five feet yearly. Note I. C 34 THEORJ OF THE EARTH. of the level would be a matter of so much in- terest, and where fixed and ancient works afford so many means of measuring its variations, the mean level of the sea is constant. There has, therefore, never been a universal lowering, nor a universal encroachment, of the waters of the ocean. In some places, indeed, such as Scotland, and va- rious parts of the Mediterranean, evidence has been thought to have been found, that the sea has risen, and that it now covers shores which were formerly above its level *. Volcanoes. The action of volcanoes is still more limited, and more local, than any of those which have yet been mentioned. Although we have no precise idea of the means by which nature keeps up these violent fires at such great depths, we can judge decided- ly, by their effects, of the changes which they may * Mr Stevenson, in his observations upon the bed of the German Ocean and British Channel, maintains that the level of the sea is continually rising, and has been very sensibly elevated within the last three centuries. Fortis asserts the same of some parts of the Adriatic sea. But the example of the Temple of Serapis, near Pouzzola, proves that the margins of that sea are, in many places, of such a nature as to be subject to local risings and fallings. On the other hand, there are thousands of quays, roads, and other works, made along the sea-side by the Romans, from Alexandria to Belgium, the relative level of which has never varied. Note K. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 35 have produced at the surface of the globe. After a volcano has announced itself, by some shocks of an earthquake, it forms for itself an opening. Stones and ashes are thrown to a great distance, and lava is vomited forth. The more fluid part of the lava flows in long streams, while the less fluid portion stops at the edges of the opening, raises its margins all round, and forms a cone, terminated by a crater. Thus volcanoes accumulate upon the sur- face matters which were previously buried in the bowels of the earth, after modifying their nature, and raise themselves into mountains. By these means, they have formerly covered some parts of our continent, and have also suddenly produced islands in the middle of the sea. But these moun- tains and islands have always been composed of lava, and all their materials have undergone the action of fire : they are disposed as matters should be, which have flowed from an elevated point. Volcanoes, therefore, neither raise nor overturn the strata through which their apertures pass ; and if some causes acting from those depths have contributed, in certain cases, to raise up large mountains, they cannot have been volcanic agents of the same nature as those which exist at the present day. Thus, we repeat, it is in vain that we search, among the powers which now act at the surface of c 2 36 THEORY OP THE EARTH. the earth, for causes sufficient to produce the revo- lutions and catastrophes, the traces of which are exhibited by its crust : And if we have recourse to the constant external forces with which we are as yet acquainted, we shall have no greater success. Constant Astronomical Causes. The pole of the earth moves in a circle around the pole of the ecliptic, and its axis is more or less inclined to the plane of the ecliptic ; but these two motions, the causes of which are now ascertained, are much too limited for the production of effects like those whose magnitude we have just been stating. At any rate, their excessive slowness would render them altogether inadequate to ac- count for catastrophes which, as we have shewn, must have been sudden. The same reasoning applies to all other slow motions which have been conceived as causes of the revolutions in question, chosen doubtless in the hope that their existence could not be de- nied, because it might always be easy to hold out that their very slowness rendered them impercep- tible. But whether they be true or not is of lit- tle importance, for they explain nothing, as no cause acting slowly could have produced sudden effects. Admitting that there has been a gradual dimi- nution of the waters ; that the sea has transport- ed solid matters in all directions ; that the tern- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 37 perature of the globe is either diminishing or in- creasing ; — none of these causes could have over- turned our strata; enveloped in ice large ani- mals, with their flesh and skin ; laid dry marine testacea, the shells of which are, at the present day, as well preserved as if they had been drawn up alive from the sea ; and, lastly, destroyed nu- merous species, and even entire genera. These considerations have struck most natura- lists ; and among those who have endeavoured to explain the present state of the globe, hardly any one has attributed it entirely to the agency of slow causes, still less to causes operating under our eyes. The necessity to which they are thus re- duced, of seeking for causes different from those which we see acting at the present day, is the very circumstance that has forced them to make so many extraordinary suppositions, and to lose themselves in so many erroneous and contradic- tory speculations, that the very name of their science, as I have elsewhere remarked, has long been a subject of ridicule to prejudiced persons, who have only looked to the systems which it has been the means of hatching, and have forgotten the extensive and important series of authentic facts which it has brought to light #. * When I formerly mentioned this circumstance of the science of geology having become ridiculous, I only expressed a fact, to the truth of which every day bears witness ; but in 38 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Older Systems of Geologists. During a long time, two events or epochs only, the Creation and the Deluge, were admitted as comprehending the changes which have been ope- rated upon the globe ; and all the efforts of geo- logists were directed to account for the present existing state of things, by imagining a certain original state, afterwards modified by the deluge, of which also, as to its causes, its operations, and its effects, each entertained his own theory. Thus, according to one *, the earth was at first invested with an uniform light crust, which cover- ed the abyss of the sea ; and which being broken up for the production of the deluge, formed the mountains by its fragments. According to ano- ther f, the deluge was occasioned by a momentary suspension of cohesion among the particles of mi- neral bodies ; the whole mass of the globe was dis- solved, and the paste thus formed became penetra- ted with shells. According to a third J, God raised this I did not profess to give my own opinion, as some re- spectable geologists seem to have believed. If their mistake has arisen from any thing equivocal in my expressions, I here apologize to them. * Burnet, Telluris Theoria Sacra. Lond. 1681. t Woodward, Essay towards the Natural History of the Earth. Lond. 1702. t Scheuchzcr, Mem. de 1'Acad. 1708. THEOftY OF THE EARTH. 39 op the mountains for the purpose of allowing the waters, which had produced the deluge, to run off; and selected those places in which there was the greatest quantity of rocks, without which the mountains could not have supported themselves. A fourth * created the earth from the atmosphere of one comet, and deluged it by the tail of ano- ther : The heat which it retained from its origin, was what, in his opinion, excited the whole of the living beings upon it to sin ; for which they were all drowned, excepting the fishes, whose passions were apparently less vehement. It is evident, that, even while confined with- in the limits prescribed by the Book of Genesis, naturalists might still have a pretty wide range : they soon found themselves, however, in too nar- row bounds ; and when they had succeeded in converting the six days of creation into so many indefinite periods, the lapse of ages no longer forming an obstacle to their views, their systems took a flight proportioned to the periods which they could then dispose of at pleasure. Even the great Leibnitz amused himself, like Descartes, by conceiving the earth to be an extin- guished sunf , a vitrified globe, upon which the vapours falling down again, after it had cooled, * Whiston, New Theory of the Earth. Lond. 1708. t Leibnitz, Protogaea. Act. Lips. 1683 ; Gott. 1749. 40 THEORY OF THE EARTH. formed seas, which afterwards deposited the lime- stone formations. By Demaillet the whole glohe was conceived to have been covered with water for many thou- sands of years. He supposed this water had gra- dually retired ; that all the land animals were ori- ginally inhabitants of the sea ; that man himself commenced his career as a fish ; and he asserts, that it is not uncommon, even now, to meet with fishes in the ocean, which are still only half con- verted into men, but whose descendants will in time become perfect human beings *. The system of Buffon is merely an extension of -that of Leibnitz, with the addition only of a comet, which, by a violent blow, struck off from the sun the liquefied mass of the earth, together with those of all the other planets at the same instant. From this supposition, he was enabled to assume positive dates, as, from the present tem- perature of the earth, it could be calculated how long it had taken to cool down so far ; and, as all the other planets had come from the sun at the same time, it could also be calculated how many ages are still required for cooling the greater ones, and to what degree the smaller are already irozenf. * Telliamed. Amsterd. 1748. t Theorie de la Terre, 1749; and Epoques de la Nature, 1775. THEORY Of THE EARTH. il More recent Systems. In our own times, men of still bolder imagina- tions have exercised their minds upon this great subject. Some writers have revived and greatly extended the ideas of Demaillet. They suppose that every thing was originally fluid ; that this fluid gave existence to animals, which were at first of the most simple kind, such as the monads and other infusory and microscopic species ; that, in process of time, and by assuming different ha- bits, the races of animals became complicated, and assumed that diversity of nature and character in which they now appear. By means of those various races of animals, part of the waters of the sea have gradually been converted into calcareous earth ; while the vegetables, concerning the ori- gin and metamorphoses of which these writers are totally silent, have, on their part, converted a por- tion of the same water into clay : These two earths, on being stripped of the characters which life had impressed upon them, are resolved, by a final analysis, into silex; and hence the reason that the oldest mountains are more siliceous than the rest. All the solid parts of the earth, there- fore, owe their existence to life, and, without life, the globe would still be entirely liquid *. * See La Physique de Rodig. p. 106, Leipsic, 1801 ; and 1 42 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Other writers have preferred the ideas of Kep- ler, and, like that great astronomer, have consi- dered the globe itself as possessed of vital facul- ties. According to them a vital fluid circulates in it ; a process of assimilation goes on in it, as well as in animated bodies ; every particle of it is alive ; it possesses instinct and volition, even to the most elementary molecules, which attract and repel each other according to sympathies and antipa- thies. Each kind of mineral has the power of converting immense masses into its own nature, as we convert our food into flesh and blood. The mountains are the respiratory organs of the globe, and the schists its organs of secretion ; it is by these latter that it decomposes the water of the sea, in order to produce the matters ejected by vol- canoes. The veins are carious sores, abscesses of the mineral kingdom ; and the metals are pro- ducts of rottenness and disease, which is the reason that almost all of them have so bad a smell *. Telliamed, vol. ii. p. 169, as well as a multitude of new Ger- man works. M. de Lamarck has of late years developed this system to a great extent, in France, and supported it with much ingenuity, in his Hydrogeologie and Philosophic Zoologique. * M. Patrin has shewn much ingenuity in supporting these fantastical ideas, in several articles of the Nouveau Dictionnaire d'Histoire Naturelle. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 43 More recently still, a philosophy, which substi- tutes metaphor for reasoning, and proceeds on the system of absolute identity or of pan theism, at- tributes the production of all phenomena, or which, in the eyes of its supporters, is the same thing, all beings, to polarization, such as is manifested by the two electricities ; and denominating every kind of opposition or difference, whether of situa- tion, of nature, or of function, by the title of Po- larisation, opposes to each other, in the first place, God and the universe ; then, in the universe, the sun and the planets ; next, in each planet, the solid and the liquid ; and, pursuing this course, changing its figures and allegories according to its necessities, at length arrives at the last de- tails of organic species *. It must, however, be observed, that these are what may be termed extreme examples, and that all geologists have not carried the extravagance of their conceptions to such a length as those which we have just cited. Yet, among those who have proceeded with more caution, and have not searched for geological causes beyond the limits of physical and chemical science, much diversity and contradiction still prevail. * This application of pantheism to geology may be best seen in the works of Oken and Steffens. 44 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Diversities of all the Systems. According to one system, every thing has been successively precipitated by crystallization, and deposited nearly as it exists at present ; but the sea, which covered all, has gradually retired *. According to another, the materials of which the mountains consist, are incessantly worn down and carried off by the rivers to be deposited at the bottom of the sea, where they are heated un- der an enormous pressure, and form strata, which are one day to be violently lifted up by the heat which consolidates them f. A third supposes the fluid divided into a mul- titude of lakes, placed, like the seats of an am- phitheatre, above each other, which, after having deposited our shelly strata, have successively bro- ken their dikes, to descend and fill the basin of the ocean \. According to a fourth, tides of seven or eight hundred fathoms depth have carried off, from time to time, the matter lying at the bottom of the sea, * Delametherie, in his " Geologic/' admits crystalliza- tion as the principal agent. t Hutton and Play fair. — Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory of the Earth. Edin. 1802. i Lamanon, — in various parts of the Journal de Phy- sique,— after Michaelis, and several others. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 45 and have thrown it, in the form of mountains and hills, upon the original valleys or plains of the continent *. A fifth makes the various fragments of which the earth is composed, fall successively from hea- ven, in the manner of meteoric stones, bearing the impress of their foreign origin in the unknown beings whose remains they contain f . A sixth represents the globe as hollow, and places within it a loadstone nucleus, which is transported from one pole to the other, by the at- traction of comets, carrying along with it the cen- tre of gravity, and the mass of waters at the sur- face ; thus alternately drowning the two hemis- pheres £. We might mention twenty other systems, as different from one another as those enumerated. And to prevent mistake, we may here state, that our intention is not captiously to criticize or find fault with their authors ; on the contrary, we ad- mit that these ideas have generally been conceived by men of intellect and knowledge, who were not * Eolomieu, in the Journal de Physique. t MM. de Marschall, in their Researches respecting the Origin and Development of the present order of the World. Giessen, 1802. t Bertrand, — Periodical Renewal of the Terrestrial Con- tinents. Hamburgh, 1799, 46 THEORY OF THE EARTH. ignorant of facts, several of whom had even tra- velled extensively for the purpose of examining them, and who, in this manner, made numerous and important additions to science. Causes of these differences. Whence comes it, then, that there should be so much contrariety in the solutions of the same problem, that are given by men who proceed up- on the same principles ? May not this have been occasioned by the conditions of the problem ne- ver having been all taken into consideration at once ; by which it has remained hitherto indeter- minate, and susceptible of many solutions, — all* equally good, when such or such conditions are abstracted ; and all equally bad, when a new con- dition comes to be known, or when the attention is directed to some condition which had been for- merly neglected ? Nature and Conditions of the Problem. To quit the language of mathematics, it may be asserted, that almost all the authors of these sys- tems, confining their attention to certain difficul- ties which struck them more forcibly than others, have endeavoured to solve these in a manner more or less plausible, and have left unnoticed others, equally numerous, and equally important. For example, the only difficulty with one consisted in THEORY OF THE EARTH. 47 explaining the changes that had taken place in the level of the sea ; with another, it consisted in accounting for the solution of all terrestrial sub- stances in one and the same menstruum ; and with7 a third, in shewing how animals that were be- lieved to be natives of the torrid zone could live in the frigid zone. Exhausting all the powers of the mind upon these questions, they conceived that they had done every thing that was neces- sary when they had contrived some method of answering them ; and yet, while they neglected all the other phenomena, they did not always think of determining with precision the measure and limits of those which they had endeavoured to explain. This is peculiarly the case with regard to the secondary formations, which constitute, however, the most important and most difficult part of the problem. During a long time, all that was done with respect to these, consisted of feeble at- tempts to determine the order of superposition of their strata, and the connections of these strata with the species of animals and plants whose re- mains they contain. Are there certain animals and plants peculiar to certain strata, and not found in others ? What are the species that appear first in order, and what those which succeed ? Do these two kinds of species sometimes accompany each other ? Are 48 THEORY OF THE EARTH. there alternations in their appearance ; or, in other words, do the first reappear a second time, and do the others then disappear ? Have these ani- mals and plants all lived in the places where their remains are found, or have they been transported thither from other places ? Do they all live at the present day in some part of the earth, or have they been partially or totally destroyed ? Is there any constant connection between the antiquity of the strata and the resemblance, or non-resem- blance, of the fossils contained in them to the animals and plants which now exist ? Is there any connexion, in regard to climate, between the fossils and such living beings as resemble them most ? May it be concluded, that the transportation of these living beings, if such a thing ever happened, has taken place from north to south, or from east to west ; or were they irre- gularly scattered and mingled together ; and can the epochs of these transportations be determined by the characters which they have impressed up- on the strata ? What can be said regarding the causes of the existing state of the globe, if no reply can be made to these questions, — if there be no sufficient grounds to determine the choice between an- swering in the affirmative or negative ? It is but too true, that, for a long time, none of these points was satisfactorily determined ; and scarce- ly even would geologists seem to have had any THEORY OF THE EARTH. 4& idea of the propriety of clearing them up before constructing their systems. Reason for which the Conditions of the Problem have- been neglected. The reason of this strange procedure will be discovered, when we reflect, that all geologists have hitherto been, either mere cabinet natura- lists, who had themselves paid little atttention to the structure of mountains, or mere mineralo- gists, who had not studied in sufficient detail the innumerable varieties of animals, and the infinite complication of their various parts. The former of these have only constructed systems : the latter have furnished excellent observations, and have laid the foundation of true geological science ; but have been unable to complete the edifice. Progress of Mineral Geology. The purely mineral part of the great problem of the Theory of the Earth has been investigated with admirable care by Saussure, and has been since carried to an astonishing degree of develop- ment by Werner, and by the numerous enlight- ened pupils of his school. The former of these celebrated men, by a la- borious investigation of the most inaccessible dis- tricts, continued for twenty years, in which he examined the Alps on all sides, and penetrated r> 50 THEORY OF THE EARTH. through all their defiles; has laid open to our view the entire disorder of the primitive forma- tions, and has distinctly traced the limits by which they are distinguished from the secondary forma- tions. The other, taking advantage of the nu- merous excavations made in the most ancient min- ing district in the world, has fixed the laws by which the succession of the strata are regulated, pointing out the relative antiquity of these stra- ta, and tracing each of them through all its me- tamorphoses. It is from him, and from him alone, that we date the commencement of real geo- logy, in so far as concerns the mineral nature of the strata : but neither he nor Saussure have de- termined the fossil organic species occurring in each kind of stratum, with the accuracy which has become necessary, now that the number of animals already known is so great. Other naturalists, it is true, have examined the the fossil remains of organised bodies ; they have collected and figured them by thousands, and their works will serve as so many precious collec- tions of materials. But, considering these ani- mals and plants more with reference to their own nature, than as connected with the theory of the earth ; or regarding these petrifactions as cu- riosities, rather than as historical documents ; or, lastly, contenting themselves with practical ex- planations regarding the position of each frag- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 51 ment, they have almost always neglected to in- vestigate the general laws affecting the geologi- cal position of organic remains, or their connec- tion with the strata. Importance of Fossil Remains in Geology. And yet, the idea of such an investigation was very natural ; for it is abundantly ohvious, that it is to these fossil remains alone that we owe even the commencement of a theory of the earth, and^that, without them, we should perhaps never have even suspected that there had existed any successive epochs, and a series of different operations, in the formation of the globe. By them alone we are, in fact, enabled to ascertain, that the globe has not al- ways had the same external crust ; because, we are thoroughly assured, that the plants and animals must have lived at the surface before they had thus come to be buried deep beneath it. It is only by analogy that we have been enabled to extend to the primitive formations, the con- clusion which is furnished directly for the secon- dary by the organic remains which they contain ; and if there had only existed formations in which no fossil remains were inclosed, it could never have been shewn that these formations had not all been of simultaneous origin. It is also by means of the organic remains, slight as is the knowledge we have hitherto ac- 52 THEORY OF THE EARTH. quired of them, that we have been enabled to dis- cover the little that we yet know respecting the nature of the revolutions of the globe. From them we have learned, that the strata in which they are buried have been quietly deposited in a fluid ; that their variations have corresponded with those of the fluid in question ; that their be- ing laid bare has been occasioned by the transpor- tation of this fluid to some other place ; and that this circumstance must have befallen them more than once. Nothing of all this could have been known with certainty, had no fossil remains ex- isted. The study of the mineral part of geology, though not less necessary, and even of much more utility to the practical arts, is yet much less in- structive with reference to the object of our pre- sent inquiry. We remain in utter ignorance respecting the causes which have given rise to the variety in the mineral substances of which the strata are com- posed. We are even ignorant of the agents which may have held some of these substances in solution ; and it is still disputed, respecting seve- ral of them, whether they have owed their origin to water or to fire. After all, philosophers are only agreed on one point, which is, that the sea has changed its place ; and how should this have been known, unless by means of the fossil remains ? The organic remains, therefore, which have THEORY OF THE EARTH. 53 given rise to the theory of the earth, have, at the same time, furnished it with its principal illustra- tions ; — the only ones, indeed, that have as yet been generally acknowledged. It is this consideration which has encouraged us to investigate the subject. But the field is vast ; and it is but a very small portion of it that could be cultivated by the labour of a single in- dividual. It was necessary, therefore, to select a particular department ; and the choice was soon made. The class of fossil remains which forms the subject of this work, engaged our attention at the very outset, because it appeared to us to be that which is the most fertile in precise results, and yet, at the same time, less known, and richer in new objects of research *. High importance of the Fossil Bones of Quadrupeds* It is obvious, in fact, that the fossil bones of quadrupeds must lead to more accurate conclu- sions than any other remains of organized bodies, and that for several reasons. * My work has, in fact, proved how far this inquiry was yet new when I commenced it, notwithstanding the excel- lent labours of Camper, Pallas, Blumenbach, Merk, Sim- mering, Rosenmiiller, Fischer, Faujas, Home, and other learned men, whose works I have most scrupulously cited in such of my chapters as their researches are connected with. 54 THEORY OF THE EARTH. In the first place, they indicate much more clearly the nature of the revolutions to which they have already been subjected. Shells certain- ly announce the fact, that the sea has once exist- ed in the places where they have been formed ; but the changes which have taken place in their species, when rigorously inquired into, may have arisen from slight changes in the nature of the fluid in which they lived, or merely in its tempe- rature. They may even have been produced by causes still more accidental. We can never be perfectly assured that certain species, and even genera, inhabiting the bottom of the sea, and oc- cupying certain fixed spaces, for a longer or shor- ter time, may not have been driven away and supplanted by other species or genera. In regard to quadrupeds, on the contrary, every thing is precise. The appearance of their bones in strata, and still more of their entire car- cases, announces, either that the stratum itself which contains them has, at a former period, been laid dry, or, at least, that dry land must have exist- ed in its neighbourhood. Their disappearance ren- ders it certain, that this stratum has been inun- dated, or that the dry land in question has ceased to exist. It is from them, therefore, that we learn with perfect certainty the important fact of re- peated irruptions of the sea, which the shells and other marine productions could not of them- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 55 selves have proved ; and it is by a careful investi- gation of them, that we may hope to ascertain the nnmber and the epochs of these irruptions. Secondly, The nature of the revolutions which have altered the surface of the globe, must have exerted a more powerful action upon terrestrial quadrupeds, than upon marine animals. As these revolutions have consisted chiefly of changes in the bed of the sea, and as the waters must have destroyed all the quadrupeds which they reached, if their irruption was general, it would necessa- rily have destroyed the entire class ; or if it only overwhelmed certain continents at one time, it would at least have destroyed the species pecu- liar to those continents, without having the same effect upon the marine animals. On the other hand, millions of aquatic animals would have been left dry, or buried under newly-formed strata, or thrown violently on the coasts ; while their races would still have been preserved in some more peaceful parts of the sea, whence they might again be propagated after the agitation of the waters had ceased. Thirdly, This more complete action is also more easily ascertained. It is more easy to de- monstrate its effects, because, the number of qua- drupeds being limited, and the greater part of their species, at least the large ones, being known, we have more means of determining whether fos- 56 THE Oil Y OF THE EA11TH. sil bones belong to them, or to a species that is now lost. As, on the other hand, we are very far from being acquainted with all the testa- ceous animals and fishes which inhabit the sea, and as we are still probably ignorant of the greater number of those which live in deep water, it is impossible to know with certainty, whether a species which occurs in a fossil state, may not still exist somewhere alive. And hence, we see naturalists persisting in giving the name of pela- gic shells, that is to say, shells inhabiting the open sea, to the belemnites, cornua-ammonis, and other testaceous remains, which have hitherto been found only in the older strata; meaning by this, that if they have not yet been discovered in a living state, it is because they inhabit the depths of the sea, far beyond the reach of our nets. Small probability of discovering New Species of large Quadrupeds. Naturalists, certainly, have not yet explored all the continents, nor do they even know all the quadrupeds which inhabit the countries that they have explored. New species of this class are dis- covered from time to time ; and those who have not examined with attention all the circum- stances belonging to these discoveries, might also imagine that the unknown quadrupeds, whose THE011Y OF THE EAKTH. 57 bones are found in our strata, may remain to this day concealed, in some islands not yet discover- ed by navigators, or in some of the vast deserts which occupy the middle of Asia, Africa, the two Americas, and New Holland. However, if we carefully examine what kinds of quadrupeds have been recently discovered, and in what circumstances they have been found, we shall see that there is little hope of our ever find- ing alive those which have hitherto been observed only in a fossil state. Islands of moderate extent, and at a consider- able distance from the continents or large islands, possess very few quadrupeds, and these, for the greater part, of diminutive size. When they hap- pen to contain any of the larger species, these must have been carried to them from other countries. Bougainville and Cook found no other large qua- drupeds than hogs and dogs in the South Sea Islands ; and the largest species of the West In- dia Islands was the agouti. It is true that the great continents, such as Asia, Africa, the two Americas, and New Hol- land, possess large quadrupeds, and, generally speaking, contain species peculiar to each ; inso- much, that whenever large countries of this de- scription have been discovered, which their situa- tion has kept isolated from the rest of the world, the class of quadrupeds which they contained has 58 THEORY OF THE EARTH. been found entirely different from any that exist- ed elsewhere. Thus, when the Spaniards first penetrated into South America, they did not find a single species of quadruped the same as any of Europe, Asia, or Africa. The puma, the jaguar, the tapir, the cabiai, the lama, the vicuna, the sloths, the armadilloes, the opossums, and the whole tribe of sapajous, were to them entirely new ani- mals, of which they had no idea. Similar cir- cumstances have recurred in our own time, when the coasts of New Holland and the adjacent islands were first explored. The various species of kangaroo, phascolomys, dasyurus, and perame- les, the flying phalangers, the ornithorynchi and echidnse, have astonished naturalists by the strange- ness of their conformations, which presented pro- portions contrary to all former rules, and were incapable of being arranged under any of the sys- tems then in use. If there yet remained some great continent to be discovered, we might still hope to become ac- quainted with new species, among which there might be found some having more or less simi- larity to those of which we have discovered the remains in the bowels of the earth. But it is sufficient to cast a glance over the map of the world, and see the innumerable directions in which navigators have traversed the ocean, in or- der to be satisfied that there remains no other THEORY OF THE EARTH 59 large land to be discovered, unless it may be si- tuated towards the South Pole, where the exis- tence of life would necessarily be precluded by the accumulation of ice. Hence, it is only from the interior of the large divisions of the world, that we can have any hope of still procuring quadrupeds hitherto unknown. But a little reflection will be sufficient to con- vince us, that our expectations from this source have as little foundation as from that of the is- lands. Doubtless, the European traveller cannot easi- ly traverse vast extents of countries, which are either destitute of inhabitants, or are peopled only with ferocious tribes ; and this is more especially true with regard to Africa. But there is nothing to prevent the animals themselves from roaming over these countries in all directions, and pene- trating to the coasts. Even when there may be great chains of mountains between the coasts and the deserts of the interior, they must always be broken in some places to allow the rivers to pass through ; and, in these burning deserts, the qua- drupeds naturally follow the banks of rivers. The inhabitants of the coasts also ascend these rivers, and soon become acquainted with all the remarkable species which exist even to their sources, either from personal observation, or by means of intercourse with the inhabitants of 60 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the interior. At no period, therefore, could civilized nations have frequented the coast of a large country for any considerable length of time, without gaining some tolerable knowledge of such of the animals which it contained as were re- markable for their size or configuration. This reasoning is confirmed by well known facts. Although the ancients never passed the mountains of Imaus, or crossed the Ganges, in Asia ; and, although they never penetrated very far beyond Mount Atlas, in Africa ; yet were they, iti reality, acquainted with all the large a- nimals of these two divisions of the world ; and, if they have not distinguished all the species, it was not because they had not seen them, or heard them spoken of by others, but because the mu- tual resemblances of some of these species caused them to be confounded together. The only im- portant exception which can be opposed to this as- sertion, presents itself in the Tapir of Malacca, recently sent home from India by two young na- turalists, pupils of mine, Messrs Duvaucel and Diard, and which in fact is one of the most inte- resting discoveries with which Natural History has been enriched in these latter times. The ancients were perfectly acquainted with the Elephant ; and the history of that quadruped is given more accurately by Aristotle than by Buffon. They were not even ignorant of some of THEORY OF THE EARTH. 61 the differences which distinguish the elephants of Africa from those of Asia*. They knew the two-horned Rhinoceros, which has never been seen alive in 'modern Europe. Doraitian exhibited it at Rome, and had it stamped on his medals, which have been very well described by Pausanias. The one-horned Rhinoceros, distant as was its country, was equally known to them. Pompey shewed one at Rome ; and Strabo has accurately described another which he saw at Alexandriaf. The Rhinoceros of Sumatra described by Mr Bell ; and that of Java, discovered and sent home by Messrs Duvaucel and Diard, do not appear to inhabit the continent. Hence, it is not surpris- ing, that the ancients should have been ignorant of them ; besides, they probably would not have distinguished them from the others. The Hippopotamus has not been so well de- scribed as the preceding animals ; yet very exact representations of it have been left by the Ro- mans in their monuments relative to Egypt, such as the statue of the Nile, the Palestrine pave- * This is more particularly noticed in the Chapter on Elephants in the first volume of Professor Cuvier-'s Recher- ches. t See the history of the Rhinoceros in the first part of the second volume of Professor Cuvier's Recherchts. 6£ THEORY OF THE EARTH. ment, and a great number of medals. In fact, this animal was repeatedly seen by the Romans ; having been exhibited by Scaurus, Augustus, Antoninus, Commodus, Heliogabalus, Philip, and Carinus *. The two species of Camel, the Bactrian and Arabian, are both very well described and charac- terized by Aristotle f . The Giraffe, or Camelopard (Camel-Leopard), was also well known to the ancients. A live one was shewn at Rome, in the circus, during the dictatorship of Julius Caesar, in the year of Rome 708 ; and ten of them were exhibited together by Gordian III. all of which were killed at the se- cular games of Philip J, — a circumstance which may well surprise the moderns, who have only witnessed a single individual, which was sent by the Soldan of Egypt to Laurentius de Medicis, in the fifteenth century, and is painted in the frescoes of Poggio-Cajano. If we read with attention the descriptions of the Hippopotamus, given by Herodotus and A- ristotle, and which are supposed to have been borrowed from Hecataeus of Miletum, we shall * See the chapter on the Hippopatamus, in the first volume of Recherches. t Hist. Anim. Lib. ii. cap. 1. J Jul. Capitol., Oord. iii. cap. 23. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 6$ find, that they must have been made up from two different animals, one of which was perhaps the true hippopotamus, and the other was assuredly the Gnou *, a quadruped, of which our natura- lists begin to take notice only about the end of the eighteenth century. It is the same animal of which fabulous accounts were given by Pliny and jElian, under the name of catoblepas and catablepon f . The Ethiopian Boar of Agatharchides, which is 'described as having horns, is precisely the Ethiopian Boar of modern times, the enormous tusks of which deserve the name of horns nearly as much as those of the elephant J. The Bubalus and Nagor are described by Pliny § ; the Gazelle by .ZElian \\ ; the Oryx by Oppian ^[ ; the Axis, so early as the time of Cte- sias ** ; and the Algazel, and Corinne, are accu- rately figured upon the Egyptian monuments f f . * Antilope Gnu, Gmel. t Pliny, Lib. viii. cap. 32. ; and Julian, Lib. vii. cap. 5- J Julian, Anim. v. 27- § Pliny, lib. viii. cap. 15. ; and lib. xi. cap. 37. || ^Elian, Anim. xiv. 14. IF Opp. Cyneg., ii.'v. 445. et seq. ** Pliny, lib. viii. cap. 21. tt See the great Work upon Egypt, Antiq, iv. pi. 49. ; and pi. 66. THEORY OF THE EARTH. has well described the Bos grunniens or Yak, under the name of the ox having a tail which serves for a fly-flapper *. The Buffalo was not domesticated hy the an- cients ; but the Indian Ox, of which Julian speaks f , and which had horns large enough to hold three amphorae, was assuredly that variety of the buffalo which is now called the arnee. And even the wild ox with depressed horns, which is mentioned by Aristotle as inhabiting Arachosia, a province of ancient Persia, could be nothing else than the common buffalo J. The ancients were acquainted with the horn- less variety of the ox 5, and with the African oxen, whose horns, being only attached to the skin, moved with it[|. They also knew the In- dian oxen, which equalled the horse in speed ^f ; and those which were so small as not to exceed a he-goat in size**. Nor were the broad- tailed sheep unknown to them f f , — nor those of India, which were said to be as large as asses J J. Although the accounts left us by the ancients, * ./Elian, Anim. xv. 14. t Idem, Anim. iii. 34. J Arist. Hist. Anim. lib. ii. cap. 5. § jElian, ii. 53. || Idem, ii, 20. IT Idem, xv. 24. ** Idem, xv. 24. ft Idem, Anim. iii. 3. JJ Idem, iv. 32. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 65 respecting the Aurochs, the Rein-deer, and Elk, are all mingled with fable, they are yet sufficient to prove that these animals were in some degree known to them, but that the reports which had reached them, had been communicated by igno- rant people, and had not been corrected by a ju- dicious examination *. These animals still inha- bit the countries which the ancients assigned to them ; and have only disappeared in such of them as have been too much cultivated for their ha- bits. The aurochs f and elk still exist in the fo- rests of Lithuania, which were formerly continu- ous with the great Hercynian Forest. The for- mer of these animals still occurs in the northern parts of Greece, as it did in the days of Pausa- nias. The rein-deer inhabits the snowy regions of the north, where it always had its abode ; it changes its colour, not at pleasure, but according to the change of the seasons. It was in conse- quence of mistakes scarcely excusable, that it was imagined to have occurred in the Pyrenees in the fourteenth century $. * This is more particularly explained in the chapters upon Deer and Oxen, in the fourth volume of Professor Cu- vier's Recherches. t Aurochs is Bos Urus, Lin., not the Urus of the ancients, which latter appears now to be extinct. J Buffon having read in Du Fouilloux a mutilated pas- sage of Gaston-Phebus, Count de Foix, in which that prince describes the chace of the rein-deer, imagined that, in the time of Gaston, this animal lived in the Pyrenees ; and the >* K 66 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Even the White Bear had been seen in Egypt while under the Ptolemies *. Lions and Panthers were common at Rome, where they were presented by hundreds in the games of the Circus. Even several Tigers were exhibited there, as well as the Striped Hyena and the Crocodile of the Nile. In the ancient mosaics preserved at Rome, there are excellent representations of the rarest of these animals. Among others, the striped hyena is seen repre- sented with accuracy in a fragment preserved in the Museum of the Vatican ; and, while I was at Rome in 1809, a mosaic pavement, composed of natural stones, arranged in the Florentine man- ner, was discovered in a garden beside the tri- umphal arch of Galienus, which represented four Bengal tigers executed in a superior manner. In the Museum of the Vatican, there is depo- sited the figure of a crocodile in basalt, which is almost a perfect representation of that animal f. printed editions of Gaston were so faulty, that it was diffi- cult to make out, with certainty, what the author had in- tended to say ; but having had recourse to his original ma- nuscript, which is preserved in the Royal Library, I have ascertained that it was in Xueden and Nourvegue, (Sweden and Norway), that he relates having seen and hunted the rein- deer. * Athenseis, lib. v. t The only error committed, is that of giving it a claw THEORY OF THE EARTH. 67 It cannot in the least be doubted, that the Hippotigris was the Zebra, which, however, is only found in the southern parts of Africa *. It would be easy to shew that almost all the more remarkable species of Apes and Monkeys have been distinctly indicated by the ancients, under the names of Pithed, Sphinxes, Satyri, Cebi, Cynocephali, and Cercopitheci f . They even knew, and have described several species of Glires of inconsiderable size, when these animals presented any thii7*^emarkable in their conformation or properties*!]^ But the small species are of no importance with reference to the object in view ; and, it is sufficient for our purpose to have shewn, that all the large species, which possess any remarkable character, and which we know to inhabit Europe, Asia, and Africa, at the present day, were known to the ancients ; too much to the hind foot. Augustus exhibited thirty-six of them ; Dion, lib. Iv. * Caracalla killed one of them in the Circus ; Dion, lib. Ixxvii. Consult also Gisb. Cuperi de Eleph. in mimmis obviis, ex. ii. cap. vii. t See Lichtenstein, Comment, de Simiarum quotquot veteribus innotuerunt formis. Hamburgh, 1791. J The Jerboa is impressed upon the medals of Cy- rene, and indicated by Aristotle under the name of Two- legged Rat. 1 E 2 68 THEORY OF THE EARTH. whence we may fairly conclude, that their silence in respect to the small quadrupeds, and their ne- glect in distinguishing the species which very nearly resemble each other, as the various species of antelopes, and of some other genera, were occa- sioned by want of attention and ignorance of me- thodical arrangement, rather than by any diffi- culty proceeding from climate. We may also conclude, with equal certainty, that, as the lapse of eighteen or twenty centuries, together with the advantages of circumnavigating Africa, and of pe- netrating into India, have added nothing in this department to the information left us by the an- cients, there is no probability that succeeding ages will add much to the knowledge of our po- sterity. But perhaps some persons may be disposed to employ an opposite train of argument, and to al- lege that the ancients were not only acquainted with as many large qradupeds as we are, as has already been shewn, but that they have described several others which we do not now know, — that we act rashly in considering these animals as fabu- lous,— that we ought to search for them before concluding that we have exhausted the history of the present animal creation, — and, in fine, that among those animals which we presume to be fa- bulous, we may, perhaps, discover, when we be- come better acquainted with them, the originals THEORY OF THE EARTH. 69 of those bones of unknown animals which we dis- cover buried in the earth. Some may even con- ceive, that those various monsters, which consti- tute the essential ©rnaments of the history of the heroic ages of almost all countries, are precisely those very species which it was necessary to de- stroy, in order to allow the establishment of civi- lization. Thus the Theseuses and Bellerophons of ancient times had been more fortunate than all the nations of our days, which have only been able to drive back the noxious animals, but have never yet succeeded in exterminating a single species. Inquiry respecting the Fabulous Animals of the An- cients. It is easy to reply to the foregoing objection, by examining the descriptions of these unknown be- ings, and by inquiring into their origins. The greater number of them have an origin purely my- thological, and of this origin their descriptions bear unequivocal marks ; for in almost all of them we see merely parts of known animals united by an unbridled imagination, and in contradiction to all the laws of nature. Those which were invented or arranged by the Greeks, have at least the merit of possessing ek* gance in their composition. Like those ara- 70 THEORY OF THE EARTH. besques which decorate the remains of some ancient buildings, and which have been multiplied by the fertile, pencil of Raphael, the forms which they combine, however repugnant to reason they may be, present agreeable contours. They are the fantastic productions of playful genius ; perhaps emblematic representations in the oriental taste, in which were supposed to be concealed under my- stical images certain propositions in metaphysics or in morals. We may excuse those who employ their time in attempts to discover the wisdom con- cealed in the sphinx of Thebes, the pegasus of Thessaly, the minotaur of Crete, or the chimera of Epirus ; but it would be absurd to expect seri- ously to find such productions in nature. As well might we search for the animals described in the Book of Daniel, or for the beast of the Apoca- lypse. Neither may we look for the mythological ani- mals of the Persians, creatures of a still bolder imagination : the martichore, or man-destroyer, bearing a human head on the body of a lion, ter- .minated by the tail of a scorpion * ; the griffon, guardian of treasures, half eagle, half lion f ; the * Plin. viii. 31. Arist. lib. ii. cap. 40. Phot. Bibl., Art. 72 ; Ctes. Indie. vElian. Anim., iv. 21. t ^Elian, Anim. iv. 27. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 71 cartazonon, or wild ass, armed with a long horn on its forehead *. Ctesias, who has described these as real animals, has been looked upon by many authors as an in- ventor of fables ; whereas he has merely attribut- ed an actual existence to emblematical figures. These imaginary compositions have been seen in modern times sculptured upon the ruins of Per- sepolis f . What they were intended to signify we shall probably never know ; but of this much we are certain, that they do not represent actual beings. Agatharchidas, another fabricator of animals, drew his information in all probability from a si- milar source. The ancient Egyptian monuments still furnish us with numerous fantastic representa- tions, in which the parts of different species are combined : gods are often figured with a human body and the head of an animal, and animals are seen with human heads ; thus giving rise to the cynocephali, sphinxes, and satyrs of ancient natu- ralists. The custom of representing in the same painting men of very different sizes, of making the * jElian, xvi, 20. Photius, Bibl., art. 72. Ctes. Indie. t See Corneille Lebrun, Voyage en Muscovie, en Perse et aux Indes, torn. ii. See also the German work by M. Hee- ren, on the Commerce of the Ancients. 72 THEORY OF THE EAETH. king or the conqueror gigantic, the subjects or the conquered three or four times smaller, must have given rise to the fable of the pigmies. It was in some corner of one of these monuments that Aga- tharchidas must have seen his carnivorous bull, which, with mouth extending from ear to ear, de- voured every other animal*. Certainly no natura- list would admit the existence of such an animal ; for nature never combines either cloven hoofs or horns with teeth adapted for devouring animal food. There may perhaps have been many other fi- gures equally strange, either among such of these monuments as have not been able to resist the ra- vages of time, or in the temples of Ethiopia and Arabia, which have been destroyed by the religi- ous zeal of the Mahometans and Abyssinians. The monuments of India teem with such figures ; but the combinations in these are too extravagant to have deceived any one. Monsters with a hun- dred arms, and twenty heads all different from one another, are far too absurd to be believed. Nay, the inhabitants of Japan and China also have their imaginary animals, which they repre- sent as real, and which figure even in their religi- ous books. The Mexicans had them. In short, * Photius, Biblv art. 250. Agatharchid., Excerpt. histv /pap. xxxix. .^Elian, Anim xvii. 45. Plin. viii, 21. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 73 they are the fashion among all nations, whether at the periods when their idolatry has not yet been refined, or when the import of these emblematical combinations has been lost. But who would dare to affirm that he had found those productions of ignorance and superstition in nature ? And yet it may have happened that travellers, influenced by a desire of making themselves famous, might pre- tend that they had seen those strange beings, or that, deceived by a slight resemblance, into which they were too careless to enquire, they may have taken real animals for them. In the eyes of such people, large baboons or monkeys may have ap- peared true cynocephali, sphinxes, or men with tails. It is thus that St Augustin may have ima- gined he had seen a satyr. Some real animals, inaccurately observed and described, may have given rise to monstrous ideas, which, however, have had their foundation in some reality. Thus, we can have no doubt of the ex- istence of the hyena, although that animal has not its neck supported by a single bone *, and al- * I have even seen, in the collection of the late Mr Ad- drien Camper, a skeleton of a hyena, in which several of the vertebrae of the neck were anchylosed. It was probably from seeing some similar individual that the character in question was attributed to all hyenas. This animal ought to be more subject than any other to such an accident, on 74 THEORY OF THE EARTH. though it does not change its sex every year, as Pliny alleges*. Thus, also, the carnivorous bull is perhaps nothing else than a two-horned rhinoceros erroneously described. M. de Weltheim affirms with probability, that the auriferous ants of He- rodotus are corsacs. One of the most famous amongst these fabulous animals of the ancients, is the unicorn. Even to our own time people have obstinately persisted in searching for it, or, at least, in seeking arguments to prove its existence. Three several animals are frequently mentioned by the ancients as having only one horn in the middle of the forehead. The African oryx, having cloven hoofs, the hair placed in the contrary direction to that of other animals f, equal in size to the bull \9 or even the account of the prodigious power of the muscles of its neck, and the frequent use which it makes of them. When the hyena has laid hold of any thing, it is easier to drag it along by it than to wrest it from its jaws ; and it is this circum- stance which has caused the Arabs to consider it as the em- blem of invincible obstinacy. * It does not in reality change its sex, but it has an ori- fice in the perineum, which might make it be supposed to be hermaphrodite. t Arist. Anim. ii. 1. iii. 1. Plin. xl. 46. t Herod, iv. 192. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 75 rhinoceros *, and said to resemble deer and goats in form f ; the Indian ass, having solid hoofs ; and the monoceros, properly so called, whose feet are sometimes compared to those of the lion f, and sometimes to those of the elephant §, and which is therefore considered as having divided feet. The one-horned horse || and one-horned bull are doubtless both to be referred to the Indian ass, for even the latter is described as having solid hoofs ^f. I would ask, If these animals exist as distinct spe- cies, should we not at least have their horns in our collections ? And what single horns do we possess, excepting those of the rhinoceros and nar- wal ? How is it possible, after this, to refer to rude figures traced by savages upon rocks**? Ignorant of perspective, and wishing to represent a straight horned antelope in profile, they could only give it a single horn, and thus they produced an oryx. The oryxes, too, that are seen on the Egyptian monuments, are probably nothing more than pro- ductions of the stiff style, imposed upon the ar- * Oppian, Cyneg. ii. vers. 551. t Plin. viii. 53. t Philostorg. iii. 11. |§ Plin. viii. 21. || Onesicrit, ap. Strab. lib. xv. jiElian, xiii. 42. 1T Plin. viii. 31. ** Barrow's Voyage to the Cape, Fr. transl. ii. 178. 76 THEORY OF THE EARTH. tists of that country by their religion. Many of their profiles of quadrupeds shew only one fore and one hind leg ; and this being the case, why should they have shewn two horns ? It may per- haps have chanced that individuals have been ta- ken in the chace, which had accidentally lost one of their horns, as pretty frequently happens to the chamois and saiga : and this would have been sufficient to confirm the error produced by these representations. It is probably in this way that the unicorn has recently been reported to be found in the mountains of Thibet. All the ancients, however, have not represented the oryx as having only one horn. Oppian ex- pressly gives it several #, and JElian mentions oryxes which had four f . Finally, if this animal was ruminant and cloven-hoofed, we know assu- redly that its frontal bone must have been longi- tudinally divided into two, and that it could not, as is very justly remarked by Camper, have had a horn placed upon the suture. But it may be asked, What two-horned animal could have given the idea of the oryx, and pre- sented the characters which it is described as pos- sessing with regard to its conformation, even in- * Oppian, Cyneg, lib. II. v. 468. and 471. t De Anim. lib. xv. cap. 14. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 77 dependent of the notion of a single horn ? To this I reply, with Pallas, that it was the straight horned antelope, the Antilope oryx of Gmelin, improperly named pasan by Buffon. It inhabits the deserts of Africa, and must approach the con- fines of Egypt. It is this animal which the hie- roglyphics appear to represent. Its form is near- ly that of the stag ; its size equals that of the bull ; the hair of its back is directed toward the head ; its horns form exceedingly formidable wea- pons, pointed like javelins, and hard as iron ; its hair is whitish, and its face is marked with spots and streaks of black. Such is the description gi- ven of it by naturalists ; and the fables of the Egyptian priests, which have occasioned the in- sertion of its figure among their hieroglyphics, do not require to have been founded in nature. Sup- posing, therefore, that an individual of this spe- cies had been seen which had lost one of its horns by some accident, it might have been taken as a representative of the whole race, and erroneously adopted by Aristotle, and copied by his successors. All this is possible, and even natural, and yet proves nothing with regard to the existence of a single-horned species. In regard to the Indian ass, if we attend to the properties ascribed to its horns as an antidote a- gainst poison, we shall see that they are precisely the same as those which the eastern nations attri- 87 THEORY OF THE EARTH. bute at the present day to the horn of the rhino- ceros. When this horn was first imported into Greece, the animal to which it belonged might still have been unknown. In fact, Aristotle makes no mention of the rhinoceros, and Aga- tharchides was the first who described it. In the same manner, ivory was in use among the an- cients long before they were acquainted with the elephant. It is even possible that some of their travellers might have given to the rhinoceros the name of Indian ass, with as much propriety as the Romans denominated the elephant the bull of Lucania. Every, thing, moreover, that is said of the strength, size, and ferocity of this wild ass of theirs, corresponds very well with the rhinoce- ros. In succeeding times, naturalists, who had now become better acquainted with the rhinoce- ros, finding this denomination of Indian ass in the writings of authors who had preceded them, might have taken it, from want of proper exami- nation, for that of a distinct animal ; and from the name, they would have concluded the animal should have solid hoofs. There is, indeed, a full description of the Indian ass given by Ctesias*,but we have seen above that it had been taken from the bas-reliefs of Persepolis, and must therefore go for nothing in the real history of the animal. * .Elian, Anim. iv. 52 ; Photius, Bibl. p. 154. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 79 When there afterwards appeared more exact descriptions of an animal having a single horn only, but with several toes, a third species would have heen made out, to which they gave the name of monoceros. These double references applied to the same species, are more frequent among ancient naturalists, because most of their works which have come down to us were mere compila- tions ; even because Aristotle himself has fre- quently mingled facts borrowed from others with those which he had observed himself; and because the habit of critical examination was then as little known among naturalists as among historians. From all these reasonings and digressions, it may be fairly concluded, that the large animals of the old continent with which we are now acquaint- ed, were known to the ancients ; and that the ani- mals described by the ancients, and which are now unknown, were fabulous. It also follows, that the large animals of the three principal parts of the then discovered world could not have been long in being known to the nations which fre- quented their coasts. It may also be concluded, that no large species remains to be discovered in America. If there were any, there can be no reason why we should not be acquainted with it ; and in fact none has been discovered there during the last hundred and fifty years. The tapir, the jaguar, the puma, 80 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the cabiai, the lama, the vicunna, the red wolf, the buffalo or American bison, the ant-caters, sloths and armadilloes, are as well described by Margrave and Hernandez as by Buffon ; it may even be said that they are better, for Buffon has confused the history of the ant-eaters, mistaken the jaguar and red wolf, and confounded the bison of America with the aurochs of Poland. Pen- nant, it is true, was the first naturalist who clear- ly distinguished the small musk ox ; but it was long before made mention of by travellers. The cloven-footed horse of Molina, has not been de- scribed by the early Spanish travellers ; but its existence is more than doubtful, and the autho- rity of Molina is too suspicious to authorise our adopting it. It might be possible to characterise more accurately than has been done the different species of deer belonging lo America and India ; but the case is with respect to these animals as it was among the ancients with respect to the ante- lopes ; it is the want of a good method for dis- tinguishing them, and not of opportunities of see- ing them, that has left them so imperfectly known to' us. It may, therefore, be said, that the Mou- flon of the Blue Mountains is the only American quadruped of any considerable size of which the discovery is altogether modern ; and even it is per- haps only an argali that may have crossed upon the ice from Siberia. 2 THEORY OF THE EARTH. 81 How should it be thought, after this, that the huge mastodons and gigantic mcgatheria, whose bones have been discovered under ground in North and South America, still exist alive on that con- tinent ? How should they have escaped those wandering tribes which continually traverse the country in all directions, and which are themselves aware that these animals no longer exist, since they have invented a fabulous account of their destruc- tion, alleging that they were killed by the Great Spirit, to prevent them from extirpating the hu- man race. But it is evident that this fable has been occasioned by the discovery of the bones, like that of the inhabitants of Siberia with respect to their mammoth, which they pretend to live under ground like the mole, and, like all those of the ancients, about the graves of giants, who were thought by them to have been buried wherever the bones of elephants were discovered. Thus it may safely be concluded, that if, as we have just said, none of the large species of qua- drupeds whose remains are at the present day found in regular mineral strata, bear resemblance to any of the known living species, this is not the effect of mere chance, nor because those spe- cies of which we possess nothing but the bones, are still concealed in the deserts, and have hi- therto eluded the observation of travellers. On the contrary, this phenomenon must be regarded F causes. 82 THEORY OF THE EARTH. as resulting from general causes ; and its investi- gation may be considered as affording one of the best means for discovering the nature of these Difficulty of determining the Fossil Bones of Quadrupeds. If this study is more satisfactory in its results than that of other fossil remains of animals, it is also beset with more numerous difficulties. Fos- sil shells usually present themselves in an entire state, and with all the characters requisite for comparing them with their analogous species, preserved in the collections or figured in the works of naturalists. Even fishes present their skele- ton more or less entire ; the general form of their body is almost always distinguishable, and most commonly, also, their generic and specific charac- ters, which are drawn from their solid parts. In quadrupeds, on the contrary, even should the skeleton be found entire, it would be difficult to apply to it characters derived, for the most part, from the hair, the colours, and other marks which have disappeared previous to their incrustation. It is even excessively rare to find a fossil skeleton approaching in any considerable degree to a com- plete state. The strata, for the most part, only contain separate bones, scattered confusedly, and al- most always broken, and reduced to fragments; and THEORY OF THE EARTH. 83 these constitute the only resources of knowledge to the naturalist in this department. It may al- so be stated, that most observers, deterred by these difficulties, have passed slightly over the fossil bones of quadrupeds ; have classed them in a vague manner, according to superficial resem- blances, or have not even ventured to assign them a name ; so that this part of the history of fossil remains, although the most important and most instructive of all, is, at the same time, that which has been the least cultivated *. Principle by which this determination is effected. Fortunately, comparative anatomy possesses a principle, which, when properly developed, en- ables us to surmount all the obstacles. This prin- ciple consists in the mutual relation of forms in organised beings, by means of which, each species may be determined, with perfect certainty, by any fragment of any of its parts. Every organised being forms a whole, — a pe-M culiar system of its own, the parts of which mu- * I do not intend by this remark, as I have already ob- served on a former occasion, to detract from the merit of the observations of Camper, Pallas, Blumenbach, Sremmering, Merk, Faugas, Rosenmiiller, Home, &c. ; but their excellent works, which have been very useful to me, and which I quote throughout, are incomplete ; and several of these works have only been published since the first editions of this Essay. F 2 84 THEORY OF THE EARTH. tually corrrespond, and concur in producing the same definitive action, by a reciprocal reaction. "None of these parts can change in form, without the others also changing ; and consequently, each of them, taken separately, indicates and ascer- tains all the others. Thus, if the intestines of an animal are so or- ganised as to be fitted for the digestion of flesh only, and that flesh recent, it is necessary that its jaws be so constructed as to fit them for devouring live prey ; its claws for seizing and tearing it ; its teeth for cutting and dividing it ; the whole sys- tem of its organs of motion, for pursuing and overtaking it ; and its organs of sense for discover- ing it at a distance. It is even requisite that na- ture have placed in its brain the instinct neces- sary for teaching it to conceal itself, and to lay snares for its victims. Such are the general conditions which nature imposes upon the structure of carnivorous ani- mals ; and which every animal of this description must indispensably combine in its constitution, for without them its race could not subsist. But subordinate to these general conditions, there ex- ist others, having relation to the size, the species, and the haunts of the prey for which the animal is adapted ; and from each of these particular con- ditions, there result modifications of detail in the forms which arise from the general conditions. THEORY OF THE EAKTH. 85 Thus not only the class, but the order, the genus, and even the species, are found expressed in the form of each part. In fact, in order that the jaw may be able to seize, it must have a certain form of condyle ; that the resistance, the moving power, and the fulcrum, should have a certain relative position in regard to each other ; and that the temporal muscles should be of a certain size ; the hollow or depression, too, in which these muscles are lodged, must have a certain depth ; and the zy- gomatic arch, under which they pass, must not only have a certain degree of convexity, but it must be sufficiently strong to support the action of the masseter. In order that the animal may be able to carry off its prey, it must have a certain degree of vi- gour in the muscles which elevate thehead; whence there results a determinate form in the vertebrae from which these muscles take their rise, and in the occiput into which they are inserted. In order that the teeth may be able to cut flesh, they must be sharp-edged, and must be so in a greater or less degree, according as they have flesh more or less exclusively to cut. Their base will be solid, according to the quantity and size of the bones which they have to break. The whole of these circumstances must necessarily influence the development and form of all the parts which contribute to move the jaws. • . 86 THEORY OF THE EARTH. In order that the paws may be able to seize the prey, there must be a certain degree of mobility in the toes, and a certain degree of strength in the claws, from which there will result determi- nate forms in all the phalanges, and a correspond- ing distribution of muscles and tendons. The fore-arm, or cubitus, must possess a certain facility of turning, from which there will also result deter- minate forms in the bones of which it is composed. But the bones of the cubitus being articulated to the humerus, a change in the proportions of the former, will necessarily induce a corresponding change in the latter. The shoulder-bones must have a certain degree of firmness in such animals as make use of their fore-legs for seizing, and from this there must also result a certain peculiarity in their form. The play of all these parts will re- quire certain proportions in all their muscles, and the impressions made by these muscles so propor- tioned, will determine still more particularly the forms of the bones. It is easy to see that similar conclusions may be drawn with regard to the posterior extremities which contribute to the rapidity of the general motions ; with regard to the composition of the trunk, and the forms of the vertebrae, which exert an influence upon the facility and flexibility of these motions; and, lastly, with regard to the forms of the bones of the nose, of the orbit, and of the THEORY OF THE EARTH. 87 ear, the connection of which with the perfection of the senses of smell, sight, and hearing, is evi- dent. In a word, the form of the tooth regulates the forms of the condyle, of the scapula, and of the claws, in the same manner as the equation of a curve regulates all its properties ; and as, by ta- king each property separately for the base of a particular equation, we find both the ordinary equation, and all the other properties whatever ; so, the claw, the scapula, the condyle, the femur, and all the other bones taken separately, give the tooth, or are reciprocally given by it ; and thus, by commencing with any one of these bones, a person who possesses an accurate knowledge of the laws of organic economy, may reconstruct the whole animal.. This principle seems sufficiently evident, in the general acceptation in which it is here taken, and does not require any fuller demonstration ; but when it comes to be applied, there will be found many cases where our theoretical knowledge of the relations of forms will not be sufficient, unless it be supported by observation and experience. For example, we are well aware, that hoofed animals must all be herbivorous, since they have no means of seizing prey. It is also evident, that, having no other use to make of their fore-legs than to support their body, they do not require a shoul- der so vigorously organised as that of carnivo- 88 THEORY OF THE EARTH. _ rous animals ; they have, therefore, no acromion or clavicle, and their shoulder-blades are narrow. Having also no occasion to turn their fore-arm, their radius is united to the ulna by ossification, or at least articulated by a ginglimus or hinge- joint, and not by arthrodia or ball and socket, to the humerus. Their food being herbaceous, will require teeth furnished with flat surfaces, for bruis- ing seeds and plants. The crown of the teeth must also be unequal, and, for this purpose, must be composed of parts alternately consisting of bone and of enamel. Teeth of this structure neces- sarily require horizontal motions to enable them to triturate the food ; and hence the condyle of the jaw cannot be so strictly confined within its articulating cavity as in the carnivorous animals, but must be flattened, and thus correspond with a more or less flattened surface of the temporal bones. Further, the temporal fossa, which will only have a small muscle to contain, will be nar- rower, and not so shallow, as that of carnivorous animals. All these circumstances are deducible from each other, according to their greater or less generality, and in such a manner, that some of them are essential and exclusively peculiar to hoofed animals, while others, although equally necessary in these animals, are not entirely pecu- liar to them, but may occur in other animals also, where the rest of the conditions will permit their existence. THEORY OF THE KAKTH. 89 If we proceed to consider the orders or subdi- visions of the class of hoofed animals, and examine what modifications the general conditions under- go, or rather what particular conditions are con- joined with them, according to the respective cha- racters of these orders, the reasons of these subor- dinate conditions begin to appear less obvious. We can still easily conceive, in general, the ne- cessity of a more complicated system of digestive organs in those species which have a more im- ^ perfect masticatory system ; and hence we may presume, that these latter must be rather rumi- nating animals, in which there is wanting such or such an order of teeth ; and may also deduce from the same consideration, the necessity of a certain form of the oesophagus, and of correspond- ing forms in the vertebrae of the neck, &c. But I doubt whether it would have been discovered, independently of actual observation, that the ru- minating animals should all have cloven hoofs, and that they should be the only animals having them ; that there should be horns on the fore- head in this class alone ; or that such of them as have sharp canine teeth, should, in general, have no horns. However, since these relations are constant, we may be assured that they have a sufficient cause ; but as we are not acquainted with that cause, we must supply the defect of theory by means of ob- servation, and in this way establish empirical laws 90 THEORY OF THE EARTH. which become nearly as certain as those deduced from rational principles, when founded upon ob- servations, the authenticity of which is proved by frequent repetition. Hence, at the present day, any one who observes only the print of a cloven foot, may conclude that the animal which left this impression ruminates ; and this conclusion is quite as certain as any other in physics, or in moral philosophy. This simple footmark, there- fore, indicates at once to the observer the forms of the teeth, of the jaws, of the vertebrae, of all the bones of the legs, thighs, shoulders, and pelvis of the animal which had passed. It is a surer mark than all those of Zadig. That there are secret reasons, however, for all these relations, is what observation alone is sufficient to shew, independ- ently of any general principles of philosophy. In fact, when we construct a table of these rela- tions, we remark not only a specific constancy, if the expression may be allowed, between a parti- cular form of a particular organ, and some other form of a different organ ; but we also perceive a classic constancy of conformation, and a corres- ponding gradation, in the development of these two organs, which demonstrate their mutual in- fluence, almost as well as the most perfect deduc- tion of reason. For example, the dentary system of the hoofed animals, which are not ruminant, is in general more perfect than that of the cloven-footed or ru- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 91 initiating animals, because the former have either incisors, or canine teeth, and almost always both in each jaw ; and the structure of their foot is in general more complicated, because they have more toes or claws, or their phalanges less enve- loped in the hoof, — or a greater number of dis- tinct bones in the metacarpus and metatarsus — or more numerous tarsal bones — or a fibula more distinct from the tibia — or, lastly, that all these circumstances are often united in the same species of animals. It is impossible to assign reasons for these rela- tions ; but we are certain that they are not the effects of chance, because, whenever a cloven-footed animal manifests, in the arrangement of its teeth some tendency to approach the animals we now speak of, it also manifests a similar tendency in the arrangement of its feet. Thus the camels, which have canine teeth, and even two or four incisors in the upper jaw, have an additional bone in the tarsus, because their scaphoid bone is not united to the cuboid, and they have very small hoofs, with corresponding phalanges. The musk animals, whose canine teeth are much de- veloped, have a distinct fibula along the whole length of their tibia ; while the other cloven-foot- ed animals have only, in place of a fibula, a small bone articulated at the lower end of the tibia. There is, therefore, a constant harmony between two organs apparently having no connection ; and 92 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the gradations of their forms preserve an uninter- rupted correspondence, even in those cases in which we cannot account for their relations. Now, by thus adopting the method of observa- tion as a supplementary means, when theory is no longer able to direct our views, we arrive at asto- nishing results. The smallest articulating surface of bone, or the smallest apophysis, has a determi- nate character, relative to the class, the order, the genus, and the species to which it belonged; inso- much, that when one possesses merely a well pre- served extremity of a bone, he can, by careful ex- amination, and the aid of a tolerable analogical knowledge, and of accurate comparison, determine all these things with as much certainty as if he had the entire animal before him. I have often made trial of this method upon portions of known ani- mals, before reposing full confidence upon it, in regard to fossil remains; and it has always proved so completely satisfactory, that I have no longer any doubts regarding the certainty of the results which it has afforded me. It is true, that I have enjoyed all the advan- tages which were necessary for the undertaking ; and that my favourable situation, in the Museum of Natural History at Paris, and assiduous re- search for nearly thirty years, have procured me skeletons of all the genera and sub-genera of qua- drupeds, and even of many species in some genera, and of several varieties of some species. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 9S With such means, it was easy for me to multiply my comparisons, and to verify in all their details the applications which I have made of the various laws deducible from such circumstances as have been stated. We cannot here enter into a more lengthened detail of this method, and must refer to the large work on Comparative Anatomy, in which all its rules will he found. In the mean time, an intelligent reader may gather a great number of these from the work upon Fossil Bones, if he take the trouble of attending to all the applications of them which we have there made. He will see, that it is by this method alone that we are guided, and that it has almost always sufficed for referring each bone to its species, when it was a living species — to its genus, when it was an unknown species — to its order, when it was a new genus — and to its class, when it belonged to an order not hitherto established — and to assign it, in the three last cases, the proper characters for distin- guishing it from the nearest resembling orders, genera, and species. Before the commencement of our researches, naturalists had done no more than this with regard to animals, which they had the opportunity of examining in their entire state. Yet, in this manner, we have determined and classed the remains of more than a hundred and fifty mammiferous and oviparous quadrupeds. 94 THEORY OF THE EARTH. View of the General Results of these Researches. Considered with regard to species, upwards of ninety of these animals are most assuredly hither- to unknown to naturalists ; eleven or twelve have so perfect a resemblance to species already known, that the slightest doubt cannot be entertained of their identity ; the others exhibit many traits of resemblance to known species, but their compari- son has not yet been made with sufficient preci- sion to remove all doubts. Considered with regard to genera, of the ninety hitherto unknown species, there are nearly sixty that belong to new genera. The other species rank under genera or subgenera already known. It may not be without use, also, to consider these animals with regard to the classes and or- ders to which they belong. Of the hundred and fifty species, about a fourth part are oviparous quadrupeds, and all the rest mammifera. Of these last, more than the half belong to non-ruminant hoofed animals. Notwithstanding what has been done, it would still be premature to establish upon these numbers any conclusion relative to the theory of the earth, because they are not in sufficient proportion to the numbers of genera and species which may be bu- ried in the strata of the earth. Hitherto the bones of the larger species have been chiefly col- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 95 lected, these being more obvious to agricultu- ral labourers ; while the bones of the smaller species are usually neglected, unless when they chance to fall into the hands of a naturalist, or when some particular circumstance, such as their excessive abundance in certain places, attracts the attention even of the common people. Relations of the Species of Fossil Animals with the Strata in which they are found. The most important consideration, that which, in fact, is the chief object of all my researches, and which establishes their legitimate connection with the Theory of the Earth, is to ascertain in what strata each species is found, and whether there may be some general laws, relative either to the zoological subdivisions, or to the greater or less resemblance of the species to those of the present day. The laws which have been recognised with re- spect to these relations are very distinct and sa- tisfactory. In the first place, it is clearly ascertained that the oviparous quadrupeds appear much more early than the viviparous; that they are even more abundant, larger, and more varied, in the ancient strata than at the surface of the globe, as it exists at present. 96 THEORY OF THE EARTH. The Ichthyosauri, the Plesiosauri, several spe- cies of Tortoise, and several species of Crocodile, are found beneath the chalk, in the deposits com- monly called Jura formations. The Monitors of Thuringia would he still older, if, according to the W^ernerian School, the copper-slate in which they are contained, along with a great variety of fishes supposed to have belonged to fresh-water, is to be placed among the oldest beds of the se- condary formations. The enormous crocodiles and the great tortoises of Maestricht, are found in the chalk formation itself; but these are ma- rine animals. This earliest appearance of fossil bones seems, therefore, already to indicate, that dry lands and fresh waters had existed before the formation of the chalk deposits. But neither at this period, nor while the chalk was forming, nor even long after, have any bones of land-mammifera been encrusted ; or, at least, the small number of these, which are alleged to have been found in strata of these dates, forms but a trifling exception. We begin to find bones of marine mammifera, namely, of lamantins and seals, in the coarse shelly limestone which covers the chalk in the neighbourhood of Paris ; but there are still no bones of terrestrial mammifera. Notwithstanding the most assiduous investiga- tion, I have not been able to discover any distinct THEORY OF THE EARTH. 97 trace of this class in any of the deposits preceding those which rest upon the coarse limestone. Cer- tain lignites and molasses do in fact contain them ; but I am very doubtful whether these de- posits are all, as is commonly supposed, anterior to that limestone. The places where these bones have been found are so limited, both in extent and in number, as to induce us to suppose some irregularity, or some repetition of the formation containing them. On the contrary, the moment we arrive at the deposits which rest upon the coarse limestone, the bones of land-animals pre- sent themselves in great abundance. As it is reasonable to believe that shells and fishes did not exist at the period of the forma- tion of primitive rocks, we are also led to con- clude that the oviparous quadrupeds began to ex- ist along with the fishes, and at the commence- ment of the period during which the secondary rocks were formed ; but that the land-quadrupeds did not appear upon the earth, at least in any considerable number, till long after, and until the coarse limestone strata, which contain the greater number of our genera of shells, although of species different from ours, had been depo- sited. It is remarkable that those coarse limestone strata which are used at Paris for building, are the last formed strata which indicate a long and a 98 THEORY OF THE EARTH. quiet continuance of the sea upon our continents. Above them, indeed, there are found formations containing shells and other marine productions ; but these consist of collections of transported mat- ters, sand, marls, sandstones, and clays, which ra- ther indicate transportations that have taken place with more or less violence, than strata formed by tranquil deposition ; and, if there be some rocky and regular strata of pretty considerable magnitude, beneath or above these transported matters, they generally exhibit indications of ha- ving been deposited from fresh water. Almost all the known bones of viviparous qua- drupeds, therefore, have been found either in those fresh-water formations, or in the alluvial forma- tions ; and consequently there is every reason to conclude that these quadrupeds have only begun to exist, or, at least, to leave their remains in the strata of our earth, after the last retreat of the sea but one, and during the state of things that preceded its last irruption. But there is also an order in the disposition of these bones with regard to each other ; and this order further announces a very remarkable succes- sion in the appearance of the different species. All the genera which are now unknown, the Pa- laeotheria, Anaplotheria, &c., with the position of which we are thoroughly acquainted, belong to the oldest of the formations of which we are now THEORY OF THE EARTH. 99 speaking, those which rest immediately upon the coarse limestone. It is chiefly these genera which occupy the regular beds that have been deposited from fresh-water, or certain alluvial beds of very ancient formation, generally composed of sand and rolled pebbles, and which were perhaps the ear- liest alluvium of that ancient world. Along with these there are also found some lost species of known genera, but in small numbers, and some oviparous quadrupeds and fishes, which appear to have been all inhabitants of fresh-water. The beds which contain them are always more or less covered by alluvial beds, containing shells, and other ma- rine productions. The most celebrated of the unknown species, which belong to known genera, or to genera close- ly allied to those which are known, such as the fossil elephants, rhinoceroses, hippopotami, and mastodons, do not occur along with those more ancient genera. It is in the alluvial formations alone that they are discovered, sometimes accom- panied with marine shells, and sometimes with fresh-water shells, but never in regular stony beds. Every thing that is found along with these spe- cies is either unknown like themselves, or at least doubtful. Lastly, the bones of species which are appa- rently the same as those that are still found alive, are never discovered, except in the last alluvial 100 THEORY OF THE EARTH. deposits formed on the sides of rivers, or on the bottoms of ancient pools or marshes now dried up, or in the substance of beds of peat, or in the fis- sures and caverns of some rocks; or, lastly, at small depths below the surface, in places where they may have been buried by the falling down of debris, or even by the hand of man ; and their superficial position renders these bones, although the most recent of all, almost always the worst preserved. It must not, however, be thought that this clas- sification of the various geological positions of fos- sil remains, is as certain as that of the species, or that it is equally capable of demonstration. There are numerous reasons which prevent this from be- ing the case. In the first place, all my determinations of spe- cies have been made upon the bones themselves, or by means of good figures ; whereas it has been impossible for me personally to examine all the places in which these bones have been discovered. I have very frequently been obliged to content myself with vague and ambiguous accounts, given by people who were not themselves well aware of what it was necessary to observe ; and, more fre- quently still, I have been unable to procure any information whatever on the subject. Secondly, these repositories of organic remains are subject to infinitely greater doubts, than the THEORY OF THE EARTH. 101 bones themselves. The same formation may ap- pear recent in places where it shews itself at the surface, and ancient in those where it is covered by the beds which have succeeded it. Ancient formations may have been transported by partial inundations, and thus have covered recent bones ; they may have fallen upon them by crumbling, and thus have enveloped and mingled them with the productions of the ancient sea, which they previously contained. Bones of ancient periods may have been washed out by the waters, and afterwards enveloped in recent alluvial formations. Lastly, recent bones may have fallen into the fissures or caverns of ancient rocks, and been en- veloped by stalactites or other incrustations. In every individual instance, therefore, it becomes necessary to analyze and appreciate all those cir- cumstances which might disguise the real origin of fossil remains; and it rarely happens that people who have collected bones have been themselves aware of this necessity, the consequence of which has been, that the true characters of their geolo- gical position have been almost always neglected or misunderstood. Thirdly, there are some doubtful species, which must occasion more or less uncertainty in the re- sults of our researches, until they have been clearly ascertained. Thus the horses and buffaloes that occur along with the elephants, have not yet re- 102 THEORY OF THE EAUTH. ceived appropriate specific characters; and such geologists as are disinclined to adopt the different epochs which I have endeavoured to establish with regard to fossil hones, may, for many years to come, draw from thence an argument against my system, so much the more convenient as it is contained in my own work. But allowing that these epochs are liahle to some objections, from such as may only consi- der some particular case, I am not the less satis- fied, that those who shall take a comprehensive view of the phenomena, will not be checked by such inconsiderable and partial difficulties, and will be led to conclude, as I have done, that there has been at least one, and very probably two, suc- cessions in the class of quadrupeds, previous to that which at the present day peoples the surface of the earth. Proofs that the Extinct Species of Quadrupeds are not varieties of the presently existing Species. I now proceed to the consideration of another objection, one, in fact, which has already been urged against me. Why may not the presently existing races of land quadrupeds, it has been asked, be modifica- tions of those ancient races which we find in a fossil state ; which modifications may have been produced by local circumstances and change of THEORY OF THE EABTH. 103 climate ; and carried to the extreme difference which they now present, during a long succession of ages ? This objection must appear strong to those especially who believe in the possibility of indefi- nite alteration of forms in organised bodies ; and who think that, during a succession of ages, and by repeated changes of habitudes, all the species might be changed into one another, or might re- sult from a single species. Yet to these persons an answer may be given from their own system. If the species have chang- ed by degrees, we ought to find traces of these gradual modifications. Thus, between the palaeo- theria and our present species, we should be able to discover some intermediate forms ; and yet no such discovery has ever been made. Why have not the bowels of the earth preser- ved the monuments of so strange a genealogy, if it be not because the species of former times were as constant as ours ; or, at least, because the ca- tastrophe which destroyed them, had not left them sufficient time for undergoing the variation alleged ? In order to reply to those naturalists who ac- knowledge that the varieties of animals are re- strained within certain limits fixed by nature, it would be necessary to examine how far these li- mits extend. This is a very curious inquiry, — 104 THEOllY OK THE EARTH. highly interesting in itself, under a variety of relations, and yet one that has heen hitherto very little attended to. Before entering upon this inquiry, it is proper to define what is meant by a species, so that the definition may serve to regulate the employment of the term. A species, therefore, may be defin- ed, as comprehending the individuals which de- scend from each other ) or from common parents, and those which resemble them as much as they resemble each other. Thus, we consider as va- rieties of a species, only the races more or less dif- ferent which may have sprung from it by genera- tion. Our observations, therefore, regarding the differences between the ancestors and descen- dants, afford us the only certain rule by which we can judge on this subject ; all other considera- tions leading to hypothetical conclusions desti- tute of proof. Now, considering the varieties in this view, we observe that the differences which constitute it, depend upon determinate circum- stances, and that their extent increases in propor- tion to the intensity of these circumstances. Thus, the most superficial characters are the most variable : the colour depends much upon the light ; the thickness of the fur upon the heat ; the size, upon the abundance of food. But in a wild animal, even these varieties are greatly limited by the natural habits of the animal itself, which THEORY OF THE EARTH. 105 does not voluntarily remove far from the places \vhere it finds, in the necessary degree, all that is requisite, for the support of its species, and does not even extend its haunts to any great distance, unless it also finds all these circumstances con- joined. Thus, although the wolf and the fox in- habit all the climates from the torrid to the fri- gid zone, we hardly find any other difference among them, in the whole of that vast space, than a little more or a little less beauty in their fur. I have compared skulls of foxes from the northern countries and from Egypt, with those of the foxes of France, and have found no difference but such as might be expected in different individuals. Such of the wild animals as are confined within narrower limits, vary still less, especially those which are carnivorous. The only difference between the hyena of Persia and that of Morocco, consists in a thicker or a thinner mane. The wild herbivorous animals feel the influ- ence of climate somewhat more extensively, be- cause there is added to it in their case, the influ- ence of the food, which may happen to differ both as to quantity and quality. Thus, the elephants of one forest are often larger than those of another ; and their tusks are somewhat longer in places where their food may happen to be more favourable for the production of the matter of ivory. The same 106 THEORY OF THE EAKTH. may take place with regard to the horns of rein - deer and stags. But let us compare two elephants the most dissimilar, and we shall not discover the slightest difference in the number and articula- tions of the bones, the structure of the teeth, &c. Besides, the herbivorous species, in the wild state, seem more restrained from dispersing than the carnivorous animals, because the sort of food which they require, combines with the tempera- ture to prevent them. Nature also takes care to guard against the al- teration of the species, which might result from their mixture, by the mutual aversion with which it has inspired them. It requires all the inge- nuity and all the power of man to accomplish these unions, even between species that have the nearest resemblances. And, when the indivi- duals produced by these forced conjunctions are fruitful, which is very seldom the case, their fe- cundity does not continue beyond a few genera- tions ; and would not probably proceed so far, without a continuance of the same cares which excited it at first. Thus, we never see in our woods individuals intermediate between the hare and the rabbit; between the stag and the doe; or between the martin and the pole-cat. But the power of man changes this order ; it discloses all those variations, of which the type THEORY OF THE EARTH. 107 of each species is susceptible ; and from them de- rives productions which the species, if left to themselves, would never have yielded. Here the degree of the variations is still pro- portional to the intensity of their cause, which is slavery. It is not very high in the semi-doines- ticated species, such as the cat. A softer fur ; more brilliant colours ; greater or less size ; these form the whole extent of the variations in this species ; for the skeleton of an Angora cat dif- fers in no regular and constant circumstance from that of a wild cat. In the domesticated herbivorous animals, which we transport into all kinds of climates, and subject to all kinds of management, both with re- gard to labour and nourishment, we certainly ob- tain greater variations ; but still they are all merely superficial. Greater or less size ; longer or shorter horns, or even the want of these entire- ly ; a hump of fat, larger or smaller, on the shoulder ; these form the differences between the various races of the common ox or bull ; and these differences continue long, even in such breeds as have been transported from the countries in which they were produced, when proper care is taken to prevent crossing. Of this nature are also the innumerable varie- ties of the common sheep, which consist chiefly in differences of their fleeces, as the wool which 108 THEORY OF THE EARTH. they produce is an important object of attention. These varieties, although not quite so percepti- ble, are yet sufficiently marked among horses. In general, the forms of the bones vary little ; their connections and articulations, and the forms of the large grinding teeth, never vary at all. The small size of the tusks in the domestic hog, compared with the wild boar's, and the junc- tion of its cloven hoofs into one in some races, form the extreme point of the differences which we have produced in the domesticated herbivo- rous quadrupeds. The most remarkable effects of the influence of man are manifested in the animal which he has reduced most completely under subjection, the dog, — that species so entirely devoted to ours, that even the individuals of it seem to have sacrificed to us their will, their interest, and inclination. Transported by man into every part of the world, subjected to all the causes capable of influencing their development, regulated in their sexual in- tercourse by the pleasure of their masters, dogs vary in colour ; in the quantity of their hair, which they sometimes even lose altogether, and in its nature ; in size, which varies as one to five in the linear dimensions, amounting to more than a hundred fold in bulk ; in the form of the ears, nose, and tail ; in the proportional length of the legs ; in the progressive development of the brain THEORY OF THE EARTH. 109 in the domestic varieties, whence results the form of their head, which is sometimes slender, with a lengthened muzzle and flat forehead, and some- times having a short muzzle and a protuberant forehead ; insomuch that the apparent differences between a mastiff and a water-spaniel, and be- tween a greyhound and a pug, are more striking than those that exist between any two species of the same natural genus in a wild state. Final- ly, and this may be considered as the maximum of variation hitherto known in the animal king- dom, there are races of dogs which have an addi- tional toe on the hind foot, with corresponding tarsal bones ; as there are, in the human species, some families that have six fingers on each hand. Yet, in all these varieties, the relations of the bones remain the same, nor does the form of the teeth ever change in any perceptible degree ; the only variation in respect to these latter being, that, in some individuals, one additional false grinder appears, sometimes on the one side, and sometimes on the other *. Animals, therefore, have natural characters, which resist every kind of influence, whether na- * See M. Frederick Cuvier's memoir upon the varieties of dogs, in the Annales du Museum d'Histoire Naturelle, which he drew up at the request of Professor Cuvier, from a series of skeletons of all the varieties of the dog prepared in the Professor's collection. 110 THEORY OF THE EAKTH, tural or produced by human interference, and no- thing indicates that, with regard to them, time has more effect than climate and domestication. I am aware that some naturalists lay great stress upon the thousands of ages which they call into action by a dash of the pen ; but, in such matters, we can only judge of what a long period of time might produce, by multiplying in idea what a less time produces. With this view, I have endeavoured to collect the most ancient do- cuments relating to the forms of animals ; and there are none which equal, either in antiquity or abundance, those that Egypt furnishes. It af- fords us, not only representations of animals, but even their identical bodies embalmed in its cata- combs. I have examined with the greatest attention the figures of quadrupeds and birds sculptured upon the numerous obelisks brought from Egypt to an- cient Rome. All these figures possess, in their general character, which alone could be the object of attention to an artist, a perfect resemblance to the species represented, such as we see them at the present day. On examining the copies made by Kirker and Zoega, we find that, without preserving every trait of the originals in its perfect purity, they have given figures which are easily recognised. We readily distinguish the ibis, the vulture, the owl, THEORY OF THE EARTH. Ill the falcon, the Egyptian goose, the lapwing, the landrail, the aspic, the cerastes, the Egyptian hare with its long ears, and even the hippopotamus ; and, among the numerous monuments engraved in the great work on Egypt, we sometimes observe the rarest animals, the algazel, for example, which was not seen in Europe until within these few years *. My learned colleague, M. Geoffrey Saint-Hi- laire, strongly convinced of the importance of this research, carefully collected in the tombs and tem- ples of Upper and Lower Egypt as many mum- mies of animals as he could. He has brought home cats, ibises, birds of prey, dogs, monkeys, crocodiles, and the head of an ox, in this state ; and there is certainly no more difference to be perceived between these mummies and the species of the same kind now alive, than between the hu- man mummies and the skeletons of men of the present day. A difference may, indeed, be found between the mummies of the ibis and the bird which naturalists have hitherto described under that name ; but I have cleared up all doubts on * The first figure made of it from nature is in the De- scription de la Menagerie, a work composed by M. Cuvier. It is seen perfectly represented in the great work on Egypt. — Antiq. t. iv. pi. xlix. THEORY OF THE EARTH. this matter, in a Memoir upon the Ibis, which will be found at the end of this Essay, and in which I have shewn that it is still at the present day the same as it was in the time of the Pharaohs. I am aware that, in these, 1 only cite the monu- ments of two or three thousand years ; but this is the most remote antiquity to which we can resort in such a case. There is nothing, therefore, to be derived from all the facts hitherto known, that could, in the slightest degree, give support to the opinion that the new genera which I have discovered or esta- blished among the fossil remains of animals, any more than those which have in like manner been discovered or established by other naturalists, the palceotheria, anoplotheria, megalonyces, masto- donta, pterodactyli, ichthyosauri, &c. might have been the sources of the present race of animals, which have only differed from them through the influence of time or climate. Even if it should prove true, which I am far from believing to be the case, that the fosil elephants, rhinoceroses, elks, and bears, differ no more from those at pre- sent existing, than the present races of dogs differ from one another, this would not furnish a suffi- cient reason for inferring the general identity of the species, because the races of dogs have been subjected to the influence of domestication, which these other animals neither did nor could expe- rience. 2 T1IKORY OF THE EARTH. 113 Farther, when I maintain that the rocky beds contain the bones of several genera, and the allu- vial strata those of several species which no longer exist, I do not assert that a new creation was re- quired for producing the species existing at the present day. T only say that they did not origi- nally inhabit the places where we find them at present, and that they must have come from some other part of the globe. Let us suppose, for instance, that a great irrup- tion of the sea were now to cover the continent of New Holland with a coat of sand or other debris ; it would bury the carcases of animals belonging to the genera Kangurus, Phascolomys, Dasyu- rus9 Perameles, flying phalanger, echidna, and ornithorynchus, and it would entirely destroy the species of all these genera, since none of them ex- ist now in any other country. Were the same revolution to lay dry the nu- merous narrow straits which separate New Hol- land from the continent of Asia, it would open a road to the elephants, rhinoceroses, buffaloes, horses, camels, and tigers, and to all the other Asiatic quadrupeds, which would come to people a land where they had been previously unknown. Were some future naturalist, after having made himself well acquainted with this new race of animals, to search below the surface on which they live, he would find remains of quite a diffe- rent nature. H 114 THEOKY OF THE EARTH. What New Holland would be, under the cir- cumstances which we have supposed, Europe, Si- beria, and a large portion of America, now actu- ally are. And, perhaps, when other countries shall have been examined, and New Holland a- mong the rest, it will one day be found that they have experienced similar revolutions, I might al- most say, mutual changes, of productions. For, if we push the supposition farther, and, after the supply of Asiatic animals to New Holland, ad- mit a second revolution, which destroyed Asia, their original country, those naturalists who might observe them in New Holland, their second country, would be equally at a loss to know whence they had come, as we now are to find out the origin of the races of animals that inhabit our own countries. I now proceed to apply this manner of reason- ing to the human species. Proofs that there are no Fossil Human Bones. It is certain that no human bones have yet been found among fossil remains ; and this fur- nishes an additional proof that the fossil races were not mere varieties of known species, since they could not have been subjected to human in- fluence. When I assert that human bones have never been found among fossil organic remains, (I must THEORY OF THE EARTH. 115 be understood to speak of fossils or petrifactions, properly so called), or, in other words, in the regu- lar strata of the surface of the glohe ; for in peat- bogs (tourbieres), and alluvial deposits, as in burying-grounds, human bones might as well be found as bones of horses, or other common species. They might equally be found in fissures of rocks, and in caverns, where they may have been covered over by stalactite ; but in the beds which contain the ancient races, among the palceotheria, and even among the elephants and rhinoceroses, the smallest portion of a human bone has never been discovered. Many of the labourers in the gypsum quarries about Paris, believe that the bones which occur so abundantly in them, are in a great part human ; but I have seen several thousands of these bones, and I may safely affirm that not one of them has ever belonged to our species. I have examined at Pavia the groups of bones brought by Spallanzani from the Island of Ce- rigo ; and, notwithstanding the assertion of that celebrated observer, I equally affirm, that there is not one among them that could be shewn to be human. The homo diluvii testis of Scheuchzer has been restored, in my first edition, to its true genus, which is that of the salamanders ; and, in a more recent examination of it at Haarlem, al- lowed me by the politeness of Mr Van Maruin, who permitted me to uncover the parts enveloped H 2 116 THEOJtY OF'THK KAHTH. in the stone, I obtained complete proof of what I had before announced. Among the bones found at Canstadt, the fragment of a jaw, and some ar- ticles of human manufacture, were found ; but it is known that the ground was dug up without any precaution, and that no notes were taken of the different depths at which each article was disco- vered. Every where else, the fragments of bone alleged to be human, are found, on examination, to belong to some animal, whether these frag- ments have been examined themselves, or merely through the medium of figures. Very recently, some were pretended to have been discovered at Marseilles, in a quarry that had been long ne- glected ; * but they have turned out to be impres- sions of tuyaux marines.^ Such real human bones as have been exhibited as fossil, belonged to bodies that had fallen into fissures, or had been left in the old galleries of mines, or that had been incrusted ; and I extend this assertion even to the human skeletons discovered at Guadaloupe, in a rock formed of fragments of madrepore, thrown up by the sea, and united by water im- * See the Journal de Marseille et des Bouches-du- Rhone, of the 27th Sept. 25th Oct. and 1st Nov. 1820. t I am confirmed in this opinion by the sketches trans- mitted to me by M. Cottard, one of the Professors of the College of Marseilles. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 117 pregnated with calcareous matter. * The human bones found near Koestriz, and pointed out by M. de Schlotheim, had been announced as taken * These skeletons, more or less mutilated, are found near Port de Moule, on the north-west coast of the mainland of Guadaloupe, in a kind of slope resting against the steep edges of the island. This slope is, in a great measure, covered by the sea at high- water, and is nothing else than a tufa, formed, and daily augmented, by the very small debris of shells and corals, which the waves detach from the rocks, and the accumulated mass of which assumes a great degree of cohesion in the places that are most frequently left dry. We find, on examining them with a lens, that several of these fragments have the same red tint as a part of the corals contained in the reefs of the island. Formations of this kind are common in the whole archipelago of the An- tilles, where they are known to the Negroes under the name of Ma?onne-bon-dieu. Their augmentation is proportioned to the violence of the surge. They have extended the plain of the Cayes to St Domingo, the situation of which has some resemblance to the Plage du Moule, and there are sometimes found in it fragments of earthen vessels, and of other articles of human fabrication, at a depth of twenty feet. A thousand conjectures have been made, and even events imagined, to account for these skeletons of Guada- loupe. But, from all the circumstances of the case, M. Mo- reau de Jonnes, correspondent of the Academy of Sciences, who has been upon the spot, and to whom I am indebted for the above details, thinks that they are merely bodies of per- sons that have perished by shipwreck. They were discovered in 1805 by M. Manuel Cortes y Campomanes, at that time a general officer in the service of the colonv- General Er- 118 THEORY OF THE EARTH. out of very old beds ; but this estimable natural- ist is anxious to make known how much this as- nouf, the governor, caused one to be extracted with much labour, of which the head, and almost the whole superior extremities, were wanting. This had been deposited at Guadaloupe, in the expectation that another and more com- plete specimen would be procured, in order to send them to- gether to Paris, when the island was taken by the English. Admiral Cochrane having found this skeleton at the head- quarters, sent it to the English Admiralty, who presented it to the British Museum. It is still in that collection, and M. Kcenig, Keeper of the Mineralogical Department, has described it in the Phil. Trans, of 1814, and there I saw it in 1818. M. Kcenig observes, that the stone in which it is imbedded, has not been cut to its present shape, but that it seems to have been simply inserted, in the form of a distinct nodule, into the surrounding mass. The skeleton is so superficial, that its presence must have been perceived by the projection of some of its bones. They still contain some of their animal matter, and the whole of their phosphate of lime. The rock being entirely formed of pieces of corals, and of compact limestone, readily dissolves in nitric acid. M. Koenig has detected fragments of Millepora miniacea, of several madrepores, and of shells, which he compares to Helix acuta and Turbo pica. This fossil skeleton is repre- sented in Plate I. More recently, General Donzelot has caused another of these skeletons to be extracted, which is now in the Royal Cabinet, and of which a figure is given in Plate II. It is a body which has the knees bent. A small portion of the upper jaw, the left half of the lower, nearly the whole of one side of the trunk and pelvis, and a large portion of the left upper and lower extremities, arc what remain of it. The rock which contains it, is evidently THEORY OF THE EARTH. 119 sertion is still subject to doubt. * The same has been the case with the articles of human fabrica- tion. The pieces of iron found at Montmartre are fragments of the tools which the workmen use for putting in blasts of gunpowder, and which sometimes break in the stone f . Yet human bones preserve equally well with those of animals, when placed in the same circum- stances. In Egypt, no difference is remarked be- tween the mummies of men and those of quadru- peds. I picked up, from the excavations made some years ago in the ancient church of St Ge- nevieve, human bones that had been interred be- low the first race, which may even have belonged to some princes of the family of Clovis, and which a travertin, in which are imbedded shells of the neighbouring sea, and land-shells, which are still found alive in the island, namely, the Bulimus guadalupensis of Ferussac. * See M. de Schlotheim's Treatise on Petrifactions, Go- tha, 1820, p. 57 ; and his Letter in the Isis of 1820, 8th Number, No. 6. of Supplement. t It is perhaps proper that I take notice of those frag- ments of sandstone, regarding which some noise was at- tempted to be made last year~(1824), and in which a man and a horse were alleged to have been found petrified. The mere circumstance of its being a man and a horse, with their flesh and skin, that these fragments must have represented, might have enabled every one to perceive that the whole was a mere lusus nature? t and not a true petrifaction.— -Note L. 120 THEORY OF THE EARTH. still retained their forms very perfectly #. We do not find in ancient fields of battle that the ske- letons of men are more wasted than those of horses, except in so far as they may have been influenced by size ; and we find among fossil remains the bones of animals as small as rats, still perfectly preserved. Every circumstance, therefore, leads to the con- clusion, that the human species did not exist in the countries in which the fossil bones have been discovered, at the epoch of the revolutions by which these bones were covered up ; for there cannot be a single reason assigned, why men should have entirely escaped from such general cata- strophes, or why their remains should not be now found like those of other animals. I do not pre- sume, however, to conclude that man did not exist at all before this epoch. He might then have in- habited some narrow regions, whence he might have repeopled the earth after those terrible events. Perhaps also, the places which he inhabited may have been entirely swallowed up in the abyss, and his bones buried at the bottom of the present seas, with the exception of a small number of in- dividuals, which have continued the species. * Fourcroy has given an analysis of them in the Annales du Museuni, vol. x. p. 1. THEORY OF THE EARTH. However this may be, the establishment of man in those countries in which we have said that the fossil remains of land animals are found, that is to say, in the greatest part of Europe, Asia, and America, has necessarily been posterior, not only to the revolutions which have covered up these bones, but also to those which have laid bare the strata containing them, and which are the last that the globe has undergone. Hence it clearly appears, that no argument in favour of the anti- quity of the human species in these different countries can be derived either from those bones themselves, or from the more or less considerable masses of rocks or of earthy materials by which they are covered. Physical Proofs of the Newness of the Present Continents. On the contrary, by a careful examination of what has taken place on the surface of the globe, since it has been laid dry for the last time, and its continents have assumed their present form, at least in the parts that are somewhat elevated, it may be clearly seen that this last revolution, and consequently the establishment of our exist- ing societies, could not have been very ancient. This result is one of the best established, and, at the same time, one of the least attended to in ra- tional geology ; and it is so much the more valu- THEORY OF THE EARTH. able, that it connects natural and civil history in one uninterrupted series. When we measure the effects produced in a given time by causes still acting, and compare them with those which the same causes have pro- duced since they have begun to act, we are en- abled to determine nearly the instant at which their action commenced ; which is necessarily the same as that in which our continents assumed their present form, or that of the last sudden re- treat of the waters. It must, in fact, have been since this last re- treat of the waters, that our present steep decli- vities have begun to disintegrate, and to form heaps of debris at their bases ; that our present rivers have begun to flow, and to deposit their alluvial matters ; that our present vegetation has begun to extend itself, and to produce soil ; that our present cliffs have begun to be corroded by the sea ; that our present downs have be- gun to be thrown up by the wind: just as it must have been since this same epoch, that co- lonies of men have begun, for the first or second time, to spread themselves, and to form establish- ments in places fitted by nature for their recep- tion. I do not here take the action of volcanoes into account, not only because of the irregula- rity of their eruptions, but because we have no proofs of their not having been able to exist mi- THE011Y OF THE EAKTH. der the sea ; and because, on that account, they cannot serve ns as a measure of the time which has elapsed since its last retreat. Additions of Land by the Action of Rivers. MM. Deluc and Dolomieu have most care- fully examined the progress of the formation of new ground by means of matters washed down by rivers ; and although exceedingly opposed to each other on many points of the Theory of the Earth, they agree in this. These formations aug- ment very rapidly ; they must have increased still more rapidly at first, when the mountains fur- nished more materials to the rivers, and yet their extent is still inconsiderable. Dolomieu's Memoir respecting Egypt * tends to prove, that the tongue of land on which Alex- ander caused his city to be built, did not exist in the days of Homer ; that they were then able to navigate directly from the island of Pharos into the gulf afterwards called Lake Mareotis ; and that this gulf was then, as indicated by Mene- laus, from fifteen to twenty leagues in length. It had, therefore, only required the nine hundred years that elapsed between the time of Homer and that of Strabo, to bring things to the state in * Journal de Physique, t. xlii, p. 40. et seq. 124 THEORY OF THE EAKTH. which this latter author describes them, and to reduce the gulf in question to the form of a lake, of six leagues in length. It is more certain, that, since that time, things have changed still more. The sand thrown up by the sea and winds have formed, between the island of Pharos and the site of ancient Alexandria, a tongue of land two hun- dred fathoms in breadth, upon which the modern city has been built. It has blocked up the near- est mouth of the Nile, and reduced the lake Ma- reotis to almost nothing ; while, during the same period, the alluvial matter carried down by the Nile, has been deposited along the rest of the shore, and has greatly increased its extent. The ancients were not ignorant of these changes. Herodotus says, that the Egyptian priests regarded their country as a gift of the Nile. It is only in a manner, he adds, within a short period, that the Delta has appeared *. Aristotle observes, that Homer speaks of Thebes as if it had been the only great city in Egypt ; and nowhere makes mention of Memphis f . The Canopian and Pelusian mouths of the Nile were formerly the principal ones; and the coast ex- tended in a straight line from the one to the * Herod. Euterpe, v. and xxv. t Arist. Meteor, lib. i. cap. 14. THEORY OF THE EARTH. other ; and in this manner it still appears in the charts of Ptolemy. Since then, the water has been directed into the Bolbitian and Phatnitic mouths ; and it is at these entrances into the sea that the greatest depositions have been formed, which have given the coast a semicircular outline. The cities of Rosetta and Damieta, which were built upon these mouths, close to the edge of the sea, less than a thousand years ago, are now two leagues distant from it. According to Demaillet*, it would only have required twenty-six years to form a promontory of half a league in extent be- fore Rosetta . An elevation is produced in the soil of Egypt, at the same time that this extension of its surface takes place, and the bed of the river rises in the same proportion as the adjacent plains, which makes the inundations of every succeeding cen- tury pass far beyond the marks which it had left during the preceding ones. According to He- rodotus, a period of nine hundred years was suf- ficient to establish a difference of level amount- ing to ten or twelve feet. At Elephantia f, the inundation at present exceeds by seven feet the greatest heights which it attained under Septi- mus Severus, at the commencement of the third * Demaillet, Description of Egypt, p. 102,-3. t Herod. Euterpe, xiii. 126 THEORY OF THE EARTH. century. At Cairo, before it is judged sufficient for the purpose of irrigation, it must exceed, by three feet and a half, the height which was neces- sary in the ninth century. The ancient monu- ments of this celebrated land have all their bases more or less buried in the soil. The mud left by the river even covers, to a depth of several feet, the artificial mounds on which the ancient towns were built *. The delta of the Rhone is not less remarkable for its increase. Astruc gives a detailed account of it in his Natural History of Languedoc ; and proves, by a careful comparison of the descriptions of Mela, Strabo and Pliny, with the state of the places as they existed at the commencement of the eighteenth century, taking into account the statements of several writers of the middle age, that the arms of the Rhone have increased three leagues in length in the course of eighteen hun- dred years ; that similar additions of land are made to the west of the Rhone ; and that a num- * See M. Girard's Observations on the valley of Egypt ; and on the secular increase of the soil which covers it, in the great work upon Egypt, and Mod. Mem. t. ii. p. 343. On this subject we may further observe that Dolomieu, Shaw, and other respectable authors, have estimated these secular elevations much higher than M. Girard. It is to be lament- ed, that nowhere has it been tried to examine the depth of these deposits over the original soil, or the natural rock. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 127 ber of places, which were situated, six or eight hundred years ago, at the edge of the sea or of large pools, are now several miles distant from the water. Any one may observe in Holland and Italy, with what rapidity the Rhine, the Po, and the Arno, since they have been confined within dikes, raise their beds, advance their mouths into the sea, forming long promontories at their sides ; and judge, from these facts, how small a number of ages was required by these rivers to deposit the low plains which they now traverse. Many cities, which were flourishing sea-ports at well known periods of history, are now some leagues inland ; and several have even been ruin- ed, in consequence of this change of position. The inhabitants of Venice find it exceedingly difficult to preserve the lagunes, by which that city is separated from the continent ; and not- withstanding all their efforts, it will be inevitably joined to the mainland *. We know, from the testimony of Strabo, that Ravenna stood among lagunes in the time of Au- gustus, as Venice does now ; but at present Ra- venna is a league distant from the shore. Spina * See M. Forfait's Memoir on the lagunes of Venice, inserted in the Mem, de la Classe Phys. de 1'Institut, t. v. p. 213. 128 THEORY OF THE EARTH. had been built by the Greeks at the edge of the sea ; yet in Strabo's time it was ninety stadia from it, and is now destroyed. Adria in Lom- bardy, which gave name to the Adriatic sea, and of which it was, somewhat more than twenty cen- turies ago, the principal port, is now six leagues distant from it. Fortis has even rendered it pro- bable that, at a more remote period, the Euga- nian Mountains may have been islands. M. de Prony, a learned member of the Insti- tute, and inspector- general of bridges and roads, has communicated to me some observations which are of the greatest importances as explaining those changes that have taken place along the shores of the Adriatic *. Having been directed by govern- ment to investigate the remedies that might be ap- plied to the devastations occasioned by the floods of the Po, he ascertained that this river, since the period when it was shut in by dikes, has so great- ly raised the level of its bottom, that the surface of its waters is now higher than the roofs of the houses in Ferrara. At the same time, its allu- vial depositions have advanced so rapidly into tire sea, that, by comparing old charts with the pre- sent state, the shore is found to have gained more than six thousand fathoms since 1604, giving an average of a hundred and fifty or a hundred and Note M. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 129 eighty, and in some places two hundred feet year- ly. The Adige and the Po, are at the present day higher than the whole tract of land that lies between them; and it is only by opening new channels for them in the low grounds, which they have formerly deposited, that the disasters which they now threaten may be averted. The same causes have produced the same ef- fects along the branches of the Rhine and the Meuse ; and thus the richest districts of Holland have continually the frightful view of their rivers held up by embankments at a height of from twenty to thirty feet above the level of the land. M. Wiebeking, director of bridges and high- ways in the kingdom of Bavaria, has written a memoir upon this subject, so important as to be worthy of being properly understood, both by the people and the government, in all countries where these changes take place. In this memoir, he shews that the property of raising the level of their beds is common in a greater or less degree to all rivers. The additions of land that have been made a- long the shores of the North Sea, have not been less rapid in their progress than in Italy. They can be easily traced in Friesland and in the coun- try of Groningen, where the epoch of the first dikes, constructed by the Spanish governor Caspar Robles, is well known to have been in 1570. An 130 THEORY OF THE EARTH. hundred years afterwards, land had already been gained, in some places, to the extent of three quarters of a league beyond these dikes ; and even the city of Groningen, partly built upon the old land, on a limestone which does not belong to the present sea, and in which the same shells are found as in the coarse limestone of the neighbour- hood of Paris, is only six leagues from the sea. Having been upon the spot, I am enabled to ad- duce my own testimony in confirmation of facts already well known, and which have been so well stated by M. Deluc *. The same phenomenon may be as distinctly observed along the coasts of East Friesland, and the countries of Bremen and Holstein, as the period at which the new grounds were inclosed for the first time is known, and the extent that has been gained since can be measured. This new alluvial land, formed by the rivers and the sea, is of astonishing fertility, and is so much the more valuable, as the ancient soil of these coun- tries, being covered with heaths'and peat-mosses, is almost everywhere unfit for cultivation. The allu- vial lands alone produce subsistence for the many populous cities that have been built along these coasts, since the middle age, and which perhaps would not have attained their present flourishing condition, without the aid of the rich deposits * In various parts of the two last volumes of his Letters to the Queen of England, . THEORY OF THE EARTH. 131 which the rivers had prepared for them, and which they are continually augmenting. If the size which Herodotus attributes to the Sea of Asoph, which he makes equal to the Eux- ine #, had been less vaguely indicated, and if we knew precisely what he meant by the Gerrhus f , we should there find strong additional proofs of the changes produced by rivers, and the rapidity with which they are made ; for the alluvial depo- sitions of rivers alone have, since the time of He- rodotus, that is to say, in the course of two thou- sand and two or three hundred years, reduced the Sea of Asoph $ to its present comparatively small size, shut up the course of the Gerrhus, or that branch of the Dnieper which had formerly joined the Hypacyris, and discharged its waters a- long with that river into the gulf called Carcinites, * Melpom. Ixxxvi. t Ibid. Ivi. J This supposed diminution of the Black Sea and Sea of Asoph, has also been attributed to the rupture of the Bos- phorus, which had taken place at the pretended period of the deluge of Deucalion ; and yet, in order to establish the fact itself, recourse is had to successive diminutions of the extent attributed to these seas by Herodotus, Strabo, and others. But it is very obvious, that, if this diminution had arisen from the rupture of the Bosphorus, it would neces- sarily have been completed long before the time of Herodo- tus, and even at the period at which Deucalion is supposed to have lived. 13S THEORY OF THE EARTH. now the Olu-Degnitz, and reduced the Hypacyris itself to almost nothing*. We should possess proofs no less strong of the same kind, could we be certain that the Oxus or Sihoun, which at pre- sent discharges itself into the lake Aral, former- ly reached the Caspian Sea. But we are in pos- session of facts sufficiently conclusive on the point in question, without adducing such as are doubt- ful, and without being exposed to the necessity of making the ignorance of the ancients in geo- graphy the basis of our physical propositions, f * See the Geography of Herodotus by M. Rennel, p. 56. et seq. ; and the Physical Geography of the Black Sea, &c. by M. Dureau de Lamalle. There is only at present the small river of Kamennoipost, that could represent the Ger- rhus and Hypacyris, such as they are described by Herodo- tus. M. Dureau, p. 170, supposes Herodotus to have made the Borysthenes and Hypanis discharge themselves into the Pa- lus Mseotis; but Herodotus (in Melpom. liii.) only says that these two rivers fall together into the same lake, that is, into the Liman, as at the present day. Herodotus does not carry the Gerrhus and Hypacyris any farther. t For example, M. Dureau de Lamalle, in his Physical Geography of the Black Sea, quotes Aristotle (Meteor, lib. i. cap. 13.) as " apprising us, that, in his time, there still existed several ancient periods and peripli, attesting that there had been a canal leading from the Caspian Sea into the Palus Mse- otis." Now, Aristotle's words at the place mentioned (Duval's edition,!. 545. B.) are merely these : " From the Paropamisus, descend, among other rivers, the Bactrus, the Choaspes, and THEORY OF THE EARTH. 133 Progress of the Downs. THE downs or hillocks of sand which the sea throws up on low coasts, when its bottom is sandy, have already been mentioned. Wherever human industry has not succeeded in fixing these downs, they advance as irresistibly upon the land as the alluvial depositions of the rivers advance into the sea. In their progress inland, they push before them the large pools formed by the rain which falls upon the neighbouring grounds, and whose communication with the sea is intercepted by them. In many places they proceed with a frightful rapidity, overwhelming forests, buildings, and cultivated fields. Those upon the coast of the Bay of Biscay * have already overwhelmed a great number of villages mentioned in the records of the the Araxis, from which the Tanais, which is a branch of it, takes its origin, into the Palus Maeotis." Who does not see that this nonsense, which is neither founded upon peripli nor periods, is nothing else than the strange idea of Alexander's soldiers, who took the Jaxartes or Tanais of the Transoxian for the Don or Tanais of Scythia ? Arrian and Pliny distinguish these two rivers from each other, but the distinction does not appear to have been made in the time of Aristotle. How, then, could such geographers as these furnish us with geolo- gical documents ? * See the Report upon the Downs of the Gulf of Gascony (or Bay of Biscay) by M. Tassin — Mont de-Marsan, an x. 134 THEORY OF THE EARTH. middle age ; and at this moment, in the single Department of the Landes, they threaten ten with inevitable destruction. One of these villages, named Mimisan, has been struggling against them these twenty years, with the melancholy prospect of a sand-hill of more than sixty feet perpendicular height visibly approaching it. In 1802, the pent up pools overwhelmed five fine farming establishments at the village of St Julian *. They have long covered up an ancient Roman road leading from Bourdeaux to Bayonne, and which could still be seen forty years ago, when the waters were low f . The Adour, which is known to have formerly passed Old Boucaut, to join the sea at Cape Breton, is now turned to the distance of more than two thousand yards. The late M. Bremontier, inspector of bridges and highways, who conducted extensive opera- tions upon these downs, estimated their progress at sixty feet yearly, and in some places at seventy- two feet. According to this calculation, it will only require two thousand years to enable them to reach Bourdeaux ; and, from their present ex- tent, it must have been somewhat more than * Memoir on the means of fixing Downs, by M. Bremon- tier. t Report of M. Tassin, loc. cit. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 135 four thousand years since they began to be form- ed *. The overwhelming of the cultivated lands of Egypt, by the sterile lands of Libya, which are thrown upon them by the west wind, is a pheno- menon of the same nature with the downs. These sands have destroyed a number of cities and vil- lages, whose ruins are still to be seen ; and this has happened since the conquest of the country by the Mahometans, for the summits of the mi- narets of some mosques are seen projecting be- yond the sand f. With a progress so rapid, they would, without doubt, have filled up the narrow parts of the valley, ^if so many ages had elapsed since they began to be thrown into it } ; and there would no longer remain any thing between the Libyan chain and the Nile. Here, then, we have another natural chronometer, of which it would be as easy as interesting to obtain the measure. Peat-Mosses and Slips'. THE turbaries, or peat-mosses, which have been found so generally in the northern parts of Europe, by the accumulation of the remains of * See M. Bremontier's Memoir, f Denon, Voyage en Egypte. £ We might cite in confirmation all the travellers who have visited the western border of Egypt. 136 THEORY OF THE EARTH, sphagna and other aquatic mosses, also afford a measure of time. They increase in height in proportions which are determinate with regard to each place. They thus envelope the small knolls of the lands on which they are formed ; and several of these knolls have been covered over within the memory of man. In other places the peat-mosses descend along the valleys, advancing like glaciers, but differing from them in this re- spect, that, while the glaciers melt at their lower part, the progress of the peat is impeded by no- thing. By sounding their depth down to the so- lid ground, we may estimate their age ; and we find, with regard to these peat-mosses, as with re- gard to the downs, that they cannot have derived their origin from an indefinitely remote period. The same observation may be made with regard to the slips or fallings, which take place with won- derful rapidity at the foot of all steep rocks, and which are still very far from having covered them. But as no precise measures have hitherto been ap- plied to these two agents, we shall not insist up- on them at greater length *. * These phenomena are very well treated of in M. Deltic's Letters to the Queen of England, in the parts where he de- scribes the peat-moses of Westphalia ; and in his Letters to Lametherie^insertedmthe Journal de Physique for 1791,&c. as well as in those which he has addressed to Blumenbach. We may refer also to the very interesting details which THEORY OF THE EARTH. 137 From all that has been said, it may be seen that nature uniformly speaks the same language, everywhere informing us that the present order of things cannot have commenced at a very remote period. And, what is very remarkable, mankind everywhere speaks as nature, whether we consult the received traditions of the various nations, or examine their moral and political state, and the intellectual attainments which they had made at the period when their authentic records com- mence. The History of Nations confirms the Newness of the Continents. In fact, although, at the first glance, the tradi- tions of some ancient nations, which extend their origin to so many thousands of ages, appear strongly to contradict this newness of the world,as it exists at present ; yet when we examine these traditions more carefully, we soon perceive that they are not sufficiently authenticated. We are, on the contrary, quickly convinced, that true his- tory, deserving that name, and all that has been are given in note F, respecting the islands of the west coast of the Duchy of Sleswick, and the manner in which they have been joined, whether to one another, or to the con- tinent, by alluvial depositions and peat-mosses, as well as re- specting the irruptions of the sea which from time to time have destroyed or separated some of their parts. 138 THEORY OF THE EARTH. preserved of positive documents regarding the first establishment of nations, confirm what has been announced by the natural monuments al- ready mentioned. The chronology of none of the western nations can be traced in a continuous line farther back than 3000 years. None of them afford us, pre- vious to that period, nor even two or three cen- turies after, a series of facts connected with any degree of probability. The north of Europe pos- sesses no authentic records which bear a remoter date than that of its conversion to Christianity. The history of Spain, of Gaul, and of England, commences only at the period when these coun- tries were conquered by the Romans ; that of northern Italy is, at the present day, almost un- known. The Greeks acknowledge that they did not possess the art of writing, until it was taught them by the Phenicians, fifteen or sixteen centu- ries before the Christian era; even for a long time after, their history is full of fables ; and they do not assign a more remote date than 300 years farther back, to their uniting into distinct tribes. Of the history of Western Asia, we have only a few contradictory extracts, which do not, with any connection, give a greater antiquity than twenty-five centuries * ; and even if we ad- * The period of Cyrus, about 650 years before the Christian era. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 139 mil the few historical details which refer to more remote periods, it can scarcely be extended to forty *. Herodotus, the first profane historian whose works have been transmitted to us, has not a greater antiquity than 2300 years f . The histo- rians, prior to him, whom he may have consulted, do not date a century before him \. We may even judge of what they were by the extravagan- ces handed down to us, extracted from the works of Aristceus of Proconnesus, and some others. Before them we have only poets ; and Homer, the most ancient that we possess, Homer the immortal master and model of all the West, flourished only twenty-seven or twenty-eight cen- turies before the present time. When these first historians speak of ancient events, whether occurring in their own nation, or in neighbouring countries, they only cite oral traditions, and not public works. It was not un- * The period of Ninus, about 2348 years before Christ, according to Ctesias, and those who have followed him; but only 1250, according to Volney, after Herodotus. t Herodotus lived 440 years before Christ. J Cadmus, Pherecydes, Aristaeus of Proconnesus, Acu- silaus, Hecataeus of Miletum, Charon of Lampsacus, &c. See Vossius, Histor. Graec. lib. i., and especially his fourth book. 140 THEORY OF THE EAUTH. til a long time after them, that pretended ex- tracts were given from the Egyptian, Phenician, and Babylonian annals. Berosus wrote only in the reign of Seleucus Nicanor ; Hieronymus in that of Antiochus Soter, and Manetho under Ptolemy Philadelphia ; the whole three having flourished only in the third century before the Christian era. That Sanconiatho was an author real or supposed, was not known till Philo of Byblos had published a translation of his work in the reign of Adrian, in the second century be- fore Christ; and, when he did become known, there was nothing found in his account of the early ages, as in those of all the authors of this kind, but a puerile theogony, or metaphysical doctrines, so disguised under the form of allegory as to be unintelligible One nation alone has preserved annals written in prose before the period of Cyrus, namely, the Jewish people. The part of the Old Testament which is known by the name of the Pentateuch, has existed in its present form, at least since the separation of the ten tribes under Jeroboam, since it was received as authentic by the Samaritans equally as the Jews, which assures us that its ac- tual antiquity is upwards of 2800 years. Besides this, we have no reason to doubt the book of Ge- nesis having been composed by Moses himself, which gives it an antiquity of 500 years more, or THEORY OF THE EARTH. 141 of thirty-three centuries ; and it is only necessary to read it, to perceive that it has in part been composed of fragments of previously existing works. We cannot, therefore, hesitate to admit, that this is the most ancient writing which has been trans- mitted to modern times in the West *. Now, this work, and all those which have been composed since, whatever strangers their authors might be to Moses and his people, speak of the nations on the shores of the Mediterranean as of recent origin ; they represent them as still in a half savage state some ages before. And, further, they all speak of a general catastrophe, an irrup- tion of the waters, which occasioned an almost total regeneration of the human race ; and to this epoch they do not assign a very remote antiquity. Those texts of the Pentateuch, which extend this epoch the longest, do not place it farther back than twenty centuries before Moses, and hence not more than 5400 years before the pre- sent day f. In the poetical traditions of the Greeks, from which is derived the whole of our profane history with reference to those remote ages, there is no- thing which contradicts the Jewish annals. On the * Note N. t The Septaagint, 5345 years; the Samaritan text, 4869; the Hebrew text, 4174, 142 THEORY OF THF. EARTH. contrary, they have a wonderful agreement with them, by the epoch which they assign to the Egyptian and Phenician colonies, by which the first germs of civilization were carried into Greece. We find that, about the same period when the Israelites took their departure from Egypt, to carry into Palestine the sublime doctrine of the unity of God, other colonies issued from the same country, to carry into Greece a religion less pure, at least in its external character, whatever might have been the secret doctrines which it reserved for the initiated ; while others, again, came from Phenicia, and imparted to the Greeks the art of writing, and whatever was connected with navi- gation and commerce *. * There is a difference of several years among chronolo- gists with respect to each of these events ; but these migra- tions form, notwithstanding, the peculiar and very remark- able feature of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries before the Christian era. Thus, according to the calculations of Usserius, Cecrops came from Egypt to Athens about 1556 years before Christ ; Deucalion settled on Parnassus about 1548; Cadmus arrived from Phenicia at Thebes about 14p3 ; Danaus came to Argos about 1485 ; and Dardanus established himself on the Hellespont about 1449* All these founders of nations must therefore have been nearly contemporary with Moses, whose migration took place in 1491. Consult further, regarding the synchronism of Moses, Danaus and Cadmus, Diodorus, lib. xi; in Photius, p. 1152. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 143 It is undoubtedly far from being the case, that we have had since that time a connected history, since we still find, for a long period after these founders of colonies, a multitude of mythological events, and adventures, in which gods and heroes are concerned ; and these chiefs are connected with authentic history only by means of genealo- gies evidently fictitious *. And, it is still more certain, that whatever preceded their arrival, could only have been preserved in very imperfect traditions, and supplied by mere fictions, similar to those of our monks of the middle age regarding the origin of the European nations. Thus, not only should we not be surprised to find, even in ancient times, many doubts and contradictions respecting the epochs of Cecrops, Deucalion, Cadmus and Danaus ; and not only would it be childish to attach the smallest import- * The genealogies of Apollodorus are generally known, and that portion of them upon which Clavier endeavoured to establish a sort of primitive history of Greece; but, when we become acquainted with the genealogies of the Arabs, those of the Tartars, and all those which our old chroni- cling monks invented for the different sovereigns of Eu- rope, and even for individuals, we readily comprehend that Greek writers must have done for the early periods of their nation what has been done for. all the other nations, at pe- riods when criticism had not been used to throw light upon history. 144 THEORY OF THE EARTH. ance to any opinion whatever, regarding the precise dates of Inachus * or Ogyges f ; but, if any thing ought to surprise us, it is this, — that an infinitely more remote antiquity had not been as- signed to those personages. It is impossible that there has not been in this case some effect of the influence of received traditions, from which the inventors of fables were not able to free them- selves. One of the dates assigned to the deluge of Ogyges, even agrees so much with one of those which have been attributed to the deluge of Noah, that it is almost impossible it should not have been derived from some source, where this latter deluge had been the one intended to be spoken of ^ * 1856 or 1823 years before Christ, or other dates still, but always about 350 years before the principal Phenician or Egyptian colonies. t The common date of Ogyges, according to Acusilaus, followed by Eusebius, is 179$ years before Christ, conse- quently several years after Inachus. £ Varro places the deluge of Ogyges, which he calls the first deluge, 400 years before Inachus, and consequently 1600 years before the first Olympiad. This would refer it to a period of 2376 years before Christ ; and the deluge of Noah, according to the Hebrew text, is 2349, there being only 27 years of difference. This testimony of Varro is 2 * • >•-•'* ' THEORY OF THE EARTH. 145 As to Deucalion, whether this prince be re- garded as a real or fictitious personage, however little we enter into the manner in which his de- luge has been introduced into the poems of the Greeks, and the various details with which it be - comes successively enriched, we perceive that it was nothing else than a tradition of the great ca- taclysm, altered and placed by the Hellenians in the period which they also assigned to Deuca- lion, because he was regarded as the founder of their nation, and because his history is confound- ed with that of all the chiefs of the renewed na- tions*. mentioned by Censorinus, De Die Natali, cap. xxi. In reality, Censorinus wrote only 238 years after Christ ; and, it appears, from Julius Africanus, ap. Euseb. Praep. cv. that Acusilaus, the first author who placed a del age in the reign of Ogyges, made this prince cotemporary with Phoronaeus, which would have brought him very near the first Olym- piad. Julius Africanus makes only an interval of 1020 years between the two epochs ; and there is even a passage in Censorinus conformable to this opinion. Some also read erogilium in place of ogygium, in the passage of Varro, which we have quoted above from Censorinus. But what would this be but an Erogitian Cataclysm, of which nobody has ever heard ? * Neither Homer nor Hesiod knew any thing of the de- luge of Deucalion, any more than that of Ogyges, The first author, whose works are extant, by whom mention is made of the former, is Pindar (Od, Olymp. ix.) He speaks of Deuca- K 146 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Each of the different colonies of Greece, that had preserved isolated traditions, commenced lion as landing upon Parnassus, establishing himself in the city of Protogene (first growth or birth), and re-creating his people from stones; in a word, he relates, but con- fining it to a single nation only, the fable afterwards gene- ralized by Ovid, and applied to the whole human race. The first historians who wrote after Pindar, namely, Hero- dotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon, make no mention of any deluge, whether of the time of Ogyges, or that of Deu- ealion, although they speak of the latter as one of the first kings of the Hellenes. Plato, in his Timaeus, says only a few words of the de- luge, as well as of Deucalion and Pyrrha, in order to com- mence the recital of the great catastrophe, which, according to the priests of Sais, destroyed the Atlantis ; but, in these few words, he speaks of the deluge in the singular number, as if it had been the only one. He even expressly men- tions farther on, that the Greeks knew only one. He places the name of Deucalion immediately after that of Phoro- neus, the first of the human race, without making mention of Ogyges. Thus, with him, it is still a general event, a true universal deluge, and the only one which had hap- pened. He regards it, therefore, as identical with that of Ogyges. Aristotle (Meteor, i. 14.) seems to be the first who con- sidered this deluge only as a local inundation, which he places near Dodona and the river Achelous, but near the Achelous and Dodona of Thessaly. Apollodorus (Bibl. i. § 7-) restores to the deluge of Deucalion all its grandeur and mythological character. According to him, it took place at the period when the age of brass was pass- ing into the age of iron. Deucalion is the son of Titan THEORY OF THE EARTH. 14? them with a particular deluge of its own, because some remembrance of the general deluge common Prometheus, the fabricator of man ; he forms anew the hu- man race of stones ; and yet Atlas, his uncle, Phoroneus, who lived before him, and several other personages ante- rior to him, preserve a lengthened posterity. In proportion as we advance toward authors who ap- proach nearer our own times, we find circumstances of de- tail added, which more resemble those related by Moses. Thus Apollodorus gives Deucalion a great chest as a means of safety ; Plutarch speaks of the pigeons by which he sought to find out whether the waters had retired ; and Lucian, of the animals of every kind which he had taken with him, &c. With regard to the blending of traditions and hypothe- ses, by which it has recently been tried to infer the con- clusion, that the rupture of the Thracian Bosphorus was the cause of Deucalion's deluge, and even of the opening of the pillars of Hercules, by making the waters of the Euxine Sea discharge themselves into the Archipelago, supposing them to have been much higher and more ex- tended than they have been since that event, it is not neces- sary for us to treat of it in detail, since it has been deter- mined by the observations of M. Olivier, that if the Black Sea had been as high as it is imagined to have been, it would have found several passages for its waters, by hills and plains less elevated than the present banks of the Bos- phorus ; and by those of the Count Andreossy, that had it one day fallen suddenly in the manner of a cascade by this new passage, the small quantity of water that could have flowed at once through so narrow an aperture, would not only be diffused over the immense extent of the Mediterra- nean, without occasioning a tide of a few fathoms, but that 2 K2 148 THEORY OF THE EARTH. to all the nations, was preserved among each of the tribes ; and, when it was afterwards attempted to reduce these various traditions to a common chronology, different events were imagined to have been recorded, from the circumstance that dates, in reality uncertain, or perhaps altogether false, although considered as authentic in the countries where they originated, were not found to agree with each other. Thus, in the same manner that the Hellenes had a deluge of Deu- calion, because they regarded him as the founder of their nation, the Autochtones of Attica had one of Ogyges, because it was with him that their history commenced. The Pelasgi of Arcadia had that which, according to later authors, com- pelled Dardauus to retire towards the Helles- pont.* The island of Samothracia, one of those in which a succession of priests had been more anciently established, together with a regular worship and connected traditions, had also a de- the mere natural inclination necessary for the flowing of the waters, would have reduced to nothing their excess of height above the shores of Attica. See further on this subject the note that I have published at the head of the third volume of Ovid, of M. Lemaire's collection. * Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Antiq. Rom. lib. i. cap. Ixi, THEORY OF THE EARTH. 149 luge, which passed for the most ancient of all *, and which was attributed to the bursting of the Bosphorus and the Hellespont. Some idea of a similar event was preserved in Asia Minor f , and in Syria t, and to this the Greeks would after- wards naturally attach the name of Deucalion ||. But none of these traditions assign a very re- remote antiquity to this cataclysm ; and there is none of them that does not admit of explanation, in so far as its date and other circumstances are concerned, from the variations to which narra- tives, that are not fixed by writing, must be con- tinually liable. The very remote Antiquity attributed to certain Na- tions is not supported by History. Those who would attribute to the continents and the establishment of nations, a very remote antiquity, are therefore obliged to have recourse to the Indians, Chaldeans, and Egyptians, three * Diodorus Siculus, lib. v. cap. xlvii. t Stephen of Byzantium, under the word Iconium ;— Zenodotus, Prov. cent. vi. No. 10. ; — and Suidas, voce Nan- nacus. t Lucian, De Dea Syra. |j Arnobius, Contra Gent. lib. v. p. m. 158, even speaks of a rock in Phrygia, from which it was pretended that Deucalion and Pyrrha had taken their stones. 150 THEOllY OF THE EA11TH. nations, in fact, which appear to have been the most anciently civilized of the Caucasian Race, and having a remarkable similarity, not only in their temperament, and in the climate and na- ture of the countries which they occupied, but also in their political and religious constitution, but whose testimony this almost identical consti- tution ought to render equally suspected^. These three nations agreed in having each a hereditary caste, to which the care of religion, laws, and science, was exclusively consigned. In all of them, this caste had its allegorical language and secret doctrines ; and in all it reserved to it- self the privilege of reading and explaining the sacred books, the whole doctrines of which had been revealed by the gods themselves. W"e can easily conceive what history would ne- cessarily come to in such hands ; but, without having recourse to any great efforts of reason, we may learn it from the fact itself, by examining what it has come to in the only one of these * This mutual resemblance in their institutions is carried to such an extent as to make it very natural to suppose that these nations had a common origin. It should not be for- gotten, that many ancient authors thought that the Egyp- tian institutions came from Ethiopia ; and that Syncellus, p. 151. says positively that the Ethiopians came from the banks of the Indus in the time of King Amenophtis. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 151 three nations which still exists, namely, the In- dians. The truth is, that history does not exist at all among them. In the midst of that infinity of books on mystical theology and abstract metaphysics which the Brahmins possess, and many of which have been made known to us by the ingenious per- severance of the English, we find no connected account of the origin of their nation, or of the vicissitudes of their society. They even pretend that their religion prohibits them from recording the events of the present time, their age of mis- fortune *. According to the Vedas, the first revealed works, on which are founded the whole religious opinions of the Hindoos, the literature of this people, like that of the Greeks, had its origin at two great epochs ; the Ramaian and the Maha- barat, — a thousand times more monstrous in their wonders than the Iliad and Odyssey, but in which we also perceive some traces of a meta- physical doctrine of that description generally termed sublime. The other poems, which, toge- ther with the two mentioned, compose the great body of the Pouranas, are nothing else than me- trical legends or romances, written at different * See Polier. Mythology of the Hindoos, vol. i. p. 8& 91. 152 THEORY OF THE EARTH. periods, and by different authors, and not less extravagant in their fictions than the great poems. It has been imagined that, in some of these writ- ings, events and names of men bearing some re- semblance to those spoken of by the Greeks and Latins, might be discovered ; and it is chiefly from these resemblances of names that Mr Wil- fort has attempted to extract from the Pouranas a kind of concordance with our ancient chrono- logy of the west ; a concordance which, in every line, betrays the hypothetical nature of its basis, and which, moreover, can only be admitted by absolutely rejecting the dates given in the Poura- nas themselves *. The list of kings which the Indian pundits or doctors pretend to have compiled according to these Pouranas, are nothing but mere catalogues without any details, or adorned with absurd ones, like those of the Chaldeans and Egyptians, and like those which Trithemus and Saxo Gramma- ticus have made up for the northern nations f . ! ^ •'«-wj * See the elaborate Memoir of Mr Wilfort, on the chrono- logy of the kings of Magadha, and the Indian emperors, and on the epochs of Vicramaditya or Bikermadjit, and Saliva- hanria, in the Calcutta Memoirs, vol. ix. p. 82. 8vo. edit. t See Sir William Jones on the chronology of the Hin- doos. Calcutta Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 111. See also Wilfort ' ' THEORY OF THE EARTH. 153 These lists are far from corresponding ; none of them supposes a history, or registers, or records ; the very basis on which they rest may have been purely imagined by the poets from whose works they have been extracted. One of the pundits who furnished Mr Wilfort with them, acknow- ledged that he had arbitrarily filled up the spaces between the celebrated kings with imaginary names *, and avowed that his predecessors had done the same. If this be true of the lists ob- tained by the English at the present day, how should it not be so of those given by Abou-Fa- zel, as extracts from the annals of Cachmere f , and which, besides, full of fables as they are, do not extend farther back than 4300 years, of which more than 1200 are occupied with names of princes whose reigns, in as far as regards their duration, remain undetermined. Even the era, accordingly, from which the In- dians count their years at the present day, which commences fifty seven years before Christ, and __^ — — — — — _ -^_______ on the same subject, Ibid. vol. v. p. 241. and the lists which he. gives in his essay cited above, vol. ix. p. 116. * Wilfort, Calcutta Mem. 8vo. vol. ix. p. 133. t In the Ayeen-Acbery, vol. ii. p. 138, of the English transl. See also Heeren, Commerce of the Ancients, vol. i. part ii. p. 329. 154 THEORY OF THE EARTH. which bears the name of a prince called Vicrama- ditjia, or Bickermadjit, bears it only by a sort of convention ; for we find, according to the synchro- nisms attributed to Vicramaditjia, that there may have been at least three, and perhaps so many as eight or nine, princes of this name, who have all similar legends, and who have all waged war with a prince named Saliwahanna ; and, further, we cannot well make out whether this period, the fifty-seventh year before the Christian era, is that of the birth, reign, or death of the hero whose name it bears.* Lastly, the most authentic books of the In- dians, contradict, by intrinsic and very obvious characters, the antiquity attributed to them by the pundits. Their vedas, or sacred books, alle- ged by them to have been revealed by Brama himself from the beginning of the world, and ar- ranged by Viasa (a name which signifies no- thing else than collector), at the commencement of the present age, if we judge of them by the calendar which is found annexed, and to which they refer, as well as by the position of the co- lures indicated by this calendar, may extend to * See Bentley, on the Astronomical Systems of the Hindoos, and their Connection with History ; Calcutta Me- moirs, vol. viii. p. 243. of the 8vo edition. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 155 3200 years, or about the epoch of Moses.* Nay, perhaps those who give credit to the assertion of Megasthenest, that in his time the Indians were not acquainted with the art of writing, who re- flect that none of the ancients has made mention of their superb temples, those immense pagodas, the remarkable monuments of the religion of the Bramins, and who are aware that the epochs of their astronomical tables have been calculated backwards, and ill calculated, and that their trea- tises of astronomy are modern and antedated, will be inclined still farther to reduce the pre- tended antiquity of the Vedas. Yet even in the midst of all the Brahminical fictions, circumstances occur, whose agreement with the result of the historical monuments of more western countries cannot but astonish us. Thus, their mythology consecrates the successive devastations which the surface of the globe has already undergone, or is yet destined to undergo ; and it is only to a period somewhat less than 5000 years, that they refer the last catastrophe^ * See Mr Colebrooke's Memoir on the Vedas, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. viii. p. 493. 8vo edition. t Megasthenes apud Strabonem, lib. xv. p. 709. Almel. J The epoch which gave birth to the present age, Call- yug (the earthen age,) 4927 years before the present day, or 3200 years before Christ. See Legentil, Voyage 156 THEORY OF THE EARTH. One of these revolutions, which is in reality placed much farther from us, is described in terms nearly corresponding with those of Moses *. Mr Wilfort even assures us, that, in another event of the same mythology, a conspicuous place is held hy a personage who resembles Deucalion, in his origin, name, and adventures, and even in the name and adventures of his father f . It is a cir- aux Indes, t. i. p. 253. ; — Bentley, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. viii. of the 8vo edition, p. 212. This period is only fifty- nine years farther back than the deluge of Noah, according to the Samaritan text. * The person named Satyavrata plays the same part as Noah, by saving himself with fourteen saints. See Sir W. Jones, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. i. p. 230. 8vo edition ; — also in the Bagvadam, or Bagavata, translated by Fouche d'Ob- sonville, p. 212. t Cala-Javana, or, in common language, Cal-Yun, to whom his partisans might have given the epithet, deva, deo, (dieu, god), having attacked Chrishna (the Indian Apollo), at the head of the northern nations (the Scythians, of whom was Deucalion, according to Lucian), was repulsed by fire and water. His father Garga had for one of his surnames Pramathesa (Prometheus); and, according to another le- gend, he was devoured by the eagle Garuda. These parti- culars have been extracted by Mr Wilfort (in his Memoir upon Mount Caucasus, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. vi. p. 507, 8vo edition), from the Sanscrit drama, entitled Hari-Vansa. Mr Charles Ritter, in his Vestibule of the History of Eu- rope before Herodotus, concludes that the whole fable of Deucalion was of foreign origin, and had been brought into THEORY OF THE EARTH. 157 cumstance equally worthy of remark, that, in the lists of their kings, imperfect and unauthentic as they are, they date the commencement of their first human sovereigns (those of the race of the sun and moon), at an epoch which is nearly the same as that from which Ctesias, in his singu- larly constructed list, commences the reign of his Assyrian kings *. This deplorable state of historical knowledge was necessarily the result of the system of a people, among whom the exclusive privilege of writing, of preserving, and of explaining the books, was given to the hereditary priests of a religion monstrous in its ritual, and cruel in its maxims. Some legend made up for the purpose of establishing a place of pilgrimage, inventions adapted to impress more deeply a respect for their Greece along with the other legends of that part of the Gre- cian worship which had come from the north, and which had preceded the Egyptian and Phenician colonies. But if it be true that the constellations of the Indian sphere have also names of persons celebrated in Greece, that Andromeda and Cepheus are represented under the names of Antarma- dia and Capita, &c. we should perhaps be induced to draw, with Mr Wilfort, a conclusion quite the reverse. Unfortu- nately the authenticity of the documents referred to by this writer has been doubted among the learned. * About 4000 years before the present time. See Bent- ley, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. viii. p. 226. of the 8vo edition. Note. 158 THEORY OF THE EARTH. caste, must have interested these priests more than any historical truths. Of the sciences, they might have cultivated astronomy, which would give them credit as astrologers ; mechanics, which would assist them in raising their monuments, those signs of their power, and objects of the superstitious veneration of the people ; geometry, the hasis of astronomy, as well as of mechanics, and an important auxiliary to agriculture in those vast plains of alluvial formation, which could only be rendered healthy and fertile by the aid of numerous canals. They might have encou- raged the mechanical or chemical arts, which supported their commerce, and contributed to their luxury, and the magnificence of their tem- ples. But history, which informs men of their mutual relations, would be regarded by them with dread. What we see in India, we might therefore ex- pect to find in general, wherever sacerdotal races, constituted like those of the Brahmins, and esta- blished in similar countries, assumed the same empire over the mass of the people. The same causes produce the same effects ; and, in fact, we have only to glance over the fragments of Egyp- tian and Chaldean traditions which have been preserved, to be convinced that there is no more historical authenticity in them than in those of the Indians. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 159 In order to judge of the nature of the chro- nicles which the Egyptian priests pretended to possess, it is only necessary to review the extracts which have heen given by themselves at different periods, and to different individuals. Those of Sais, for example, informed Solon, ahout 550 years before Christ, that, as Egypt was not subject to deluges, they had preserved not only their own annals, but those of other na- tions also; that the cities of Athens and Sais had been built by Minerva, the former 9000 years before, the latter only 8000 ; and to these dates they added the well known fables respecting 'the Atlantes, and the resistance which the ancient Athenians opposed to their conquests, together with the whole romantic description of the At- lantis*, a description in which we find events and genealogies similar to those of all mythologi- cal romances. A century later, about 450 years before Christ, the priests of Memphis gave entirely different accounts to Herodotus f . Menes, the first king of Egypt, according to them, had built Memphis, and inclosed the Nile within dikes, as if it were possible that the first king of a country could * See Plato's Timaeus and Critias. t Euterpe, chap. xcix. et seq. 160 THEORY OF THE EARTH. perform operations of this kind. Between this prince and Moeris, who, according to them, reigned 900 years before the period at which this account was given (1350 years before Christ), they had a succession of three hundred and thirty other kings. After these kings came Sesostris, who extend- ed his conquests as far as Colchis * ; and altoge- ther, there were, to the time of Sethos, three hundred and forty-one kings, and three hundred and forty-one chief priests, in three hundred and forty-one generations, during a space of 11,340 years. And, in this interval, as if to insure the authenticity of their chronology, these priests as- serted that the sun had risen twice where he sets, without any change having taken place in the climate or productions of the country, and with- out any of the gods having at that time, or be- fore, made their appearance and reigned in Egypt. * Herodotus thought he had discovered relations of figure and colour between the Colchians and Egyptians; but it is infinitely more probable that those dark-coloured Colchians of which he speaks, were an Indian colony,, at- tracted by the commerce anciently established between In- dia and Europe, by the Oxus, the Caspian Sea, and the Phasis. See Hitter,, Vestibule of Ancient History before Herodotus, chap. i. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 161 To this fable, which, despite of all the pre- tended explanations that have been given of it, evinces so gross an ignorance of astronomy, they added, regarding Sesostris, Phero, Helenius, and Rhampsinitus, the kings who built the pyramids, and an Ethiopian conqueror named Sabacos, a set of tales equally absurd. The priests of Thebes did better : they shewed Herodotus, and they had before shewn to Heca- taeus, three hundred and forty-five colossal figures of wood, which represented three hundred and forty-five high priests, who had succeeded to each other from father to son, all men. all born the one of the other, but who had been preceded by gods *. Other Egyptians told him that they had exact registers, not only of the reign of men, but also of that of gods. They reckoned 17,000 years from Hercules to Amases, and 15,000 from Bac- chus. Pan had even been prior to Hercules f . These people evidently took for history some al- legories relating to pantheistic metaphysics, which formed, unknown to them, the basis of their my- thology. * Euterpe, chap, cxliii. t Ibid, cxliv. 1 62 THEORY OF THE EARTH, It is only from the time of Sethos that Hero- dotus commences the part of his history which is somewhat rational ; and it is worthy of remark, that this part begins with an event which agrees with the Hebrew annals, the destruction of the army of the King of Assyria, Sennacherib * ; and this agreement continues under Necho -f-, and un- der Hophra or Apries. Two centuries after Herodotus (about 260 years before Christ) Ptolemy Philadelphus, a prince of a foreign race, wished to become ac- quainted with the history of the country which events had called him to govern. A priest, called Manetho, was employed to write it for him. It was not from registers or archives that he pre- tended to compile this work, but from the sa- cred books of Agathodaemon, the son of the se- cond Hermes, and the father of Tat, who had copied it upon pillars erected before the flood by Tot or the first Hermes, in the Seriadic land {. And this second Hermes, this Agathodsemon, this Tat, are personages of whom nothing had ever been said before, any more than of the Seri- * Euterpe; cxli. t Ibid, clix., and in the fourth Book of the Kings, chap. 19, or in the second of the Paral. chap. 32. t Syncell. p. 40. THEORY OF THE EAHTH. 163 adic land, or of its pillars. The deluge itself was an event entirely unknown to the Egyptians of preceding times, and concerning which Manetho says nothing in what remains of his dynasties. The product resembles its source ; not only is the whole full of absurdities, but they are absurdities peculiar to the work, and utterly irreconcilable with those which the priests of older times had re- lated to Solon and Herodotus. It is Vulcan who commences the series of di- vine kings. He reigns 9000 years ; the gods and demi-gods reign 1985 years. The names, and successions, and dates of Manetho are utterly un- like any thing that was published before or after him ; and from the discrepancy of the extracts gi- ven by Josephus, Julius Africanus, and Eusebius, we may infer that his narratives were as obscure and confused in themselves, as they were discor- dant with those of other authors. Even the du- ration of the respective reigns of his human kings is not settled. According to Julius Africanus, it extended to 5101 ; according to Eusebius, to 4723 ; and according to Syncellus, .to 3555 years. It might be thought that the differences in the names and cyphers arose from the inaccu- racy of copyists ; but Josephus quotes a passage at length, the details of which are manifestly in con- tradiction with the extracts of his successors. 164 THEORY OF THE EARTH. A chronicle, named the ancient *, and which some consider anterior, others posterior, to Ma- netho, gives still different calculations. The to- tal duration of its kings is 36,525 years, of which the sun reigned 30,000, the other gods 3984, and the demi-gods 217 ; there remaining for those of the human race only 2339 years. There are thus also but 113 generations, in place of the 340 of Herodotus. A learned man of an order different from that of Manetho, the astronomer Eratosthenes, dis- covered and published, in the reign of Ptolemy Euergetes, about 240 years before Christ, a par- ticular list of thirty-eight kings of Thebes, commencing with Menes, and continuing for a space of 1024 years ; of which we have an extract that Syncellus has copied from Apollodorus f . Scarcely any of the names found in this list cor- respond with those of the others. Diodorus went to Egypt in the reign of Pto- lemy Auletes, about sixty years before Christ, consequently two centuries after Manetho, and four after Herodotus. He also collected from the narratives of the priests a history of the coun- try, and his account is again quite different from those of his predecessors $. It isjio longer Menes * Syncell. p. 51. t Ibid, p. 91. el seq. % Diod. Sic. lib. i. sect. 2. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 165 who built Memphis, but Uchoraeus ; and long be- fore his time Busiris the second had built Thebes. The eighth ancestor of Uchoraeus, Osymandyas, possessed himself of Bactria, and crushed rebel- lions in it. Long after him, Sesoosis made still more extensive conquests, having proceeded as far as the Ganges, and returned by Scythia and the Tanais. Unfortunately these names of kings are unknown to all the preceding historians, and none of the nations which they conquered have preserv- ed the slightest traces of them. As to the gods and heroes, their reign, according to Diodorus, ex- tended through a space of 18,000 years, while that of the human sovereigns was 15,000. Four hundred and seventy of the kings were Egyptians, and four Ethiopians, without reckoning the Per- sians and Macedonians. The fables, besides, with which the whole is intermingled, do not yield in childishness to those of Herodotus. In the eighteenth year of the Christian era, Germanicus, the nephew of Tiberius, led by the desire of becoming acquainted with the antiqui- ties of this celebrated land, went over to Egypt, at the risk of incurring the displeasure of a prince so suspicious as his uncle, and proceeded up the Nile as far as Thebes. It was no more Sesostris or Osymandyas, of whom the priests spoke to him as a conqueror, but Rhamses, who, at the head of 700,000 men, had invaded Libya, Ethiopia, Me- 166 THEORY OF THE EARTH. dia, Persia, Bactria, Scythia, Asia-Minor, and Syria *. Lastly, in the celebrated article of Pliny upon the ohelisks f, we find names of kings which are not to be seen elsewhere ; Sothies, Mnevis, Zmarreus, Eraphius, Mestires, a Semenpserteus, contemporary of Pythagoras, &c. A Ramises, who might be thought the same as Rhamses, is there made to live at the time of the siege of Troy. 1 am not sure whether it has been attempted to reconcile these discordant lists by the supposi- tion that the kings have borne several names. For my own part, when I consider not only the discrepancy of these various accounts, but, above all, the mixture of authentic facts, attested by vast monuments, and of puerile extravagancies, it appears to me much more natural to conclude, that the Egyptian priests possessed no real his- tory whatever; that, inferior still to those of * Tacit. Annal. lib. ii. cap. 60. N. B. — According to the interpretation given by Am- mianus, lib. xvii. cap. 4., of the hieroglyphics on the obelisk of Thebes, which is at present in Rome in the place of St John of Latran, it appears that a Rharaestes was styled, af- ter the eastern manner, lord of the habitable earth ; and that the history told to Gennanicus was only a commentary on this inscription. t Pliny, lib. xxxvi. cap. 8, 9, 10, 11. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 167 •% India, they had not even suitable and connected fables ; that they preserved only lists more or less defective of their kings, and some remembrances of the more distinguished among them, of those especially who had taken care to have their names inscribed upon the temples and other great edifices which adorned their country ; but that these re- membrances were confused, — that they rested merely upon the traditional explanation which was given to the representations painted or sculp- tured upon the monuments ; explanations found- ed solely upon hieroglyphical inscriptions, con- ceived, like that which has been handed down to us *, in very general terms, and which, passing from mouth to mouth, were altered, as to their details, at the pleasure of those who communi- cated them to strangers ; and that it is conse- quently impossible to rest any proposition relative to the antiquity of the presently existing conti- nents, upon the shreds of these traditions, so in- complete even in their own times, and become utterly unintelligible under the pen of those who have been the means of transmitting them to us. Should this assertion require other proofs, they would be found in the list of the sacred works of * That of Ramcstes in Ammian. loc. cit. 168 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Hermes, which were carried by the Egyptian priests in their solemn processions. Clement of Alexandria * names them all to the number of forty-two, and there is not even found among them, as is the case with the Brahmins, one epic poem, or one book, which has the pretension to be a narrative, or to fix in any way a single great action or a single event. The interesting researches of M. Champollion the younger, and his astonishing discoveries re- garding the language of the hieroglyphics f , far from overturning these conjectures, on the con- trary, confirm them. This ingenious antiquary has read, in a series of hieroglyphic paintings in the temple of Abydos J, the prenomens of a cer- tain number of kings placed in regular succession one after another ; and a part of these prenomens (the last ten) recurring on various other monu- ments, accompanied with proper names, he has concluded that they are those of kings who bore those proper names, and this has afforded him * Stromat. lib- vi. p. 633. t See the " Precis clu Systeme Hieroglyphique des Anciens Egyptiens/' by M. Champollion the younger, p. 245; and his Letter to the Duke de Blacas, p. ]5 et seq. J This important bas-relief is engraved in the second volume of M. Caillaud's Voyage a Meroe, Plate xxxii. 1 THEORY OF THE EARTH. 169 nearly the same kings, and in the same order, as those of which Manetho composes his eighteenth dynasty, that which expelled the shepherds. The concordance, however, is not complete: in the painting of Abydos, six of. the names that appear in Manetho's list are wanting ; there are some, again, which bear no resemblance ; and, last- ly, there unfortunately occurs a blank before the most remarkable of all, the Rhamses, who appears the same as the king represented on many of the finest monuments, with the attributes of a great conqueror. It would be, according to M. Cham- pollion, in the list of Manetho, the Sethos, the chief of the nineteenth dynasty, who, in fact, is indicated as powerful in ships and in cavalry, and as having carried his arms into Cyprus, Media and Persia. M. Champollion thinks, with Mar- sham and many others, that it is this Rhamses, or this Sethos, who is the Sesostris, or the Sesoo- sis of the Greeks ; and this opinion possesses some probability, in this respect, that the representa- tions of the victories of Rhamses, probably carried over the wandering tribes in the vicinity of Egypt, or at the most into Syria, have given rise to those fabulous ideas of vast conquests attributed, by some other confusion, to a Sesostris. But, in Manetho, it is in the twelfth dynasty, and not in the eighteenth, that a prince bearing the name of Sesostris is inscribed, who is noted as having con- 170 THEORY OF THE EARTH. quered Asia and Thrace *. Marsham also asserts, that this twelfth dynasty and the eighteenth make but one f . Manetho could not himself, therefore, have understood the lists which he copied. Lastly, if we admit in their full degree, both the histo- rical truth of this bas-relief of Abydos, and its accordance, whether with the part of M anetho's lists that seems to correspond to it, or with the other hieroglyphic inscriptions, this consequence would result, that the pretended eighteenth dy- nasty, the first regarding which the ancient chro- nologists begin to manifest some agreement, is also the first which has left traces of its existence upon monuments. Manetho may have consulted this document and others of a like nature ; but it is not the less obvious, that a mere list, a series of names or of portraits, as he has throughout, is far from being a history. Ought not this, then, which is proved and de- monstrated with respect to the Indians, and which I have rendered so probable with respect to the inhabitants of the valley of the Nile, be presumed also to be the case with those of the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris ? Establish- ed, like the Indians j and Egyptians, upon a much * Syncell, p- 59. t Canon, p, 355. J The whole ancient mythology of the Brahmins has THEORY OF THE EARTH. 171 frequented route of commerce, in vast plains, which they had been obliged to intersect with nume- rous canals; instructed, like them, by hereditary priests, the pretended depositaries of secret books, the privileged possessors of the sciences, astrolo- gers, builders of pyramids, and other great monu- ments * ; should they not also resemble them in other essential points ? Should not their history be equally a mere collection of legendary tales ? I venture almost to assert, that not only is this pro- bable, but that it is actually demonstrated. Up to this period neither Moses nor Homer speak of any great empire in Upper Asia. Herodo- tus f gives to the supremacy of the Assyrians a du- ration of only 520 years, and does not attribute to their origin a greater antiquity than about eight centuries before his own time. After having been at Babylon, where he consulted the priests, he had not even learnt the name of Ninus as king of the Assyrians, and does not mention him otherwise than as the father of Agroj, the first relation to the plains or the course of the Ganges, where their first establishments were evidently formed. * The descriptions of the ancient Chaldean monuments have a strong resemblance to what we see of those of the Indians and Egyptians; but these monuments are not equally well preserved, because they were only built of bricks dried in the sun. t Clio, cap. xcv. j Clio, cap. vii. 146 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Lydian king of the family of the Heraclides. Notwithstanding, he makes him the son of Be- lus : so much confusion had there been in the traditions. Though he speaks of Semiramis as one of the queens who left great monuments in Baby- lon, he only places her seven generations before Cyrus. Hellanicus, who was cotemporary with Hero- dotus, far from allowing that Semiramis had built any thing at Babylon, attributes the foun- dation of that city to Chaldseus, the fourteenth successor of Ninus*. Berosus, a Babylonian and a priest, who wrote scarcely a hundred and twenty years after Herodotus, gives an astounding antiquity to Babylon ; but it is to Nabuchodono- sor, a prince comparatively very modern, that he attributes the principal monuments f . Regard- ing even Cyrus, a prince so remarkable, and whose history must have been so well known and so popular, Herodotus, who only lived a hundred years after him, owns that, in his time, there al- ready existed three different opinions ; and, in fact, sixty years later, Xenophon gives a biogra- phy of this prince quite at variance with that of Herodotus. * Stephen of Byzantium, at the word Chaldosi. t Josephus, (Contra App,) lib. i. cap. xix. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 173 Ctesias, who was nearly cotemporary with Xe- nophon, pretends to have extracted from the roy- al archives of the Medes, a chronology which carries back the origin of the Assyrian monarchy upwards of 800 years, putting at the head of their kings, that same Ninus, the son of Belus, whom Herodotus had made one of the Hera- elides ; and, at the same time, he attributes to Ninus and Semiramis conquests towards the west, of an extent absolutely incompatible with the Jewish and Egyptian history of the times in question *. According to Megasthenes, it was Nabucho- donosor who made these incredible conquests. He pushed them by way of Libya, as far as Spain f . We find that, in the time of Alexan- der, Nabuchodonosor had completely usurped the reputation which Semiramis had possessed in the time of Artaxerxes. But we must suppose, without doubt, that Semiramis and Nabuchodo- nosor had conquered Ethiopia and Libya, much in the same way as the Egyptians made India and Bactria to be subdued by Sesostris or Osy- mandias. 1 Diod. Sic. lib. ii. | Josephus (contra App.) lib. i. cap. 6; and Strsbo, lib. xv. p. 687. 174 THEORY OF THE EARTH: It would lead to no result were we now to exa- mine the different accounts respecting Sardana- palus, in which a celebrated writer imagined he had found proofs of the existence of three princes of that name, who were all victims of similar mis- fortunes * ; much in the same way as another writer found in the Indian Vicramaditjia, at least three princes, who were equally the heroes of si- milar adventures. It is apparently from the want of agreement in all these accounts, that Strabo thought him- self justified in saying, that the authority of He- rodotus and Ctesias was not equal to that of Ho- mer or Hesiod f. Nor has Ctesias been more happy in transcribers than Manetho ; and it is very difficult, at the present day, to harmonize the extracts made from his writings by Diodorus, Eusebius, and the Syncelle. Since there existed such a state of uncertainty in the fifth century before the Christian era, how should it be imagined that Berosus had been able to clear it up in the third century before that era ; or how should we repose more confidence in the 430,000 years which he puts before the deluge, or * See in the Memoirs of the Academy of Belles Let- tres, vol. v. the memoir of Freret on the History of the Assyrians. t Strabo, lib. xi. p. 507* .THEORY OF THE EARTH. 175 the 35,000 years which lie places between the de- luge and Semiramis, than in the registers of 150,000 years, which he boasts of having consult- ed*. Structures raised in remote provinces, and bear- ing the name of Semiramis, have been spoken of ; and columns erected by Sesostrisf have been pre- tended to have been seen in Asia Minor, in Thrace. But, in the same way, in Persia, at the present day, the ancient monuments, perhaps even some of the above, bear the name of Roustan ; and in Egypt or Arabia, they bear the names of Joseph or Solomon. This is an ancient custom among the eastern nations, and probably among all ignorant people. The peasants of our own country give the name of Caesar's Camp to all the remains of Roman entrenchments. In a word, the more I consider the subject, the more I am persuaded that there existed no an- cient history at Babylon or Ecbatan, more than in Egypt and India. And, in place of reducing * Syncellus, p. 38 and 39. t N. B. — It is very remarkable that Herodotus does not mention having seen monuments of Sesostris, except in Pales- tine, and does not speak of those of Ionia, but upon the au- thority of others, adding, at the same time, that Sesostris is not named in the inscriptions, and that those who had seen these monuments attributed them to Memnon. See Eu- terpe, chap. cvi. 3 176 THEORY OF THE EARTH. mythology to history, with Evhemere and Ban- nier, I am of opinion that a great part of history should be referred to mythology. It is only at the epoch of what is commonly called the Second Kingdom of Assyria, that the history of the Assyrians and Chaldeans begins to become more intelligible ; and this epoch is also that at which the history of the Egyptians under- goes a similar change, when the kings of Nine- veh, of Babylon, and of Egypt, commence their conflicts on the theatre of Syria and Palestine. It appears, nevertheless, that the authors of these countries, or those who had consulted the traditions regarding them, Berosus, and Hierony- mus, and Nicholas de Dam as, agreed in speaking of a deluge. Berosus has even described it with circumstances so similar to those detailed in the book of Genesis, that it is almost impossible what he says of it should not have been derived from the same sources, even although he removes its epoch a great number of ages back, — insomuch, at least, as we may judge of it, by the confused extracts which Josephus, Eusebius, and Syncel- lus, have preserved of his writings. But we must remark, and with this observation we shall conclude what we have to say with regard to the Babylonians, that these numerous ages, and this long series of kings, placed between the deluge and Semiramis, are a new thing, entirely peculiar THEORY OF THE EARTH. 177 to Berosus, and of which Ctesias, and those who have followed him, had no idea, and which has not even been adopted by any of the profane au- thors posterior to Berosus. Justin and Velleius consider Ninus as the first of the conquerors, and those who, contrary to all probability, place him highest, only refer him to a period of forty centu- ries before the present time *. The Armenian authors of the middle age nearly agree with one of the texts of Genesis, when they refer the deluge to a period of 4916 years from their own time ; and it might be thought that having collected the old traditions, and perhaps extracted the old chronicles of their country, they form an additional authority in fa- vour of the newness of the nations. But when we reflect that their historical literature com- mences only in the fifth century, and that they were acquainted with Eusebius, we perceive that they must have accommodated themselves to his authority, and to that of the Bible. Moses of Chorene expressly professes to have followed the Greeks, and we see that his ancient history is moulded after Ctesias f. However, it is certain, that the tradition of the deluge existed in Armenia long before the con- * Justin, lib. i. cap. i. Vetleius Paterculus, lib. i. cap. 7. t See Moses of Chorene, Histor. Armeniac. lib. 1. cap. i, M 178 THEORY OF THE EARTH. version of its inhabitants to Christianity ; and the city, which, according to Josephus, was called the Place of the Descent, still exists at the foot of Mount Ararat, and bears the name of Nachid- chevan, which, in fact, has the same significa- tion. * Along with the Armenians, we include the Arabians, Persians, Turks, Mongolians, and Abyssinians, of the present day. Their ancient books, if they ever had any, no longer exist. They have no ancient history, but that which they have recently made up, and which they have modelled after the Bible ; hence, what they say of the deluge is borrowed from Genesis, and adds nothing to the authority of that book. It were curious to inquire what had been the opinion of the ancient Persians upon this subject, before it was modified by the Christian and Ma- homedan creeds. We find it deposited in their Boundehesh, or Cosmogony, a work of the time of Sassanides, (but evidently extracted or transla- ted from more ancient works), and which was dis- covered by Anquetil du Perron, among the Parsis of India. According to it, the total du- ration of the world could only be 12,000 years; hence it cannot still be very old. The appear- * See the Preface of the Brothers Whiston, regarding Moses of Chorene, p. 4. THEORY OF THE EA11TH. 179 ance of Cayoumortz (the bull-man, the first of the human race), is preceded by the creation of a great water. * For the rest, it would be as useless to expect a regular history of ancient times from the Parsis, as from the other eastern nations. The Magi have left none, any more than the Brahmins or Chaldeans. Of this there is nothing more requir- ed for proof than the uncertainty which exists re- garding the epoch of Zoroaster. It is even as- serted, that the little history they may have pos- sessed, that which relates to the Achemenides, the successors of Cyrus to Alexander, had been expressly altered, and this in consequence of an official order to that purpose from a monarch named Sassanidesf- In order to discover authentic dates of the com- mencement of empires, and traces of a general de- luge", we must therefore go beyond the great de- serts of Tartary. Toward the east and north we find another race of men, who differ from us as much in their institutions and manners as in their form and temperament. Their language consists of monosyllables, and they make use of arbitrary hieroglyphics in writing. They have only a po- * Zendavesta of Anquetil, vol. ii. p. 354. t Mazoudi, ap. Sacy, MS. of the Royal Library, vol. viii. p. 161, M 2 180 THEORY OF THE EARTH. litical system of morals, without religion ; for the superstitions of Fo were imported among them from India. Their yellow skin, their prominent cheeks, their narrow and oblique eyes, and their scanty beard, render them so different from us, that one is tempted to believe that their ancestors and ours had escaped the great catastrophe on two different sides. But however this may be, the epoch which they assign to their deluge is nearly the same as ours. The Chou-king is the most ancient of the Chinese books * ; it is said to have been compiled by Confucius, about 2255 years ago, from frag- ments of more ancient works. Two hundred years afterwards, a general persecution of the men of letters, and destruction of the books, is said to have taken place under the emperor Chi-Hoang- ti, whose object in this was to destroy the traces of the feudal government established under the dynasty which preceded his. Forty years after, under the dynasty which had overturned that to which Chi-Hoang-ti belonged, a portion of the Chou-king was restored from memory by an old literatus, and another was discovered in a tomb ; but nearly the half of it was for ever lost. Now, this book, the most authentic which the Chinese * See the preface to the edition of Chou-king, by M. de Guignes. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 181 possess, commences the history of their country with the reign of an emperor named Yao, whom it represents to us as occupied in removing the wa- ters, which, having risen to the skies, still bath- ed the foot of the higher mountains, covered the less elevated hills, and rendered the plains impas- sahle *. According to some, the reign of Yao was 4163 years before the present time ; accord- ing to others, 3943. The discrepancy in the opi- nions regarding this epoch even amounts to 284 years. A few pages farther on we find one Yu, a mi- nister and engineer, re-establishing the courses of the waters, raising embankments, digging canals, and regulating the taxes of all the provinces in China, that is to say, in an empire extending 600 leagues in all directions. But the impossibility of such operations, after such events, shews clear- ly that the whole is nothing else than a moral and political romance f. More modern Chinese historians have added a series of emperors before Yao, but with a mul- titude of fabulous circumstances, without ventu- ring to assign them fixed epochs. These writers * Chou-king, French translation, p. 9- t See the Yu-kong, or first chapter of the second part of the Chou-king, pp. 4-3-60. 182 THEORY OF THE EARTH. are at perpetual variance with each other, even regarding the number and names of their empe- rors, and are not universally approved by their countrymen. Fouhi, with the body of a serpent, the head of an ox, and the teeth of a tortoise, to- gether with his successors, who are not less mon- strous, are altogether absurd, and have no more existed than Enceladon and Briareus. Is it possible that mere chance could have pro- duced so striking a result, as to make the tradi- tional origin of the Assyrian, Indian, and Chi- nese monarchies agree in being referred to an epoch of nearly 4000 years from the present pe- riod ? Would the ideas of nations which have had so little communication with each other, and whose language, religion, and laws are altogether different, have corresponded upon this point, had they not been founded upon truth ? We could not expect precise dates from the natives of America, who had no real writings, and whose oldest traditions extended only to a few centuries before the arrival of the Spaniards. And yet, even among them, traces of a deluge are ima- gined to be found in their rude hieroglyphics. They have their Noah, or Deucalion, as well as the Indians, Babylonians, and Greeks *. * See the excellent and magnificent work of M. de Hum- boldt upon the Mexican monuments. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 183 The Negroes, the most degraded race among men, whose forms approach the nearest to the brutes, and whose intellect has not yet arrived at the institution of regular governments, or at any thing having the least appearance of systematic knowledge, have preserved no sort of annals or traditions. They cannot, therefore, afford us any information on the subject of our present re- searches, though all their characters clearly shew us that they have escaped from the great catas- trophe, at another point than the Caucasian and Altaic races, from which they had perhaps been separated for a long time previous to the occur- rence of that catastrophe. But if the ancients, it is argued, have left no history, their long existence as nations is not the less attested by the advances which they have made in astronomy, by observations whose date is easily determined, and even by monuments which still remain, and which themselves bear their dates. Thus, the length of the year, such as the Egyptians are supposed to have determined it, according to the heliacal rising of Sirius, proves correct for a period comprised between the year 3000 and the year 1000 before Christ, a period to which the traditions of their conquests and of the great prosperity of their empire also refer. This accuracy proves to what perfection they had carried their observations, and shews that they 184 THEOltY OF THE EARTH. had for many ages applied themselves to such in- vestigations. In order to determine the force of this argu- ment, it is necessary that we should here enter upon some explanations. The solstice is the moment of the year at which the rise of the Nile commences, and that which the Egyptians must have observed with most attention. Having, at the beginning, made, from imperfect observations, a civil or sacred year of three hundred and sixty-five days complete, they would preserve it from superstitious motives, even after they had perceived that it did not agree with the natural or tropical year, and did not bring back the seasons to the same days *. How- ever, it was this tropical year which it behoved them to mark for the purpose of directing them in their agricultural operations. They would, therefore, have to search in the heavens for an apparent sign of its return, and they imagined they had found this sign when the sun returned to the same position, relatively to some remarkable star. Thus they applied them- selves, like almost all nations who are beginning * Geminus, who was cotemporary with Cicero, explains their motives at length. See M. Halma's edition at the end of the Plolomee, p. 43. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 185 this inquiry, to observe the heliacal risings and settings of the stars. We know that they chose particularly the heliacal rising of Sirius, at first, doubtless, on account of the beauty of the star ; and, especially, because, in those ancient times, this rising of Sirius being nearly coincident with the solstice, and indicative of the inundation, was to them the most important phenomenon of this kind. Hence it was that Sirius, under the name of Sothis, occupied so conspicuous a place in their mythology, and in their religious ceremonies. Supposing, therefore, that the return of the he- liacal rising of Sirius and the tropical year were of the same duration, and believing, at length, that this duration was 365 days and a quarter, they would imagine a period after which the tro- pical year and the old year, the sacred year of 365 days only, would return to the same day ; a period which, according to these incorrect data, was necessarily 1461 sacred years, and 1460 of those improved years to which they gave the name of years of Sirius. They took for the point of departure of this period, which they named the Sothiac or great year, a civil year, the first day of which was, or had been, also that of a heliacal rising of Sirius ; and it is known, from the positive testimony of Censorinus, that one of these great years had 186 THEORY OF THE EARTH. ended in the 138th year of the Christian era*. It had consequently commenced in the 1322d be- fore Christ, and that which preceded it in the 2782d. In fact, the calculations of M. Ideler shew, that Sirius was heliacally risen on the 20th July of the Julian year 139, a day which corres- ponded that year to the first of Thot, or the first day of the Egyptian sacred year f . But not only is the position of the sun, with relation to the stars of the ecliptic, or the side- real year different from the tropical year, on ac- count of the precession of the equinoxes. The he- liacal year of a star, or the period of its heliacal rising, especially when it is distant from the ecliptic, differs still from the sidereal year, and differs in various degrees according to the lati- tudes of the places where it is observed. What is very singular, however, and the observation has already been made by Bainbridge J and Father Petau §, it happens, by a remarkable concurrence * The whole of this system is developed by Censorinus, De Die Natali, cap. tv'ni. and xxi. t Ideler. Historical Researches regarding the Astrono- mical Observations of the Ancients. M. Raima's transla- tion, at the end of his Canon de Ptolomee, p. 32. et seq. J Bainbridge, Canicul. § Petau, Var. Dios. lib* v. cap. vi. p. 108. — Also, La Nanze, Acad. de Bell. Lett. t. xiv. p. 346. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 187 in the positions, that, in the latitude of Upper Egypt, at a certain epoch, and during a certain number of ages, the year of Sirius was really within very little of 365 days and a quarter ; so that the heliacal rising of this star returned in fact to the same day of the Julian year, the 20th July, in the year 1322 before, and the year 138 after Christ *. From this actual coincidence, at this remote period, M. Fourier, who has confirmed all these accounts by new calculations, concludes, that, since the length of the year of Sirius was so per- fectly known to the Egyptians, they must have determined it by observations made during a long series of years, and conducted with great accuracy ; observations which must be referred to at least 2500 years before the present time, and which could not have been made long before or long af- ter this interval of time f. * Petau. loc. cit. M. Ideler asserts that this concurrence of the heliacal rising of Sirius also took place in 2782 be- fore Christ. (Historical Researches in M. Raima's Ptolo- mee, vol. iv. p. 37.) But with regard to the Julian year 1598 after Christ, which is also the last of a great year, Pe- tau and Ideler differ much from each other. The latter refers the heliacal rising of Sirius to the 22d July; the for- mer to the 19th or 20th of August. t See, in the great work on Egypt, Antiq. Memoirs, vol. 1. p. 803. the ingenious Memoir of M. Fourier, enti- 188 THEORY OF THE EA11TH. This result would assuredly be very striking, had it heen directly, and by observations, made upon Sirius itself, that they had fixed the length of the year of Sirius. But experienced astrono- mers affirm it to be impossible that the heliacal rising of a star could afford a sufficient foundation for exact observations on such a subject, especially in a climate where the circumference of the ho- rizon is constantly so much loaded with va- pours, that, in clear nights, stars of the second or third magnitude can never be seen within some degrees of the verge of the horizon, and that the sun itself is completely obscured at its rising and setting. * They maintain, that, if the length of the year had not been otherwise as- certained, there would have been a mistake of one or two days, f They have no doubt, therefore, that this duration of 365 days and a quarter, is that of the tropical year inaccurately determined by the observation of the shadow, or by that of tied Recherches sur les Sciences et le Gouvernement de 1'Egypte. * These are the words of the late M. Nouet, Astronomer to the Expedition to Egypt. See Volney, New Inquiries regarding Ancient History, vol. iii. t Delambre, Abrege d' Astronomic, p. 217 : and in his note upon the Parantaellons, in his History of ,the Astro- nomy of the Middle Age, p. lij. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 189 the point where the sun rose each day, and through ignorance identified with the heliacal year of Sirius ; so that it would be mere chance which had fixed with so much accuracy the dura- tion of this latter for the period of which we speak. * Perhaps it will also be judged, that men ca- pable of making observations so exact, and which they had continued during so long a period, would not have attributed so much importance to Sirius, as to pay him religious homage ; for they would have seen that the relations of the rising of this star with the tropical year, and with the inun- dation of the Nile, were merely temporary, and took place only in a determinate latitude. In fact, according to M. Icfeler's calculations, in the year 2782 before Christ, Sirius appeared in Up- per Egypt, on the second day after the solstice ; in 1322, on the third ; and in the year 139 af- ter Christ, on the twenty-sixth.f At the present day, its heliacal rising is more than a month af- ter the solstice. The Egyptians would there- fore set themselves by preference to finding the period, which would bring about the coincidence * Delambre, Report upon M. de Paravey's Memoir re- garding the Sphere, in the 8th vol. of the Nouvelles An- nales des Voyages. t Ideler, loc. cit. p. 38. 190 THEORY OF THE EARTH. of the commencement of the sacred year, with that of the true tropical year, and then they would discover that their great period must have heen 1508 sacred years, and not 1461.* Now, we assuredly do not find any traces of this period of 1508 years in antiquity. In general, we may defend ourselves with the idea, that, if the Egyptians had possessed so long a series of observations, and of accurate observa- tions too, their disciple Eudoxus, who studied among them for thirteen years, would, on his re- turn, have brought into Greece a system of astro- nomy more perfect, and maps of the heavens less erroneous, and more coherent in their different parts, f How should it happen that the preces- sion of the equinoxes was not known to the Greeks, but through the works of Hipparchus, if it had been marked in the registers of the Egyp- tians, and inscribed in characters so manifest up- on the ceilings of their temples ? And how comes it that Ptolemy, who wrote in Egypt, should not * See Laplace, Systeme du Monde, 3d edition, p. 17; and the Annuaire of 1818. t See on the Inaccuracy of the Determinations of the Sphere of Eudoxus, M. Delambre, in the first volume of his History of the Astronomy of the Ancients, p. 120. et seq. 2 •> /X>f ,T":- THEORY OF THE EAIITH. 191 have deigned to avail himself of any of the obser- vations of the Egyptians ? * Farther, Herodotus, who lived so long with them, says nothing of those six hours which they added to the sacred year, nor of that great So- thian period which resulted. On the contrary, he says expressly that the Egyptians, making their year of 365 days, the seasons returned to the same point, so that in his time the necessity of this quarter of a day does not appear to have been suspected, f Thalles, who had visited the priests of Egypt, less than a century before He- rodotus, did not, in like manner, make known to his countrymen, any other than a year of 365 days only .J And, if we reflect that all the co- lonies which migrated from Egypt, fourteen or fifteen centuries before, Christ, the Jews and the Athenians, carried with them the lunar year, it will perhaps be inferred that the year of 365 days itself had not existed in Egypt in these re- mote ages. I am aware that Macrobius § gives the Egyp- tians a solar year of 365^ days ; but this author, * See the Preliminary Discourse of the History of the Astronomy of the Middle Age, by M, Delambre, p. viii. et seq. t Euterpe, chap. iv. % Diog. Laert, lib. i. in Thalet. § Saturnal. lib. i. cap. xv. 192 THEORY OF THE EARTH. who is comparatively modern, and who lived at a long period after the establishment of the fixed year of Alexandria, must have confounded the epochs. Diodorus * and Strabo •(• only attribute such a year to the Thebans ; they do not say that it was in general use, and they themselves did not live till long after Herodotus. Thus the Sothian or great year must have been a comparatively recent invention, since it results from the comparison of the civil year with this pretended heliacal year of Sirius ; and it is for this reason that it is only spoken of in the works of the second and third century after Christ J, and that Syncellus alone, in the ninth, seems to cite Manetho as having made mention of it. . Notwithstanding all that is said to the con- trary, the same opinion must be formed of the as- tronomical knowledge of the Chaldeans. It is na- tural enough to think, that a people who inhabi- ted vast plains, under a sky perpetually serene, must have been led to observe the course of the stars, even at a period when they still led a wan- dering life, and when the stars alone could direct • Bibl. lib. i. p. 46. t Geogr. p. 182. J See regarding the probable newness of this period the excellent dissertation of M. Biot, in his Researches respect- ing several points of the Egyptian Astronomy, p. 148 et sea. " THEORY OF THE EAIITH. 193 their courses during the night ; but since what period were they astronomers, and to what per- fection did they carry the science ? Here rests the question. It is generally allowed that Callisthe- nes sent to Aristotle observations made by them, and which referred to a period of 2200 years be- fore Christ ; but this fact is related only by Sim- plicius *, as stated upon the authority of Por- phyry, and 600 years after Aristotle. Aristotle himself says nothing on the subject, nor has any creditable astronomer spoken of it. Ptolemy mentions and makes use of ten observations of eclipses really made by the Chaldeans ; but they do not refer to an earlier period than that of Nabo- nassar (721 years before Christ) ; they are inaccu- rate also ; the time is expressed only in hours and half-hours, and the shadow only in halves or fourths of the diameter. Notwithstanding, as they had fixed dates, the Chaldeans must have had some knowledge of the true length of the year, and some means of measuring time. They appear to have known the period of eighteen * See M. Delambre, Hist, de T Astronomic, vol. i. p. 212. See also his analysis of Geminus, ibid. p. 211. Compare this with M. Ideler's Memoirs on the Astronomy of the Chaldeans, in the fourth volume of M. Raima's Ptolemy, p. 166. N 194 THEORY OF THE EARTH. years, which brings back the eclipses of the moon in the same order ; a piece of knowledge which the mere inspection of their registers would promptly afford them ; but it is certain that they could neither explain nor predict eclipses of the sun. It is from not having sufficiently understood a passage of Josephus, that Cassini, and after him Bailly, have imagined that they discovered in it a luni-solar period of 600 years, which had been known from the time of the first patriarchs *. Thus every thing leads us to believe that the great reputation of the Chaldeans was given them at a more recent period, by their unworthy suc- cessors, who, under the same name, sold their ho- roscopes and predictions throughout the whole Roman empire, and who, in order to procure themselves more credit, attributed to their rude ancestors the honour of the discoveries of the Greeks. With regard to the Indians, every body knows that Bailly, believing that the epoch which is used as a period of departure in some of their as- tronomical tables had been actually observed, has attempted to draw from thence a proof of the great antiquity of the science among this people, * See Bailly, History of Ancient Astronomy ; and M. Delambre, in his work on the same subject, vol. i. p. 3. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 195 or at least among the nation which had bequeath- ed them its knowledge. But the whole of this system, invented with so much lahour, falls to the ground of itself, now that it is proved that this epoch has been adopted but of late, from calcula- tions made backwards, and even false in their re- sults .* Mr Bentley has discovered that the tables of Tirvalour, on which the assertion of Bailley espe- cially rested, must have been calculated about 1281 of the Christian era, or 540 years ago, and that the Surya-Siddhanta, which the Brahmins regard as their oldest scientific treatise on astro- nomy, and which they pretend to have been re- vealed upwards of 20,000,000 of years ago, could not have been composed at an earlier period than about 760 years from the present day f . Solstices and equinoxes indicated in the Pou- ranas, and calculated according to the positions which seem to be attributed to them by the signs * See Laplace, Expose du Systeme du Monde, p. 330 ; and the Memoir of Mr Davis, on the Astronomical Calcula- tions of the Indians. — Calcutta Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 225, Svo. edition. t See Mr Bentley 's Memoirs on the Antiquity of the Su- rya-Siddhanta, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. vi. p, 540 ; and on the Astronomical Systems of the Indians, ibid., vol. via*, p. 195. of the Svo edition. 196 THEORY OF THE EARTH. of the Indian zodiac, such as they are supposed to be, have acquired the character of an enormous antiquity. A more attentive examination of these signs or nacchatras has lately convinced M. de Paravey that reference is only made to solsti- ces of 1200 years hefore the Christian era. This author at the same time admits, that the place of the solstices is so inaccurately fixed, that this de- termination of their date must he received with a latitude of 200 or 300 years. They are in the same predicament as those of Eudoxus and of Tcheoukong *. It is ascertained that the Indians do not make observations, and that they are not in possession of any of the instruments necessary for that pur- pose. M. Delambre indeed admits, with Bailly and Legentil, that they have processes of calcu- lation, which, without proving the antiquity of their astronomy, shew at least its originality f ; and yet this conclusion can by no means be extended to their sphere ; for, independently of their twenty- seven nacchatras or lunar houses, which strongly * Manuscript Memoirs of M. de Paravey, on the sphere of Upper Asia. t See the profound essay on the Astronomy of the In- dians in M. Delambre's Histoire de TAstronomie ancienne, vol. i. p. 400-556. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 197 resemble those of the Arabians, they have the same twelve constellations in the zodiac as the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Greeks * ; and, if we refer to Mr Wilfort's assertions, their extra-zo- diacal constellations are also the same as those of the Greeks, and bear names which are merely slight alterations of their Greek names f. It is to Yao that the introduction of astrono- * See the Memoir of Sir William Jones, on the Anti- quity of the Indian Zodiac, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. ii, p. 289 of the 8vo edition. f The following are Mr Wilfort's own words, in his memoir on the Testimonies of Ancient Hindoo Books, re- specting Egypt and the Nile, Calcutta Memoirs, vol. iii. p. 433 of the 8vo edition; — ct Having desired my pundit, who is a learned astro- nomer, to point out in the heavens the constellation of Antarmada, he directed me immediately to Andromeda, which I had taken care not to shew him as a constellation that I knew. He afterwards brought me a very rare and curious book, in Sanscrit, in which there was a particular chapter on the Upanacshatras, or extra-zodiacal constella- tions, with figures of Capeya, of Casyape, seated, and hold- ing a lotus-flower in her hand ; of Antarmada, chained, with the fish near her ; and of Parasica, holding the head of a monster, which he had killed, dropping blood, and having snakes for hair." Who does not recognise in this, Perseus, Cepheus, and Cassiope? But we must not forget that this pundit of Mr Wilfort's has become much suspected. 198 THEORY OF THE EARTH. my into China is attributed. He is represented, in the Chou-king, as sending astronomers toward the four cardinal points of his empire, to examine what stars presided over the four seasons, and to regulate the operations to be carried on at each period of the year *, as if their dispersion was ne- cessary for such an undertaking. About 200 years later, the Chou-king speaks of an eclipse of the sun, but accompanied with ridiculous circum- stances, as in all the fables of this kind ; for the whole Chinese army, headed by a general, is made to march against two astronomers, because they had not properly predicted itf; and it is well known that, more than 2000 years after, the Chi- nese astronomers possessed no means of accurately predicting the eclipses of the sun. In 1629 of our era, at the time of their dispute with the Je- suits, they did not even know how to calculate the shadows. The real eclipses, recorded by Confucius in his Chronicle of the kingdom of Lou, commence only 1400 years after this, in the 776th before Christ, and scarcely half a century earlier than those of the Chaldeans related by Ptolemy. So true is it, that the nations which escaped at the same time * Chou-king, p. 6 and 7- t Idem, p. 66. et seq. THEORY OF THE EARTH, 199 from the general catastrophe, also arrived about the same period, when their circumstances have been similar, at the same degree of civilization. Now, it might be thought, from the identity of the names of the Chinese astronomers in different reigns (they appear, according to the Chou-king, to have all been named Hi and Ho)9 that, at this remote epoch, their profession was hereditary in China, as it was in India, Egypt, and Baby- lon. The only Chinese observation of any antiquity, which has nothing in itself to prove its want of authenticity, is that of the shadow made by Tcheou-kong about 1100 years before Christ; and even it is far from being correct *. Hence our readers may conclude, that the in- ferences drawn from the alleged perfection of as- tronomical science among ancient nations, is not more conclusive in favour of the excessive anti- quity of those nations, than the testimonies which they have adduced in reference to themselves. But had this astronomy been more perfect, what would it prove ? Has the progress been cal- culated which this science ought to make among * See, in the Connaissance des Temps of 1809, ?• 382, and in M. Delambre's Histoire de 1'Astronomie ancienne, vol. i. p. 391, the extract of a memoir by P. Gaubil, on the Observations of the Chinese. 200 THEORY OF THE EARTH. nations who were not in any degree in possession of others ; to whom the serenity of the sky, the necessities of the pastoral or agricultural life, and their superstitious ideas, would render the stars an object of general attention ; where colleges, or societies of the most respectable men among them, were charged with keeping a register of interest- ing phenomena, and transmitting their memory ; and where, from the hereditary nature of the pro- fession, the children were brought up from the cradle in the knowledge of facts ascertained by their parents? Supposing that, among the nume- rous individuals of whom the cultivation of astro- nomy was the sole occupation, there should hap- pen to be one or two possessed of extraordinary talents for geometry, all the knowledge acquired by these nations might be attained in a few cen- turies. Since the time of the Chaldeans, real astronomy has only had two eras, that of the Alexandrian school, which lasted 400 years, and that of our own times, which has not existed so long. The learned period of the Arabians scarcely added any thing to it ; and the other ages have been mere blanks with regard to it. Three hundred years did not intervene between Copernicus and the author of the Mecanique Celeste ; and can it be believed that the Indians required thousands of years to arrive at their crude theories ? THEORY OF THE EAHTH. 201 The Astronomical Monuments left by the Ancients do not bear the excessively remote dates which have been attributed to them. Recourse has therefore been had to arguments of another kind. It has been pretended that, in- dependently of the knowledge which these na- tions may have acquired, they have left monu- ments which bear a date fixed by the state of the heavens which they represent, and one that refers to a very remote antiquity. The zodiacs sculp- tured in two temples of Upper Egypt, are ad- duced as furnishing proofs perfectly demonstrative of this assertion. They present the same figures of the zodiacal constellations as are employed at the present day, but distributed in a manner pe- culiar to themselves. The state of the heavens at the period when these monuments were de- lineated, is imagined to have been represented by this distribution, and it has been thought that it would be possible from it to infer the precise pe- riod at which the edifices containing them were erected *. * Thus at Dendera, the ancient Tentyris, a city below Thebes, in the portico of the great temple, the entrance of which faces the north, there are seen on the ceiling the signs of the zodiac marching in two bands, one of which 202 THEORY OF THE EARTH. But to arrive at the high antiquity which is supposed to be deducible from this, it must, in extends along the eastern side, and the other along the op- posite one. Each of the bands is embraced by the figure of a woman of the same length, the feet of which are to- ward the entrance, the head and arms toward the bottom of the portico ; the feet are consequently to the north, and the heads to the south. (Great Work on Egypt, Antiq. vol. ix. pi. 20.) The Lion is at the head of the band which is on the wes- tern side ; his direction is toward the north, or toward the feet of the figure of the woman, and his feet are toward the eastern wall. The Virgin, the Balance, the Scorpion, the Saggittary and the Capricorn, follow marching in the same line. The latter is placed toward the bottom of the por- tico, and near the hands and head of the large figure of the woman. The signs of the eastern band commence at the extremity where those of the other band terminate, and are consequently directed toward the bottom of the portico, or toward the arms of the large figure. They have the feet to- ward the lateral wall of their own side, and the heads in the contrary direction to those of the opposite band. The Aqua- rius marches first, and is followed by the Fishes, the Ram, the Bull, and the Twins. The last of the series, which is the Crab, or rather the Scarabeeus, (for this insect is sub- stituted for the crab in the zodiacs of Egypt), is thrown to a side upon the legs of the large figure. In the place which it should have occupied is a globe resting up- on the summit of a pyramid, composed of small triangles, which represent a sort of rays, and before the base of which is a large head of a woman with two small horns. A se- cond scarabseus is placed awry and cross- wise upon the THEORY OF THE EA11TH. 203 the first place, be supposed, that their division has a determinate relation to a certain state of first band, in the angle which the feet of the large figure form with the body, and before the space in which the Lion marches, which is a little behind. At the other end of this same band, the Capricorn is very near the bottom, or at the arms of the large figure ; and, upon the left band, the Aqua- rius is separated to some distance from it. The Capricorn, however, is not repeated like the Crab. The division of this zodiac, from the entrance, is therefore made between the Lion and the Cancer; or if it be thought that the repetition of the Scarabseus marks a division of the sign, it takes place in the Crab itself ; but that of the lower end is made be- tween the Capricorn and Aquarius. In one of the inner halls of the same temple, there was a circular planisphere inscribed in a square, the same that has been brought to Paris by M. Lelorrain, and which is to be seen at the Royal Library. In it, also, the signs of the zodiac are observed among many other figures which ap- pear to represent constellations. (Great Work on Egypt, Antiq. vol. iv. pi. 21.) The Lion corresponds to one of the diagonals of the square ; the Virgin, which follows, corres- ponds to a perpendicular line which is directed toward the east ; the other signs march in the usual order, till we come to the Crab, which, in place of completing the chain, by corresponding to the level of the Lion, is placed above it, nearer the centre of the circle, in such a manner that the signs are upon a somewhat spiral line. This Crab, or ra- ther Scarabaeus, marches in a contrary direction to the other signs. The Twins correspond to the north, the Sagittaryto the south, and the Fishes to the east, but not very exactly. At the eastern side of this planisphere is a large figure of a 204 THEORY OF THE EA11TH. the heavens, dependent upon the precession of the equinoxes, which causes the colures to make woman, with the head directed toward the south, and the feet toward the north, like that of the portico. Some doubt might therefore also be raised regarding the point at which the series of the signs ought to commence. According as one of the perpendiculars or one of the diagonals is taken, or the place where one part of the series passes over the other part, the division will be judged to be at the Lion, or between the Lion and the Crab ; or lastly at the Twins. At Esne, the ancient Latopolis, a city placed above Thebes, there are zodiacs on the ceilings of two different temples. That of the great temple, the entrance of which faces the east, is upon two bands, which are contiguous and parallel to one another, along the south side of the ceiling. The female figures which embrace them are not placed in the direction of their length, but in that of their breadth, so that one lies across near the entrance, or to the east, the head and arms toward the north, and the feet to- ward the lateral wall, or toward the south, and the other is in the bottom of the portico, equally across, and looking toward the first. The band nearest the axis of the portico, or the north, presents first, on the side of the entrance, or east, and toward the head of the female figure, the Lion, placed a little behind, and marching toward the bottom, the feet directed toward the lateral wall. Behind the Lion, at the commencement of the band, are two smaller Lions. Before it is the Scarabaeus, and then the Twins marching in the same direction ; then the Bull and the Ram, and the Fishes close to each other, placed across upon the middle of the band, the Bull having its head toward the lateral wall, the ram toward the axis. The Aquarius is more distant, x THEORY OF THE EARTH. 205 the tour of the zodiac in 26,000 years ; that it indicated, for example, the position of the sol- and resumes the same direction toward the bottom as the first signs. On the band nearest the lateral wall and the north, we see first, but at a considerable distance from the wall of the bottom, or the west, the Capricorn, which marches in a contrary direction to the Aquarius, and is di- rected toward the east, or the entrance of the portico, having the feet turned toward the lateral wall. Close upon it is the Sagittarius, which thus corresponds with the Fishes and Ram. It also marches toward the entrance ; but its feet are turned toward the axis, and in a contrary di- rection to those of the Capricorn. At a certain distance before, and placed near one another, are the Scorpion and a woman holding the Balance. Lastly, a little before, but still at a considerable distance from the anterior or eastern extremity, is the Virgin which is preceded by a sphinx. The Virgin and the woman holding the Balance, have also their feet toward the wall, so that the Sagittary is the only one which is placed with its head contrary to the other signs. To the north of Esne is a small isolated temple, equally facing the east, and having a zodiac also in its portico (Great Work on Egypt, Antiquities, vol. i. Plate 87-) This zodiac is upon two lateral and separated bands. That which extends along the south side commences with the Lion, which marches toward the bottom, or toward the west, the feet turned toward the wall, or the south. It is preceded by the Scarabaeus, and the latter by the Gemini, marching in the same direction. The Bull, on the con- trary, faces them, having a direction toward the east. But the Ram and the Fishes resume the direction toward the bottom, or toward the west. On the band of the north 206 THEORY OF THE EARTH. stitial point ; and, secondly, that the state of the heavens represented was precisely that which took place at the period when the monument was side, the Aquarius is near the bottom, or the west, march, ing towards the entrance or east, the feet turned toward the wall, preceded by the Capricorn and Sagittary, both marching in the same direction. The other signs are lost; but it is clear that the Virgin must have marched at the head of this band, on the side next the entrance. Among the accessory figures of this small zodiac, must be re- marked two winged Rams placed across, the one between the Bull and the Twins, the other between the Scorpion and Sagittary, and each nearly in the middle of its band ; the second, however, a little more advanced toward the entrance. It was at first thought, that, in the great zodiac of Esne, the division of the entrance took place between the Virgin and the Lion, and that of the bottom between the Fishes and the Aquarius. But Mr Hamilton, and MM. de Jollois and Villiers, have supposed, that, in the Sphinx, which precedes the Virgin, they found a repetition of the Lion, analogous to that of the Cancer in the great zodiac of Den- dera; so that, according to them, the division would be at the Lion. In fact, without this explanation, there would only be five signs on one side, while there would be seven on the other. With regard to the small zodiac of the north of Esne, it is not known whether some emblem analogous to this Sphinx may have occurred in it, because this part is de- stroyed— See British Review, February 1817, p- 136; and Critical Letter on Zodiacomania, p. 33. ' THEORY OF THE EARTH. 207 erected,— two suppositions which themselves, as is evident, suppose a great number of others. In point of fact, are the figures of these zodiacs the constellations, — the true groups of stars which at present bear the same names, or merely what astronomers call signs, that is to say, divisions of the zodiac proceeding from one of the colures, what- ever place this colure occupies ? Is the point at which these zodiacs have been divided into two bands, necessarily that of a solstice ? Is the division of the side next the entrance, neces- sarily that of the summer solstice ? Does this division indicate, even in general, a phenomenon dependent upon the precession of the equinoxes ? Does it not refer to some period the rotation of which would be less ; for example, to the moment of the tropical year when such or such sacred years of the Egyptians commenced, which, being shorter than the true tropical year by nearly six hours, would make the tour of the zodiac in 1508 years ? Lastly, whatever signification it may have had, has it been intended by it to mark the time when the zodiac was sculptured, or that when the tem- ple was built ? Has not the object been to record a previous state of the heavens at some period which was interesting in a religious point of view, whether it had been actually observed, or inferred from a retrograde calculation ? From the mere announcement of such ques- tions, it will be perceived how complicated they 208 THEORY OF THE EARTH. necessarily are, how much subject to controversy any solution that might be adopted on this subject would be, and how little qualified to serve as a solid proof, for the solution of another problem, such as the antiquity of the Egyptian nation. And it may be said, with regard to those who have attempted to infer a date from these data, that there have arisen as many opinions as there have been authors. The learned astronomer Mr Burkhard, from a first examination, judged that, at Dendera, the solstice is marked by the Lion ; which would make it two signs less remote than at the present day, and the temple at least 4000 years old *. He gave, at the same time an antiquity of 7000 years to that of Esne, although it is not known how he had purposed to reconcile these numbers with what we know of the precession of the equinoxes. The late M. Lalande, seeing that the Cancer was repeated on the two bands, imagined that the sol- stice passed to the middle of that constellation ; but as this was the case also in the sphere of Eu- doxus, he concluded that some Grecian artist might have represented this sphere on the ceiling of an Egyptian temple, without knowing that it represented a state of the heavens which no lon- * Description of the Pyramids of Ghiza, by M. Grobert, p 117. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 209 ger existed *. This, as is seen, was a conclusion very different from that of Mr Burkhard. Dnpuis was the first who thought it necessary to search for proofs of the idea, in some measure confident- ly adopted, that it was the solstice that was denot- ed. He found them, with reference to the great zodiac of Dendera, in the glohe on the top of the pyramid, and in several emblems placed near dif- ferent signs, and which he imagined, sometimes according to the opinion of ancient authors, such as Plutarch, Horus Apollo, or Clement of Alex- andria, sometimes according to his own conjec- tures, ought to be regarded as representing phe- nomena which had been really those of the sea- sons affected at each sign. As for the rest, he maintained that this state of the heavens affords the date of the monument, and that it is the ori- ginal, and not a copy, of the sphere of Eudoxus, that was represented at Dendera, which would refer it to a period of 1468 years before Christ, or to the reign of Sesostris. The number of nine- teen, boats, however, placed under each band, fur- nished him with the idea that the solstice might probably have been at the nineteenth degree of the sign, which would make it 288 years older f . -(j (Yl^'-i JO viC'ivaH i :tt ©a£! ___ :TJ '£i'rG *•>. * Connaissance des Temps for the year xiv. t Observations upon the zodiac of Dendera, in the Revue Philosophique et Litteraire, 1806, p. 257, et seq. O 210 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Mr Hamilton * having remarked, that, at Den- dera, the Scarabaeus belonging to the side of the ascending signs is smaller than that of the other side, an English author f has concluded from this that the solstice may have heen nearer its actual point than the middle of the Cancer, which would carry us back to a period of 1000 or 1200 years before Christ. The late M. Nouet, judging that the globe, the rays, and the horned head, or head of Isis, re- present the heliacal rising of Sirius, supposed that it was intended to mark an epoch of the Sothian period, but that it was intended to mark it by the place which the solstice occupied. Now, in the last but one of, these periods, that which elapsed between 2782 and 1322 before Christ, the solstice had passed from 30° 48' of the constellation of the Lion to 13° 34' of Cancer. At the middle of this period, it was therefore at 23° 34; of cancer. The heliacal rising of Sirius happened then some days after the solstice ; and this is nearly what has been indicated, according to M. Nouet, by the re- * ^Egyptiaca, p. 212. t See in the British Review of February 1817, p. 13. et seq. the article No. vi. upon the origin and antiquity of the zodiac. It is translated at the end of Swartz's Critical Let- ter upon the Zodiacomania. * ^. ttrtkrtitei THEORY OF THE EARTH. 211 petition of the Scarabaeus, and by the figure of Si- nus with the rays of the sun placed at the com- mencement of the band to the right. Calculating upon this basis, he concludes that the temple of Dendera was built 2052 years before Christ, and that of Esne 4600 * All these calculations, even admiting that the division marks the solstice, would still be suscep- tible of many modifications ; and, at first, it ap- pears that their authors have supposed the con- stellations all of thirty degrees like the signs, and have not reflected that it is far from being the case that they are thus equal, at least as they are represented at the present day, and as the Greeks have transmitted them to us. In reality, the sol- stice, which is at present on this side of the first stars of the constellation of Gemini, could only have left the first stars of the constellation of Cancer forty-five years before Christ, and had left the constellation of Leo only 1260 years before the same era. My distinguished and learned colleague, M. Delambre, has favoured me with the following table and remarks, which illustrate what has been above said. * See M. Nouet's Memoir in Volney's New Inquiries re- garding Ancient History, vol. iii. p. 328-336. O 2 TABLE of the Extent of the Zodaical Constellation*, as tliey are designed upon our Globes, and of the Times required by the Colures to traverse them. ARIES. Stars. Longitudes in 1800. Year of the Equinox. Year of the Solstice. y # Of f 20 5 T tail. 18 0° 23' 40" 1 1 10 40 1 4 52 0 1 5 18 50 1 6 14 16 1 19 8 50 1 20 51 0 —389 — 441 —710 —742 —810 —1739 —1862 6869 6921 7190 7222 7290 8219 8342 Dur. 20 27 20 1473 1473 TAURUS. I n Of, ft ? a Coch. 1s 19° 6' 0" 1 27 12 0 2 6 59 40 2 19 47 0 2 22 0 0 2 24 42 40 —1735 —2318 —3024 —3944 —4104 —4300 —8215 —8798 —9504 —10424 —10584 —10780 Dur. 35 36 40 2565 2565 GEMINI. Propus. »j V 3 Castor. Pollux. * 2s 28° 9' 20" 3 0 39 0 3 6 18 40 3 15 44 0 3 17 27 30 3 20 28 9 3 22 27 10 —4547 —4727 —5134 —5813 —5937 —6154 —6926 —11027 —11207 —11614 —12293 —12417 —12634 —12776 Dur. 24 17 40 1749 1749 THEORY OF THE EARTH. 213 CANCER. Stars. Longitudes in 1800. Year of the Equinox. Year of the Solstice. 1 u E ft y ] a. 2* X 3s 24° 2V 55" 3 28 32 0 4 1 28 20 4 4 45 0 4 10 18 50 4 10 50 36 4 13 23 0 6475 6734 6906 7182 7583 7621 7804 +45 —254 —426 —702 —1103 —1141 —1324 Dur. 19 1 5 1369 1369 LEO. 76 06 * ft 4s 12° 30' 0" 4 27 3 10 5 8 30 0 5 18 50 55 —7740 —8788 —9612 —10357 —1260 —1908 —3132 —3877 •j g 7s 28° 28' 20" 9 3 32 56 9 10 50 28 9 14 15 15 9 23 2 19 9 25 39 25 —17530 —17895 —18421 —18667 —19299 —19487 —11050 —11415 —11941 —12187 —12819 —13007 Dur. 27 11 50 1957 1957 THEORY OF THE EARTH. 215 CAPRICORN. Stars. Longitudes in 1800. Year of the Equinox. Year of the Solstice. !er 2« ft i V P ; ,'.f t r t 9s 29° 39/ 15" 10 1 3 58 10 1 15 30 10 14 53 30 10 18 59 28 10 23 1 12 —19775 —19877 —19891 —20872 —21166 —21458 —13295 —13397 —13411 —14392 —14586 —14978 Dur. 23 21 17 1683 1683 AQUARIUS. £ ft ec ? 2^ 5A 10s 8° 56' 0" 10 20 36 30 11 0 34 0 11 6 7 0 11 13 5£ 12 11 18 3 28 —20444 —21285 —22001 —22400 —22963 —23260 —13964 —14805 —15521 —15920 —16483 —16780 Dur. 39 7 28 2816 2816 PISCES. ft A 3 «• ec 11' 15° 49 0" 11 23 49 0 12 11 22 0 12 24 26 0 12 26 34 58 23095 23675 24939 25879 26034 16615 17195 18459 19399 19554 Dur. 40 45 58 2939 2939 Sirius 3 11 20 10 0° —5487 270" —18447 216 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Construction and Use of the Table. " The longitudes of the stars,for 1800, have been taken from the Berlin Tables, and are those of Lacaille, Bradley, or Flam stead. The first and the last of each constellation have been taken, as well as some of the brightest of the intermediate stars. The third column indicates the year in which the longitude of the star was 0', that is to say, that in which the star was in the equinoxial colure of spring. The last column indicates the year when the star was in the solstitial colure, whether of winter or of summer. " For Aries, Taurus, and Gemini, the winter solstice has been chosen ; for the other constella- tions the summer solstice has been chosen, for the sake of not receding into too remote anti- quity, and of not approaching too near modern times. It will be easy to find the opposite sol- stice, by adding the semiperiod of 12,960 years. The same rule will serve for finding the time when the star has been, or will be, at the autum- nal equinox. " The sign — indicates the years before our era, the sign 4- the year of our era ; and the last line, at the end of each sign under the title of dura- tion) gives the extent of the constellation in de- grees, and the time which the equinox, or the solstice, occupies in traversing the constellation from one end to the other. :. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 217 " The precession of 50" yearly has been supposed, this being the result of the comparison of the catalogue of Hipparchus with the modern cata- logues. We have thus the advantage of round numbers, and a general accuracy that may be re- lied upon. The entire period is thus 25,920 years; the semiperiod, 12,960 years; the quar- ter period, 6480 years ; the twelfth, or a sign, 2160 years. " It is to be remarked, that the constellations leave empty spaces between them, and that some- times they encroach upon each other. Thus, be- tween the last star of Scorpio, and the first of Sagittarius, there is an interval of 6§ degrees. On the other hand, the last of Capricorn is more advanced by 14° in longitude, than the first of Aquarius. Hence, even independently of the in- equality of the sun's motion, the constellations would afford a very unequal and very erroneous measure of the year and its months. The signs of 30° furnish a more convenient and less defec- tive one. But the signs are merely a geometri- cal conception ; they can neither be distinguished nor observed ; and they are continually changing place from the retrogradation of the equinoxial point. " We have at all times been able to determine, in a rough manner, the equinoxes and solstices ; 218 THEORY OF THE EARTH. at the long run it has been remarked, that the appearance of the heavens was no longer exactly the same that it anciently was at the times of the equinoxes and solstices. But we have never heen able to observe exactly the heliacal rising of a star, being always necessarily some days wide of it; and people frequently speak of it, without possessing a fixed datum on which to count. Before Hipparchus, we find nothing, either in books or in traditions, that can be submitted to calculation ; and it is this which has given rise to so many systems. Controversies have arisen with- out a sufficient knowledge of the subject. Those who are not astronomers may form ideas as beau- tiful as they please of the knowledge of the Chal- deans, Egyptians, &c. ; no real inconvenience will result. The enterprise and knowledge of the mo- derns may be lent to these nations, but nothing can be borrowed from them ; for they have either had nothing, or they have left nothing. Astro- nomers will never derive from the ancients any thing that can be of the slightest utility. Let us leave to the learned their vain conjectures, and confess our utter ignorance respecting things of little use in themselves, and of which no monu- ment remains. " The limits of the constellations vary according to the authors which we consult. We find these limits extend or contract, as we pass from Hip- THEORY OF THE EARTH. parchus to Tycho, from Tycho to Hevelius, from Hevelius to Flamstead, Lacaille, Bradley, or Piazzi. " I have said elsewhere, the constellations are good for nothing, unless at the most to enable us to mark the stars with more ease ; whereas the stars in particular afford fixed points to which we can refer the motions, whether of the colures or of the planets. Astronomy commenced only at the period when Hipparchus made the first catalogue of the stars, measured the revolution of the sun, that of the moon, and their principal inequalities. The rest presents nothing but darkness, uncer- tainty, and gross error. The time would be lost that were occupied in attempting to reduce this chaos to order. " I have given, with the exception of a few particulars, the whole of my opinion on this sub- ject. I am nowise anxious about making con- verts, for it gives me little concern whether my ideas be adopted or not ; but, if my reasons be compared with the reveries of Newton, Herschell, Bailly, and so many others, it is not impossible but that, in time, these more or less brilliant chi- meras will no longer be relished. " I have attempted to determine the extent of the constellations, according to the catasterisms of Eratosthenes ; but the thing is really im- possible. The matter would be still worse were i 220 THEORY OF THE EARTH. we to consult Hygin, and especially Firmicus. The following is what I have made out from Eratosthenes. CONSTELLATIONS. DURATIONS. CONSTELLATIONS. DURATIONS. Years. Aries, 1747 The Talons, Taurus, 1826 Scorpio, Gemini, 1636 Sagittarius,. Cancer, 1204 Capricorn,. Leo, ~~ ~~~~~26 1 7 Aquarius, Virgo, _~_3307 Pisces, ~ " As to the Chaldeans, Egyptians, Chinese, and Indians, there is no want of reveries among them. One can absolutely make nothing of them. My opinion with regard to them may be seen in the preliminary discourse of my History of the Astronomy of the Middle Age, p. xvii and xviii. See also the note affixed to the Report on the Me- moirs of M. de Paravey, vol. viii. of the Nouvelles Annales des Voyages, and republished by M. de Paravey in his Summary of his Memoirs upon the Origin of the Sphere, p. 24, 31-36. See further * Eratosthenes has made but one constellation of the Scorpion and Talons. He indicates the commencement of the latter without its termination ; and as he gives 1823 years to Scorpio, properly so called, there remain 1089 for the other, on the supposition that there is not an empty space between these two constellations. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 221 the Analysis of the Mathematical Labours of the Academy in 1820, p. 78 and 79. ." DELAMBRE." It would still have to be ascertained at what period the observers ceased to place the constella- tion in which the sun entered after the solstice, at the head of the descending signs, and whether this was done as soon as the solstice had retro- graded sufficiently to touch the preceding constel- lation. Thus MM. Jollois and Devilliers, — to whose unremitting zeal we are indebted for an accurate knowledge of these famous monuments, always considering the division towards the entrance of the porch as the solstice, and judging that the Virgin must have been regarded as the first of the descending constellations, insomuch as the sol- stice had not receded at least so far as the middle of the constellation of the Lion ; and, believing that they saw farther, as we have mentioned, that the Lion is divided in the great zodiac of Esne, — have not given to that zodiac a more re- mote antiquity than 2160 years before Christ. * Mr Hamilton, who was the first that observed this division of the sign of the Lion, in the zodiac * See the great work on Egypt. Antiq. Mem. vol. i. p. 486. 222 THEORY OF THE EARTH. of Esne, reduced the distance of the period at which the solstice occurred there, to 1400 years be- fore Christ. A great many other opinions have appeared on the same subject. M. Rhode, for ex- ample, has proposed two. The first refers the zodiac of the portico of Dendera to a period of 591 years before Christ ; the second, to 1290 *. M. Latreille has fixed the period of this zodiac at 670 years before Christ ; that of the plani- sphere at. 550; that of the zodiac of the great temple of Esne at 2550 ; and that of the small one at 1760. But a difficulty inherent in all the dates, which proceed on the double suppositon, that the di- vision marks the solstice, and that the position of the solstice marks the epoch of the monument, is the unavoidable consequence that the zodiac of Esne must have been at least 2000, and perhaps 3000, years f older than that of Dendera, a con- sequence which evidently involves the supposition in ruin ; for no one, in any degree acquainted with the history of the arts, could believe, that * Rhode. Essay upon the Age of the Zodiac, and the Origin of the Constellations, in German. Breslau, 1809, p. 78- t According to the tables of M. Delambre's note above, the solstice has remained 3474, or at least 3307 years, in the constellation of virgo, the one which occupies the great- est space in the zodiac, and 2617 in that of the Lion. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 223 two edifices, so similar in their style of architec- ture, could have been erected at periods so remote from each other. The feeling of this impossibility, joined al- ways to the belief that this division of the zo- diacs indicates a date, has given rise to another conjecture, namely, that the intention had been to mark the particular sacred year of the Egyp- tians, in which the monument had been erected. As these sacred years consisted only of 365 days, if the sun, at the commencement of one occupied the commencement of a constellation, he would be nearly six hours later in returning to the commencement of the following year, and, after 121 years, he would only be at the commence- ment of the preceding sign. It seems natural enough that the builders of a temple might wish to indicate about what period of the great, or So- thian year, it had been erected ; and the indica- tions of the sign, by which the sacred year then commenced, was a good enough means. It will be perceived, that, calculating upon this assump- tion, there will be an interval of from 120 to 150 years between the temple of Esne and that of Dendera. But, in his mode of solving the problem, there remained to be determined in which of the great years these buildings had been erected, whether in that which ended in the 224 THEOIIY OF THE EARTH. year 138 after, or in that which ended in 1322 before Christ, or in some other. The late Visconti, who was the first author of this hypothesis, taking the sacred year, whose commencement corresponded with the sign of the Lion, and judging from the resemblance of the signs, that they had been represented at a period when the opinions of the Greeks were not un- known to the Egyptians, was naturally led to make choice of the end of the last great year, or the space that elapsed between the year 12 and the year 138 after Christ *, which appeared to him to ac- cord with the Greek inscription, of which, how- ever, he knew little more than that it was said to make mention of one of the Caesars. M, Testa, seeking the date of the monument in another order of ideas, went so far as to sup- pose that since the Virgin is seen at Esne, at the head of the zodiac, it was meant thereby to repre- sent the era of the battle of Actium, such as it had been established with regard to Egypt, by a decree of the senate, mentioned by Dion Cassius, and which commenced in the month of Septem- ber, the day on which Alexandria was taken by Augustus.f * Translation of Herodotus by Larcher, vol. ii. p. 570. t See the Dissertation of the Abbe Dominique Testa, Sopra due Zodiaci novellamente scoperte nell' Egitto, Rome, 1802, p. 34. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 225 M. de Paravey considered these zodiacs in a new point of view, which embraced at once both the revolution of the equinoxes, and that of the great year. Supposing that the circular plani- sphere of Dendera must have been set to the east, and that the axis from north to south is the line of the solstices, he found the summer solstice at the second of the Twins, and that of winter at the buttock of the Sagittary, while the line of the equinoxes would have passed through the Fishes and the Virgin, from which he obtained for date the first century of our era. According to this method, the division of the zodiac of the portico could no longer refer to the colures, and the mark of the solstice must be sought for elsewhere. M . de Paravey having remarked that there are between all the signs figures of women bearing a star upon their heads, and marching in the same direction, and obser- ving that the one which comes after the twins, is alone turned in a direction contrary to the others, judged that it indicates the conversion of the sun or the tropic, and that this zodiac corres- ponds in this way with the planisphere. By applying the idea of easting to the small zodiac of Esne, the solstices would be found be- between the Twins and the Bull, and between the Scorpion and Sagittary ; they would even be marked by the change of direction of the Bull, 226 THEORY OF THE EARTH. and by the winged Rams placed across at these two places. In the great zodiac of the same city, the marks would be the cross position of the Bull, and the reversed one of the Sagittary. There would thus be but a portion of a constel- lation traversed between the dates of Esne and those of Dendera, but even this would be still too long for buildings so closely resembling each other. An operation of the late M. Delambre upon the circular planisphere appears to confirm these conjectures, detracting from its remote antiqui- ty ; for, on placing the stars upon Hipparchus's projection, according to the theory of that astro- nomer, and according to the positions which he has given them in his catalogue ; and augment- ing all the longitudes, so that the solstice might pass through the second of the Twins, he nearly reproduced this planisphere -y and " the re- semblance," says he, " would have been still greater, had the longitudes been adopted such as they are in the catalogue of Ptolemy, for the year 123 of our era. On the contrary, by referring to twenty-five or twenty-six centuries back, the right ascensions and the declinations will be con- siderably changed, and the projection will assume quite a different figure *. All our calculations," Delambre. Note at the end of the Report on the THEORY OF THE EARTH. 227 adds this great astronomer, " lead us to this con- clusion, that the sculptures are posterior to the epoch of Alexander." In reality, the circular planisphere having been brought to Paris by the care of MM. Saunier and Lelorrain, M. Biot, in a work founded upon precise measurements and calculations full of in- genuity, has determined that it represents, ac- cording to an exact geometrical projection, the state of the heavens, such as it was 700 years be- fore Christ ; but he by no means concludes that it had been sculptured at that period . In fact, all these efforts of intellect and science, in so far as they concern the epoch of the monu- ments, have become superfluous, since finishing where they should naturally have begun, if the first observers had not been blinded by prejudice, people have taken the trouble of copying and re- storing the Greek inscriptions engraved upon these monuments, and especially since M. Cham- pollion has discovered the method of decyphering those which are expressed in hieroglyphics. Memoir of M. de Paravey. This report is printed in the Nouvelles Annales des Voyages, vol. viii. * See the work of M. Biot, entitled, Recherches sur plusieurs points de 1'Astronomie Egyptienne, appliquees aux monumens astronomkjues trouves en Egypte ; Paris, 1823, 8vo. 228 THEORY OF THE EARTH. It is now certain, and the Greek inscriptions agree with the hieroglyphical inscriptions in prov- ing it, — it is certain, we say, that the temples in which zodiacs have been sculptured, were built during the time when Egypt was subject to the Romans. The portico of the temple of Dendera, according to the Greek inscription of its frontis- piece, is consecrated to the safety of Tiberius *. On the planisphere of the same temple we read the title of Autocrator in hieroglyphical charac* ters f ; and it is probable that it refers to Nero. The small temple of Esne, that of which the ori- gin has been placed on the lowest calculation be- tween 2700 and 3000 years before Christ, has a column sculptured and painted in the sixth year of Antonine, 147 years after Christ, and it is painted and sculptured in the same style as the zodiac which is near it J. Further, we have a proof that this division of the zodiac, in such or such sign, has no reference to the precession of the equinoxes, or to the dis- placement of the solstice. A mummy case, late- ly brought from Thebes by M. Caillaud, and con- * Letronne. Researches into the history of Egypt du- ring the domination of the Greeks and Romans, p. 180. t Id. ibid. p. xxxviij. | Letronne, Ibid. p. 456, and 457- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 229 taining, according to the very legible Greek in- scription upon it, the body of a young man who died in the ninth year of Trajan, 116 years after Christ *, presents a zodiac divided at the same point as those of Dendera f ; and all the appear- ances indicate that this division marks some astro- logical theme relative to the individual, — a con- clusion which may probably be equally applied to the division of the zodiacs contained in the tem- ples. It may mark either the astrological theme of the time of their erection, or that of the prince to whose safety they had been consecrated, or such another epoch with relation to which the position of the sun would have appeared of import- ance to be noticed. Thus are dissipated for ever the conclusions which people had drawn from some ill explained monuments, against the newness of the conti- nents and nations ; and we might have dispensed with treating of them so much in detail had they not been so recent, and had they not made suffi- * Letronne. Critical and Archaeological Observations upon the object of the zodiacal representations which remain to us of antiquity, occasioned by an Egyptian zodiac painted in a mummy case, which bears a Greek inscription of the time of Trajan ; Paris, 1824, 8vo, p. 30. t Idem, p. 48, and 49, * §130 THEORY OF THE EARTH. cient impression still to retain their influence over the minds of some individuals. The Zodiac is far from bearing in itself a certain and excessively remote date. But there are writers who have maintained that the zodiac bears in itself the date of its in- vention, because the names and figures given to its constellations are an index of the position of the colures at the time when it was invented ; and this date, according to several, is so evident and so remote, that it is quite a matter of indiffe- rence whether the representations which we pos- sess of this circle are morp. or less ancient. They do not attend to the circumstance that, in this sort of argument, there is a complication of three suppositions equally uncertain : the coun- try in which the zodiac is presumed to have been invented, the signification which is supposed to have been given to the constellations which occu- py it, and the position in which the colures were with relation to each constellation, when this sig- nification was attributed to it. According as other allegories have been imagined, or as these allegories are admitted to have referred to the constellation of which the sun occupied the first degrees, or to that of which it occupied the mid- dle, or to that into which it began to enter, that is to say, of which it occupied the last degrees ; THEORY OF THE EARTH. or, lastly, to that which was opposite to him, and which rose at night ; or according as the inven- tion of these allegories is placed in a different cli- mate, must the date of the zodiac also be chang- ed. The possible variations in this respect might comprehend so much as the half of the revolution of the fixed stars, that is to say, 13,000 years, and even more. In this manner Pluche, generalizing some indications of the ancients, has imagined, that the Ram announces the commencement of the sun's elevation, and the vernal equinox ; that the Cancer indicates his retrogradation to the summer solstice ; that the Balance, the sign of equality, marks the autumnal equinox * ; and that the Capricorn, a climbing animal, indicates the winter solstice, after which the sun returns to us. According to this method, by placing the inventors of the zodiac in a temperate climate, we should have rains under Aquarius, the drop- ping of lambs and kids under the Gemini, violent heats under the Lion, gathering of the harvest un- der the Virgin, the time of hunting under the Sa- gittary, &c. ; and the emblems would be appro- * Varro, de Ling. Lat. lib. vi. Signa, quod aliquid sig- nificent, ut libra aequinoctium ; Macrob. Sat. lib. i. cap. xxi. Capricornus ab infernis partibus ad superas solem reducens Caprse naturam videtur imitari. 232 THEORY OF THE EARTH. priate enough. If we should then place the co- lures at the commencement of the constellations, or at least the equinox at the first stars of Aries, we should, in the first instance, arrive at a period of only 389 years before Christ, an epoch evi- dently too modern, and which would render it necessary to recur to a complete equinoxial pe- riod, or 26,000 years. But if the equinox be supposed to pass through the middle of the con- stellation, a period of about 1000 or 1200 years higher is obtained, 1600 or 1700 years before Christ ; and this is what several celebrated men have believed to be the true epoch of the inven- tion of the zodiac, the honour of which they have, for other reasons not sufficiently weighty, confer- red upon Chiron. But Dupuis, who required for the origin which he endeavoured to attribute to all religions, that astronomy, and, in particular, the figures of the zodiac should in some measure have preceded all other human institutions, has sought another cli- mate for the purpose of finding other explanations for the emblems, and for that of deducing ano- ther epoch from them. If, assuming the Ba- lance as an equinoxial sign, but supposing it at the vernal equinox, it be presumed that the zodiac has been invented in Egypt, other sufficiently plausible explanations might in fact be found for THEORY OF THE EARTH. 233 the climate of that country. * The Capricorn, an animal with the tail of a fish, would mark the commencement of the rise of the Nile at the sum- mer solstice; the Aquarius and Fishes, the progress and diminution of the inundation ; the Bull, the time of labouring ; the Virgin, the time of reap- ing ; and they would mark them at the periods when these operations actually took place. In this system, the zodiac would have 15,000 years f for a sun supposed at the first degree of each sign, more than 16,000 for the middle, and 4000 only, on supposing that the emblem has been given to the sign at the opposite of which the sun was ^. It is to the 15,000 years that Du- puis has attached himself; and it is upon this date that he has founded the whole system of his celebrated work. There are not wanting those, however, who, admitting that the zodiac has been invented in Egypt, have imagined allegories applicable to la- ter times. Thus, according to Mr Hamilton, the Virgin would represent the land of Egypt when not yet fecundated by the inundation ; the * See the Memoir on the Origin of the Constellations, in Dupuis's Origine des Cultes, vol. iii. p. 324. et seq. t Id. ibid. p. 267. J Dupuis himself suggests this second hypothesis. Ibid, p. 340. 1234 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Lion, the season when that country is most liable to be overrun by ferocious animals, and so on *. The high antiquity of 15,000 years would be- sides induce this absurd consequence, that [the Egyptians, those men who represented every thing by emblems, and who must have attached a great importance to the circumstance that these emblems were conformable to the ideas which they were intended to represent, had preserved the signs of the zodiac thousands of years after they no longer in any way corresponded with their ori- ginal signification. The late M. Renii Raige endeavoured to support the opinion of Dupuis by an argument of an en- tirely new kindf. Having remarked that signi- fications more or less analogous to the figures of the signs of the zodiac, might be found for the Egyptian names of the months, on explaining them by the oriental languages, and finding in Ptolemy that epifi, which signifies Capricorn, commences at the 20th of June, and therefore comes immediately after the summer solstice, he * jEgyptiaca, p. 215. t See in the Great Work on Egypt, Antiq. Mem. vol. i., the memoir of M. Remi Raige upon the nominal and ori- ginal zodiac of the ancient Egyptians. See also the table of the Greek, Roman, and Alexandrian months, in M. Hal- ma's Ptolemy, vol. iii, THEORY OF THE EARTH. 235 concluded from thence, that, at the beginning, Ca- pricorn itself was at the summer solstice, and so of the other signs, as Dupuis had supposed. But, independently of all that there is merely conjectural in these etymologies, Raige did not perceive that it was simply by chance that, five years after the battle of Actium, in the year 25 before Christ, at the establishment of the fixed year of Alexandria, the first day of Thoth was found to correspond with the 29th of the Julian August, and continued to correspond since that time. It is only from this epoch that the Egyp- tian months commenced at fixed days of the Ju- lian yean and only at Alexandria : even Pto- lemy did not the less continue to employ in his Almagest the ancient Egyptian year with its vague months *. Why might not the names of the signs have been given to the months at some epoch, or the names of the months to the signs, in the same ar- bitrary manner in which the Indians have given to their twenty-seven months twelve names, se- * See the Historical Researches regarding the Astrono- mical Observations of the ancients, by M. Ideler, a trans- lation of which has been inserted by M. Halraa in the third volume of his Ptolemy : and especially M. Freret's memoir on the opinion of Lanauze, relative to the establishment of the Alexandrian year, in the memoirs of the Academy of Belles Lettres, vol. xvi. p. 308, 286 THEORY OF THE EARTH. lected from among those of their lunar houses, for reasons which it is impossible at the present day to determine*? The absurdity which there would have been in preserving for the constella- tions, during 15,000 years, figures and symboli- cal names which no longer presented any relation with their position, would have been more evi- dent had it been carried so far as to preserve to the months those same names which were incessantly in the mouths of the people, and whose inapti- tude would be every moment perceived. And what, besides, would all these systems come to, had the figures and the names of the zodiacal constellations been given to them with- out any relation to the course of the sun ; as their inequality, the extension of several of them beyond the zodiac, and their manifest connection with the neighbouring constellations, seem to de- monstrate was the case f . What would still happen, if, as Macrobius ex- pressly says J, each sign must have been an em- * See the Memoir of Sir William Jones on the Antiqui- ty of the Indian Zodiac. Calcutta Memoirs, vol. ii. t See the Zodiac explained, or Researches regarding the Origin and Signification of the Constellations of the Greek Sphere, translated from the Swedish of M. Swartz ; Paris, 1809. J Saturnalia, lib. i. cap. xxi. sub. fin. Nee solus Leo, THEORY OF THE EARTH. 237 blem of the sun, considered in some one of its ef- fects or of its general phenomena, and without reference to the months when it passes, whether into the sign, or to its opposite ? Lastly, What if the names had heen given in an abstract manner to the divisions of space or time, as they are now given by astronomers to what they call the signs, and had not been appli- ed to the constellations or groups of stars, but at a period determined by chance, so that nothing could be concluded from their signification* ? In these suggestions there is, without doubt, enough to give an ingenuous mind a distaste for seeking to find in astronomy proofs of the anti- quity of the nations. But were these alleged proofs as certain as they are vague and destitute of any satisfactory result, what could be concluded from them against the great catastrophe, which has left monuments amply demonstrative in other sed signa quoque universa zodiaci ad naturam solisjure refe- runtur, 8?c. It is only in the explanation of the Lion and Capricorn, that he has recourse to some phenomenon relative to the seasons ; the Cancer itself is explained in a general point of view, and with reference to the obliquity of the sun's march. * See the Memoir of M. Guignes on the Zodiacs of the Eastern Nations, in the Memoirs of the Academy of Belles Lettres, vol. xlvii. 238 THEOKY OP THE EARTH. respects of its existence ? All that can be admit- ted in this matter is, what some moderns have thought, that astronomy was among the number of the sciences preserved by those whom this catas- trophe dispersed, Exaggerations relative to the Antiquity of certain Mining1 Operations. The antiquity of certain mining operations has also been much exaggerated. A very late writer has imagined, that the mines of the island of Elba, judging from the rubbish carried out of them, must have been wrought for more than 40,000 years ; but another author, who has also examined this rubbish with attention, has redu- ced the period in question to -a little more than 5000 years, * and this even on the supposition that the ancients did not extract annually more than a fourth part of the quantity of ore now wrought. But what reason could there be to suppose that the Romans, for example, who con- sumed so much iron in their armies, derived so little advantage from these mines ? Moreover, if these mines had been wrought for even 4000 years * See M. de Fortia d'Urban's History of China before the Deluge of Ogyges, p. 33. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 239 only, how should iron have been so little known in the times of remote antiquity ? General Conclusion relative to the Period of the last Revolution. I agree, therefore, with MM. Deluc and Do- lomieu, in thinking, that if any thing in geology be established, it is, that the surface of our globe has undergone a great and sudden revolution, the date of which cannot be referred to a much earlier period than five or six thousand years ago ; that this revolution overwhelmed and caused to disappear the countries which were previously in- habited by man, and the species of animals now best known ; that, on the other hand, it laid dry the bottom of the last sea, and formed of it the countries which are at the present day inhabited ; that it is since the occurrence of this revolution that the small number of individuals dispersed by it have spread and propagated over the newly ex- posed lands, and, consequently, that it is since this epoch only, that human societies have assu- med a progressive march, that they have formed establishments, raised monuments, collected natu- ral facts, and invented scientific systems. But the countries which are at present inhabi- ted, and which the last revolution laid dry, had already been previously inhabited, if not by men, 240 THEORY OF THE EARTH. at least by land animals, and, therefore, one pre- ceding revolution at least had put them under water ; and if we may judge by the different or- ders of animals the remains of which are observed in them, they had perhaps been subjected to two or three irruptions of the sea. Further Researches to be made in Geology. These alternations now appear to me to form the problem in geology that it is of most import- ance to solve, or rather to define and circumscribe within due limits ; for, in order to resolve it satis- factorily, it would be necessary to discover the cause of these events, — an undertaking which presents a difficulty of quite a different kind. I repeat it, we see pretty clearly what is going on at the surface of the continents in their pre- sent state ; we have formed a tolerable conception of the uniform progress and regular succession of the primitive formations, but the study of the se- condary formations has been little more than merely commenced. That wonderful series of un- known zoophytes and marine mollusca, succeeded by reptiles and fresh-water fishes equally un- known ; and these again replaced, in their turn, by other zoophytes and mollusca, more nearly re- lated to those of the present day ; those land ani- mals, and those equally unknown fresh water inoj- lusca and other animals which next occupied THEORY OF THE EARTH. 241 the surface, to be again displaced but by mol- lusca and other animals similar to those of our present seas ; the relations of these diversified be- ings to the plants the remains of which accompany theirs, the connection of these two kingdoms with the mineral strata in which they are deposited ; the greater or less uniformity existing between these different orders of beings in the different basins ;— these are phenomena which appear to me imperiously to demand the attention of philo- sophers. Rendered interesting by the variety of the pro- ducts of the partial or general revolutions of this epoch, and by the abundance of the various species that figure alternately on the stage, this study is divested of the dryness of that of the primordial formations, and does not, like it, almost necessa- rily launch into hypotheses. The facts are so direct, so curious, and so evident, that they are sufficient, so to speak, to satisfy the most ardent imagination ; and the conclusions to which they lead from time to time, however scrupulous the observer may be, having nothing vague in them, are equally free of any thing arbitrary. In fine, it is in those events that approach nearer to our own times, that we may hope to find some traces of more ancient events, and of their causes; if, indeed, after so many fruitless attempts as have been already made, one may be permitted to flat- ter himself with such a hope. Q THEORY OF THE EARTH. These ideas have haunted, I may almost say have tormented me, during my researches among fossil bones, the results of which 1 have lately pre- sented to the public; researches which embrace but a very small part of those phenomena of the age preceding the last general revolution of the globe, and which are yet intimately connected with all the others. It was almost impossible that the desire should not arise of investigating the general mass of these phenomena, at least as they occur in a limited space around us. My excellent friend, M. Brongniart, in whose mind other stu- dies excited the same desire, had the complais- ance to associate me with himself in the task ; and it is thus that we have laid the first founda- tions of our labours upon the environs of Paris. But this work, while it still bears my name, has become almost entirely that of my friend, from the infinite attention which he has bestowed, since the first conception of our plan, and since our journeys, upon the profound investigation of the objects, and the perfecting and arranging of the whole. I have placed it, with M. Brongniart's consent, in the second part of my " Recherches," in that in which I treat of the fossil bones of our neighbourhood. Although apparently relating only to a rather limited extent of country, it af- fords numerous results, which are applicable to geology in general, and, in this point of view, it THEORY OF THE EARTH. may be considered as intimately connected with the present discourse ; at the same time, that it is, without a doubt, one of the best ornaments of my work *. In it there is presented the history of the most recent changes that have taken place in a particu- lar basin, and it descends so far as the Chalk forma- tion, the extent of which over the globe is vastly more considerable than that of the materials of the basin of Paris. The chalk, which has been considered so modern, is thus found to be ad- vanced in antiquity among the ages of the great period preceding the last catastrophe. It forms a sort of limit between the most recent formations, those to which the name of Tertiary may be re- served, and the formations which are named Se- condary, which have been deposited before the Chalk, but after the Primitive and Transition formations. Recapitulation of the Observations upon the Succession of the Tertiary Formations. The most superficial strata, those deposits of mud and clayey sand, mixed with rolled pebbles, * Copies have been printed separately, under the title of Description Geologique des Environs de Paris, par MM. G. Cuvier et Al. Brongniart. Second edition. Paris, 1822, 4to. 244 THEORY OF THE EARTH. that have been transported from distant countries, and filled with bones of land animals, the species of which are for the most part unknown, or at least foreign to the country in which they are found, seem especially to have covered all the plains, filled the bottom of all the caverns, and choked up all the fissures of rocks that have corne in their way. Described with particular care by Mr Buckland, under the name of diluvium, and very different from those other beds equally consisting of transported matters, continually de- posited by torrents and rivers, which contain only bones of animals that still live in the country, and distinguished by the name of alluvium, the former are now considered by all geologists as ex- hibiting the most obvious proof of the immense inundation which has been the last of the cata- strophes of our globe *. Between this diluvium and the chalk, are the formations alternately filled with fresh water and salt water productions, which mark the irruptions and retreatings of the sea, to which this part of the globe has been subjected, since the deposition of the chalk-strata : first, marls and buhrstones, * See Professor Buckland's work, entitled Reliquiae Diluviance. Lond. 1823, 4to, p. 185 et seq. ; and the article Eau, by M. Brongniart, in the l4th volume of the Diction- des Sciences Naturelles. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 245 or cavernous quartz, filled with fresh-water shells, similar to those of our marshes and pools ; under them marls, sandstones, and limestones, all the shells of which are marine, such as oysters, &c. At a greater depth are found fresh water for- mations of an older date, and particularly those famous gypsum deposits of the neighbourhood of Paris, which have afforded so much facility in or- namenting the buildings of that great city, and in which we have discovered whole genera of land- animals, of which no traces had been elsewhere perceived. They rest upon those not less remarkable beds of limestone, of which our capital is built, in the more or less compact texture of which the patience and sagacity of our naturalists, and of several ar- dent collectors, have already detected more than 800 species of shells, all of them marine, but the greater part unknown in the presently-existing sea. They also contain only bones of fishes, and of cetacea and other marine mammifera. Under this marine limestone there is another fresh water deposit, formed of clay, in which there are interposed large beds of lignite (brown coal), or that sort of fossil-coal which is of more recent origin than the common or black coal. Among shells, which are always of fresh water origin, there are also found bones in the deposit ; but, what is remarkable, bones of reptiles, and not of mammi- 246 THEORY OF THE EARTH. fera. It is filled with crocodiles and tortoises, but the genera of extinct mammifera which the gypsum contains, are not found in it : they evi- dently did not exist in the country when these clays and lignites were formed. This fresh water formation, the oldest which has been distinguished in our neighbourhood, and which supports all the formations which we have just enumerated, is itself supported and embraced on all sides by the chalk, an immense formation, both as to thickness and extent, which shews it- self in very distant countries, such as Pomerania and Poland ; but which, in our vicinity, reigns with a sort of continuity in Bern, Champagne, Picardy, Upper Normandy, and a part of Eng- land, and thus forms a great circle, or rather a great basin, in which the deposits of which we have been speaking are contained, but of which they also cover the edges in the places where they were less elevated. In fact, it is not in our basin only that these various formations have been deposited. In the other countries where the surface of the chalk presented similar cavities for them ; in those even where there was no chalk, and where the older formations alone presented themselves as supports, circumstances often led to the formation of depo- sits more or less similar to ours, and containing the same organic bodies. THEORY OF THE EARTH, 247 Our formations containing fresh-water shells, have been seen in England, in Spain, and even so far as the confines of Poland. The marine shells interposed between them, have been found along the whole course of the Appenines. Some of the quadrupeds of our gypsum depo- sits, our palseotheria, for example, have also left their bones in certain gypseous formations of the Velai, and in the molasse quarries of the south of France. Thus the partial revolutions which have taken place in our neighbourhood, between the period of the chalk and that of the great inundation, and during which the sea threw itself upon our districts or retired from them, had also taken place in a multitude of other countries. It seems as if the globe had undergone a long series of changes by which variations were produced, proba- bly in close succession, as the deposits which they have left nowhere shew much thickness or soli- dity. The chalk has been produced by a more tranquil and more continuous sea ; it contains only marine productions, among which there are, how- ever, some very remarkable vertebrate animals, but all of the class of reptiles and fishes ; large tortoises, vast lizards, and other similar animals. The formations anterior to the chalk, and in the hollows of which the chalk is itself deposited, - 248 THEORY OF THE EARTH. as the formations of our neighbourhood are in its hollows, form a great part of Germany and Eng- land ; and the efforts which the naturalists of these two countries have recently made according with ours, and proceeding upon the same principles, com- bined with those which had been previously tried by the school of Werner, will soon leave nothing to be desired with respect to our knowledge of them. Messrs de Humboldt and de Bonnard in France and Germany, and Messrs Buckland and Conybeare in England, have furnished the most complete and most instructive accounts of them. The subjoined table, in which not only the se- condary formations have been arranged, but the whole series of strata, from the oldest known to the most modern and most superficial, has been politely furnished me by M. de Humboldt, to adorn my work. It may be considered as an epi- tome of the labours of geologists up to the present period *. \ " ; T\ ]' * A full view of the arrangement of rocks is given in note O. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 249 TABLE of Geological Formations in the order of their superposition. By M. Al. de Humboldt. Alluvial Deposits. Lacustrine Formation with Buhrstones. Fountainbleau sandstone and sand. Gypsum with bones. Siliceous Limestone. Coarse Limestone. (London Clay.) Tertiary sandstone with lignites. (Plastic clay,— Molasse,— Nagelfluhe.) Chalk. white. tufaceous. chloritic. Ananchites. Green sand. Weald clay. Iron Sand. (Secondary Sandstone with lignites.) Ammonites. Planulites. Jura Limestone. Quadersandstein, or white sandstone, sometimes above the lias. Slaty beds with fishes and Crustacea. Coral rag. Dive clay. Oolites and Caen limestone. Muschelkalk. Ammonites nodosus. Marly or calcareous lias with Gryphaa arcuata. Marls with fibrous gypsum. Arenaceous beds. Saliferous variegated sandstone. Productus aculeatus. Magnesian limestone. Zechstein. Copper slate. (Alpine limestone.) JQuartziferous Porphyry. Co-ordinate formations of porphyry, red sandstone, and coal. Transition Formations. Slates with Lydian-stone, greywacke, diorites, euphotides. Limestones with orthoceratis, trilobites and euomphalites. Primitive Formations. Clayslates (Thonschiefer), Micaslates. Gneiss. Granites. 250 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Under the chalk are found deposits of green sand, of which its lower strata contains some orga- nic remains. Beneath this are ferruginous sands. In many countries both of these deposits are agglu- tinated into heds of sandstone, in which lignites, amber, and remains of reptiles, are also observed. Under this, we find the great mass of strata which compose the Jura chain, and that of the mountains by which it is continued into Suabia and Franconia, the principal ridges of the Apen- nines, and multitudes of beds in France and England. It consists of limestone-schists, rich in fishes and Crustacea ; vast beds of oolites, or of a granular limestone ; grey marly limestones, with pyrites, characterised by the presence of am- monites, of oysters with recurvate valves, named Gryphaeae, and of reptiles, which are remarkable on account of their forms and structures. Large beds of sand and sandstone, often pre- senting vegetable impressions, support all these Jura deposits, and are themselves supported by a limestone, the innumerable shells and zoophytes contained in which induced Werner to give it the much too general name of Shell-limestone, and which is separated by other beds of sandstone, of the kind denominated variegated sandstone, from a still older limestone, which has been not less improperly called Alpine limestone, because it composes the High Alps of the Tyrol ; but THEORY OF THE EARTH. 251 which also shews itself at the surface in the east- ern provinces of France, and in the whole south- ern part of Germany. In this shell -limestone are deposited great masses of gypsum and rich beds of salt ; and un- der it are found the thin beds of copper- slates so rich in fishes, among which there are also fresh- water reptiles. The copper-slate rests upon a red sandstone, to the epoch of which belong those famous deposits of coal, which supply the present inhabitants of the civilized countries of Europe with fuel, and are the remains of the first vege- table productions with which the face of the globe was adorned. We learn from the trunks of ferns, whose impressions they have preserved, how different these ancient forests have been from ours. We then quickly come to those transition for- mations, in which primeval nature, nature dead and purely mineral, seems to have disputed the empire with organising nature. Black limestones, and schists which present only Crustacea and shells of kinds now extinct, alternate with remains of primitive formations, and announce our having arrived at those formations, the oldest with which we are acquainted, those ancient foundations of the present envelop of the globe, the marbles and primitive slates, the gneisses, and, lastly, the gra- nites. 252 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Such is the precise enumeration of the succes- sive masses with which nature has enveloped the globe. The positive geological information pre- sented by it, has been obtained, by combining the knowledge furnished by mineralogy with that presented by the sciences connected with organic existence. This order, so new and so interesting in facts, has only been acquired by geology, since it preferred positive knowledge, furnished by ob- servation, to fanciful systems, contradictory conjec- tures regarding the first origin of the globe, and all those phenomena, which, having no resemblance to what actually takes place in nature, could nei- ther find in it, for their explanation, materials nor touchstone. A few years ago, the greater number of geologists might have been compared to historians, who, in writing the history of France, should have interested themselves only about the events which had taken place among the Gauls be- fore the time of Julius Cesar. In composing their romances, however, these historians would have taken advantage of their knowledge of posterior facts ; and the geologists of whom I speak, abso- lutely neglected the posterior facts, which could alone have reflected some light upon the darkness of preceding times. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 253 Enumeration of the Fossil Animals recognised by the Author. In concluding this discourse, there only remains for me now to present the result of my own re- searches, or, in other words, a general account of my great work. I shall enumerate the animals which I have discovered, in the inverse order of that which I have followed in my enumeration of the formations. By proceeding deeper and deeper into the series of strata, I there rose in the series of epochs. I shall now take the oldest formations, — make known the animals which they contain, — and, passing from one epoch to another, point out those which successively make their appearance in proportion as we approach the present time. We have seen that zoophytes, mollusca, and certain Crustacea, hegin to appear in the Transition formations ; perhaps there may even at that pe- riod be bones and skeletons of fishes ; but we do not by any means observe at so early a period re- mains of animals which live on land, and respire air in its ordinary state. The great beds of coal, and the trunks of palms and ferns of which they preserve the impressions, although they afford evidence of the existence of dry land, and of a vegetation no longer confined 254 THEORY OF THE EAltTH. to the waters, do not yet shew bones of quadru- peds, not even of oviparous quadrupeds. It is only a little above this, in the bituminous copper-slates, that we see the first traces of them ; and, what is very remarkable, the first quadrupeds are reptiles of the family of lizards, very much resembling the large monitors which live at the present day in the torrid zone. Several indivi- duals of this kind have been found in the mines of Thuringia*, among innumerable fishes of a genus now unknown, but which, from its relations to the genera of our days, appears to have lived in fresh water. Every body knows that the monitors are also fresh water animals. A little higher is the limestone called Alpine, and resting upon it the shell-limestone, so rich in entrochites and encrinites, which forms the basis of a great part of Germany and Lorraine. In it have been found skeletons of a very large sea-tortoise, the shells of which might have been from six to eight feet in length ; and those of an- other oviparous quadruped of the family of lizards, of a large size, and with a very sharp muzzle f. Rising still through sandstones, which present * See my " Recherches sur les Ossemens Fossiles," t. v. part ii. p. 300. t Id. vol. v. part ii. p. 355 and 525. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 255 only vegetable impressions of large arundinaceaa, bamboos, palms, and other monocotyledonous plants, we come to the different strata of the de- posit which has been named the Jura limestone, on account of its forming the principal nucleus of that chain of mountains. It is here that the class of Reptiles assumes its full development, and shews itself under the most varied forms and gigantic sizes. The middle part, which is composed of oolites and lias, or of grey sandstone containing gryphites, contains the remains of two genera, the most ex- traordinary of all, which have combined the cha- racters of the class of oviparous quadrupeds with organs of motion similar to those of the cetacea. The ichthyosaurus *, discovered by Sir Everard Home, has the head of a lizard, but prolonged into an attenuated muzzle, armed with conical and pointed teeth ; enormous eyes, the sclerotica of which is strengthened by a frame consisting of bony pieces ; a spine composed of flat vertebrae, of a depressed circular form, and concave on both surfaces like those of fishes ; slender ribs ; a ster- num and clavicles like those of lizards and orni- thorynchi; a small and weak pelvis; and four limbs, of which the humeri and femurs are short See my " Recherches," vol. v. part ii. p. 447. 256 THEORY OF THE EARTH. and thick, while the other bones are flattened, and closely set like the stones in a pavement, so as to form, when enveloped with the skin, fins of a single piece, almost incapable of bending ; ana- logous, in short, both as to use and organization, to those of cetacea. These reptiles have lived in the sea ; on shore, they could only at most have crept in the hobbling manner of seals ; at the same time after they have respired elastic air. The remains of four species have been found : The most extensively distributed (/. commu- nis) has blunt conical teeth ; its length sometimes exceeds twenty feet. The second (/". platyodori), which is at least as large as the former, has compressed teeth, with round and bulging roots. The third (7. tenuirostris], has slender and pointed teeth, and the muzzle thin and elon- gated. The fourth (/. inter medius], is, as its name implies, intermediate between the last species and the common, with respect to the form of its teeth. The two latter species do not attain half the size of the two first. The plesiosaurus, discovered by Mr Cony- beare, must have appeared still more monstrous than the ichthyosaurus. It had the same limbs, but somewhat more elongated and more flexible ; its shoulder and pelvis were more robust ; its ' THEORY OF THE EARTH. 257 vertebrae had more of the forms and articulations of the lizards ; but what distinguished it from all oviparous and viviparous quadrupeds, was a slen- der neck as long as its body, composed of thirty and odd vertebras, a number greater than that of the neck of any other animal,, rising from the trunk like the body of a serpent, and termina- ting in a very small head, in which all the essen- tial characters of that of the lizard family are ob- served. If any thing could justify those hydras and other monsters, the figures of which are so often presented in the monuments of the middle ages, it would incontestibly be this plesiosaurus. * Five species are already known, of which the most generally distributed (P. dolichodeirus) at- tains a length of more than twenty feet. A second species (P. recentior), found in more modern strata, has the vertebras flatter. A third (P. carinatus) shews a ridge on the under surface of its vertebrae. A fourth, and lastly a fifth (P. pentagonus and P. trigonus], have the ribs marked with five and three ridges, f These two genera are found everywhere in the * Researches, &c. vol. v. part if. p. 475, et seq* t Researches, vol. v, part ii. p. 485 and 486. R 258 THEORY OF THE EARTH. lias : they were discovered in England, where this rock is exposed in cliffs of great extent ; but they have also been found since in France and Germany. Along with these had lived two species of Cro- codiles, the bones of which are also found depo- sited in the lias, among ammonites, terebratulae, and other shells of that ancient sea. We have skeletons of them in our cliffs at Honfleur, where the remains are found, from which I have drawn up their characters, f One of these species, the Long-beaked Gavial, has the muzzle longer, and the head more narrow, than the gavial or long-beaked crocodile of the Ganges ; the bodies of its vertebrae are convex before, while in our crocodiles of the present day they are so behind. It has been found in the lias deposits of Franconia, as well as in those of France. A second species, the Short-beaked Gavial, has the muzzle of ordinary length, less attenuated than the gavial of the Ganges, but more so than our crocodiles of St Domingo. Its vertebrae are slightly concave at each of their extremities. But these crocodiles are not the only ones which have been deposited in the strata of these secondary limestones. * Researches, vol. v. part ii. p. 143. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 259 The beautiful oolite quarries of Caen have presented a very remarkable one, the muzzle of which is as long and more pointed than that of the long-beaked gavial, and its head more dilated behind, with wider temporal fossae. Its stony scales, marked with small round cavities, must have rendered it the best defended of all the croco- diles.* Its lower teeth are alternately longer and shorter. There is still another in the oolite of England ; but there have only been found some portions of its cranium, which do not suffice to afford a com- plete idea of it. t Another very remarkable genus of reptiles, the remains of which, although they are also found beyond the limits of the lias concretion, are espe- cially abundant in the oolite and upper sands, is the megaiosaurus, justly so named, for, along with the forms of the lizards, and particularly of the monitors, of which it has also the sharp- edged and dentated teeth, it presents so enormous a size, that if we suppose it to have possessed the proportions of the monitors, it must have exceeded seventy feet in length. It was, in fact, a lizard * Researches, vol. v. part ii. p. 127- t We expect a fuller knowledge of it from M. Cony- bear e's researches, R 2 260 THEORY OF THE EARTH. of the size of a whale. * It was discovered by Mr Buckland in England ; but we have it also in France ; and in Germany there are found bones, if not of the same species, at least of a species which can be referred to no other genus. It is to M. Soemmering that we owe the first descrip- tion of this last. He discovered the bones in strata lying above the oolite, in those limestone-schists of Franconia, long celebrated for the numerous fos- sil remains which they furnished to the cabinets of the curious, and which will be still more cele- brated for the services which their employment in lithography render to the arts and sciences. The crocodiles continue to make their appear- ance in these schists, and always of the long- muz- zled or rostrated kind. M. de Soemmering has described one (the Crocodilus prisons), the entire skeleton of a small individual of which was found nearly in as good a state of preservation, as it could have been in our cabinets, f It is one of those which most resemble the present gavial of the Ganges; the anterior or united part of its lower jaw, however, is less elongated ; its lower teeth are alternately and regularly longer and shorter. It has ten vertebrae in the tail. * Researches, vol. v. part ii. p. t Ibid. p. 120. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 261 But the most remarkable animals which these limestone slates contain, are the flying lizards, which I have named Pterodactyli. They are reptiles whose principal characters are, a very short tail, a very long neck, the muzzle much elongated, and armed with sharp teeth ; the legs also long, and one of the toes of the anterior extremity excessively elongated, having prohably served for the attachment of a membrane adapted for supporting them in the air, accompanied with four other toes of ordinary size, terminated by hooked claws. One of these strange animals, whose appearance would be frightful did they oc- cur alive at the present day, may have been of the size of a thrush*, the other of that of a com- mon batf ; but it would appear from some frag- ments that larger species had existed J. A little above the limestone slates is found the nearly homogeneous limestone of the Jura ridges. It also contains bones, but always of reptiles, crocodiles, and fresh-water tortoises, of which a vast quantity is found in particular in the neighbourhood of Soleure. They have been very carefully searched for by M. Hugi ; and, from the fragments which he has already * Researches, vol. v. part ii. p. 358. et seq. t Ibid. p. 376. J Ibid. p. 380. THEORY OF THE EARTH. collected, it is easy to recognise a considerable number of Fresh-water Tortoises, or Emydes, which further discoveries can alone determine, but of which several are already distinguished by their size and peculiar forms, from all the species hitherto known *. It is among these innumerable oviparous quadrupeds, of all sizes and forms ; in the midst of these crocodiles, tortoises, flying reptiles, huge megalosauri, and monstrous plesiosauri, that some small Mammifera are said to make their appear- ance for the first time ; and the assertion is so far authenticated by the occurrence of jaws, and some other bones discovered in England, which undoubtedly belong to this class of ani- mals, and particularly to the family of Didel- phides, or to that of the Insectivora. It may, however, be supposed, that the stoney matters which encrust these bones, owe their origin to some local recomposition, posterior to the ori- ginal formation of the strata. However this may be, it is still found for a long time that the class of Reptiles predominates. The ferruginous sands, placed in England above the chalk, contain abundance of crocodiles, tortoises, megalosauri, and especially a reptile Researches, vol. v. part ii. p. 225. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 263 which presents a character quite peculiar, in as much as its teeth appear worn, like those of our herbivorous mammifera. To Mr Mantell of Lewes, in Sussex, we are indebted for the discovery of this latter animal, as well as of other large reptiles belonging to the sands lying beneath the chalk. He has named it Iquanodon. In the chalk itself there are only reptiles to be seen : there are found in it remains of tortoises and crocodiles. The famous tufaceous quarries of the mountain of St Peter, near Maestricht, which belong to the chalk formation, along with very large sea tortoises, and a multitude of ma- rine shells and zoophytes, have afforded a ge- nus of lizards not less gigantic than the mega- losaurus, which has become celebrated by the re- searches of Camper, and the figures which Fau- jas has given of its bones, in his history of that mountain. It was upwards of five and twenty feet long ; its large jaws were armed with very strong coni- cal teeth, a little arcuate, and marked with a ridge, and it had also some of these teeth in the palate. Upwards of a hundred and thirty verte- bras were counted in its spine ; they were convex * Researches, vol. v. part ii. p. 161, 232, and 350. 264 THEORY OF THE EARTH. before, and concave behind. Its tail was deep and flat, and formed a large vertical oar (or or- gan of swimming). * Mr Conybeare has re- cently proposed to name it Mosasaurus. The clays and lignites which cover the upper part of the chalk, I have only found to contain crocodiles f ; and I have every reason to think that the lignites which in Switzerland have af- forded beaver and mastodon bones, belong to a later epoch. Nor has it been at an earlier period than that of the coarse limestone which rests up- on these clays that I have begun to find bones of mammifera ; and still do they all belong to ma- rine mammifera, to dolphins of unknown species, lamantins and morses. Among the dolphins, there is one, the muzzle of which, more elongated than that of any known species, has the lower jaw united in a conside- rable part of its length, nearly as in a gavial. It was found near Dax by the late president of Bordaj. Another species, from the cliffs of the Depart- ment de 1'Orne, has the muzzle also long, but somewhat differently shaped §. The entire genus of lamantins is at the present Researches, vol. v. part iv. p. 310, et seq. t Ibid. p. 163. J Ibid. p. 316. § P. 317. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 265 day confined to the seas of the torrid zone; and that of the morses, of which only a single living species is known to exist, is limited to the frozen ocean. Yet we find skeletons of these two genera side by side in the coarse limestone strata of the middle of France ; and this association of species, the nearest allied to which are, at the present day, found in opposite zones, will again make its ap- pearance more than once as we proceed. Our fossil lam an tins differ from those known to exist at present, in having the head more elonga- ted, and of a different form *. Their ribs, which are easily recognised by their being of a thick and rounded form, and of dense texture, are not of rare occurrence in our different provinces. With regard to the fossil morse, small frag- ments only have as yet been found of it, which are insufficient for characterising the species f. It is only in the strata that have succeeded the coarse limestone, or, at most, those which may have been of contemporaneous formation with it, but deposited in fresh-water lakes, that the class of land mammifera begins to shew itself in any quantity. I consider as belonging to the same period, and * Researches, vol. v. part ii. p. 266. t Id. vol. v. part i. p. 234 ; and part ii. p. 521. 266 THEORY OF THE EARTH. • *( as having lived together, but perhaps in different spots, the animals whose bones are deposited in the molasse and old gravel beds of the south of France ; in the gypsums mixed with limestone, such as those of Paris and Aix ; and in the fresh- water marly deposits covered with marine beds, of Alsace, the country of Orleans and of Berry. This animal population possesses a very remark- able character in the abundance and variety of certain genera of pachydermata, which are entirely awanting among the quadrupeds of our days, and whose characters have more or less resemblance to those of the tapirs, the rhinoceroses, and ca- mels. These genera, the entire discovery of which is my own, are the palceotheria, lophiodonta, ana- plotheria, anthracotheria, cheropotami, and ada- pis. The Palceotheria have resembled the tapirs in their general form, and in that of the head, parti- cularly in the shortness of the bones of the nose, which announces that they have had a small pro- boscis like the tapirs, and, lastly, in their having six incisors and two canine teeth in each jaw ; but they have resembled the rhinoceros in their grin- ders, of which those of the upper jaw have been square, with prominent ridges of various configura- tion, and those of the lower jaw in the form of dou- ble crescents, as well as in their feet, all of which THEORY OF THE EARTH. 267 V - - '•* W have been divided into three toes, while in the tapirs the fore feet have four. It is one of the most extensively diffused ge- nera and most numerous in species that occur in the deposits of this period. Our gypsum quarries in the neighbourhood of Paris are full of them. Bones of seven distinct species are found there. The first (P. magnum) is as large as a horse. The three next are of the size of a hog, but one of them (P. medium) has narrow and long feet, another (P. crassum) has the feet broader, and a third (P. latum) has them still broader, and especially shorter. The fifth species (P. curium), which is of the size of a sheep, is much lower, and has the feet still broader and shorter in proportion than the last. The sixth (P. minus) is of the size of a small sheep, and has long and slender feet, the lateral toes of which are shorter than the rest. The seventh (P, minimum), which is not larger than a hare, has also the feet slender*. Palaeotheria have also been found in other dis- tricts of France : at Puy in Valey, in strata of gypseous marl, a species (P. velaunum) f, much * See my Researches, in the whole of vol. iii., and espe- cially p. 250 ; and vol. v. part ii. p. 505, t Ibid. vol. v, part ii, p. 505. 268 THEORY OF THE EARTH. resembling (P. medium), but differing from it in the form of its lower jaw ; in the neighbourhood of Orleans, in strata of marly rock, a species (P. aurelianense) *, which is distinguished from the others by having the re-entering angle of the cres- cent of its lower grinders split into a double point, and by some differences in the necks of the upper grinders ; near Issel, in a bed of gravel or molasse, along the declivities of the Black Mountain, a species (P. isselanum) f , which has the same cha- racters as the Orleans species, but is of smaller size. It is more particularly, however, in the molasse of the Department of the Dordogne, that the palaeotherium occurs not less abundantly than in our gypsum deposits in the neighbour- hood of Paris. The Duke Decaze has discovered in the quar- ries of a single field, bones of three species which appear different from all those of our neighbour- hood i. The Lophiodons approach still somewhat nearer to the tapirs than the palaeotheria do, inasmuch as their lower false grinders have transverse necks like those of the tapirs. * Researches, vol. iii. p. 254 ; and vol. iv, p. 498. and 499, t Ibid, vol, iii. p, 258. ^ Ibid. vol. v. part ii. p. 505, THEORY OF THE EARTH. 269 They differ, however, from these latter, in ha- ving the fore ones more simple, the backmost of all with three necks, and the upper ones rhomboidal, and marked with ridges very much resembling those of the rhinoceros. We are still ignorant what the form of their snout, and the number of their toes, may have been. I have discovered not less than twelve species of this genus, all in France, deposited in marly rocks of fresh-water formation, and filled with lymnese and planorbes, which are shells peculiar to pools and marshes. The largest species is found near Orleans, in the same quarry as the palseotheria ; it approaches the rhinoceros. There is a smaller species in the same place ; a third occurs at Montpellier ; a fourth near Laon ; two near Buchsweiler in Alsace ; five near Ar- genton in Berry ; and one of the three occurs again near Issel, where there are also two others. There is also a large one near Gannat *. These species differ from each other in size, the smallest being scarcely so large as a lamb of three months, and in various circumstances connected * See my Researches, vol. ii. part i. p, 177 and 218; vol. iii, p. 394; and vol. iv. p. 498. 270 THEORY OF THE EARTH. with the form of their teeth, which it would he too tedious and minute to detail here. The Anoplotheria have hitherto heen disco- vered nowhere but in the gypsum quarries of the neighbourhood of Paris. They have two characters which are observed in no other animal ; feet with two toes, the metacarpal and metatarsal bones of which are separate in their whole length, and do not unite into a single piece, as in the ruminan- tia ; and teeth placed in a continuous series with- out any interruption. Man alone has the teeth so placed in mutual contiguity, without any inter- val. Those of the anaplotheria consist of six in- cisors in each jaw, a canine tooth and six grinders on each side, both above and below ; their canine teeth are short and similar to the outer incisors. The three first grinders are compressed ; the four others are, in the upper jaw, square, with trans- verse ridges, and a small cone between them ; and, in the lower jaw, in the form of a double crescent, but without neck at the base. The last has three crescents. Their head is of an oblong form, and does not indicate that the muzzle has terminated either in a proboscis or a snout. This extraordinary genus, which can be com- pared to nothing in living nature, is subdivided into three subgenera : the Anaplotheria, proper- ly so called, the anterior molares of which are still pretty thick, and the posterior ones of the lower THEORY OF THE EARTH. jaw have their crescents with a simple ridge ; the Xipliodons, of which the anterior molares are thin and sharp on the edges, and the under pos- terior, have, directly opposite the concavity of each of their crescents, a point, which, on being worn, also assumes the form of a crescent, so that then the crescents are double as in the ruminantia ; lastly, the Dichobunes, the outer crescents of which are also pointed at the beginning, and which have thus points disposed in pairs upon their lower posterior grinders. The most common species in our gypsum quar- ries (An. commune), is an animal of the height of a boar, but much more elongated, and furnished with a very long and very thick tail, so that al- together it has nearly the proportion of the otter, but larger. It is probable that it was well fitted for swimming, and frequented the lakes in the bottom of which its bones have been incrusted by the gypsum which was deposited there. We have one a little smaller, but in other respects pretty similar (An. secundarmm.) We are as yet acquainted with only one ocipho- don, which, however, is a very remarkable ani- mal : it is that which I have named An. gracile. It is slender, and delicately formed, like the pret- tiest gazelle. There is one dichobune, nearly of the size of a hare, to which I have given the name of An. le- 272 THEORY OF THE EARTH. porinum. Besides its subgeneric characters, it differs from the anaplotheria and xiphodons, in having two small and slender toes on each foot, at the sides of the two large toes. We do not know if these lateral toes exist in the two other dichobunes, which are small, and scarcely exceed in size the common Guinea pig *. The genus of Anthracotheria is in some de- gree intermediate between the palaeotheria, ana- plotheria, and hogs. I have named it so, because two of its species have been found in the lignites of Cadibona, near Savone. The first approached the rhinoceros in size ; the second \\ as much smaller. They have also been found in Alsace, and in the Velay. Their grinders are similar to those of the anaplotheria ; but they have project- ing canine teeth f. The genus Cheropotamus is found in our gyp- sum deposits, where it accompanies the palaeothe- ria and anaplotheria, but where it is of much rarer occurrence. Its posterior grinders are square above, rectangular below, and have four large conical eminences surrounded with smaller ones. * Regarding the Anaplotheria, see the whole of the 3d volume of my " Researches," and particularly p. 250 and 396. t " Researches," vol. iii, p. 398 and 404; vol. iv. p. 501 ; vol. v. part ii. p. 506. THEORY OF THE EARTH. The anterior molares are short cones, slightly compressed, and with two roots. Its canine teeth are small. Neither its incisors nor its feet are yet known. I possess only one species, which is of the size of a Siam hog *. The genus Adapis has also but one species, which is at most of the size of a rabbit : it is also from our gypsum quarries, and must have been nearly allied to the anaplotheria f . We have thus nearly forty species of pachy- dermata belonging to genera now entirely extinct, and presenting forms and proportions to which there is nothing that can be compared in the pre- sent animal kingdom, excepting two tapirs and a daman. This large number of pachydermata is so much the more remarkable, that the ruminantia, which are at present so numerous in the genera of deer and antelopes, and which attain so great a size in those of the oxen, giraffes, and camels, scarcely make their appearance in the deposits of which we are speaking. I have not seen the slightest trace of them in our gypsum quarries; and all that has come to my hands consists of some fragments of a deer, of * " Researches," vol. iii. p. 260. t Id. vol. iii. p. 265. 8 274 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the size of the roe, but of a different species, col- lected among the palaeotheria of Orleans*; and of one or two other small fragments, from Swit- zerland, which, however, are perhaps of doubtful origin. But our pachyderm ata have not for all this been the only inhabitants of the countries in which they lived. In our gypsum deposits, at least, we find along with them carnivora, glires, several sorts of birds, crocodiles, and tortoises; and these two latter genera also accompany them in the molasse sandstones and marly deposits of the middle and south of France. At the head of the carnivora, I place a Bat, very recently discovered at Montmartre, and which belongs to the proper genus Vespertilio -K The existence of this genus, at an epoch so remote, is so much the more surprising, that, neither in this formation, nor in those which have succeeded it, have I seen any other trace, either of cheiroptera or of quadrumana : no bone or tooth of either monkey or maki has ever presented itself to me, in the course of my long researches. * " Researches," vol. iv. p. ] 03. t I am indebted for the knowledge of this animal to the Count de Bournon ; and as I have not described it in my great work, I have given a figure of it here. See Plate II. figs. 1 and 2. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 275 Montmartre has also furnished the bones of a fox different from ours, and which also differs from the jackals, isatises, and the various species of foxes peculiar to America * ; those of a carni- vorous animal allied to the racoons and coaties, but larger than any known species f ; those of a particular species of civet £ ; and of two or three other carnivora, which it has not been possible to determine, from the want of tolerably complete portions. What is still more remarkable, is, that there are skeletons of a small sarigue, allied to the marmose, but different, and consequently of an animal belonging to a genus which is at the pre- sent day confined to the New World §. Skele- tons of two small glires, of the genus myoxus ||, and a skull belonging to the genus sciurus ^, have also been collected. Our gypsum deposits are more fertile in bones of birds than any of the other strata either ante- rior or posterior to it. Entire skeletons, and parts * " Researches," vol. iii. p. 26?. | Id. voL iii. p. 269. J Id. vol. iii. p, 272, § Id. vol. iiL p. 284. || Id. vol. iii. p. 297 and 300. 1F Id. vol. v. part ii. p. 506. S $ 276 THEORY OF THE EARTH. of at least ten species belonging to all the orders, are found there *. The crocodiles of the period in question ap- proach our common crocodiles in the form of the head, while, in the deposits of the Jura period, we find only species allied to the gavial. A species has been found at Argenton, which is remarkable for its compressed, sharp teeth, ha- ving their edges dentated like those of certain monitors f . Some remains of it also occur in our gypsum quarries {. The tortoises of this period are all fresh-water ones: some of them belong to the subgenus Emys ; and there are species, both at Mont- martre §, and still more especially in the molasse sandstones of the Dordogne ||, which are larger than any living species known ; the others are Trionyces or soft tortoises IF. This genus, which is easily distinguished by the vermiculate surface of the bones of its shell, and which at present exists only in the rivers of warm countries, such * " Researches," vol. iii. p. 304 et seq. t Id. vol. v. part ii. p. 166. J Id. vol. iii. p. 335 ; vol, v. part ii. p. 166. § Id. vol. iii. p. 233. || Id. vol. v. p. 232. IT Id, vol. iii. p, 329; vol, v. part ii. p, 222, THEORY OF THE EARTH. 277 as the Nile, the Ganges, and the Orinoko, has been very abundant in the places where the palae- otheria lived. Vast quantities of its remains are found at Montmartre *, and in the molasse sand- stones of the Dordogne, and the other gravel de- posits of the south of France. The fresh-water lakes, around which these va- rious animals have lived, and which had received their bones, nourished, besides the tortoises and crocodiles, some fishes and testaceous mollusca. All that have been collected of these two classes of animals, are as foreign to our climate, and even as much unknown in our present waters, as the palaeotheria, and other quadrupeds which were coeval with themf. The fishes have even in part belonged to un- known genera. Hence, it cannot be doubted that this race of inhabitants, which might be termed the popula- tion of the middle age, this first great production of mammifera, has been entirely destroyed ; and, in fact, in all places where remains of them have been discovered, there are great deposits of marine formation above them, so that the sea has over- whelmed the countries which these races inhabit- * " Researches," vol, v. part ii. p, 223 and 227. t Id, vol, iii, p, 338, 278 THEORY OF THE EARTH. ed, and has rested upon them during a long period of time. Have the countries inundated by it at this pe- riod heen of great extent ? This is a question which the examination of those ancient deposits formed in their lakes do not enable us to answer. To this period I refer the gypsum beds of Pa- ris and those of Aix, several quarries of marly stones, and the molasse sandstones, at least those of the south of France. I am of opinion that we should also refer to it the portions of the molasse sandstones of Switzerland, and of the lignites of Liguria and Alsace, in which quadrupeds are found of the families enumerated above ; but I do not find that any of these animals have been also found in other countries. The fossil bones of Germany, England, and Italy, are all either older or newer than those of which we have been speak- ing, and belong either to those ancient races of reptiles of the juraic and copper- slate formations, or to the deposits of the last universal inundation, the diluvial formations. We are, therefore, authorised to believe, until the contrary be proved, that at the period when these numerous pachyderm ata lived, the globe had only presented for their habitation a small number of plains sufficiently fertile for them to multiply there, and that perhaps these plains were insulated regions, separated by pretty large spaces THEORY OF THE EARTH. 279 of elevated chains, in which we do not find that our animals have left any traces of their ex- istence. The researches of M. Adolphe Brongniart have also made known to us the nature of the vege- tables which covered those countries. In the same strata with our palaeotheria, there have been found trunks of palms, and many others of those beautiful plants whose genera now only grow in warm climates. Palms, crocodiles, and trionyces always occur in greater or less abundance where- ever our ancient pachydermata are found *. The sea which had covered these lands and destroyed their animals, left large deposits, which still form at the present day, at no great depth, the basis of our great plains : it had then retired anew, and left immense surfaces to a new popula- tion, whose remains are found in the sandy and muddy deposits of all countries known. It is to this deposition from the sea, made in a state of quiet, that certain fossil cetacea, very much resembling those ®f our own days, should, in my opinion, be referred ; — a dolphin, allied to our epaulard f , and a whale very like our ror- quals |, both discovered in Lombardy by M. Cor- * See my " Researches/' vol. iii. p. 35}. et seq. t Id. vol. v. part i. p. 309. J Id. p. 390. 280 THEORY OF THE EARTH. tesi ; a large head of a whale found within the very precincts of Paris *, and described by Lama- non and Daubenton ; and an entirely new genus, which I have discovered and named Ziphius, and which already contains three species. It is allied to the cachalots and hyperoodons f. In the extinct population which fills our allu- vial and superficial strata, and which has lived upon the deposit just alluded to, there are no longer either palaeotheria or anaplothaeria, or, in in fact, any of those singular genera. The pachy- dermata, however, still predominate ; and these are of a gigantic size, elephants, rhinoceroses, and hippopotami, accompanied with innumerable horses and several large ruminantia. Carnivorous animals of the size of the lion, tiger, and hyena, had desolated this new animal kingdom. In ge- neral, its character, even in the extreme north, and on the edges of the present frozen ocean, was similar to that which the torrid zone alone now presents, and yet there was no species in it abso- lutely the same as any of those which are found alive at the present day. The most remarkable of these animals is the species of elephant named mammoth by the Rus- * " Researches," vol. v. part i. p. 393. t Id. vol. v. part i- p. 352. and 35?. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 281 sians (the Elephas primigenius of Blumenbach), which was fifteen or eighteen feet high, and was covered with coarse red wool, and long, stiff, hlack hairs, which formed a inane along its back. Its enormous tusks were implanted in alveolae longer than those of the elephants of the present day ; but in other respects it was pretty similar to the Indian elephant *. It has left thousands of its carcases from Spain to the shores of Siberia, and it has been found in the whole of North Ameri- ca ; so that it had been distributed on both sides of the Atlantic, if, indeed, that ocean had existed in its time, in the place which it occupies at pre- sent. It is well known that its tusks are still so well preserved in cold countries, as to be applied to the same uses as fresh ivory ; and, as we have already remarked, individuals of it have been found with their flesh, skin, and hair, which had remained frozen since the last general catastrophe. The Tartars and Chinese have imagined it to be an animal which lives under ground, and perishes whenever it perceives the light. After the mammoth, and almost its equal in size, came also in the countries which form the two presently existing continents, the narrow toothed mastodon, which resembled the elephant, * " Researches," vol. i. p. 75, 195 and 335 ; vol. iii. 3?1 and 405 ; vol. iv. p. 491. 282 THEORY OF THE EARTH. and was armed like it with enormous tusks, but with tusks covered with enamel, shorter legs, and whose mamillated grinders, invested with ^ thick and shining enamel, have long furnished what has been called occidental turquoise *. Its remains, which are pretty common in the temperate parts of Europe, are not so much so towards the north ; but it has also been found in the mountains of South America, along with two allied species. In North America immense quantities of the remains of the great mastodon have been found, a species larger than the preceding, as high in proportion as the elephant, with equally huge tusks, and whose grinders, which are covered over with bristling points, made it long be considered as a carnivorous animal f. Its bones were of a large size, and very solid. Even its hoofs and stomach are said to have been found in a sufficient state of preservation to be re- cognisable ; and it is asserted that the stomach was filled with bruised branches of trees. The Indians imagine that the whole race was destroyed * " Researches/' vol. i. p. 250, 265 and 335 ; vol. iv. p. 493. t Id. vol. i, p. 206, 249 ; vol. iii. p. 37 6. THEORY OF THE EA11TH. 283 by the gods, to prevent them from destroying the human species. Along with these enormous pachydermata, liv- ed the two somewhat inferior genera of the rhino- ceroses and hippopotami. The Hippopotamus of this period was pretty common in the countries which now form France, Germany and England, and was particularly so in Italy. It so closely resembled the present Af- rican species, that it is only by an attentive com- parison that it can be distinguished from it *. There was also at this time a small species of hippopotamus of the size of the wild boar, to which there is nothing similar at present exist- ing. There were at least three species of Rhinoceros of large size, all of them two-horned. The most common species in Germany and England (my Rh. tichorhinus), and which, like the elephant, is found even to the shores of the frozen sea, where it has also left entire individuals, had the head elongated, the bones of the nose very robust and supported by an osseous and not merely cartilaginous septum narium, and, lastly, wanted incisors f. * « Researches," vol, i. p. 304, 322 ; vol, iii. p. 380 ; vol. iv, p. 493, t Id, vol. ii. part i, p, 64; and vol. iv. p, 496. 284 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Another species, of rarer occurrence, and pecu- liar to more temperate climates (Rh. incisivus) *, had incisors like our present rhinoceroses of the East Indies, and, in particular, resembled that of Sumatra f ; its distinctive characters are derived from some differences in the form of the head. The third species (Rh. leptorhirius) had no incisors, like the first and like the present rhino- ceros of the Cape ; but it was distinguished by a more pointed muzzle and more slender limbs J. The bones of this species have been found more especially in Italy, in the same strata with those of elephants, mastodons, and hippopotami. There is a fourth species still (Rh. minutus), furnished, like the second, with incisors, but of a much smaller size, and scarcely larger than a hog I). It was undoubtedly rare, for the remains of it have only as yet been found in some places in France. To those four genera of large pachydermata, is added a Tapir, which equalled them in size, and was consequently twice, perhaps three times, as * " Researches," vol. ii. part i. p. 89. vol. iii. ; p. 390 ; and vol. v. part ii. p. 50. f Id. vol. iii. p. 385. J Id. vol. ii. part i. p. Ti- ll Id. vol. ii. part i. p. 89- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 285 large in its linear dimensions as the American Tapir *. Its teeth have been found in several parts of France and Germany ; and almost always accompanying those of rhinoceroses, mastodons, or elephants. Along with these there is still associated, but as it would seem in a very small number of places, a large pachydermatous animal, of which the lower jaw alone has been found, and whose teeth are of the form of double crescents, and undulated. M. Fischer, who discovered it among bones from Si- beria, has named it Elasmotherium\ . The Horse genus also existed in those timesf . Its teeth accompany in thousands the remains of the animals which we have just mentioned, in al- most all their localities ; but it is not possible to say whether it was one of the species now exist- ing or not, because the skeletons of these species are so like each other, that they cannot be distin- guished by the mere comparison of isolated frag- ments. The Ruminantia were now greatly more nume- rous than at the epoch of the Palaeotheria ; their numerical proportion must even have differed * See my " Researches," vol. part i. p. 89. t Id. p. 95. t Id- P- ]°9 286 THEORY OF THE EARTH. very little from what it is at present ; but we are certain of several species which were different. This may, in particular, be said with much certainty of a deer exceeding even the elk in size, which is common in the marl deposits and peat- bogs of Ireland and England, and of which re- mains have also been dug up in France, Ger- many, and Italy, where they were found in the same strata with bones of elephants. Its wide, palmated, and branched horns, measure so much as twelve or fourteen feet from one point to the other, following the curvatures *. The distinction is not so clear with regard to the bones of deer and oxen, which have been collected in certain caverns, and in the fissures of certain rocks. They are sometimes, and espe- cially in the caverns of England, accompanied with bones of elephants, rhinoceroses, and hippo- potami, and with those of a hyena, which also occurs in several strata of transported matter, along with these same pachydermata. They are consequently of the same age ; but it remains not the less difficult to say in what respect they dif- fer from the oxen and deer of the present day. The fissures of the rocks of Gibraltar, Cette, Nice, Uliveta near Pisa, and other places on the See my " Researches/' vol. iv. p. 70. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 287 shores of the Mediterranean, are filled with a red and hard cement, which envelopes fragments of rock and fresh- water shells, and numerous bones of quadrupeds, the greater part fractured. These concretions are termed osseous breccia. The bones which they contain sometimes present cha- racters sufficient to prove that they have belonged to unknown animals, or at least to animals fo- reign to Europe. There are found, for example, four species of deer, three of which have charac- ters in their teeth, which are only observed in the deer of the Indian Archipelago. There is a fifth near Verona, the horns of which exceed in magnitude those of the Cana- dian deer *. There also occur, in certain places, along with bones of rhinoceroses, and other quadrupeds of this period, those of a deer so much resembling the reindeer, that it would be difficult to assign distinctive characters to it ; a circumstance which is so much the more extraordinary, that the rein- deer is at the present day confined to the coldest regions of the north, while the whole genus of rhinoceroses belongs to the torrid zone, t There exist in the strata of which we speak, * " Researches," vol. iv. p. 168-225. t Id. p. 89- 288 THEORY OF THE EARTH. remains of a species very similar to the fallow- deer, but a third larger, * and prodigious quanti- ties of horns, very much resembling those of our present stag t, as well as bones, very like those of the aurochs f and domestic ox ||, two very dis- tinct species, which had been erroneously con- founded by the naturalists who preceded us. The entire heads, however, resembling those of these two animals, as well as that of the musk-ox of Canada §, which have often been extracted from the earth, do not come from localities sufficiently well determined to enable us to assert that these species had been contemporaries of the great pa- chydermata, of which we have made mention above. The osseous brecciae of the shores of the Me- diterranean have also afforded two species of Lagomys,^ animals, the genus of which exists at the present day only in Siberia ; two species of rabbits **, lemmings, and rats of the size of the * See my " Researches," vol. iv. p. 94, t Id. vol. iv. p, 98. J Id. vol. iv. p. 148 ; and vol. v. part ii. p. 509- || Id. vol. iv. p. 150 ; vol. v. part ii. p. 510. § Id. vol. iv. p. 153. IT Id. vol.iv.p, 199-204. ** Id. vol. iv. p. 174, 177, 196; vol. v. part i. p. 55. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 289 water-rat and domestic mouse *. In the caves of England two species are also found f. The osseous brecciae even contain bones of shrew-mice and lizards f . In certain sandy strata of Tuscany, there are teeth of a porcupine ||, and in those of Russia heads of a species of beaver, larger than ours, which M. Fischer has named Trogontherium §. But it is more particularly in the class Edenta- ta that these races of animals belonging to the pe- riod before the last assume a size much superior to that of their present congeners, and even rise to a magnitude altogether gigantic. The Megatherium unites a part of the generic characters of the armadilloes, with some of those of the sloths, and is in size equal to the largest rhino- ceros. Its claws must have been of a monstrous length, and prodigious strength; its whole skeleton possesses an excessive solidity. It has only as yet been found in the sandy strata of North Ame- rica^. * See my " Researches," vol. iv. p. 1 78, 202, and 206 ; vol. v. part i. p. 54-. t Id. vol. v. part i. p. 55. { Id. vol. iv. p. 206. || Id. vol. v. part ii, 517. § Id. part i. p. 59- IT Id. p. 174; and part ii. p. 519. T $90 THEORY OF THE EARTH. The Megalonysc has been very similar to it in its characters, but has been somewhat less ; its claws much longer and sharper in the edges. Some bones and entire toes of it have been found in certain caves in Virginia, and in an island on the coast of Georgia *. These two enormous edentata have only hi- therto presented their remains in America ; but Europe possesses one of the same class which does not yield to them in magnitude. It is only known by a single terminal joint of a toe, but this fragment is sufficient to assure us that it was very similar to a pangolin or manis, but to a pangolin of nearly twenty-four feet in length. It lived in the same districts as the elephants, rhinoceroses, and gigantic tapirs ; for its bones have been found along with theirs in a sandy deposit in the county of Darmstadt, not far from the Rhinef . The osseous breccias also contain, but very rare- ly, bones of carnivora J, which are much more numerous in caverns, that is to say, in cavities wider and more complicated than the fissures or veins containing osseous breccia. The Jura chain in particular, is celebrated for them in the part of it which extends into Germany, where, for ages * See ray " Researches," vol. v. part i. p, 160, Id, vol. v. p. 193, t Id, vol, iv. p, 193. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 291 past, incredible quantities have been removed and destroyed, on account of certain medical virtues which had been attributed to them, and yet there still remains enough to fill the mind with asto- nishment. The principal part of these remains consists of bones of a very large species of bear (Ursus spelceus), which is characterised by a more prominent forehead than that of any of our living bears *. Along with these bones are found those of two other species of bear f 17. arctoideus and U. prisons) f; those of a hyena (H.fossilis), allied to the spotted hyena of the Cape, but dif- fering from it in the form of its teeth and head J; those of two tigers or panthers §, of a wolf ||, a fox 5r> a glutton **, as well as of weasels, viver- rae, and other small carnivora ff . Here, also, may be observed that singular asso- ciation of animals, the species resembling which live at the present day in climates so widely se- parated from each other as the Cape, the coun- try of the spotted hyena, and Lapland, the coun- try of our present gluttons. In like manner we * See my " Researches/' vol. iv. p. 351. t Id. vol. iv. p, 356 and 357. J Id. vol. iv. p. 392. and 507. § Id. vol. iv. p. 452. || Id. vol. iv. 458. IT Id. voL iv. p. 461 . ** Id. vol. iv. p. 475. ft Id. vol. iv. p. 467. THEORY OF THE EARTH. have seen in a cave in France, a rhinoceros and a reindeer by the side of each other. Bears are of rare occurrence in alluvial strata. Remains of the large species of the caves ( U. spelceus), are said, however, to have been found in Austria and Hainaut ; and in Tuscany there are bones of a particular species, remarkable for its compressed canine teeth (U. cultridens) *. The hyenas are more frequently met with. We have remains of them in France, found along with bones of elephants and rhinoceroses. A cave has lately been discovered in England, which con- tained prodigious quantities of them, where they were found of every age, and of which the soil presented even their excrements in a sufficient state of preservation to be easily recognised. It would appear that they had long lived there, and that it had been by them that the bones of ele- phants, rhinoceroses, hippopotami, horses, oxen, deer, and various animals of the class of glires, which are found along with them, and which bear evident marks of their teeth, had been dragged into the cave. But what must have been the soil of England, when these enormous animals lived upon it, and constituted the prey of fero- cious beasts ! These caves contain also bones of * See my " Researches/' vol. iv. p. 378 and 507 ; and vol. v. part ii. p. 516. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 293 tigers, wolves and foxes ; but the remains of bears are of excessively rare occurrence in them *. However this may be, we see that, at the epoch of the animal population which we are now pass- ing under review, the class of carnivora was nu- merous and powerful. It reckoned three bears with round canine teeth, one with compressed ca- nini, a large tiger or lion, another feline animal, of the size of the panther, a hyena, a wolf, a fox, a glutton, a martin or pole-cat, and a weasel. The class of glires, composed in general of weak and small species, has been little observed by the collectors of fossil remains ; and, in all cases, where the bones of these animals have been found in the strata or deposits of which we speak, they also have presented unknown species. Such, in particular, is a species of Lagomys found in the osseous breccias of Corsica and Sardinia, some- what resembling the Lagomys alpinus of the high mountains of Siberia : so true is it that it is not always in the torrid zone only, that we are to seek for the animals which resemble those of this period. These are the principal animals, the remains of which have been found in that mass of earth, sand, and mud, — that Diluvium, which every- * See Mr Buckland's excellent work, entitled Reliquiae Diluviance. 294 THEORY OF THE EARTH. where covers our large plains, fills our caverns, and chokes up the fissures in many of our rocks. They incontestibly formed the population of the continents, at the epoch of the great catastrophe which has destroyed their races, and which has prepared the soil, on which the animals of the present day subsist. Whatever resemblance certain of these species bear to those of our days, it cannot be disput- ed that the general mass of this population had a very different character, and that the greater part of the races which composed it have been utterly destroyed. What astonishes us is, that, among all these mammifera, the greater number of which have their congeners at the present day in the warm parts of the globe, there has not been a single quadrumanous animal, — that there has not been collected a single bone or a single tooth of an ape or monkey, not so much even as a bone or a tooth belonging to an extinct species of these animals. Nor is there any trace of man. All the bones of our species that have been found along with those of which we have been speaking, have oc- curred accidentally *, and their number besides is * See in the Reliquice Diluviance of Mr Buckland the ac- count of the skeleton of a woman found in the cave of Pa- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 295 exceedingly small, which assuredly would not have been the case, if men had then been settled in the countries which these animals inhabited. Where, then, was the human race at this pe- riod ? Did the last and most perfect of the works of the Creator nowhere exist ? Did the animals which now accompany him upon the globe, and of which there are no traces among these fossil remains, surround him ? Were the countries in which he lived with them swallowed up, when those which he now inhabits, and whose former population may have been destroyed by a great inundation, were laid dry again ? These are questions which the study of fossil remains does not enable us to solve, and in this discourse we must not apply for information to other sources. This much is certain, that we are now at least in the midst of a fourth succession of land ani- mals,— that, after the age of reptiles, the age of palaeotheria, the age of mammoths, and that of mastodons and megatheria, has come the age in vyland ; and in my Researches, vol. iv. p. 1 93, that of a fragment of a jaw, found in the osseous breccias of Nice. M. de Schlotheim collected human bones in fissures at Koestritz, where there are also bones of rhinoceroses ; but he himself expresses his doubts regarding the epoch at which they were deposited. 296 THEORY OF THE EARTH. which the human species, aided by some domes- tic animals, peaceably governs and fertilizes the earth, and that it is only in the deposits formed since the commencement of this age, in alluvial matters, peat-bogs, and recent concretions, that bones are found in the fossil state, which belong all of them to known and still living animals. Such are the human skeletons of Guadaloupe, imbedded in a species of travertine formed of land shells, slate, and fragments of shells and madre- pores of the neighbouring sea ; the bones of oxen, deer, roes, and beavers, common in peat-bogs, and all the bones of men and domestic animals found in the mud and sand deposited by rivers, in bury- ing grounds, and upon ancient fields of battle. None of these remains belong either to the great deposit formed at the time of the last catas- trophe, nor to those of preceding ages. APPENDIX. ( 299 ) APPENDIX. On the birds to which the name of Ibis was given by the ancient Egyptians. Every body has heard of the Ibis, a bird to which the ancient Egyptians rendered a religious homage ; which they reared within the precincts of their temples ; allowed to wander unmolested through their towns ; whose murderer, even al- though he had involuntarily become so, was punish- ed with death * ; which they embalmed with as much care as their parents ; — a bird to which they attributed a virgin purity ; an inviolable attach- ment to their country, of which it was the em- blem, an attachment so great that it suffered it- self to die of hunger when it was transported else- * Herodotus, i. 2. 300 ON THE IBIS. where; — a bird which possessed instinct enough to know the increase and waning of the moon, and to regulate accordingly the quantity of its daily food, and the development of its young ; which arrested at the frontiers of Egypt the ser- pents which would otherwise have carried destruc- tion into that sacred land *, and which inspired them with such terror that they dreaded its very feathers f ; — a bird, in fine, whose form the gods would have assumed, had they been forced to a- dopt a mortal figure, and into which Mercury was really transformed, when he had a mind to traverse the earth, and instruct men in the sciences and arts. No other animal could have been so easy to re- cognize as this ; for there is no other of which the ancients have left us at once, as of the ibis, excel- lent descriptions, accurate and even coloured fi- gures, and the body itself preserved with its fea- thers, under the triple envelope of a preservative bitumen, thick and close folds of linen, and solid and well varnished vases. And yet, of all the modern authors who have spoken of the ibis, there is but one, the celebrated Bruce, a traveller more famous for his courage than for the justness of his * jElian, lib. ii. cap. 35 and 38. t Id. lib. i. cap. 38. ON THE. IBIS. 301 opinions in natural history, who has not blunder- ed respecting the true species of this bird ; and his ideas with regard to this subject, however ac- curate they were, have not even been adopted by naturalists *. After several changes of opinion respecting the ibis, it was seemingly agreed, at the period when I published the first edition of this work, to give the name of Ibis to a bird a native of Africa, al- most of the size of the stork, with white plumage, having the quills black, perched upon long red legs, armed with a long arched beak, of a pale yel- low colour, sharp at its edges, rounded at its base, and notched at its point, and whose face is covered with a red skin destitute of feathers, which do not extend farther forward than the eyes. Such is the Ibis of Perrault f, the Ibis Candida of Brisson J, the Ibis blanc d'Egypte of Buf- * Bruce, French translation, 8vo. vol. viii, p. 264 ; and Atlas, pi. xxxv,, under the name of Abouhannes. •fr Description d'un Ibis blanc et de deux cicognes, Aca- demic des Sciences de Paris, t. iii, pi. iii. p. 6l. of the 4to edition of 1734, pi, xiii. fig, 1, The beak is represented as* truncated at the end, but this is a fault of the engraver, J Numenius sordide albo-rufescens, capite anteriore nudo rubro, lateribus rubro purpureo et carneo colore maculatis, remigibus majoribus nigris, rectricibus sordide albo rufes- centibus, rostro in exortu dilute luteo, in extremitate au- 302 ON THE IBIS. ffon #, and the Tantalus Ibis of Linnaeus, in his twelfth edition. It was to this same bird, also, that Blumenbach, while he avowed that it is of very rare occurrence at the present day, at least in Lower Egypt, asserted that the Egyptians rendered di- vine honours -f- ; and yet this naturalist had pos- sessed opportunities of examining bones of the true ibis in a mummy which he opened in Lon- don J. I also participated in the error of those cele- brated men whom I have just mentioned, until the moment when I was enabled to examine some mummies of the ibis by myself. This pleasure was procured for me, for the first time, by the late M. Fourcroy, to whom M. Grobert, Colonel of Artillery, on his return from Egypt, had given two of these mummies, both taken from the pits of Saccara. On carefully exposing them, we per- ceived that the bones of the embalmed bird were rantio, pedibus griseis. Ibis Candida, Brisson, Ornithologia, t. v. p. 349, * Planches Enluminees, No. 389 ; Histoire des Oiseaux, t, viii. 4to. p. 14. pi, 1, This last figure is a copy of that of Perault, with the same fault, t Handbuch der Naturgeschichte, p, 203. of the edition of 1799 ; but in the edition of 1807 he has restored the name of Ibis to the bird to which it belongs. J Philosophical Transactions for 1794. ON THE IBIS. 303 much smaller than those of the Tantalus ibis of naturalists ; that they did not much exceed those of the curlew in size, that its beak resembled that of the latter, being only a little shorter in pro- portion to its thickness, and not at all that of the tantalus ; and, lastly, that its plumage was white with the quills marked with black, as the ancients have described it. We are therefore convinced, that the bird which the ancient Egyptians embalmed, was by no means the Tantalus ibis of naturalists, that it was smaller, and that it was to be sought for in the curlew genus. We found, after some in- quiries, that the mummies of the ibis which had been opened before by different naturalists, were similar to ours. Buffon says expressly that he ex- amined several of them ; that the birds which they contained had the beak and size of curlews ; and yet he has blindly followed Perrault in ta- king the African tantalus for the ibis. One of those mummies opened by Buffon still exists in the museum ; it is similar to those which we have examined. Dr Shaw, in the supplement to his Travels *, describes and figures with care the bones of a si- milar mummy. The beak, he says, was six Eng- * Folio edition, Oxford 1?46, pi, v. and pages 64-66- 304 ON THE IBIS. lish inches in length, similar to that of the cur- lew, &c. In a word, its description agrees entire- ly with ours. Caylus, in his Collection of Antiquities, vol. vi. pi. xl. fig. 1., gives a representation of the mummy of an ibis, the height of which, with its bandages, is only one foot seven inches four lines, although he says expressly that the bird was placed upon its feet with the head straight out, and that it had no part inflected in its embalment. Hasselquist, who took a small white and black heron for the ibis, gives, as his principal reason, that the size of this bird, which is that of a crow, corresponds very well with that of the mummies of the ibis *. How, then, could Linnaeus have given the name of ibis to a bird as large as a stork ? How, especially, could he have considered this bird to be the same as the Ardea ibis of Has- selquist, which, besides its smallness, had the beak straight ? And how has this latter error of sy- nonymy been preserved to this very day in the Systema Nature ? A short time after this examination, which was made in the presence of M. Fourcroy, M. Olivier * Hasselquist, Iter Palestinum, p. 249, Magnitude gal- linte, seu cornicis ; and, p, 250,, vasa quce in sepulchrix i«- veniuntur, cum avibus conditis, hujus sunt magmtudlnis. ON THE IBIS. 305 had the politeness to shew us the bones which he had taken from two mummies of the ibis, and to open along with us two others. These bones were found similar to those of Colonel Grobert's mum- mies ; one of the four only was smaller, but it was easy to judge by the epiphyses that it had belonged to a young individual. The only figure of the beak of an embalmed ibis, which does not entirely agree with the objects which we have had under our eyes, is that of Ed- wards (pi. cv.) ; it is a ninth part larger, and yet we do not doubt its accuracy, for M. Olivier shew- ed us also a beak an eighth or a ninth longer than the others, or in the proportion of 180 to 165, which had been equally taken from a mummy. This beak only shews that there were among the ibises individuals larger than others ; but it proves nothing in favour of the tantalus, for it has not at all the form of the beak of that animal. Its beak is perfectly similar to that of the curlews ; and besides, the beak of the tantalus is a third longer than that of our largest embalmed ibises, and two-fifths longer than that of the smallest. We have ascertained further, that similar vari- ations with regard to the size of the beak exist in our European curlews, according to the age and sex. They are still more strongly marked in the green curlew of Italy, and in our godwits ; and this variation appears to be a property common to u 306 ON THE IBIS. most of the species of the family of scolopaceous birds. Lastly, our naturalists returned from the expe- dition to Egypt with a rich harvest of objects, as well ancient as recent. My learned friend M. GeofFroy St Hilaire, in particular, had occupied himself with the greatest care in collecting mum- mies of all descriptions, and had brought with him a great number of those of the ibis, both from Saccara and Thebes. The former were in the same state as those which M. Grobert had brought, that is to say, their bones had undergone a sort of half burning, and were without consistence ; they broke on the slightest touch, and it was very difficult to obtain any entire, and still more so to detach them for the purpose of making a skeleton. The bones of those brought from Thebes were much better preserved, either on account of the greater heat of the climate, or from the more effi- cacious means employed for their preparation ; and M. GeofFroy having sacrificed some of them to me, M. Rousseau, my assistant, succeeded, by dint of patience and address, and by the employ- ment of ingenious and delicate methods of proce- dure, in making up an entire skeleton, by strip- ping all the bones, and connecting them with a very fine wire. This skeleton is deposited in the anatomical galleries of the museum, of which it ON THE IBIS. 307 forms one of the most beautiful ornaments, and we have represented it in PL iv. It is likely that this mummy must have been that of a bird kept in a state of domesticity in the temples, for its left humerus has been broken and joined again. It is probable that a wild bird, whose wing had been broken, would have perished before it had healed, from its being unable to pur- sue its prey, or to escape from its enemies. This skeleton puts it in our power to deter- mine, without any uncertainty, the characters and proportions of the bird. We see clearly that it was in all points a true curlew, a little larger than the common curlew of Europe, but having the beak thicker and shorter. The following is a comparative table of the dimensions of the two birds, taken, for the ibis, from the skeleton of the mummy of Thebes, and for the curlew, from a skeleton which previously existed in our anatomi- cal galleries. We have added those of parts of the Saccara ibises, which we succeeded in obtain- ing entire. 308 ON THE IBIS. Parts. *i §<£« t5;l.s 'OU HH ^ jleton of Curlew. Saccara Ibises. £iH J5 a> £-5 Larger. Smaller. Head and beak together, Head alone, - - - - The 14 vertebrae of the \ neck together, - - / T5ark 0.210 0.047 0.192 0 O8O 0.215 0.040 0.150 0 056 ... ... n ns? 0 07O 0.037 0.035 0.078 0.060 Tibia ..... 0 1 50 0112 0 OQ*> Tarsus - O 102 0 OQO Middle-toe, .... Sternum, - . - - d»virlf» 0.097 0.092 n o^*; 0.070 0.099 0 041 ... 0 O4 0.133 0 106 0,124 Fore-arm, - - - - Hand 0.153 0 12*5 0.117 0 103 0.144 0.114 It appears by this table, that the animal of Thebes was larger than our curlew ; that one of the Saccara ibises was intermediate in size be- tween that of Thebes and our common curlew, and that the other was smaller than this latter bird. It is also seen that the different parts of the body of the ibis do not observe the same pro- portions between each other, as those of the cur- lew. The beak of the former, for example, is in particular shorter, although all the other parts are longer, &c. However, these differences of proportions do not exceed what might be expected in species of the same genus : the forms and characters which ON THE IBIS. 309 may be considered as generic, are absolutely the same. We must therefore search for the true ibis, not among those tantaluses of large size and sharp beak, but among the curlews ; and, let it be ob- served, that, by the name curlew, we intend to signify, not the artificial genus formed by Latham and Gmelin, of all the wading birds which have the beak curved downwards, but a natural genus, to which we shall give the name of Numenius* and which will comprehend all the waders with beaks curved downwards, soft and rounded, whe- ther their head be bare or clothed with feathers. It is the genus courlis, such as Buffon imagined it* A glance over the collection of birds belonging to the royal cabinet, has enabled us to distinguish a species, which is neither named nor described in the works of systematic writers, excepting per- haps by Dr Latham ; and which, when carefully examined, will be found to correspond with all that the ancients, the monuments and mummies, indicate as characteristic of the ibis. We here present a figure of it, Plate v. It is a bird somewhat larger than the curlew ; its beak is arcuate like that of the curlew, but a little * We have definitively established this genus in our " Regne Animal," t. i. p. 483, and it appears to have been adopted by naturalists. 310 ON THE IBIS. shorter, and sensibly thicker in proportion, some- what compressed at its hase, and marked on each side with a groove, which, proceeding from the nostril, is continued to the extremity ; while, in the curlew, there is a similar groove, which dis- appears before arriving at the middle of the beak ; the colour of the beak is more or less black ; the head, and the two upper thirds of the neck, are entirely destitute of feathers, and the skin of these parts is black. The plumage of the body, wings, and tail, is white, with the exception of the ends of the large quills of the wing, which are black ; the four last secondary quills have the barbs singularly long, attenuated, and hanging down over the ends of the wings, when the latter are folded ; their colour is a beautiful black, with violet reflections. The feet are black, the legs are thicker, and the toes much longer in propor- tion than those of the curlew ; the membranes be- tween the bases of the toes are also more ex- tended; the leg is entirely covered with small polygonal, or what is called reticulated scales, and the base of the toes itself has only similar scales ; while, in the curlew, two-thirds of the leg, and the whole length of the toes, are scutulate, that is to say, furnished with transverse scales. There is a reddish tint under the wing, toward the top of the thigh, and on the anterior large wing co- verts ; but this tint appears to be an individual character, or the result of an accident, for it does ON THE IBIS. 311 not occur in other individuals that are in other respects entirely similar. This first individual came from the collection of the Stadtholder, and its native country was unknown. The late M. Desmoulins, assistant naturalist to the Museum, who had seen two others, asserted that they came from Senegal; one of them must even have been brought by M. Geoffrpy de Villeneuve : but we shall see, as we proceed, that Bruce * found this species in Abys- sinia, where it was named dbou-Hannes (Father John) ; and that M. Savigny saw it in abundance in Lower Egypt, where it was called Abou- Mengel (Father of the Sickle). It is probable that the moderns will give no credit to the asser- tion of the ancients, that the ibis never left Egypt without perishing f . This assertion would, besides, be as contrary to the Tantalus Ibis as to our common Curlew; for the individuals which we have in Europe came from Senegal. It was from thence that M. Geoffroy de Villeneuve had brought the individual in the Museum of Natural History. It is even much rarer in Egypt than our curlew ; for, since Perrault, nobody mentions having seen it there, or having received it from that country. An individual without the reddish tint, but in other respects perfectly similar to the first, was brought home by M. de Labillardierc, * Bruce, loc. cit. ; and Savigny, (C Mem. sur I'lbis," p. 12* t Julian, lib. ii. cap. 38 312 ON THE IBIS. in his voyage to Australasia made along with M. d'Entrecasteux. We afterwards learned, that, when young, these birds have the head and neck furnished with feathers in the part which, as they advance in age, is to become bare ; and that the scapulars are less elongated, and of a paler and duller black. It is in this state that one was brought to us from Australasia by the late Peron, which, in other respects, differs from ours, and from that of M. Labillardiere, only in having some black mark- ings on the alula and first large coverts, and in which the head and upper part of the neck are covered with blackish feathers. It was also a youngish individual which M. Savigny brought from Egypt, and which is figured in his memoir upon the Ibis, Plate I. ; and in the great work on Egypt, under the head Birds, PI. vn. The feathers of the head and back part of the neck are rather grey than black ; those of the fore part of the neck are white. Lastly, Bruce's figure (Atlas, Plate xxxv.) is also taken from a young individual observed in Abyssinia, and almost si- milar to that of M. Savigny. We have received from Pondicherry, by M. Leschenault, an individual similar to that of Pe- ron, but in which, the head only, and a small part of the back of the neck, are furnished with black- ish feathers ; all the rest is covered with white ON THE IBIS. 313 feathers. But it is not the less certain, that all these birds have the head and the neck bare when they are full grown. The late M. Mace sent from Bengal to the Museum several individuals of a species very nearly allied to this, which has the beak a little longer, and less arched, of which the first quill only has a little black on the two edges of its point, and of which the secondary quills are also somewhat attenuated, and slightly tinged with reddish. It appears, according to M. Savigny, p. 25, that M. Levaillant observed another still, which has the secondary quills similarly elongated, but of which the neck always retains its feathers, and whose face is of a red colour. The same M. Mace also sent us a tantalus, very much resembling that which has been re- garded by naturalists as the ibis, but of which the small wing-coverts, and a broad band at the lower part of the breast, are black, and speckled with white. The last secondary quills are elon- gated, and tinged with rose-colour. It is known that, in the Tantalus ibis of naturalists, the small wing-coverts are speckled with purplish red, and that the whole under part of the body is white. We give here a table of the parts of some of these birds, which could be accurately measured in stuffed individuals. By comparing them with 314 ON THE IBIS. those of the skeletons of embalmed ibises, one may judge if it were possible to believe for a single moment that these mummies belonged to the tantalus. Leschenault's oo 1 oo 1 Numenius. o o 0 o 0 o Peron's Nume- nius. oo I 1 CO o o o O o Labillardiere's CO 00 CO CO Numenius. o o 0 o C o Mace's Nume- 00 g & 00 CO nius. 6 0 d d 0 d Numenius Ibis, ^ CO b- 0* measured by M. 12 s | 0 Savigny. o o d o Numenius Ibis *0 ^ »o o the true Ibis of o o o the Ancients. d d d d Mace's Indian CO o o xo Tantalus. d d OJ 0 d Tantalus Ibis. o i s 0 of Naturalists d o — d 1-4 d II ' t^ i • oT g <£ i ^ i i B 0 * 2 1u j J TttV Xlfyothw , KCX,} TJjV dtlPW TTOKTOtV. AtVK*} TTTtgOlFi , xctt civffivos Kail oixpwv rav Trtlpvyotv, x-ett TTW/XIV Larcher, in his French translation of Herodotus, has pro- perly understood the difference of the words oivftw, the nape, and kip or %p the throat. 316 ON THE IBIS. And yet this latter character was essential to the ibis. Plutarch (De Iside et Osiride) says, that the manner in which the white was cut by the black in the plumage of this bird, presented the form of a lunar crescent. It is, in fact, by the union of the black of the last quills, with that of the two ends of the wings, that there is formed, in the white, a large semicircular notch, which gives to the white the figure of a crescent. It is more difficult to explain what he has intended to say, in averring that the feet of the ibis form an equilateral triangle with its beak. But we can understand the assertion of ^Elian, that when it draws in its head and neck among its feathers, it represents, in some mea- sure, the figure of a heart. * It was on account of this, according to Horus Apollo (c. 35.), the emblem of the human heart. From what Herodotus says of the nakedness of the throat, and of the feathers which covered the upper part of the neck, he appears to have had under his eyes a middle aged individual ; but it is not the less certain, that the Egyptians also knew very well the individuals with the neck en- tirely bare. We see such represented from sculp- tures in bronze, in Caylus's Collection of Egyp- tian Antiquities (vol. i. pi. x. no. 4., and vol. v. * Mian, lib. v. cap. 29- ON THE IBIS. 317 pi. xi. no. 1.) This last figure is even so like our bird represented in pi. v., that it might be said that it was taken from it. The paintings of Herculaneum no longer leave any doubt on the subject. Plates 138 and 140 of David's edition, and vol. ii. p. 315, pi. 59, and p. 321, pi. 60 of the original edition, which re- present Egyptian ceremonies, shew several ibises walking in the court of the temples. The cha- racteristic blackness of the head and neck are in particular recognised, and it is easily seen from the proportion which their figure bears to the persons in the painting, that it must have been a bird of half a metre at the most, and not of a metre, or thereabouts, like the Tantalus ibis. The mosaic of Palestine, also presents in its middle part several ibises perched upon buildings. They differ in nothing from those of the paint- ings of Herculaneum. A Sardonyx of Dr Mead's Collection, copied by Shaw, App. pi. v., and representing an ibis, seems to be a miniature of the bird which we have described. A medal of Adrian, in large bronze, represented in the Farnesian Museum, vol. vi. pi. xxviii. fig. 16, and another of the same emperor, in silver, repre- sented in vol. iii. pi. vi. fig. 9, afford figures of the ibis, which, notwithstanding their smallnes s, are pretty like our bird. With regard to the figures of the ibis, sculp- 318 ON THE IBIS. tured upon the plinth of the statue of the Nile, at Belvedere, and upon the copy of it at the gar- den of the Tuileries, they are not sufficiently finished to serve as proofs ; but among the hiero- glyphics of which the Institute of Egypt has caused impressions to be made upon the spot, there are several which distinctly represent our bird. In plate iii. fig. 1, we give one of these impressions which M. Geoffroy has had the po- liteness to communicate to us. We insist particularly on this latter figure, because it is the most authentic of all, having been made at the time, and on the spot where the ibis was worshipped, and being cotemporary with its mummies ; while those which we have cited above, having been made in Italy, and by artists who did not profess the Egyptian worship, might have been less faithful. We owe to Bruce the justice of saying, that he recognised the bird which he describes under the name of Abou-Hannes, as the true ibis. He says expressly, that this bird appeared to him to resemble that which the mummy pitchers con- tained ; and further, that this Abou-Hannes, or Father John, is very common on the banks of the Nile, while he never saw there the bird re- presented by Buffon, under the name of the White Ibis of Egypt. M. Savigny, one of the naturalists of the ex- ON THE IBIS. 319 pedition to Egypt, equally asserts his not having seen the Tantalus in that country, but he ob- tained a great number of our Numenlus near the Lake Menzale, in Lower Egypt, and carried their skins with him. The Abou-Hannes has been placed by La- tham, in his Index Ornithologicus, under the name of Tantalus ^Ethiopicus ; but he does not speak of Bruce's conjecture respecting its identity with the ibis. The travellers before and after Bruce appear to have all been in error. Be- lon thought that the white ibis was the stork, in which he evidently contradicted all testimony on that head. No person has adopted his opinion in this matter, excepting the apothecaries, who have taken the stork for an emblem, because they have confounded it with the ibis, to which the invention of clysters is attributed *. Prosper Alpinus, who relates that this inven- tion is due to the ibis, gives no description of this bird in his Medicine of the Egyptians^ . In his Natural History of Egypt, he speaks of it only after Herodotus, to whose account he only adds, without doubt from a passage of Strabo, , lib. ii. cap. xxxv ; — Plut. De Solert. An. ; Cic. de Nat. Deor. lib. ii. ; — Phil, de Anim. prop. 16. &c. t De Med. Mgypt. lib. i. fol. i* vers. Paris Edition, 1646. 3 320 ON THE IBIS. which I shall mention farther on, that that bird resembles the stork in size and figure. He men- tions his having been informed that white and black ones occurred in abundance on the edges of the Nile ; but it is evident from his very expres- sions, that he did not believe it had been seen there *. Shaw says of the ibis,f that it is at the present day excessively rare, and that he has never seen it. His Emseesy, or ox-bird, which Gmelin very improperly refers to the Tantalus Ibis, is of the size of the curlew, with the body white, and the beak and feet red. It frequents the mea- dows, where it follows the cattle ; its flesh is not well tasted, and corrupts quickly. It is easy to see that this is not the Tantalus, and still less the Ibis of the ancients. Hasselquist was not acquainted with the white Ibis nor with the black one , his Ardea Ibis is a small heron, which has the beak straight. Lin- naeus had acted very properly in placing it among the herons, in his tenth edition ; but he erred, as I have said, in transporting it afterwards as a sy- nonym to the genus Tantalus. * Her. JEgypt. lib. iv. cap. i. t. i. p. 199 of the Leyden Edition. t See the French Translation, vol. ii. p. 167. 2 ON THE IBIS. Demaillet * conjectures that the ibis might be the bird peculiar to Egypt, and which was named Pharaoh's Fowl (Chapon de Pharaon), and at Aleppo Saphan-bacha. It devours serpents. There are of them white, and white and black ; and it follows, for more than a hundred leagues, the caravans which go from Cairo to Mecca, for the purpose of feeding upon the carcases of ani- mals which are killed during the journey, while at any other time there is not one seen along this route. But the author does not consider this con- jecture as certain ; he even says, that we must give up understanding the ancients, when they have spoken so as not to be understood. He ends with concluding, that the ancients have perhaps indiscriminately comprehended under the name of Ibis, all birds which rendered to Egypt the service of clearing it of the dangerous reptiles which this climate produces in abundance, such as the vulture, the falcon, the stork, the sparrow- hawk, &c. He had reason not to regard his Pharaoh's fowl as the ibis ; for, although its description is very imperfect, and although Buffon fancied he recognised the ibis in it, it is easy to judge, as well as by what Pokocke says of it, that this bird * Description de 1'Egypte, part ii, p. 23. 3Z2 ON THE IBIS. must be a carnivorous one ; and, in fact, we see from Bruce's figure (Vol. v. p. 191. of the French edition), that Pharaoh's fowl is nothing else than the rachama or the small white vulture with black wings (Vultur perenopterus, Linn.) — a bird very different from what we have proved above to be the ibis. Pokocke says that it appears, from the de- scriptions which are given of the ibis, and from the figures which he has seen of it in the temples of Upper Egypt, that it was a species of Crane. I have seen, he adds, a number of these birds in the islands of the Nile ; they were for the most part greyish *. These few words suffice to prove that he did not know the ibis better than the others. The learned have not been more happy in their conjectures than the travellers. Middle ton refers to the ibis, a bronze figure of a bird, of which the beak is arched, but short, the neck very long, and the head furnished with a small crest, a figure which never had any resemblance to the bird of the Egyptians f . This figure is, besides, not at all in the Egyptian style, and Middleton himself * Antiq. Monum. PI. x. p. 129- t Hist, Anim. lib. ix. cap, xxvii, and lib, x. cap. xxx, ON THE IBIS. 323 agrees that it must have been made at Rome. Saumaise upon Solinus says nothing that relates to the present question. As to the black ibis, which Aristotle places only near Pelusium * ; it was long thought that Belon alone had seen itf , The bird which he describes under this name is a species of curlew, to which he attributes a head similar to that of the cormorant, that is to say, apparently bald, a red beak, and feet of the same colour ; but as he does not speak of the ibis in his journey J, I sup- pose that it was only in France that he made this reference, and by comparison with mummies of the Ibis. What is certain is, that this curlew, with the beak and feet red, was not known in Egypt §, but that our green curlew of Europe (Scolopax Falcinellus, Linn. PI. Enl. 819.) is seen very commonly there, that it is even more abundant than the white numenius || ; and, as it resembles it in form and size, and, further, as its plumage may appear black, it can by no means be * Buffon, Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux, 4to, vol. viii. p, 17, t Belon, Nature des Oiseaux, p. 159 and 200 ; and Por- traits d'Oiseaux, folio 44, vers. i Observations de plusieurs singularites, &c, § Savigny, Meraoire sur 1'Ibis, p. 37, || Idem, ibid. ON THE IBIS, doubted that it was the true black ibis of the ancients. M. Savigny also made a drawing of it in Egypt, but from a young individual only*. Buffon's figure is from an adult bird ; but its co- lours are too pale. The error which prevails at present respecting the white ibis began with Perrault, who was also the first naturalist who made known the Tanta- lus ibis of the present day. This error, adopted by Brisson and Buffon, passed into the twelfth edition of Linnaeus, where it is blended with that of Hasselquist, which had been inserted in the tenth, forming with it a compound altogether monstrous. It was founded on the idea, that the ibis was essentially a bird that destroyed serpents, and upon this very natural conclusion, that, in order to enable it to devour these reptiles, it was neces- sary for it to have a sharp beak, more or less re- sembling that of the heron. This idea is even the only good objection that can be made against the identity of our bird to the ibis. How, it is urged, could a bird with a weak bill, a curlew, devour those dangerous reptiles ? It may be replied, that positive proofs, such descriptions, figures, and mummies, ought always * See the Great Work on Egypt, Natural History of Birds, pi. vii. fig, 2. ON THE IBIS. 325 to preponderate over accounts of habits too often imagined without any other motive than to jus- tify the different worships rendered to animals. It might be added, the serpents from which the ibis delivered Egypt, are represented to us as very venomous, but not as very large. I have even obtained a direct proof that the birds preserved as mummies, which have had a beak precisely si- milar to that of our bird, were true serpent eat- ers ; for I found in one of their mummies the still undigested remains of the skin and scales of ser- pents, which I have deposited in our anatomical galleries. But, at the present day, M. Savigny, who has observed, in a living state, and more than once dissected our white numenius, the bird which every thing concurs to prove to have been the ibis, asserts that it only eats worms, fresh water shells, and other small animals of that sort. Sup- posing this fact to have no exception, all that can be concluded from it is, that the Egyptians, as has happened more than once to them and others, had invented a false reason for an absurd worship. It is true that Herodotus says, he saw, in a place on the borders of the desert *, near * Euterpe, cap. Ixxv. Herodotus says a place in Arabia, but it is not seen how a place in Arabia could have been near the city of Buto, which was in the western part of the Delta. 326 ON THE IBIS. Buto, a narrow gorge, in which a multitude of bones were heaped up, which he was informed were remains of winged serpents, that were seek- ing to penetrate into Egypt in spring, and that the ibises had arrested their passage. But he does not say that he had witnessed their combats, or that he had seen those winged serpents in their entire state. The whole of his testimony, there- fore, reduces itself to this, that he had observed a heap of bones, which may very well have been those of the multitude of reptiles and other ani- mals which the inundation destroyed every year, and whose bodies it would naturally carry to the places where it was stopped, to the borders of the desert, and which must by preference have accu- mulated in a narrow gorge. However, it is equally from this idea of the combats of the ibis with serpents, that Cicero gives that bird a horny and strong beak *. Ha- ving never been in Egypt, he imagined that this must have been the case by mere analogy. I am aware that Strabo says somewhere, that the ibis resembles the stork in form and size f , and that this author ought to have known it well, since he asserts that in his time the streets and * Avis excelsa, cruribus rigidis, corneo proceroque ros* tvo. Cic, de Nat. Deor. lib. i. t Strabo, lib. xvii. ON THE IBIS. 327 cross- ways of Alexandria were so filled with them, that they proved a great inconvenience ; but he must have spoken of it from memory. His tes- timony cannot he received when he contradicts all the rest, and especially when the bird itself is there to refute him. In like manner, I shall not trouble myself about the passage where Mlian * relates, accord- ing to the Egyptian embalmers, that the intes- tines of the ibis are eighty-six cubits long. The Egyptian priests of all classes have been guilty of so many extravagancies with regard to Natural History, that no great importance can be attribu- ted to wh? t one of their lowest classes might aver. An objection might still be drawn against my opinion from the long attenuated and black fea- thers which cover the rump of our bird, and of which some traces also are seen in Bruce's figure of the Ahou-Hannes. The ancients, it might be said, do not speak of them in their descriptions, and their figures do not exhibit them. But I have more on my side, in respect to this matter, than a written testimony or a figured representa- tion. I have found precisely the same feathers in one of the Saccara mummies ; I kept them carefully as being at once a singular monument * -Elian, Anim. lib. x, cap, xxix, 328 ON THE IBIS. of antiquity and a peremptory proof of the iden- tity of species. These feathers having an uncom- mon form, and not occurring, I believe, in any other curlew, leave, in fact, no doubt respecting the accuracy of my opinion. I conclude this memoir with a view of its re- sults : 1. The Tantalus Ibis of Linnaeus ought to constitute a separate genus, along with the Tan- talus Loculator. Their character would be : Itostrum l designated also under the names of Cimbri and Sicambri : the latter name, M. Hartz conjectures, might come from the an- cient German words SeeJcampfers, i. e. Sea-warriors ; the Frisians being very warlike. These people appear to have had the same origin with those, who, at a rather earlier period, took possession of the marsches of Ost- Frise (East-Friesland), and of that Friesland which forms one of the United Provinces ; but this common origin is very obsure. Even at the present day, the inhabitants of the marsches, from near Husum to Ton- dern, or Tunder to the North, though themselves un- acquainted with it, speak a language which the other inhabitants of the country do not understand, and which is supposed to be Frisian. It is the same at a village in the peninsula of Bremen, by which I have had occa- sion to pass. The Sicambri or North Frisians, are traced back to some centuries before the Christian era. At the com- mencement of that era, they were attacked by Frotho, King of Denmark, and lost a battle, under their king Vicho, near the river Hever. Four centuries afterwards they joined the troops of Hengist and Horsa. In the year 692, their king Radebot resided in the island of Heiligeland. Charles Martel subdued them in 732 ; and some time afterwards they joined Charlemagne against Gottric, King of Denmark. These are some of the cir- cumstances of the history of this Frisian colony, record- ed in the chronicles of which I have spoken ; but the his- tory here interesting to us is that of the lands whereon they settled. Jt appears that these people did not arrive here in FRISIAN COLONY. 36l one body, but successively, in the course of many years : they spread themselves over various parts of the coasts of the North Sea, and even a considerable way up the borders of the Weser and the Elbe ; according to do- cuments which I have mentioned in my Letters sur THis- toire de la Terre et de THomme. These new settlers found large marsches, formed, as well in the wide mouths of those rivers as along the coasts, and around the origi- nal islands of geest ; especially that of Heiligeland, the most distant from the coast, and opposite the mouth of the Eyder. Of this island, which is steep towards the south, the original mass consists of strata of sandstone ; and at that time its marsch extended almost to Eyder- stede : there were marsches likewise around all the other original islands; besides very large islands of pure marsch in the intervals of the former. All these lands were desert at the arrival of the Fri- sians ; and the parts on which they established their first habitations, to take care of their breeds of horses and cattle feeding on the marsches, were the original emi- nences of the islands ; on that of Heiligeland they built a temple to their great goddess Phoseta, or Fosta. When they became too numerous to confine themselves to the heights, their herds being also greatly multipli- ed, they ventured to begin inhabiting the marsches ; but afterwards, some great inundations having shewn them the dangers of that situation, they adopted the practice followed by those who had settled on the marsches of the province of Groningen, and still continued on the Hal- ligs ; that of raising artificial mounts called wer/s, on which they built their houses, and whither they could, upon occasion, withdraw their herds; and it likewise 362 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. appears, that, in the winter, they assembled in greater- numbers on the spots originally the highest, in the is- lands, as well as on some parts of the coasts. Things continued in this state for several centuries ; during which period, it is probable that the inhabitants of these lands were often, by various catastrophes, dis- turbed in the enjoyment of them, though not discoura- ged. But in 516, by which time these people were be- come very numerous, more than 600 of them perished by one of the concurrences of fatal circumstances al- ready defined. It was then that they undertook the as- tonishing enterprise of enclosing these lands. They dug ditches around all the marsches^ heaping up on their exterior edge the earth which was taken out ; and thus they opposed to the sea, dikes of eight feet in height. After this, comprehending that nothing could contri- bute more to the safety of their dwellings, than to re- move the sea to a greater distance, they undertook, with that view, to exclude it from the intervals between the islands, by uniting, as far as should be possible, those islands with each other. I will describe the pro- cess by which they effected this, after I shall have re- called to attention some circumstances leading to it. From all that I have already said of the fore-lands, and of the manner in which they are increased, it may be understood, that the common effects of the waves and of the tides is to bring materials from the bottom of the sea towards the coasts ; and that the process con- tinues in every state of the sea. The land winds pro- duce no waves on the coasts, which can carry back to the bottom of the sea what has been brought thence by the winds blowing against the shore ; and as for the UNITING THE ISLANDS. 363 tides, it may have been already comprehended (and shall soon be proved), that the ebb carries back but very little of what has been brought by the flood. So that, but for some extraordinary circumstances, the materials continually impelled towards the shore, which first form islands, would at last unite against the coast in a conti- nuous soil. The rare events, productive of great cata- strophes, do not carry back these materials towards the bottom of the sea ; they only, as it has been said before, ravage the surface, diminishing the heights, and destroy- ing the effect of vegetation. These, then, were the effects against which it was necessary to guard. I now come to the plan of uniting the islands, form- ed by these early inhabitants. They availed themselves for that purpose of all such parts of the sand-banks as lay in the intervals between the large islands, and were beginning to produce grass. These, when surrounded with dikes, are what are called Hoogs ; and their effects are to break the waves, thus diminishing their action against the dikes of the large islands, and, at the same time, to determine the accumulation of the mud in the intervals between those islands. In this manner a large marsch island, named Everschop, was already, in 987, united to Eyderstede by the point on which Poppenbull is situated ; and in 995, the union of the same marsches was effected by another point, namely, that of Tetenbull. Lastly, in the year 1000, Eyderstede received a new in- crease by the course of the Hever, prolonged between the sand banks, being fixed by a dike ; but the whole still remained an island. This is an example of the manner in which the marsch islands were united by the hoogs ; and the chronicle of the country says, that, by 364 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. these labours, the islands were so considerably enlarged in size, and the intervals between them so much raised, that, at low water, it was possible to pass on foot from one to the other. The extent of these marsches was so great on the coast of Sleswigh alone, that they were di- vided into three provinces, two of which comprehended the islands, and the third comprised the marsches conti- guous to the coast ; and the same works were carried on upon the marsches of the coast of Holstein. But the grounds thus gained from the sand-banks were very insecure ; these people, though they had in- habited them more than ten centuries, had not yet un- derstood the possibility of that combination of fatal cir- cumstances above described, against which their dikes formed but a very feeble rampart ; the North Sea, by the extraordinary elevations of its level, being much more formidable in this respect than the ocean, where the changes of absolute level are much less considerable. I shall give an abridged account of the particulars ex- tracted by M. Hartz from the chronicle of Dankwerth, relative to the great catastrophes which these marsches successively underwent, previously to the time when ex- perience led to the means necessary for their security. In 1075, the island of Nord Strand, then contiguous to the coast, particularly experienced the effect of that unusual combination of destructive causes ; the sea pass- ing over its dike, and forming within it large excava- tions like lakes. In 1114 and 1158, considerable parts of Eyderstede were carried away ; and in 1204, the part called Sudhever in the marsch of Uthholm was destroyed. All these catastrophes were fatal to many of the marsch settlers ; but in 1&16, the sea having risen so high that FORMATION OF FORE LANDS. 365 its waves passed over Nord Strand, Eyderstede, and Dit- marsch, near 10,000 of their inhabitants perished. Again, in 1300, seven parishes in Nord Strand and Pell worm were destroyed; and in 1338, Ditmarsch experienced a new catastrophe, which swept away a great part of it on the side next Eyderstede : the dike of the course of the Eyder between the sand-banks was demolished, and the tides have ever since preserved their course throughout that wide space. Lastly, in the year 1362, the isles of Fora and Sylt, then forming but one, were divided, and Nord Strand, then a marsch united to the coast, was sepa- rated from it. During a long time, the inhabitants who survived these catastrophes, and their successors, were so much discouraged, that they attempted nothing more than to surround with dikes like the former such spaces of their meadow-land as appeared the least exposed to these ra- vages, leaving the rest to its fate. But the common course of causes continually tending to extend and to raise the grassy parts of the sand-banks, and no extra- ordinary combination of circumstances having interrupt- ed these natural operations, later generations, farther advanced in the arts, undertook to secure to themselves the possession of those new grounds. In 1525, they turned their attention to the indentations made, during the preceding catastrophes, in the borders of the marsches; the waves, confined in these narrow spaces, sometimes threatening to cut their way into the interior part. In the front of all the creeks of this kind they planted stakes, which they interlaced with osiers, leaving a cer- tain space between the lines. The waves, thus broken, could no longer do injury to the marsch ; and their se- 2 366 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. diments being deposited on both sides of this open fence, very solid fore-lands were there formed. In 1550, they raised the dikes considerably higher, employing wheelbarrows, the use of which was only then introdu- ced. For this purpose, they much enlarged and deepen- ed the interior canals, in order to obtain more earth, not merely to add to the height of the dikes, but to extend their base on the outer side. At last they began to cover these dikes with straw-ropes ; but this great pre- servative of dikes was at first ill managed ; and the use of it was so slowly spread, that it was not adopted in North Strand and in Eyderstede, till about the years 1610 and 1612. Before that time, however, the safety of the exten- sive soil of the latter marsch had been provided for in a different manner. I have said above, that, when the isles of Everschop and Utholm had been united to it, the whole together still formed but one large island ; now, in this state, it was in as great danger on the side towards the continent, as on that open to the sea ; be- cause two small rivers, the Trene and the Nord Eyder, discharging themselves into the interval between it and the land, and by preserving their course to the sea, this interval was thus kept open to tempest, sometimes from the side of the Hever, sometimes from that of the Eyder ; and the waves, beating against the geest, were thence repelled upon the marsch. The inhabitants, seeing that the expence of remedying these evils would be greater than they could afford, while at the same time it was indispensable to their safety, addressed them- selves to their bishop and to their prefect, of whom they requested pecuniary assistance; and having obtained 1 BUILDING OF DIKES. 367 it they first undertook the great enterprise of carrying the Trene and the Nord Eyder higher up into the Ey~ der; keeping their waters, however, still separate for a certain space, by a dam with a sluice, in order to form there a reservoir of fresh water ; the tides ascending up the Eyder above Frederickstadt. They were thus en- abled to carry on the extremities of the dike on both sides to join the geest ; and the interval between the lat- ter and the marsch was then soon filled up, there being only left at their junction the canal "above described which receives the water of the geest, and, at low wa- ter, discharges them from both its extremities by sluices. At the same time, the islands of Pelworm and Nord Strand were united with each other by means of eight hoogs ; and the sandy marsches of which I have spoken, contiguous to the geest., on the north of that of Husum, were inclosed with dikes. After the dikes had been thus elevated, and their surface rendered firm bv the straw ropes, though the lat- ter were not yet properly fixed, the inhabitants of the marsches for some time enjoyed repose ; but on the llth October 1634, the sea, rising to an excessive height, car- ried away, during a great tempest, the hoogs which had produced the junction between Pell worm and Nord Strand, these having ever since continued distinct islands; it also violently attacked Ditmarsch; and its ravages ex- tended over the whole coast, as far as the very extensive new lands of Jutland. Princes then came forward zea- lously to the relief of their subjects. In particular, Fre- derick III., Duke of Sleswigh, seeing that the inhabitants of Nord Strand were deficient both in the talents and in the means necessary for the reparation and future se- 368 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. curity of that large island, and knowing that the art of dikes had made greater progress in Holland, because of the opulence of the country, addressed himself to the States-General, requesting them to send him an engi- neer of dikes, with workmen accustomed to repair them ; and this was granted. The dikes of Nord Strand were then repaired in the most solid manner ; and the Dutch engineer, seeing the fertility of its soil, advised his sons upon his death-bed, to purchase lands and settle there, if the Duke would grant them the free exercise of their religion ; they being Jansenist catholics, and the in- habitants of the island Lutherans. The Duke agreed to this, on condition that they and their posterity should continue to superintend the works carried on upon the dikes ; to which they engaged themselves. From that time the art of dikes, and particularly that part of it which consists in covering them solidly with straw, has be- come common to all the marsches ; and the Dutch fami- lies, which have contributed to this fortunate change, continue to inhabit the same island, and to enjoy the free exercise of their religion." NOTE G, p. 28. ON THE SAND-FLOOD. In different parts of Scotland, as in Aberdeenshire, Hebrides, and Shetland Islands, there are examples of the natural chronometer mentioned in the text. In Morayshire there is a striking example of the sand-flood, concerning which the following details have been fur- nished by my young friend the Rev. Mr Ritchie. SAND-FLOOD IN MORAYSHlRE 369 Sand-Flood in Morayshire* " Westward from the mouth of the river Findhorn in Moray shire, a district, consisting of upwards often square miles of land, which, owing to its extreme fertility, was once termed the Granary of Moray, has been depopu- lated and rendered utterly unproductive by the sand- flood. This barren waste may be characterised as hilly ; the accumulations of sand composing these hills frequent- ly varying in their height, and changing their situation. There is historical evidence, that, in the year 1097, the Moray Firth overflowed the low country on its south- ern shore, and threw out sand. But the destruction of the barony of Coubine (which includes the greater part of the desert mentioned above) was long subsequent to this, as might be proved from the inscription on a tomb- stone in the church yard of Dyke. From historical no- tices, also, in regard to the Kinnairds of Coubine, pre- paring for publication, it appears that the eruption of sand commenced about the year 1 677 ; that its progress was gradual ; that, in 1697, not a vestige was to be seen of the manor-place, orchards, and offices of Coubine ; that two-thirds of the barony were already ruined, and that the sand was daily gaining ground. This sand, which overwhelmed Coubine, came from Mavieston, situated on the shore, about seven miles west from the mouth of the Findhorn, where, from time im- memorial, there have been large accumulations of sand. The sands at Mavieston had formerly been covered with vegetation. In an act of the Scottish Parliament, dated 16th July 1695, for the preservation of lands adjacent to sand-hills, it is stated, that the destruction of Con- A a 370 ON THE SANDS OF COUBINE bine " was occasioned by the bad practice of pulling bent and juniper ." Having been thus set at liberty, the sand moved towards the north-east, as appears from the deso- lation which marks its progress. The moving cause is the wind. I have had opportunities of witnessing the effect of the wind on the loose sand. When the breeze is moderate it carries along with it successive waves of sand, each wave (if I may be allowed the expression) being of a small size, and moving with greater or less velocity, in proportion to the strength of the breeze, and presenting a very beautiful appearance. When the wind is high the heavier particles are drifted forwards, the more minute are raised to a considerable height in the atmosphere, occasioning no small inconvenience to the spectator, who finds his ears and nostrils filled with sand. The movements of the sand are still towards the north- east. In the winter of 1816 a large portion of Binsness, the only remaining farm on the west side of the Find- horn, situated in the line of the sand's progress, was over- whelmed. Since that period large accumulations of sand have disappeared altogether, and rich soil, marked with the plough, has been left bare, after having been buried for upwards of a century. The very minute particles, which, as has been stated, the wind raises to a considerable height, are occasionally carried across the Bay of Findhorn. In the statistical account of Dyke, the parish in which Coubine is situated, it is said, " that, at the town of Findern, in a blowing day, one may feel the sand sharply striking on his face, from the west side."" This sand, of extreme fineness, is to be seen in and around the town of Findhorn, and along the coast much rich land is said to have been covered by sand brought from the west. IN MORAYSHIRE. 371 The greater quantity of the sand is drifted into the river, and its effects have been very remarkable. Many years ago the mouth of the river having become blocked up with sand, it cut out for itself its present channel, which conducts it, by a more direct course, to the sea. In consequence of this, the old town of Findhorn had changed its situation, from the east to the west side of the river, and its site has since been covered by the sea. Previous to this, however, the inhabitants, carrying with them the stones of their former houses, had removed across the river, and erected the present village. On the retiring of the tide from the bay, the river almost disap- pears, being swallowed up by the sand, and quick-sands are formed. The effect resulting from the same cause, the drifting in of the sand is very different at high wa- ter. In consequence of the channel of the river having been filled up, the bay has increased in breadth. The sand constantly carried down by the river has formed a bar, which prevents the entrance of large vessels ; and the river, probably owing to its increased breadth, and this bar depriving it of the impetus acquired in the course of its descent, is, at spring-tides, unable to force its way into the sea, when it is made to flow back, and inundate a considerable extent of carse-land situated at the head of the bay. It was at one time proposed to render the river navigable by dredging. And it is proposed to en- deavour to save the adjoining carse-land, which is of the richest quality, from the monthly inundation to which it is at present subject, by building a wall along the river side. I venture to suggest, that the plan Nature employs for fettering down sand should first be imitated, and that seeds of the Arundo arenaria, Elymus arenarius, and 372 ON THE SANDS OF COUBINE. other plants, which grow readily in sand, should be, from time to time, strewed over the Mavieston Hills. The seeds of the Arundo arenaria are not always to be had ; but plants might easily be procured in abundance, and be dibbled into the sand-hills. The circumstance of great accumulations of sand having of late disappeared from Coubine, has given rise to the expectation, that the ba- rony is at no distant period to become again serviceable to man. By cutting off fresh supplies from Mavieston, this period would be accelerated, and the proposed im- provements rendered comparatively easy. There is at present little bent on Coubine. It is chiefly confined to a range of knolls, which forms the southern boundary of the sand, and protects the adjoin- ing cultivated fields from its encroachments ; and yet, notwithstanding the terrible calamity the inhabitants of Moray brought upon themselves, by the pulling of bent, this " bad practice1' still prevails ; this plant being in no other district of country which I have visited so gene- rally employed for thatching cottars1 houses, and other economical purposes."" In the Outer Hebrides the effects of the sand-flood are also considerable, as shewn in the following notice com- municated by my intelligent assistant Mr Macgillivray. Sand-Flood in the Hebrides, and other parts of Scot- land. " The bottom of the sea, along the whole west coast of the Outer Hebrides, from Barray Head to the Butt of the Lewis, appears to consist of sand. Along the shores pf these islands this sand appears here and there, in SAND-FLOOD IN THE HEBRIDES. 373 patches of several miles, separated by intervals of rock, of equal or greater extent. In some places the sandy shores are flat, or very gently sloping, forming what are here called Fords ; in others, behind the beach, there is an accumulation of sand to the height of from twenty to sixty feet, formed into hillocks. This sand is constant- ly drifting ; and in several places islands have been form- ed by the removal of isthmi. The parts immediately behind the beach are also liable to be inundated by the sand ; and in this manner most of the islands have suf- fered very considerable damage. Those of Pabbay and Berneray in Harris may be particularised ; in the former of which, a tract of about a mile and a-half long, by half a mile in breadth, has been converted into a desert of drifting sand ; and in the latter a large plain, that was formerly noted for its fertility, has been entirely swept away. The sand consists almost entirely of comminuted shells, apparently of the species which are found in the neighbouring seas. It is rather coarse in the grain ; but, during high winds, by the rubbing of its particles upon each other, a sort of dust is formed, which, at a distance, resembles smoke, and which, in the Island of Berneray, I have seen driven into the sea, to the distance of up- wards of two miles, appearing like a thin white fog. The cure of sand drift has been attempted in these islands in two different ways. Mr Alexander Macleod, surgeon of North Uist, is the inventor of the most efficacious method, which is that of cutting thin square turfs from the neigh, bouring pasture grounds, and laying them down at inter- vals of some inches. In the course of a very few years the turfs coalesce, and the stript ground is little the worse; for the roots remaining in it, a new vegetation rapidly springs up. The other method was introduced by Mr Macleod 374 SAND-FLOOD IN THE HEBRIDES. of Harris, and tried extensively upon his estate. It con- sists of planting small bundles of Arundo arenaria, at distances of about a foot and a-half. These take root, and prevent the drifting to a certain degree. But often vegetation is tardy in establishing itself, and if the turf plan be not considerably more expensive, it seems pre- ferable, because it very effectually prevents the drift, and moreover, produces excellent pasture ground ; the former of which indications, the planting system, does not completely effect, and the latter in a very imperfect degree." We may add, as this subject is a very interesting one, that further details, in regard to the moving sands of Scotland, will be found, on consulting the Statistical Account of Scotland, vol. xx. p. 220. In the Appendix to the Account of the parish of Dyke, vol. xx. p. 228. et seq. there is an account of the Sand-Hills of Maviston, which overwhelmed the barony of Coubine, as mentioned in Mr Ritchie's communication. In vol. xix. p. 622. is a notice of the shifting of two hills of the Ma- vieston Range 500 yards in twenty years. In vol. xxi. p. 207-5 is a notice of some hundred acres in Duffus1 pa- rish covered uiree feet deep by drift sand ; fourteen inches accumulating in one night. In NeilTs Tour in Orkney and Shetland 1804, it is observed, that, in the neighbour- hood of the Castle of Noltland,in Westra, much havoc has been done by the blowing of the sand. No measures are there employed for putting a stop to this kind of devas- tation. In the 6th volume of the Highland Society's Transactions will be found a report of the operations car- ried on in Harris, and alluded to in Mr Macgillivray's communication. And in Dr Walker's Account of the MOVING SANDS IN AFltlCA. 375 Hebrides, and Mr Macdonald's Work on the Hebrides, farther details may be seen. In Jameson's Account of the Shetland Islands, and in Shirreff and Fleming's Reports on these islands, are also facts connected with this devastat- ing agent. We may add, that Dr Oudney, Major Den- ham, and Captain Clapperton, have added to our know- ledge of the blowing sands of the African deserts. The coloured engraving of the sand-hills of the African De- sert in Denham, Oudney and Clapperton's Narrative, is a striking and interesting representation of the form of the moving sand-hills of Africa. The moving Sands of Africa and their effects are thus described in the Mercure de France for September 1809, by De Luc. The sands of the Lybian desert, he says, driven by the west winds, have left no lands capable of tillage on any parts of the western banks of the Nile not shel- tered by mountains. The encroachment of these sands on soils which were formerly inhabited and cultivated is evidently seen. M. Denon informs us, in the account of his Travels in Lower and Upper Egypt^ that summits of the ruins of ancient cities buried under these sands still appear externally ; and that, but for a ridge of moun- tains called the Lybian chain, which borders the left bank of the Nile, and forms, in the parts where it rises, a barrier against the invasion of these sands, the shores of the river, on that side, would long since have ceased to be habitable. Nothing can be more melancholy, says this traveller, than to walk over villages swallow- ed up by the sand of the desert, to trample under foot their roofs, to strike against the summits of their mina- 376 MOVING SANDS IN AFRICA, rets, to reflect that yonder were cultivated fields, that there grew trees, that here were even the dwellings of men, and that all has vanished. If, then, our continents were as ancient as has been pretended, no traces of the habitation of men would ap- pear on any part of the western bank of the Nile, which is exposed to this scourge of the sands of the desert. The existence, therefore, of such monuments attests the suc- cessive progress of the encroachments of the sand ; and those parts of the bank, formerly inhabited, will for ever remain arid and waste. Thus the great population of Egypt, announced by the vast and numerous ruins of its cities, was in great part due to a cause of fertility which no longer exists, and to which sufficient attention has not been given. The sands of the desert were formerly remote from Egypt ; the Oases, or habitable spots, still appearing in the midst of the sands, being the remains of the soils formerly extending the whole way to the Nile ; but these sands, transported hither by the western winds, have overwhelmed and buried this extensive tract, and doomed to sterility a land which was once remark- able for its fruitfulness. It is therefore not solely to her revolutions and changes of sovereigns that Egypt owes the loss of her ancient splendour ; it is also to her having been thus ir- recoverably deprived of a tract of land, by which, before the sands of the desert had covered it, and caused it to disappear, her wants had been abundantly supplied. Now, if we fix our attention on this fact, and reflect on the consequences which would have attended it if thou- sands, or only some hundreds, of centuries had elapsed since our continents first existed above the level of the MOVING SANDS IN AFRICA. 377 sea, does it not evidently appear that all the country on the west of the Nile would have been buried under this sand before the erection of the cities of ancient Egypt, how remote soever that period may be supposed ; and that in a country so long afflicted with sterility, no idea would even have been formed of constructing such vast and numerous edifices ? When these cities indeed were built, another cause concurred in favouring their prospe- rity. The navigation of the Red Sea was not then attended with any danger on the coasts ; all its ports, now nearly blocked up with reefs of coral, had a safe and easy ac- cess ; the vessels laden with merchandize and provisions could enter them and depart without risk of being wreck- ed on these shoals, which have risen since that time, and are still inci ?asing in extent. The defects of the present government of Egypt, and the discovery of the passage from Europe to India round the Cape of Good Hope, are therefore not the only causes of the present state of decline of this coun- try. If the sands of the desert had not invaded the bor- dering lands ffn the west, if the work of the sea polypi in the Red Sea had not rendered dangerous the access to its coasts and to its ports, and even filled up some of the latter, the population of Egypt and the adjacent coun- tries, together with their product, would alone have suf- ficed to maintain them in a state of prosperity and abun- dance. But now, though the passage to India by the Cape of Good Hope should cease to exist, though the political advantages which Egypt enjoyed during the briliant period of Thebes and Memphis should be re- established, she could never again attain the same de- gree of splendour. 378 ACTION OF THE SEA UPON COASTS. Thus the reefs of coral which had been raised in the Red Sea on the east of Egypt, and the sands of the de- sert which invade it on the west, concur in attesting this truth : That our continents are not of a more re- mote antiquity than has been assigned to them by the sacred historian in the book of Genesis, from the great era of the deluge. NOTE H, p. 30. Action of the Sea upon Coasts. THE ocean, in its action upon the cliffs and banks si- tuated on the coast, breaks them down to a greater or less extent, and either accumulates the debris at their basis in the form of sea beaches of greater or less mag- nitude, or by currents carries it away to be deposited upon other shores, or to give rise to sand-banks near the coast, which, in the course of time, become united to the land, and thus secure it from the further action of the sea. These destroying and forming effects of the waters of the ocean are to be observed all around the coasts of this island ; and beautiful examples of such ac- tions are to be seen on the coasts of Ireland, and in many of the islands that lie to the west and north of Great Britian. In a paper read before the Wernerian Natural History Society, Mr Stevenson, engineer, men- tions many facts illustrative of the destroying effects of the ocean on our coasts. — Thus he informs us that the waters of the sea are wearing away the land up- on both sides of the Frith of Forth, not only in expo- sed, but also in sheltered situations, and the solid strata, as well as the looser alluvial formations, which owe their ACTION OF THE SEA UPON COASTS. 379 origin to the destroying agency of the ocean at a former period, are again yielding to its action. At Saint An- drew's, the famous castle of Cardinal Beaton, which is said originally to have been some distance from the sea, now almost overhangs it : From St Andrew's northward to Eden water and the River Tay, the coast presents a sandy beach, and is so liable to shift, that it is difficult to trace the change it may have undergone. It is cer- tain, however, that, within this last century, the sea has made such an impression upon the sands of Barrey, on the northern side of the Tay, that the light-houses at the entrance of the river, which were formerly erected at the southern extremity of Button-ness, have been from time to time removed about a mile and a quarter further northward, on account of the wasting and shift- ing of these sandy shores, and that the spot on which the outer light-house stood in the 17th century, is now two or three fathoms under water, and is at least three quar- ters of a mile^within flood-mark. NOTE, p. 32. On the growth of Coral Islands. OF all the genera of lithophytes, the madrepore is the most abundant. It occurs most frequently in tropical countries, and decreases in number and variety as we ap- proach the poles. It encircles in prodigious rocks and vast reefs many of the basaltic and other rocky islands in the South Sea and Indian Ocean, and, by its daily growth, adds to their magnitude. The coasts of the is- lands in the West Indies, also those of the islands on the east coast of Africa, and the shores and shoals of the Red Sea, are encircled and incrusted with rocks of coral. 380 ON THE GROWTH OF Several different tribes of madrepore contribute to form these coral reefs ; but by far the most abundant are those of the genera carophylla, astrea and meandrina. These Hthophytic animals not only add to the magnitude of land already existing, but, according to some naturalists, they form whole islands. Dr Forster, in his Observations made during a Voyage round the World, gives an account of the formation of these coral islands in the South Sea. All the low isles, he says, seem to me to be a produc- tion of the sea, or rather its inhabitants, the polype-like animals forming the lithophytes. These animalcules raise their habitation gradually from a small base, always spreading more and more, in proportion as the structure grows higher. The materials are a kind of lime mixed with some animal substances. I have seen these large structures in all stages, and of various extent. Near Turtle Island, we found, at a few miles distance, and to . leeward of it, a considerable large circular reef, over which the sea broke every where, and no part of it was above water ; it included a large deep lagoon. To the east and north-east of the Society Isles, are a great many isles, which in some parts are above water ; in others, the elevated parts are connected by reefs, some of which are dry at low water, and others are constantly under water. The elevated parts consist of a soil formed by a sand of shells and coral rocks, mixed with a light black mould, produced from putrified vegetables, and the dung of sea-fowls ; and are commonly covered by cocoa-nut trees and other shrubs, and a few antiscorbutic plants. The lower parts have only a few shrubs and the above plants ; others still lower, are washed by the sea at high- water. All these isles are connected, and include a la- goon in the middle, which is full of the finest fish ; and CORAL ISLANDS. 381 sometimes there is an opening, admitting a boat or canoe, in the reef, but I never saw or heard of an opening that would admit a ship. The reef, or the first origin of these isles, is formed by the animalcules inhabiting the lithophytes. They raise their habitation within a little of the surface of the sea, which gradually throws shells, weeds, sand, small bits of corals, and other things, on the tops of these co- ral rocks, and at last fairly raises them above water ; where the above things continue to be accumulated by the sea, till by a bird, or by the sea, a few seeds of plants that commonly grow on the sea-shore, are thrown up, and begin to vegetate ; and by their annual decay and reproduction from seeds, create a little mould, year- ly accumulated by the mixture with sand, increasing the dry spot on every side ; till another sea happens to carry a cocoa-nut hither, which preserves its vegetative power a long time in the sea, and therefore will soon begin to grow on this soil ; especially as it thrives equally in all kinds of soil ; and thus may all these low isles have be- come covered with the finest cocoa-nut trees. The animalcules forming these reefs want to shelter their habitation from the impetuosity of the winds, and the power and rage of the ocean ; but as, within the tro- pics, the winds blow commonly from one quarter, they, by instinct, endeavour to stretch only a ledge, within which is a lagoon, which is certainly entirely screened against the power of both. This, therefore, might account for the method employed by the animalcules in building only narrow ledges of coral rocks, to secure in their mid- dle a calm and sheltered place ; and this seems to me to be the most probable cause of the origin of all the Tro- pical Low Isles, over the whole South Sea. 382 ON THE GROWTH OF That excellent navigator, the late Captain Flinders, gives the following interesting account of the formation of Coral Islands, particularly of Half-way Island on the north coast of Terra Australis ». " This little island, or rather the surrounding reef, which is three or four miles long, affords shelter from the south-east winds ; and being at a moderate day's run from Murray^s Isles, it forms a convenient anchorage for the night to a ship passing through Torres1 Strait : I named it Half-way Island. It is scarcely more than a mile in circumference, but appears to be increasing both in elevation and extent. At no very distant period of time, it was one of those banks produced by the wash- ing up of sand and broken coral, of which most reefs af- ford instances, and those of Torres1 Strait a great many. These banks are in different stages of progress : some, like this, are become islands, but not yet habitable ; some are above high-water mark, but destitute of vegetation ; whilst others are overflowed with every returning tide. " It seems to me, that, when the animalcules which form the corals at the bottom of the ocean cease to live, their structures adhere to each other, by virtue either of the glutinous remains within, or of some property in salt water ; and the interstices being gradually filled up with sand and broken pieces of coral washed by the sea, which also adhere, a mass of rock is at length formed. Future races of these animalcules erect their habitations upon the rising bank, and die in their turn, to increase, but principally to elevate, this monument of their wonderful labours. The care taken to work perpendicularly in the early stages, would mark a surprising instinct in these diminutive creatures. Their wall of coral, for the most •Vol. II. p. 114, 115, 116. CORAL ISLANDS. 383 part, in situations where the winds are constant, being arrived at the surface, affords a shelter, to leeward of which their infant colonies may be safely sent forth ; and to this, their instinctive foresight, it seems to be owing, ,that the windward side of a reef exposed to the open sea, is generally, if not always, the highest part, and rises al- most perpendicular, sometimes from the depth of 200, and perhaps many more fathoms. To be constantly co- vered with water, seems necessary to the existence of the animalcules, for they do not work, except in holes upon the reef, beyond low- water mark ; but the coral, sand, and other broken remnants thrown up by the sea, adhere to the rock, and form & solid mass with it, as high as the common tides reach. That elevation surpassed, the fu- ture remnants, being rarely covered, lose their adhesive property ; and remaining in a loose state, form what is usually called a key, upon the top of the reef. The new bank is not long in being visited by sea-birds : salt plants take root upon it, and a soil begins to be formed ; a co- coa-nut, or the drupe of a pandanus, is thrown on shore; land birds visit it, and deposit the seeds of shrubs and trees ; every high tide, and still more every gale, adds something to the bank ; the form of an island is gradual- ly assumed ; and last of all comes man to take possession. " Half-way Island is well advanced in the above pro- gressive state ; having been many years, probably some ages, above the reach of the highest spring tides, or the wash of the surf in the heaviest gales. I distinguished, however, in the rock which forms its basis, the sand, co- ral, and shells, formerly thrown up, in a more or less perfect state of cohesion. Small pieces of wood, pumice stone, and other extraneous bodies which chance had mixed with the calcareous substances when the cohesion 384 ON THE GROWTH OF began, were inclosed in the rock ; and in some cases were still separable from it without much force. The upper part of the island is a mixture of the same substances in a loose state, with a little vegetable soil ; and is covered with the casuarina and a variety of other trees and shrubs, which give food to parroquets, pigeons, and some other birds ; to whose ancestors, it is probable, the island was originally indebted for this vegetation." Mr Chamisso, who accompanied Kotzebue in his voy- age, has published interesting observations on this sub- ject. He informs us that the low islands of the South Sea and Indian Ocean owe their origin principally to the operations of several species of coral. Their situation with respect to each other, as they often form rows, their union in several places in large groups, and .their total absence in other parts of the same seas, induce us to con- clude, that the corals have founded their building on shoals of the sea ; or, to speak more correctly, on the tops of mountains lying under water. On the one side, as they in- crease, they continue to approach the surface of the sea, on the other side they enlarge the extent of their earth. The larger species of corals, which form blocks, measur- ing several fathoms in thickness, seem to prefer the more violent surf on the external edge of the reef ; this, and the obstacles opposed to the continuation of their life, in the middle of a broad reef, by the amassing of the shells abandoned by the animals, and fragments of corals, are probably the reason that the outer edge of the reef first approaches the surface, As soon as it has reached such a height, that it remains almost dry at low water, the corals leave off building higher ; sea-shells, fragments of coral, shells of echini, and their broken off prickles, are united by the burning sun, through the me- CORAL ISLANDS. 385 dium of the cementing calcareous sand, which has arisen from the pulverization of the above mentioned shells into one whole or solid stone, which, strengthened by the con- tinual throwing up of new materials, gradually increases in thickness till it at last becomes so high, that it is cover- ed only during some seasons of the year by the high tides. The heat of the sun so penetrates the mass of stone when it is dry, that it splits in many places, and breaks of in flakes. These flakes, so separated, are rais- ed one upon another by the waves at the time of high water. The always active surf throws blocks of coral, (frequently of a fathom in length, and three or four feet thick,) and shells of marine animals, between and upon the foundation stones ; after this the calcareous sand lies undisturbed, and offers to the seeds of trees and plants, cast upon it by the waves, a soil upon which they rapid- ly grow, to overshadow its dazzling white surface. En- tire trunks of trees, which are carried by the rivers from other countries and islands, find here, at length, a rest- ing place after their long wanderings ; with them come some small animals, such as lizards and insects, as the first inhabitants. Even before the trees form a wood, the real sea-birds nestle here ; strayed land-birds take re- fuge in the bushes ; and at a much later period, when the work has been long since completed, man also ap- pears, builds his hut on the fruitful soil formed by the corruption of the leaves of the trees, and calls himself lord and proprietor of this new creation. In the preceding account, we have seen how the exte- rior edge of a submarine coral edifice first approaches the surface- of the water, and how this reef gradually as- sumes the properties of land ; the island, therefore, ne- cessarily has a circular form, and in the middle of it an B b 386 ON THE GROWTH OF inclosed lake. This lake, however, is not entirely in- closed ; (and it could not be, for without supply from the sea it would soon be dried up by the rays of the sun,) but the exterior wall consists of a great number of small- er islands, which are separated from each other by some- times larger, sometimes smaller spaces. The number of these islets amounts, in the larger coral islands, to sixty ; and between them it is not so deep but that it becomes dry at the time of ebb. The interior sea has in the mid- dle generally a depth of from thirty to five-and- thirty fa- thoms ; but on all sides towards the land the depth gra- dually increases. In those seas where the constant mon- soonsprevail, where, consequently, the waves beat only on one side of the reef or island, it is natural that this side of the reef, exposed to the unremitting fury of the ocean, should be formed chiefly by broken-off blocks of coral, and fragments of shells, and first rise above the elements that created it. It is only these islands respecting the formation and nature of which we hitherto know any thing with certainty ; we are almost entirely without any observations on those in the Indian and Chinese Sea, which lie in the regions of the six months' monsoons. From the charts given of them, it is to be inferred that every side is equally advanced in formation. The lee side of such a coral reef in the Pacific Ocean, which is governed by the constant monsoons, frequently does not shew itself above the water, when the opposite side, from time immemorial, has attained perfection in the atmos- pheric region; the former reef is even interrupted in many places by intervals tolerably broad, and of the same depth as the inner sea, which have been left by nature, like open gates, for the exploring mariner to enter the internal calm and secure harbour. In their external CORAL ISLANDS. 387 form the coral islands do not resemble each other ; but this, and the extent of each, probably depends on the size of the submarine mountain tops, on which their basis is founded. Those islands which have more length than breadth, and are opposed in their greatest -extent to the winds and waves, are richer in fruitful islets than those whose situation is not so adapted to a quick formation. In the large island-chains, there are always some single islets which have the appearance of high land ; these lie upon an angle projecting into the sea, are exposed to the surf upon two sides, consist therefore almost entirely of large blocks of coral, and are destitute of smaller frag- ments of shells and coral sand to fill up the intervals. They are, therefore, not adapted to support plants re- quiring a depth of soil, and only afford a basis to high trees, provided with fibrous roots, (as the Pisonia, Cor- dia Sebastiana, L. ; Morinda citrifolia, L. ; and Pan- danus odoratissimus, L.), which, at a distance, give to these, always very small islands, the form of a hill. The inner shores of the island, exposed to the surf, consist of fine sand, which is washed up by the tide. Between the small islands under their protection, and even in the mid- dle of the inner sea, are found smaller pieces of coral, which seek a quiet abode, form in time, though very slowly, banks, till they at last reach the surface of the water ; gradually increase in extent ; unite with the islands that surround them ; and at length fill up the minor seas, so that what was at first a ring of islands, becomes one connected land. The islands which are so far formed, retain in the middle a flat plain, which is al- ways lower than the wall that surrounds them on the 388 ON THE GROWTH OF banks ; for which reason pools of water are formed in them, after a continued rain, — the only springs and wells they possess. One of the peculiarities of these islands is? that no dew falls in the evening, that they cause no tem- pests, and do not check the course of the wind. The very low situation of the country sometimes exposes the inha- bitants to great danger, and threatens their lives when the waves roll over their islands, if it happens that the equi- nox and full moon fall on the same day (consequently when the water has reached its greatest height), and a storm agitates the sea at the same time. These islands are said to be also shaken by earthquakes. MM. Quoy and Gaimard, in a lately published me- moir, propose, !<$£, To examine how corals raise their ha- bitations upon rocks, and what circumstances are favour- able or unfavourable to their growth. %d, To shew that there are no islands of any extent, constantly inha- bited by man, which are entirely formed of corals ; and that far from raising from the depths of the ocean per- pendicular walls, as has been alleged, these animals form only layers or crusts of a few fathoms thickness. The following, according to the French naturalists, is the manner in which this addition or superposition of madrepores is effected. In the places where the heat is constantly intense, where the land is indented by bays containing shallow and quiet water, which is not liable to be agitated by great surges, or by the re- gular breezes of the tropics, there also the saxigenous polypi multiply. They construct their habitations on the submarine rocks, envelope these rocks in whole or in part, but do not form them properly speaking. Thus, CORAL ISLANDS. 389 all those reefs, those girdles of madrepore, which are so frequently met with in the South Sea, to the leeward of islands, are shoals depending upon the conformation of the original ground, which will be perceived to belong to it when the direction of the mountains and hills has been attentively observed. It is always where the slopes are gentle, and the sea shallowest, that the greatest masses of madrepores are found. They sprout up if it is calm ; in the contrary case, they form only scattered tufts, be- longing to species which seem to be least affected by the agitation of the waters. It has been said, and it is even a matter of general be- lief among mariners, say MM. Quoy and Gaimard, that there occur in the equatorial seas shoals composed of co- rals, which rise from the greatest depths, like walls at the bottom of which the sounding line finds no ground. The fact certainly does exist in so far v* regards the depth spoken of ; and it is this very o*cumstance which is pro- ductive of so much danger to vessels, which, when taken in a calm and carried away by currents, cannot cast anchor in such places. But it is not correct to say that these reefs are entirety formed of madrepores. First, because the species which always form the most considerable banks, such as some meandrinae, certain caryophylleae, but espe- cially the astreae, adorned with the most beautiful and velvety colours, require the influence of light to per- fect them ; because they are not seen to grow beyond a few yards of depth ; and because they cannot consequent- ly be developed at a depth of ten or twelve hundred feet, as they would necessarily be, did they raise the cliffs in question. Besides, these different species of animals would then almost exclusively enjoy the privilege of living 390 ON THE GROWTH OF at all depths, under all degrees of pressure, and, so to speak, in all temperatures. Another circumstance to which navigators have not ad- verted, which corroborates the opinion here stated, isr that, in depths so great as those to which we allude, the sea, always agitated at the surface, breaks with force upon these reefs, without requiring for that purpose any addi- tional impulse from the winds. And by merely attend- ing to the necessary consequences of the observations of these same navigators, who say (what is very true) that, wherever the waves are agitated, the lithophytes are un- able to go on with their work, because they destroy their frail edifices, we shall acquire the moral certainty that these submarine steeps are not produced by these animal- cules. But, in these same places, let there occur a hol- low, a sheltered spot of some kind, and then they will im- mediately raise then habitations, and will contribute to diminish the little depth tKat already exists there. And this is what may be seen in almost all the places where an elevated temperature permits these animals to grow in abundance. In the localities where the tides are sensi\>lp, their cur- rents alone may sometimes form irregular canals between the madrepores, without their ever being encumbered with their species, from the twofold cause united, of the motion and the coldness of the water ; while, on the other hand, the flexible alcyonia are seen to multiply there. When these geological dispositions are carefully ob- served, we see that the zoophytes rise to the surface of the waves, never beyond it \ after which the generation which has attained thus far appears to die. It is de~ CORAL ISLANDS. 391 stroyed much sooner, if, from the effect of the tides, these frail animalcules are exposed naked to the action of a burning sun. When there occur small hollows in these heaps of inert spoils, deprived of their inhabitants, which are always covered by the water, several tufts of those lithophytes are still remarked, which, having escaped from the almost general destruction, glow with the most lively colours. Then, the families which are developed anew, not being able to build on the outside of those reefs on which the sea is constantly breaking, draw nearer and nearer the shore, where the waves now deadened have scarcely any more action upon them, as in the Isle of France, at Timor, the Papua, the Marian, and the Sandwich Islands ; provided always the waters had not a great depth, as is the case at Turtle Island, of which Cook speaks, where no bottom is found between the madrepore reefs and the island, notwithstanding the shortness of the space which exists between these two points. If we examine these animals in the places best adapted to their growth, we shall see their different species, the forms of which, as varied as they are elegant, become rounded into balls, spread out into fans, or ramify into trees, mingling together, blending with each other, and reflecting the varied hues of red, yellow, blue and violet. It is well known that all these alleged walls, exclusive- ly formed of corals, are intersected with openings through which the sea enters and retires with violence ; and every body knows the danger which Captain Cook ran on one occasion, on the coast of New Holland, when he had no other resource, in order to save himself from destruction, than to take the sudden resolution of attempting one of 392 ON THE GROWTH OF these narrow passes, where one is always sure of finding plenty of water. And this circumstance also comes in support of what we have advanced ; for, if these perpen- dicular walls were entirely composed of madrepores, they would present no deep openings in their continuity, be- cause it is the property of zoophytes to build in masses that have no interruption ; and because, again, could they raise themselves from very great depths, they would end with encumbering and shutting up these passages ; a cir- cumstance which does not take place, and probably never will, from the causes which we have related. If these facts prove, that madrepores cannot exist at very great depths, the submarine rocks, which they only increase in height, are not, therefore, exclusively formed by them. We now come to the second part of the argument ; and we assert, that there are no islands of any magnitude and constantly inhabited by man, that are formed by co- rals ; and that the layers which they construct under the water, are not more than a few fathoms in thickness. We shall commence with the second part of this ques- tion. The impossibility of penetrating to the bottom of the sea to examine at what precise depth the solid zoo- phytes establish themselves, constrains us to confine our- selves to what has taken place in former times; and the monuments which the ancient revolutions of the globe have disclosed to our view, will serve to prove what is going on in our own days. We shall mention what has been seen in several places, and we shall first speak of the island which Peron took for the theatre of the great works of these polypi, namely the island of Timor. The banks of coral which the sea has left exposed m CORAL ISLANDS. 893 the land, as it retired, are remarkable for their uncommon magnitude. The whole shores of Coupang are formed of them, and the low hills in its vicinity are enveloped in them ; but a few hundred yards from the town, they dis- appear, when distinct strata of slate make their appear- ance. The corals form a bed over the subjacent rocks from 25 to 80 feet thick. Every thing announces that, in the Island of Timor, there exist no mountains exclusively formed of corals. As in all extensive countries, they are composed of vari- ous substances. Quoy and Gaimard having coasted it for about fifty leagues, sufficiently near to enable them to form an idea of its geography, were able to see that it ex- hibited volcanic appearances in several parts. Besides it abounds in mines of gold and copper, which, in conjunc- tion with what we have already mentioned, shews in a general way the nature of the rocks of which it is com- posed. Perhaps, remarks Quoy and Gaimard, the Bald-Head, a mountain of King George's harbour in New Holland, which Vancouver has described in passing, and on the sum- mit of which he saw perfectly preserved branches of coral, might be adduced as a fact in opposition to the opinion here advanced. Yet the phenomenon exhibited there, is still precisely the same as at Timor, and in a thousand other places *. The zoophytes have built upon a basis previously existing, and they occupy only the surface of * A remarkable fact of this kind is related by Salt, in his second journey to Abyssinia. The Bay of Amphila, in the Red Sea, is formed, he says, of twelve islands, eleven of which are in part composed of al- luvial matters, consisting of corallines, madrepores, echinites, and a great variety of shells common in that sea. The height of these islands is sometimes thirty feet above high water. The small island, which dif- 394 ON THE GROWTH OF it. For why should this Bald-Head differ from Mount Gardner, which, although close by it, is formed of primi- tive rocks ? Besides, Peron says, that it has the same geo- logical constitution. (T. ii. p. 133.) At Rota, one of the Marian Isles, M. Gaudichaud, detached from the limestone rock, at about a hundred toises [above the level of the sea, branches of true, ma- drepores, in perfect preservation. Here are, then, three lo* calities in which they are found at great heights. We have observed them, say the French naturalists, at infinite- ly lower elevations in several other places, as at the Isle of France, where they form a bed' more than six feet thick, between two streams of lava ; at Wahou, one of the Sandwich Islands, where they have not a greater elevation, but extend for several hundred toises over the surface of the island. In all these cases, it is necessary to distin- guish between the lithophy tes, which have, by their living powers, formed continuous masses, from those which, after having been rolled about, broken down by the water, and mixed with sea shells, contribute to form those depo- sits known by the name of madrepore limestone. The latter sort is nothing but the debris of the former. De- posits of this description occur in the Marian Isles, and in those of the Papous ; they occur also on the coasts of France, and in several other places. It would appear from observations made in Timor and other places, that the species of the genus Astraea which fers from the elevea others, is composed of a solid limestone rock, in which veins of calcedony are observed. Does not this small island, we may ask, indicate that some cause has prevented the madrepores from covering it, while they constructed their habitations in the neighbour- hood, on bases which probably must be of the same nature as those of the small island ? CORAL ISLANDS. 395 are the only ones capable of covering immense extents of surface, do not commence their operations at a greater depth than twenty-five or thirty feet, in order to raise their habitations to near the surface of the sea. Frag- ments of these species are never obtained, either with the sounding line, or upon the anchors ; nor do we ever see them, unless in places where the water is shallow ; while the branched madrepores, which do not form thick and continuous beds, either on the elevated places which the ocean has left, or on the shores where they still exist, live at considerable depths. It is evident, then, that these corals have erected their fabrics on the^summits of submarine hills and mountains ; and that all those reefs of Taiti, the Dangerous Archi- pelago, Navigators'* Islands, the Friendly Islands, &c. are composed of madrepores only at the surface. We thus consider it demonstrated, that the rocks of the solid zoophytes or coral, are not capable of forming the im- mense bases on which the greater number of the islands that occur in the Pacific Ocean rest. There now remains for us to state how these animals, by their union, are capable of raising small islets. Fors- ter, as already stated, has given a very good description of the manner in which this is effected. In fact, when these animalcules have raised their habitations to the sur- face of the water, under the shelter of the land, and they remain uncovered during the reflux of the tide, the hurri- canes which sometimes supervene, by the agitation which they produce in those shallow waters, throw up from the bottom sand and mud. These substances are detained in the sinuosities and cavities formed between the corals, and thus serve to fix them together, and connect them in- 396 ON THE GROWTH OF to masses. Whenever the summit of this new island can remain constantly uncovered by the sea, and the waves can no longer destroy what they themselves have contri- buted to form, then its extent is enlarged, and its edges are gradually raised by the successive addition of sand. According to the direction of the winds and currents they may long remain sterile ; but if the seeds of vegetables be transported to them from the neighbouring shores, by the action of these two causes, then, in latitudes favourable to their development, we presently see these islands becoming covered with verdure, the successively accumulated remains of which form layers of soil, which contribute to the ele- vation of the surface. But, in order that this phenomenon of growth be ac- complished, the distance from land must not be too great, because then the vegetables cannot get so easily to the islets in question, which then remain almost always bare and sterile. And for this reason what navigators report of those madrepore Islands of the Great Ocean, which are covered with verdure, and are yet at a great distance from any known land, has always appeared to us extraordi- nary ; and that so much the more, that, in those vast spaces, the violence of the waves, which nothing can break there, must disturb the operations of the zoophytes. We do not, however, deny the existence of these islands, which it would be interesting carefully to examine anew ; for, whenever navigators meet with low islands between the Tropics, they do not hesitate, in compliance with the ge- nerally received opinion, to say that they consist of ma- drepores. Yet how many islands, which scarcely rise a- bove the surface of the water, recognise no such origin ? We may mention, as an example, the Island of Boni, si- CORAL ISLANDS. 397 tuated under the equator, the beautiful vegetation of which rises upon limestone. Cocoa Island, near Guam, is in the same condition, being also composed of lime- stone. In general, if they are inhabited, consequently they have springs or lakes of fresh water, we may almost be certain that they are not composed of lithophytes, or are only so in part, because springs could not be formed in their porous substances. Some of the Caroline Isles are excessively low ; we supposed them encrusted with madrepores ; and as they have inhabitants there must be somewhere in them a soil favourable to the accumula- tion of fresh water*. In restraining the power of these animalcules, con- cludes Quoy and Gaimard, and in pointing out the limits which nature has prescribed them, we have no other ob- ject than to furnish more correct data to the naturalists who aspire to great hypothetical considerations, regard- ing the conformation of the globe. On reconsidering these zoophytes with greater attention, they will no longer be seen filling up the basins of the seas, raising islands, increasing the size of the continents, threatening future generations with a solid equatorial circle formed of their spoils. Their influence, with regard to the road-steads or harbours, in which they multiply, is already great enough, without adding more to it. But, compared with * On glancing over the charts of Kotzebue's voyage, we are struck at seeing several of these islands grouped in a circular form, connected with one another by reefs which appear to consist of madrepores, and to present, by this arrangement, a small internal sea of great depth, to which an entrance is afforded by one or more openings. May not this arrangement be owing to submarine craters, on the edge of which the lithophytes have erected their habitations ? 398 ON THE LEVEL the masses on which they rest, what are their layers, of- ten interrupted, and which must be searched for with care, before they can be recognised, to the enormous volcanic peaks of the Sandwich Islands, the Island of Bourbon, the Moluccas, the Marian Islands, the mountains of Timor, New Guinea, &c. Sec. ? Nothing, certainly ; and the solid zoophytes are in no degree capable of being compared with the testaceous mollusca, with reference to the materials which they have furnished, and still con- tinue to furnish to the crust of the Globe. NOTE I, p. 33. ON THE LEVEL OF THE BALTIC. About the middle of the last century, a controversy took place among the natural philosophers of the north of Europe, regarding the alleged gradual lowering of the level of the sea in general, and of the Baltic Sea in particular. Celsius was the first who introduced this idea to notice. He generalised it by applying it to all the planets, and was supported by the authority of the celebrated Linnaeus. He soon perceived, however, that the point could never be settled by mere discussion, and that facts alone could lead to any certain result. Obser- vation was therefore had recourse to ; and thus the dis- pute in question had at least one good effect, that of di- recting to the subject the attention of men of science, whose situation might enable them to mark the varia- tions of level that take place along the coasts of the i OF THE BALTIC. 399 North Sea. The results of investigations undertaken for this purpose, are now beginning to be collected. In the course of 1820 and 1821, Mr Bruncrona, as- sisted by the officers of the Pilotage Establishment, and other qualified persons, undertook the examination of all the authentic measures that had been established upon the west coast of the Baltic, during the last half century. The results of this examination are given in a short memoir, inserted in the Swedish Transactions for 1823. The following table indicates the degree to which the level of the sea has fallen during the last forty years, on the coast of Sweden, at various latitudes. It is proper to remark, that, in some of the places observed, the mea- sures were much older, and in some others much more recent, than the period of forty years. In both these cases, the change of level that must have been effected during this period, has been estimated, by calculating the mean annual depression furnished by the observa- tions. Fall of sur- Latitude. face in forty years. Latitude. Fall of sur- face in forty years. Latitude. Fall of sur- face in forty years. East Coast. < Feet. East Coast. Feet. East Coast Feet. 63° 59' 1.50 59° 17' 2.17 56° 10' 0.00 2.50 58 44 1.00 56 11 0.00 0.50 58 42 1.08 55 53 0.00 61 43 Gl 37 2.50 2.83 58 45 58 35 1.17 2.00 South-W est Coast. 61 32 2.50 58 28 0.07 55 23 0.00 61 45 2.50 58 11 0.83 55 22 0.00 60 11 2.33 58 8 1.00 57 21 0.00 59 46 0.17 57 50 1.00 57 53 1.00 59 46 2.00 56 41 0.41 Of the facts collected in the course of this investiga- 400 ON THE LEVEL tion, the following may be mentioned as tending to sup- port the opinion of a fall of level. 1st, It is generally believed among the pilots of the Baltic, that the sea has become shallower along the course which vessels ordinarily follow ; but, it is added, that this alteration is more sensible in the places where the tide collects sand, detached pebbles, and sea-weeds, or in those where the bottom is composed of rocks. The same observation has been made in the neighbourhood of some large towns and fisheries ; for example, a hydrographic chart made in 1771, gives six fathoms for the mean depth of the sea opposite the har- bour of Landskrona, whereas, in 1817, the sounding line scarcely gave five fathoms at the same point. 2d, According to the oldest and most experienced pilots, the straits which separate the numerous islets scattered along the coast of Sweden, from Haarparanda to the frontiers of Norway, received vessels that drew ten feet of water ; now they are not practicable for boats that draw more than two or three feet. 3d, The pilots further affirm, that, along the whole coast of Bahusia, the bottom undergoes a diminution, which becomes sensible every ten years in certain places, where it is composed of rocks. Several other parts of the Baltic may be cited, in which a similar change has been remarked. M. C. P. Hallstrom, in an Appendix to Mr Bruncro- na^s Memoir, gives the following table of the diminution observed in the depth of the waters of the Gulf of Bothnia. LEVEL OF THE BALTIC. 401 .3 . .3 1 |.s l'| § 8* PLACES. if il ||l mber of a I X If £ p Raholem, parish of Lower Kalix, 1770 1750 2.05 50 4.10 1775 2.49 75 4.32 Stor Rebben, parish of Pitea, 1751 1785 1.70 34 5.00 1796 1.90 45 4.22 Ratan, parish of Bygdea, 1749 1785 2.70 36 4.72 1795 2.50 46 5.43 1819 2.60 70 3.47 1774 1785 0.55 11 5.00 1795 1.16 21 5.52 1819 1.60 45 3.57 1795 1819 0.65 24 2.71 Ronnskat, on the coast of Wasa, 1755 1797 1.70 42 4.05 1821 2.87 65 4.35 Wargon, on the coast of Wasa, 1755 1785 1.45 30 4.83 1797 1.69 42 4.02 1821 2.87 65 4.35 Logfrundet, near Sefle, 1731 1785 2.90 54 5.37 1796 2.17 65 3.34 Ulfon, in Angermanland, 1795 1822 1.58 27 5.85 It is not demonstrated that the numbers of the last column represent exactly the lowering of the water in a century ; for it has not yet been sufficiently determined if this lowering be uniform, or if it vary at different pe- riods, and if it depend upon some local circumstance,— upon the climate,— or upon the state of the atmosphere. Nor is it properly established, that this lowering, which becomes less perceptible from the north of the Baltic, un- til it disappears entirely at the southern extremity, fol- lows precisely the same law of diminution as the lati- tude. It appears to be uniform in the whole extent of the Gulf of Bothnia, and it rises about four feet and a quarter in that region ; at Cahnar (lat. 57° 5(X) it is on- c c 402 LEVEL OF THE BALTIC. ly two feet ; but it is not yet known whether it decreases in a regular manner between these two places. Some authors consider the facts related by MM. Bruncrona and Halstrom, as deciding the question in fa- vour of those who believe in a lowering of the level of the Baltic. The editor of the Annalen der Physik * goes farther, and seems to consider it as confirming the opi- nion of a general lowering of the level of the sea. In support of this opinion, he adduces the traditions and observations of the natives of Otaheite and of the Mo- luccas and Sunda Islands, regarding the retreat of the sea in several parts of their coast. We are disposed to stand neutral in this matter. The geographers who have collected the greatest number of facts relating to the le- vel of the inland seas, and of the ocean in its various re- gions, find nearly as many in favour of a rise as in favour of a fall of level. The very distribution of contrary in- dications, leads them to believe in a partial displacement of the mass of waters from one region towards another, and even from the one side of an inland sea towards the opposite side ; a displacement which might be owing to fugitive or more or less durable causes, such as a varia- tion of temperature in the polar regions, the action of winds and of currents, modified by the greater or less quantity of water in the rivers that feed the different ba- sins, upon the sides opposed to their direction. » 1824, St. 12. p. 443. Malt£ Brun. Precis de la Geogr. Univers. T. ii. p. 459. ; Cat- teau Calleville, TabL de la Mer Bait. T. i. p. 158, 188. LfcVEL OF THE BALTIC. 403 Are the facts contained in the memoir in question of a nature to overthrow this opinion ? They do not appear so to us. The two series of observations which are ad- duced, only shew a fall upon the coasts of Sweden, pro- perly so called, that is to say, upon the west coast of the Baltic, and the east coast of the Cattegat. Two obser- vations only have been made upon the coasts of Finland, toward the extremity of the Gulf of Bothnia. These facts would perfectly accord with the opinion of those who think that the currents determined from the north to the south of the Baltic by the numerous streams which rush into itj push the waters toward the south shore, that of Pomerania, Mecklenbourg, and Holstein ; and that the waters consequently gain upon the land on this coast, as numerous historical facts attest, while they retire along the northern shores, those of the Gulf of Bothnia. Be this as it may, the question as to the con- stancy of the level of the sea cannot be considered as de- cided, until a long series of observations shall have been made upon authentic and perfectly fixed measures erect- ed upon all Jhe shores of the different seas, and of the different regions of the ocean. Those which have been published in the Swedish Transactions furnish import- ant documents for this purpose ; and similar ones should be begun to be collected in other countries. The phenomena exhibited by the waters of the Baltic engaged the attention of two rival speculators^ Playfair and Deluc ; and their views are often alluded to by geo- logists. We shall here state them in their own words. Professor Playfair, in his well known and elegant work on the Huttonian Theory of the Earth, has the following remarks : 404 LEVEL OE THE OCEAN. " If we proceed further to the north, to the shores of the Baltic for instance, we have undoubted evidence of a change of level in the same direction as on our own shores. The level of the sea has been represented as lowering at so great a rate as forty inches in a century. Celsius observed, that several rocks which are now above the water, were not long ago sunken rocks, and danger- ous to navigators ; and he took particular notice of one which, in the year 1680, was on the surface of the wa- ter, and, in the year 1731, was 20 J Swedish inches above it. From an inscription near Aspo, in the lake Melar, which communicates with the Baltic, engraved, as is supposed, about five centuries ago, the level of the sea appears to have sunk in that time no less than thirteen Swedish feet. All these facts, with many more which it is unnecessary to enumerate, make the gradual depres- sion, not only of the Baltic, but of the whole Northern Ocean, a matter of certainty." — Playfaifs Illustrations, p. 445. That indefatigable and accurate observer De Luc, ha* the following commentary on the preceding passage . " It would be unnecessary- to mention even the two in- considerable facts above, if the depression of the level of the seas were indeed a matter of certainty ; for the best authenticated and the least equivocal monuments of their change would then abound along all their coasts. But proofs are every where found that such a change is chi- merical : they may be seen in all the vales coming down to these seas, in which there is no perceptible impression of the action of any waters but those of the land, and no vestige, through their whole extent, of any permanent abode of those of the sea ;^ and proofs to the same effect 2 LEVEL OF THE OCEAN. 405 are equally visible, along the coasts of both these seas, in all the new lands which have been formed on them, and which, being perfectly horizontal from the point where their formation commenced, evidently show that the water displaced by them has been constantly at the same level. Hence appears the necessity of multiplying, as I have done, and shall continue to do, for the subver- sion of a prejudice of such ancient date, the examples of these peremptory proofs of its total want of founda- tion. The rock mentioned by Celsius had probably been observed by him at times when the level of the sea was different ; its known differences much exceeding the quantity here specified. As for the inscription near Aspo, in a country abounding with lakes as much as that which I have above described, if we are acquainted with its tterms, we should probably find it to be, like many which I have seen in various places along the course of the Oder and the Elbe, the monument of some extraordinary inundation of the land, from the sudden melting of the snows in the mountains, at a time when the water had been prevented from running off by an equally extraordinary rise of the level of the sea ; of which the effects on low coasts may extend very far inland. " By this conclusion, however, from these few facts, contrary to every thing observed on the coasts of this sea, Mr Playfair thinks himself authorised to maintain, that the gradual depression, not only of the Baltic, but of the whole northern ocean, is a matter of certainty ; af- terwards he examines merely which of these two causes, the subsidence of the sea itself, or the elevation of the land around it, agrees the best with the phenomena ; and he decides in favour of the latter, pointing out its accor- dance with the Huttonian Theory."" 406 FOSSIL REMAINS OF MAN. NOTE L, p. 119. FOSSIL REMAINS OF THE HUMAN SPECIES. FROM the observations of Werner and others, it ap- pears, that the most simple animals are those first met with in a mineralized state ; that these are succeeded by others more perfect, and which are contained in newer formations ; and that the most perfect, as quadrupeds, occur only in the newest formation. But we naturally inquire, have no remains of the human species been hi- therto discovered in any of the formations ? Judging from the arrangement already mentioned, we would na- turally expect to meet with remains of man in the new- est of the formations. In the writings of ancient au- thors there are descriptions of anthropolithi. In the year 1577, Fel. Plater, Professor of Anatomy at Basle, described several fossil bones of the elephant found at Lucerne, as those of a giant at least nineteen feet high. The Lucemese were so perfectly satisfied with this discovery, that they caused a painting to be made of the giant, as he must have appeared when alive, assumed two such giants as the supporters of the city arms, and had the painting hung in their public hall. The Land- voigt Engel, not satisfied with this account of these re- mains, maintained that our planet, before the creation of the present race of men, was inhabited by fallen angels, and that these bones were part of the skeletons of some of those miserable beings. Scheuchzer published an en- graving and description of a fossil human skeleton, which proved to be a gigantic species of salamander or proteus. FOSSIL REMAINS OF MAN. 407 Spallanzani describes a hill of fossil human bones in the island of Cerigo ; but this also is an error, as has Been satisfactorily shewn by Blumenbach. Lately, however, a fossil human skeleton has been imported into this coun- try from Guadaloupe, by Sir Alexander Cochrane. It is imbedded in a block of calcareous stone, composed of particles of limestone and coral, and which, like the ag- gregations of shells found on the limestone coasts in some parts of this country, has acquired a great degree of hardness. It is therefore an instance of a fossil human petrifaction in an alluvial formation. The engraving here given is copied from the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London ; and the following de- scription of the fossil remains it exhibits is that of Mr Konig, which has been drawn up with great care. " The situation of the skeleton in the block was so superficial, that its presence in the rock on the coast had probably been indicated by the projection of some of the more elevated parts of the left fore-arm. " The operation of laying the bones open to view, and of reducing the superfluous length of the block at its extremities, being performed with all the care which its •excessive hardness, and the relative softness of the bones, required, the skeleton exhibited itself in the manner re- presented in the annexed drawing (PI. I.) with which my friend Mr Alexander has been so good as to illus- trate this description. " The skull is wanting ; a circumstance which is the more to be regretted, as this characteristic part might possibly have thrown some light on the subject under consideration, or would, at least, have settled the ques- tion, whether the skeleton is that of a Carib, who used 408 FOSSIL REMAINS OF MAN. to give the frontal bone of the head a particular shape by compression, which had the effect of depressing the upper and protruding the lower edge of the orbits, so as to make the direction of their opening nearly upwards, or horizontal, instead of vertical *. " The vertebrae of the neck were lost with the head. The bones of the thorax bear all the marks of conside- rable concussion, and are completely dislocated. The seven true ribs of the left side, though their heads are not in connexion with the vertebrae, are complete ; but only three of the false ribs are observable. On the right side only fragments of these bones are seen ; but the upper part of the seven true ribs of this side are found on the left, and might at first sight be taken for the ter- mination of the left ribs ; as may be seen in the draw- ing. The right ribs must therefore have been violently broken and carried over to the left side, where, if this mode of viewing the subject be correct, the sternum must likewise lie concealed below the termination of the ribs. The small bone dependent above the upper ribs of the left side, appears to be the right clavicle. The right os humeri is lost ; of the left nothing remains except the condyles in connexion with the fore-arm, which is in the state of pronation ; the radius of this side exists nearly in its full length, while of the ulna the lower part only remains, which is considerably pushed upwards. Of the two bones of the right fore-arm, the inferior terminations are seen. Both the rows of the bones of the wrists are lost, but the whole metacarpus of the left hand is dis- played, together with part of the bones of the fingers : * See the excellent figures in Blumenbach's Decades. FOSSIL REMAINS OF MAN. 40$ the first joint of the fore-finger rests on the upper ridge of the os pubis ; the two others, detached from their me- tacarpal bones, are propelled downwards, and situated at the inner side of the femur, and below the foramen mag- num ischii of this side. Vestiges of three of the fingers of the right hand are likewise visible, considerably be- low the lower portion of the fore-arm, and close to the upper extremity of the femur. The vertebrae may be traced along the whole length of the column, but are in no part of it well defined. Of the os sacrum, the supe- rior portion only is distinct : it is disunited from the last vertebra and the ilium, and driven upwards. The left os ilium is nearly complete, but shattered, and one of the fragments depressed below the level of the rest ; the ossa pubis, though well defined, are gradually lost in the mass of the stone. On the right side, the os innomina- tum is completely shattered, and the fragments are sunk : but towards the acetabulum, part of its internal cellular structure is discernible. " The thigh-bones, and the bones of the leg of the right side, are in good preservation, but being conside- rably turned outwards, the fibula lies buried in the stone, and is not seen. The lower part of the femur of this side is indicated only by a bony outline, and appears to have been distended by the compact limestone that fills the cavities both of the bones of the leg and thigh, and to the expansion of which, these bones probably owe their present shattered condition. The lower end of the left thigh-bone appears to have been broken and lost in the operation of detaching the block ; the two bones of the leg, however, on this side, are nearly complete ; the tibia was split almost the whole of its length a little be- 410 ON THE ALLUVIUM OF THE PO. low the external edge, and the fissure being filled up with limestone, now presents itself as a dark -coloured straight line. The portion of the stone which contained part of the bones of the tarsus and metatarsus, was unfortunate- ly broken ; but the separate fragments are preserved. " The whole of the bones, when first laid bare, had a mouldering appearance, and the hard surrounding stone could not be detached without frequently injuring their surface ; but after an exposure for some days to the air, they acquired a considerable degree of hardness. Sir H. Davy, who subjected a small portion of them to chemi- cal analysis, found that they contained part of their ani- mal matter, and all their phosphate of lime.*" NOTE M, p. 128. Account of the Displacement of that part of the Coast of the Adriatic which is occupied by the Mouths of the Po. THAT portion of the shore of the Adriatic which lies between the lake, or rather lagune, of Commachio, and the lagunes of Venice, has undergone considerable alte- rations since ancient times, as is attested by authors wor- thy of entire credit, and as is still evinced by the actual state of the soil in the districts near the coast ; but it is impossible now to give any exact detail of the successive progress of these changes, and more especially of their precise measures during the ages which preceded the twelfth century of our era. ON THE ALLUVIUM OF THE PO. 411 We are, however, certain, that the city of Hatria, now called Adria, was formerly situated on the edge of the coast ; and by this we attain a known fixed point upon the primitive shore, whence the nearest part of the pre- sent coast, at the mouth of the Adige, is at the distance of 25,000 metres * ; and it will be seen in the sequel, that the extreme point of the alluvial promontory formed by the Po, is farther advanced into the sea than the mouth of the Adige by nearly 10,000 metres •(•. The inhabitants of Adria have formed exaggerated pretensions, in many respects, as to the high antiquity of their city, though it is undeniably one of the most an- cient in Italy, as it gave name to the sea which once washed its walls. By some researches made in its inte- rior and its environs, a stratum of earth has been found mixed with fragments of Etruscan pottery, and with no- thing whatever of Roman manufacture. Etruscan and Roman pottery are found mixed together in a superior bed, on the top of which the vestiges of a theatre have been discovered. Both of these beds are far below the level of the present soil. I have seen at Adria very cu- rious collections, in which these remains of antiquity are separately classed ; and having, some years ago, observed to the viceroy, that it would be of great importance, both • Equal to 27,340 yards and 10 inches English measure, or 154 miles and 60 yards. In these reductions of the revolutionary French metres to English mea- sure, the metre is assumed as 39,37 English inches.— Transl. •f Or 10,936 yards and 4 inches, equal to 6 miles and nearly a quar- ter, English measure. Hence the entire advance of the alluvial promontory of the Po appears to have extended to 21 miles 5 furlongs and 216 yards. — Transl. 412 ON THE ALLUVIUM OF THE PO. to history and geology, to make a thorough search into these buried remains at Adria, carefully noticing the le- vels in comparison with the sea, both of the primitive soil, and of the successive alluvial beds, his Highness en- tered warmly into my ideas ; but I know not whether these propositions have been since carried into effect. Following the coast, after leaving Hatria, which was situated at the bottom of a small bay or gulf, we find to the south a branch of the Athesis or Adige, and of the Fossa Philistina, of which the remaining trace corre- sponds to what might have been the Mincio and Tartaro united, if the Po had still run to the south of Ferrara. We next find the Delta Venetum, which seems to have occupied the place where the lake or lagune of Comma- chio is now situated. This delta was traversed by seven branches of the Eridanus or Po, formerly called also the Vadls Padus or Podincus ; which .river, at the diramifi- cation of these seven branches, and upon its left or north- ern bank, had a city named Trigoboli, whose site could not be far from where Ferrara now stands. Seven lakes, inclosed within this delta, were called Septem Maria, and Hatria was sometimes denominated Urbs Septem Marium, or the city of the seven seas or lakes. Following the coast from Hatria to the northwards, we come to the principal mouth of the Athesis or Adige, formerly named Fossa Philistina, and afterwards Es- tuarium Altini, an interior sea, separated by a range of small islands from the Adriatic Gulf, in the middle of which was a cluster of other small isles, called Rialtum, and upon this archipelago the city of Venice is now seat- ed. The Estuarium Altini is what is now called the Lagune of Venice, and no longer communicates with the ON THE ALLUVIUM OF THE PO. 413 sea, except by five passages, the small islands of the Ar- chipelago having been united into a continuous dike. To the east of the lagunes, and north from the city of Este, we find the Euganian mountains, or hills, forming, in the midst of a vast alluvial plain^ a remarkable iso- lated group of rounded hills, near which spot the fable of the ancients supposes the fall of Phaeton to have taken place. Some writers have supposed that this fable may have originated from the fall of some vast masses of in- flamed matters near the mouths of the Eridanus, that had been thrown up by a volcanic explosion ; and it is certain that abundance of volcanic products are found in the neighbourhood of Padua and Verona. The most ancient notices that I have been able to procure respecting the situation of the shores of the Adri- atic at the mouths of the Po, only begin to be precise in- the twelfth century. At that epoch the whole waters of this river flowed to the south of Ferrara, in the Po de Volano and the Po di Primaro, branches which inclosed the space occupied by the lagune of Commachio. The two branches which were next formed by an irruption of the waters of the Po to the north of Ferraro, were named the river of Corbola, Longola, or Mazzorno, and the river Tol. The former, and more northern of these, received the Tartaro, or canal bianco, near the sea, and the latter was joined at Ariano by another branch deriv- ed from the Po, called the Goro river. The sea-coast was evidently directed from south to north, at the distance of ten or eleven thousand metres* from the meridian of Adria ; and Loreo, to the north of Mesola, was only about 2000 metres^ from the coast. * Equal to 10,936 or 12,030 yards English measure.-— Trans!. f Or 2,186 yards 2 feet English — Transl. 414 dN THE ALLUVIUM OF THE PO. Towards the middle of the twelfth century, the flood- waters of the Po were retained on their left or northern side by dikes near the small city of Ficarolo, which is about 19,000 metres* to the north-west of Ferrara, spreading themselves southwards over the northern part of the territory of Ferrara and the Polesine of Rovigo, and flowed through the two formerly mentioned canals of Mazzorno and Toi. It seems perfectly ascertained, that this change in the direction of the waters of the Po had been produced by the effects of human labours ; and the historians who have recorded this remarkable fact only differ from each other in some of the more minute de- tails. The tendency of the river to flow in the new chan- nels, which had been opened for the more ready dis- charge of its waters when in flood, continually increased; owing to which the two ancient chief branches, the Vola- no and Primaro, rapidly decreased, and were reduced in less than a century to their present comparatively insig- nificant size ; while the main direction of the river was established between the mouth of the Adige to the north, and what is now called Porto di Goro, on the south. The two before-mentioned canals of Mazzorno and Toi becoming insufficient for the discharge, others were dug; and the principal mouth, called Bocco Tramontana, or the northern mouth, having approached the mouth of the Adige, the Venetians became alarmed in 1604 ; when they excavated a new canal of discharge, named Taglio de Porto Viro, or Po delle Fornaci, by which means the Bocco Maestro, was diverted from the Adige towards the south. • Or 20,778 yards 1 foot 10 inches — Transl ON TttE ALLUVIUM OF THE PC. During four centuries, from the end of the twelfth to that of the sixteenth, the alluvial formations of the Po gained considerably upon the sea. The northern mouth, which had usurped the situation of the Mazzorno canal, becoming the Rama di Trimontana, had advanced in 1600 to the distance of 20,000 metres * from the meri- dian of Adria ; and the southern mouth, which had ta- ken possession of the canal of Toi, was then 17,000 me- tres •(• advanced beyond the same point. Thus the shore had become extended nine or ten thousand metres J to the north, and six or seven thousand to the south §. Be- tween these two mouths there was formerly a bay, or a part of the coast less advanced than the rest, called Sac- ca di Goro. During the same period of four hundred years previous to the commencement of the seventeenth century, the great and extensive embankments of the Po were constructed ; and also, during the same period, the southern slopes of the Alps began to be cleared and cul- tivated. The great canal, denominated Taglio di Porto Viro^ or Podelle Fornaci, ascertains the advance of the alluvial depositions in the vast promontory now formed by the mouths or delta of the Po. In proportion as their en- trances into the sea extend from the original land* the yearly quantity of alluvial depositions increases in an alarming degree, owing to the diminished slope of the • Or 21,872 yards TransL |Or 18,591 yards.— Transl. $ Equal to 9,842 or 10,936 yards Transl § Equal to 6,564 or 7,655 yards— Transl. 416 ON THE ALLUVIUM OF THE t>O. streams, which was a necessary consequence, of the pro- longation of their bed, to the confinement of the waters between dikes, and to the facility with which the increas- ed cultivation of the ground enabled the mountain tor- rents which flowed into them to carry away the soil. Owing to these causes, the bay called Sacra di Goro was very soon filled up, and the two promontories which had been formed by the two former principal mouths of Mazzorno and jTo«, were united into one vast projecting cape, the most advanced point of which is now 32,000 or 33,000 metres * beyond the meridian of Adria : so that in the course of two hundred years, the mouths or delta of the Po have gained about 14,000 metres^ upon the sea. From all these facts, of which I have given a brief •enumeration, the following results are clearly establish- ed. First, That, at some ancient period, the precise date of which cannot be now ascertained, the waves of the Adriatic washed the walls of Adria. Secondly, That, in the twelfth century, before a pas- sage had been opened for the waters of the Po at Ficar- rolo ; on its left or northern bank, the shore had been al- ready removed to the distance of nine or ten thousand metres \ from Adria. * From 19 miles 7 furlongs and 15 yards, to 20 miles 4 furlongs and 9 yards, English measure — Transl f Or 15,366 yards Transl. $ Equal to 9,842 or 10.936 .yards.— Transl. ON THE ALLUVIUM OF THE PO. 417 Thirdly, That the extremities of the promontories formed by the two principal branches of the Po, before the excavation of the Taglio di Porto Viro, had extend- ed, by the year 1600, or in four hundred years, to a me- dium distance of 18,500 metres * beyond Adria; giving, from the year 1200, an average yearly increase of the al- luvial land of 25 metres -f*. Fourthly, That the extreme point of the present sin- gle promontory, formed by the alluvions of the existing branches, is advanced to between thirty-two and thirty- three thousand metres J beyond Adria ; whence the ave- rage yearly progress is about seventy metres § during the last two hundred years, being a greatly more rapid propor- tion than in former times. PRONY. NOTE, p. 244. On the Universal Deluge. MR CUVIER in the present work, and more recently in a note to Mr Lemaire's edition of Ovid's Metamorphoses, enumerates the Mosaic, Grecian, Assyrian, Persian, In- dian, and Chinese traditions, concerning a universal de- • Or 20,231 yards — TransL f Exactly 27 yards 1 foot and |th of an inch English.— Transl. J Already stated at from 19| to 201 miles; or more precisely, from 34,995 yards I foot 8 inches, to 36,089 yards 10 inches English measure. — Transl. § Equal to 76 yards 1 foot 7 inches and 9-iOths Transl. Dd 418 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. luge ; and concludes from them, that the surface of the globe, five or six thousand years ago, underwent a gene- ral and sudden revolution, by which the lands inhabited by the human beings who lived at that time, and by the various species of animals known at the present day, were overflowed by the ocean ; out of which emerged the present habitable portions of the globe. This celebiated naturalist maintains, that these regions of the earth were peopled by the few individuals who were preserved, and that the tradition of the catastrophe has been pre- served among these new races of people, variously mo- dified by the difference of their situation and their social disposition. According to Mr Cuvier, similar revolu- tions of nature had taken place, at periods long antece- dent to that of the Mosaic deluge. The dry land was in- habited, if not by human beings, at least by land animals at an earlier period ; and must have been changed from the dry land to the bed of the ocean ; and it might even be concluded from the various species of animals con- tained in it, that this change, as well as its opposite, had occurred more than once. This opinion being brought forward in a geognostic work, especially in a work abounding in such valuable matters of fact, and stated as the result of geognostic in- vestigation, we may be permitted, in this point of view, to examine it ; and to ask, whether, from the phenomena exhibited by the present condition of the earth's surface, we are entitled to conclude that it owes its conformation to such a universal deluge. *?** We know, from arguments suggested by chemistry and the higher mechanics, that the globe was once in a state of fluidity ; hence it might be maintained with some ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 419 appearance of probability, that the condition of the earth, previous to the existence of organic matter, depended upon fusion ; and that the primitive rocks are of igneous origin. Since, however, granite has been found above rocks of various kinds which contain the remains of or- ganic bodies, we are under no necessity of ascribing to primitive rocks an origin different from that of subse- quent formations ; and, without having recourse to other arguments, the fact, that aquatic animals are the most abundant of fossil organic remains from the earliest of the transition to the latest of the secondary and tertiary formations, affords evidence that they are precipitates from water. Notwithstanding the great and daily advancement of science, our knowledge of chemistry is still too imperfect for us to arrive at an adequate knowledge of the state of this water, or rather sea, as, from its universal expansion, it must be denominated. Did it contain dissolved in it at the same time all the materials from which the various beds of rock were formed ; what were the solvents of those materials which we find, either insoluble in water, or at least not easily soluble ; by what means were the precipitates produced ; and whence came this prodigious mass of waters ? Upon these unanswered questions de- pend others no less important. The aquatic animals of a former world undoubtedly lived in this sea ; otherwise, we must admit of another sea free from heterogeneous mate- rials. But did these animals continue to live in it during the whole process of precipitation ; and did this process proceed so slowly and imperceptibly, that animal life was not interrupted by it, and that only remains of dead animals, such as the skeletons of fishes, and the covering 420 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. of shell-fishes, were enveloped in the precipitates ? Or, did animal life continue only during the state of solu- tion ; and were the myriads of aquatic animals found in beds of rocks buried in them alive ? Many naturalists appear to entertain the latter opinion, from observing the agonies of death depicted in the distorted position of fishes in copper-slate, or from deriving the bituminous properties of stink-stone, as well as of marl, from the decomposition of animal bodies, of which such numerous vestiges are extant in these beds ? In this way a plausi- ble explanation is given of the phenomena of a former world that has perished. How, then, do they explain the constant appearance of so many species, which have continued without interruption for such an infinite length of time ? Have these species been propagated by indi- viduals who accidentally escaped destruction : or, Does a new race continually spring up again ? But laying aside the difficulty of this explanation, the violent de- struction of so many races of animals, is scarcely consist- ent with the general order of the universe, according to which, we behold every animal occupying its proper ele- ment, and fulfilling its particular destiny. We, there- fore, involuntarily revert to the opinion, that those crea- tures, whose remains are preserved in beds of rocks, have lived continually in the sea, out of which the rocks were precipitated, in the same manner as the analogous species now living in the sea become enveloped in depo- sits still taking place, although on a comparatively small scale. What has just been said does not entitle us to admit that the various parts of the earth have been, from time to time, overflowed with water. Yet are there other ap- ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 421 pearances which completely indicate such a change, namely, beds of coal, and the fossil remains of land ani- mals. The carbonisation of roots of trees in clefts of rocks, and of marsh plants in peat-bogs, which takes place, as it were, under our own immediate observation ; the transitions of bituminous wood into pitch-coal, the frequent presence of vegetables partly converted into coal, in the neighbourhood of beds of coal, and which are more abundant the nearer they are to these beds ; and, finally, the chemical nature of coal, which is similar to that of vegetables, go to prove the vegetable origin of the older and independent coal formation. Though some fossil vegetables might derive their origin, by being floated to quarters more or less remote from their native soil, as we find to be the case in many islands of the South Sea, and on other shores ; on the other hand, neither the breadth and extent of beds of coal, nor the erect position in which fossil trees and reed plants are not unfrequently found in their neighbourhood, coincide with such an explanation. The plants, from which these beds were formed, once stood and grew in the place where they were buried ; and, from these remains, we infer that they were entire- ly land plants, tree-ferns, Lycopodia, and other crypto- gamia. It also appears undeniable, that the land, being once dry, was, during a longer or shorter time, covered with luxuriant vegetation ; that it was afterwards over- flowed with water, and then became dry land again. But, was this overflow of water produced by a sudden, violent, and universal catastrophe, such as we consider the deluge ? Many circumstances leave room for opposite conjecture. If it is probable that the older or black coal ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. is of vegetable origin, the plants from which it has origina- ted, must have suffered an incomparably greater change than those of more recent coal formations. Their com- position and their texture, afford evidence of a long opera- tion of the fluid in which the changes were produced ; and their situation, proves that the substance of the plants, though not entirely dissolved, was yet much com- minuted, and was kept floating and swimming, and then precipitated. How can we, in any other way, account for the layers of sandstone and slate-clay, with which coal regularly alternates, so that from one to sixty alter- nate beds have been enumerated ? How can we explain the combination of mineral coal with slate-clay, or ac- count for the appearance of bituminous shale, flinty slate, of iron-pyrites and iron-ore, in the midst of mineral coal itself ? We do not, however, admit of a repeated uncover- ing and covering of the land with water, and of a renewal of vegetation for every particular bed of coal ; far from it, for violent inundations exhibit very different phenomena, These formations, like pure mineral formations, bear the evident impress of a lengthened operation, and of gentle precipitations ; and whoever still entertains doubts re- garding this, may have them completely removed by the condition in which vegetable remains are frequently found in the coal formations, by the perfect preservation of the most delicately shaped fern leaves, by the upright position of stems, and by other appearances of a similar character. It is also an important objection against the universality of the cover of water, notwithstanding the wide extent of beds of coal, that they are sometimes ac- companied with fossil remains of fresh-water shells, from ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 423 which we are entitled to draw the conclusion, that they must have been deposited in inclosed basins of inland waters. From the beds of coal found in various situations among Alpine limestone, as well as in other secondary formations, under similar circumstances, we are at liber- ty to maintain that they are not indebted for their origin to any universal and sudden revolution. When we proceed to the second division of coal for- mations, to brown coal, or to lignite, the principal diffe- rence we discover is, that the change which the vegeta- bles have undergone, having taken place at a time when the chemical power had lost much of its energy, was in- complete ; and besides, we observe in the different brown coal formations the same repetition of single beds alternating with other beds of rocks, the mixture of different minerals, and not unfrequently of upright stems. Some appear to be derived from sea plants, and others from fresh-water plants ; but the greater pro- portion from land plants. They, equally with the beds of black coal, give evidence of a new overflow of water, and the water plants themselves, which never thrive at a great depth, and which frequently appear under prodi- gious beds of rocks, must have experienced such a change. But that change was scarcely of the kind which we understand by a deluge, and the frequent repeti- tion of deluges indicated, according to some, by the re- peated beds of coal from the transition to the newest ter- tiary periods, is hardly credible. It may be maintained, with more certainty, of brown coal than of black coal, that they have been formed in land water, and hence in 424 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. limited and isolated basins of water, since fresh-water animals are their constant attendants. Although the beds of coal of our secondary formations appear to have originated in a similar way with other mineral formations, and not by violent catastrophes, it is otherwise with a part of those vegetable remains which are met with in alluvial land. Subterranean forests, whose circumference, in some instances, extends about 70 square leagues, partly in a state of good preservation, and partly more or less decomposed, afford satisfactory proof of deluges, and have undoubtedly been covered up with earth by a violent eruption of standing or running water. But these are local effects, similar to what take place in our own day, but on a larger scale. There are abundant fossil remains of land animals, re- sembling those of water animals, found in such a state of preservation, that we cannot suppose them to have been brought hither from distant places, and by means of cur- rents. Their appearing in beds of rocks, or generally in aqueous precipitates, proves that the soil they first in- habited, must have been dry land, afterwards overflowed with water. The appearance of what are called fresh water shells, in alternate beds with marine animals, being sometimes observed in newer floetz rocks in great abundance, seems to indicate a reiterated retreat and return of the sea. But however meritorious the labours of naturalists, through whom attention has been directed to the subject, may be in other respects, we are nevertheless disposed to entertain doubts concerning their conclusions. In our own seas and ponds upon the coasts, we observe the same ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 425 testaceous animals growing equally well in salt water 9 and in water nearly fresh ; and, again, fresh water ani- mals living in salt water *. By artificial means the inha- bitants of the sea may be changed into inhabitants of fresh water ; as fresh- water animals are, in their turn, converted into marine animals, so that, to decide con- cerning the proper element of each individual species is often matter of difficulty. Therefore, other circum- stances besides that of containing salt must be taken into account. The occasional plenty, scarcity, or absolute want of food ; the soil being sometimes sandy, slimy, or rocky ; the depth, extent, agitation or tranquillity of the water ; and, finally, the quality of the air contained in it, may be as instrumental in determining the habitation of these animals, as the materials which the water holds in solution. An excellent observer has indeed very lately shewn in a treatise, which supports the idea of fresh-water formations, that we possess no unerring character for dis- tinguishing sea shell-fish from those of fresh water ; but admitted, notwithstanding the transition above stated, we can draw a line of distinction between them, we must not forget that this investigation is neither regarding sea shell- fish now existing, nor of our present waters. We indeed draw our conclusion, and not without reason, from similar conformation, similar modes of existence. But one of two things must be ; either that the shell-fish, whose remains are found in beds of rocks, lived in the water out of which these beds were precipitated, or the water in which they lived, was dislodged by other water containing the * In the salt lakes of Westphalia, we find Lymnaea and fresh water plants in abundance. 426 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. materials of the precipitations. In the first and more generally admitted case, the water was so different from the present water, whether salt or fresh, that we cannot infer from the inhabitants of the latter any thing concerning the inhabitants of the former ; but we can confidently maintain, that a greater resemblance pre- vails between our sea and land water, than between either the one or the other, and that fluid which was inhabited by the shell-fish. In other respects, there remains no other difference between fresh and salt water formations, but that the bottom upon which the former is placed once contained land water ; a fact worthy of observation : but the notion of enclosed basins, and of isolated forma- tions originating in them, the way in which fresh water formations are supposed to have taken place, remained a long time unsatisfactory. Finally, we may be permit- ted to ask, upon what grounds they considered themselves entitled to ascribe to the former sea the continual posses- sion of a portion of salt, while the salt precipitates appear only at particular intervals, and after long interruptions ? If the sea occasionally contained a great, and sometimes a very small, quantity of salt, it might equally be at times altogether without it. And yet it deserves to be remem- bered, that the beds of rock, to which the salt formations are most nearly related, contain no petrifactions ; that, therefore, the so-called marine animals are wanting in those periods during which we have any direct evidence of the presence of salt water. There is, however, a geognostic fact, which, in prefe- rence to all others, has been cited in evidence of violent re- volutions and deluges, that is, the appearance of conglome- rates or of reproduced kinds of stone. Indeed, there might ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 427 still be a wide field for investigation here, and more than one formation, which now passes for sandstone, might be acknowledged as an original and chemical production ; without having occasion to go so far as Mr Gerhard does with grey wacke, — that is, to consider them as immediate precipitates from the atmosphere. But still conglome- rates sufficiently genuine, will remain from the tran- sition period through all the subsequent formations, to serve as acknowledged monuments of destruction, as well as of the renovation of what was destroyed. These are the Codices rescripti, in the archives of the Earth, out of which, the antiquarian will one day de- cipher the almost obliterated traces of her former condi- tion, as well as the history of her changes. Though these conglomerates deviate so much in their nature, and in the character of their origin, from chemical productions, they have yet among themselves this remarkable and common characteristic, that, with few exceptions, the old- er are much less varied in character, and more extensive in distribution, than the newer, and that, at length, the newest conglomerates become mere local appearances. But, in reference to the main question which engages our attention, we may conjecture that the beds of rocks from which the sea had never retreated, might be assail- ed by its floods and currents, and shattered to pieces, as happens even in our own time, and the fragments be again reunited into solid rocks, by means of the still re- maining dissolved matter in the water. But of many conglomerates it is evident that they have been deposited on the dry land, in the same way as our gravels. Ju- piter, who took counsel with himself, whether he would 428 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. destroy the sinful world with fire or water, and at length decided for water *, may not be so justly considered the author of these appearances, as Saturn, who devoured his children. Or, to be less metaphorical in our language, it may perhaps have been with the origin of conglomerates, as it is in our own day with the origin of fragments of rock and boulders, in which the rock being fractured in various places by the alternations of heat and cold, by the influ- ence of air and atmospheric water, falls into pieces of greater or smaller magnitude, which are carried forward by the water, and gradually rounded in their progress, so that they assume a more perfectly globular shape the farther they are removed from their original situation. Therefore, as regards the foregoing enquiry, it is not an unimportant circumstance, that the long but continual rolling of the boulders during their rounding, appears to be much more efficacious than a rapid and violent im- petus, and that, in this case, as in many other geognostic appearances, time rather than force is to be taken into account. Another circumstance, perhaps, corresponds with this, that the change produced by the weather, not only by the first disunion, but also by the progressive disintegration of the rocks, by the blunting of the edges and corners, by the diminution of the fragments, and generally in the origin of the boulders and fragments of rocks of every description, has just as much influence as * " Jamque eral in tolas sparsurus fulmina terras, •4 Tela reponuntur, manibus fabricata Cyclopum : " Poena placet diversa ; genus mortale sub undis " Perdere, et ex omni nimbos dimittere coelo." 1 OVID. Met. lib. i. v. 255. ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 429 the mechanical operation of the water ; and that a great part of the land called Alluvial, generally owes its exis- tence to this cause *. But if, upon farther consideration, the conglomerates appear to derive their origin in a simi- lar way with rolled masses of gravel, they afford evi- dence, nevertheless, of the elevated station of the water in the neighbourhood, from which they had been before removed ; for their conglomeration could take place only under water ; and, with few exceptions, they occupy an incomparably greater elevation than any of the coal for- mations, or any of the beds of rocks which enclose the remains of land animals. Geognosy certainly contains many facts, which cannot be explained, but by a change from dry land to the bot- tom of the sea, although our knowledge of them is still so imperfect, that we cannot hazard a probable conjec- ture respecting the numbers of these changes, whether they commence at the same or at different periods in the various quarters of the world, and whether they are local or universal. These changes appear neither sudden nor violent, such as we consider revolu- tions of the earth, but at all times proceed with silent and regular steps, and depend upon similar causes, concealed it is true from us, such as the universal retreat of the waters from their original height to the present bed of the ocean. We do not belong to those geologists who divert the world from its axis for the purpose of explain- ing the inequalities of its surface, at whose command the Earth sometimes opens her bosom to engulf the sea, and at other times the floodgates of Heaven are lifted * Vide note on the Non-mechanical Action of pure Water. 430 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. up to pour down another ocean. He who reflects on the devastation caused by earthquakes, inundations and the fall of mountains, even though they are merely local appearances confined to particular quarters, cannot help putting the question to himself, how the order, regulari- ty and connection exhibited by strata of rocks, could in any measure exist, if the same or similar accidents had happened throughout the whole world, and if mecha- nical power had operated with such energy, and to such an extent ? All our knowledge of the structure of the earth, and of the existence of its inhabitants, declares rather a quiet uninterrupted and continually progressive advance- ment in its formation and development. In the lapse of geological epochs, we observe a gradation of rock formations following one another, in which the latter, however remotely connected, still appear sufficient- ly similar to the earlier to indicate a common origin, till they at length terminate in simple formations, resembling those which are presently taking place. When the pre- cipitates were exhausted, and the structure was complet- ed, nay, even earlier, its destruction commenced; not that violent destruction by which lofty mountains are torn asunder and levelled, no uproar of nature, no gigan- tic struggle of the elements, such as we commonly con- ceive, but a decomposition of the strata of rocks to a great- er or less depth, caused partly by chemical, partly by mechanical, but slow operating powers, what they wanted in intensity being compensated by the endurance of their operation. According to the common law of na- ture, deficiency of power is supplied by duration of time ; for, of all the oracles which have been consulted ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 431 concerning the formation of the earth, there is no one which can make such important revelations to us as the oracle of the age of mountains. These operations at the earth's surface generally appear to have produced its pre- sent figure, and to have designed it for the habitation of numerous organic beings. This appears as early as a suitable element occurred ; first, in water, then in land animals ; and, like the formation of rocks, we observe a regular succession of organic formations, the later always descending from the earlier, down to the present inhabi- tants of the earth, and to the last created being who was to exercise dominion over them. But here occurs this important distinction : the organic world with youthful vigour renews itself daily, and decomposes its materials only to reunite them by fresh combinations in uninter- rupted succession ; while the powers of the inorganic world appear almost extinguished. Though this course of nature is manifest to our own observation, her resour- ces and progress are, on the contrary, more concealed ; and we can hardly lift the veil which conceals her, unless we follow Bacon's advice, Turn back from rash theories, and follow observation and experience. We have hitherto endeavoured to shew that incontro- vertible geognostic facts indicate an alternate rising and falling of the water which covered the earth's surface, but that they were not of a kind to justify the notion of violent revolutions, or of sudden and universal eruptions of the sea ; and that, therefore, such deluges as the Mo- saic deluge, recorded in the traditions of nations, were not revolutions of this description. If, according to the supposition of Cuvier, the earth's surface inhabited at the commencement of the latter deluge has become the 432 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. present bed of the sea, and the former bed of the sea has become the present dry land, then, according to the present state of geography, though only conjectural, we should be able to point out such portions of the earth as were over- whelmed by the catastrophe ; and yet we have never heard that any one has hazarded such an experiment. In the constitution of the present habitable globe, we find no proofs remaining of such a revolution. Among these revolutions of nature, we never reckon common inundations, such as take place at present from water overflowing its boundaries, though these also may produce devastation whose effects remain visible for an hundred years. But, in mountainous districts, another kind of aqueous eruption makes its appearance, and may be classed along with the traditions of a deluge. We very frequently, for instance, observe the valleys of high mountains forming a range of basins separated from one another by shorter or longer defiles, and opening through the last defile into a wider valley, or a marsh. The shape of these basins, or cauldrons, commonly lying above one another like so many stories, and the level surface of their water, leave no doubt of their being once enclosed lakes which were formerly blocked up by the barriers of the defiles, and which flowed towards the level country, as soon as the defiles were broken down by the waters, If no kind of historical monuments in the west of Europe bears evidence of those events, which, at least on a small scale, occur in our own times, this intimates that it was inhabited, not by an original population, but by a fo- reign or modern race of people ; whereas those revolutions extended to remote antiquity. The numerous masses of rock found on both sides of the Alps to the height of ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 438 4000 feet, as well as in the plains of the north of Europe, at a great distance from their original position, and con- cerning whose coming hither so much light has lately been thrown by Messrs Buch and Escher, are a very probable proof of these debacles ; while every circum- stance renders it evident that these blocks were swept along by the currents thus created, to the place where they are now found. The Greek writers have also pre- served accounts of such revolutions, which, although not unquestionably authenticated, are yet stamped with the impress of historical testimony. Herodotus has the fol- lowing passages directly relative to the country where the Greeks place their second or Deucalionic deluge. " Thessaly must formerly have been an inland sea, sur- rounded by high mountains. On the east it was bound- ed by Pelios and Ossa, whose bases were united ; on the north by Olympus ; on the west by Pindus ; and on the south by Othrys. Thessaly lay in the midst of these mountains in the form of a basin, into which, in conjunc- tion with other copious streams, the five well-known rivers, the Peneus, the Apidanus, the Orochomenus, the Eni- peus, and the Pamisos, emptied themselves. These rivers, which are collected in their basin from the mountains which encompass Thessaly, after their junction under the name of Peneus, in which they lose their former appella- tion, open towards the sea through a narrow valley. According to tradition, this valley and opening did not formerly exist ; so that the rivers and the Lake Brebeis, which did not formerly bear these names, having their confluence in this place, rendered the whole of Thessaly an inland sea. The Thessalians affirm that Neptune opened the valley for the passage of the river Peneus, E e ON THE UNIVERSAL DELU&&. and they may perhaps be right. If we consider Nep- tune the author of earthquakes, and consider the violent concussion of the mountains caused by them as the work of this deity, we must, upon surveying these regions, con- fess that they owe their present shape to him ; for the se- paration of every mountain appears to me to have been produced by some violent commotion of the earth." Strabo makes mention of this tradition, which he thought worthy of belief, and accounts for the origin of the Vale of Tempe, which is the bed of the river Peneus, and likewise for the separation of Ossa from Olympus, by means of an earthquake *. In making this remark, we perceive that our theories which allow that earthquakes are to operate in forming the surface of the earth, have not even the merit of novelty. According to the last writer, similar eruptions of water must have originated lit the lake Copais in Breotia -f-, in the lakes Bistonis and Aphnetis, in Thrace, and have been accompanied with huge devastation J. Diodorus Siculus § remembered a Samothracian tradition, according to which the Euxine * T. ix. c, & Claudian describes this occurrence in the following words t " Cum Thessaliam scopulis inclusa teneret Peneo stagnante palus, et mersa negarent Arva eoli, trifida Neptunus euspide monies Impulit adversos : turn forti saucius ictu Dissiluit gelido vertex OSSJEUS Olympo." De raptu Proserp* I. ii. v. 179. t L. i c. 3. $ According to Wheeler, who was on the spot, it appears to have bro- ken through the Mount. Ptous. Bibliothec. Hkstoric. 1. v. c. 47. ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. 435 Sea was once shut up on all sides. It afterwards burst through its mighty mound offa/anischen rocks to the Hel- lespont, and inundated a great part of the coast of Asia, as well as Samothracia itself. An objection started to the possibility of such an event is, that, from the observations of Olivier and General Andreossy, the shores of the Black Sea are, in most places, lower than those of the Bosphorus ; and that its waters, therefore, even if they were Considerably higher than they are at present, would more readily overflow the former than the latter. But since every rock exposed for such a length of time is daily crumbling down, it is a question, whether the shore of the Black Sea has undergone any alteration since that period ; and we know that the eruptions took their direction, not so much from the low situation of the barrier, as from the nature of the rock of which it was constructed, being influenced by the weather, and from the rock itself being rent asunder. Be that as it may, the words with which Diodorus commences his nar- rative are remarkable, when he says, the Samothracian deluge happened earlier than those of other nations. It at least so far preceded others, that, in the estimation of the Greek historian, independent of the deluges of Ogy- ges and Deucalion, similar natural occurrences more or less authenticated were received as historical facts. Finally, the effects produced by the bursting of lakes or debacles do not appear to be out of proportion to the devastation mentioned by the traditions of nations. To abide by our former example, floods which could carry along with them masses of rock of 50,000 cubic feet, were in a situation to bury a whole people ; and the few individuals who might be preserved would undoubtedly 436 ON THE UNIVERSAL DELUGE. have handed down the memory of such an event to remote posterity. Other deluges may have arisen from other causes, at a time when, as is shewn by numerous ves- tiges, lakes and rivers had a much greater elevation than at present ; and, therefore, every overflowing of them must have produced greater and more extensive ravages. From these last local eruptions of water, that is, from single limited districts, arose the mechanical precipitates known under the denomination of Alluvial Soil. Their situation, as the uppermost covering of the earth, as well as their origin, which takes place beneath our own obser- vation, furnishes evidence of their being the most recent mineral formations ; and it follows from their nature and connection that they were not produced by chemical means, but removed by the mechanical force of water. Since they, among other things, contain prostrate forests, and abundant remains of land animals, we conclude that they did not originate in the bed of the sea, but were floated and deposited upon the dry land by an overflow of land water. How is it conceivable that these precipitates have been covered by the ocean, since their deposition, and have, by means of an opposite change, become the dry land they are at present; and yet it must have been so, if they are to be considered as intimations of the Mosaic deluge. The view now given, which is that of Henger in his Beitrage, is also advocated by other naturalists, and has lately been brought forward in an interesting manner in the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal*. We have been frequently requested to give the two views, in regard to » Vol. xiv. p. 205. ON THE ACTION OF RUNNING WATERS. 437 the universal deluge, namely, that which maintains that it is proved by an appeal to the phenomena of the mine- ral kingdom ; the other, which affirms that that great event has left no traces of its existence on the surface or in the interior of the earth. M. Cuvier's Essay, and Professor Buckland's Reliquiae, are the best authorities for the first opinion ; while numerous writers have advo- cated the second, NOTE, p. 244. ,ON THE ACTION OF RUNNING WATERS A very great degree of power has been attributed to the waters which move at the surface of the earth, or in its interior. Many geologists have advanced the opinion, that they have scooped out the channels and even the valleys in which they flow, and formed the cliffs whose feet they wash ; and many philosophers, naturalists and even geologists, still support this opinion, not only in some of its applications, but even in its whole extent. In order to appreciate it, it is sufficient to observe with care the different modes of action of water set in motion by different causes, and the changes which it has operat- ed upon the rocks and deposits upon which it has acted, from the most remote times to which history may reach. We must, in the first place, successively examine the different sorts of action of the principal masses of water which are in motion at the surface of the earth, that is to say, the action of torrents, of rivers, of currents of the sea, or of great lakes, and that of waves. We shall afterwards see what consequences are to be deduced from these observations. l 438 ON THE ACTION OF RUNNING WATERS. 1. Action of Torrents. Torrents have a true degrading and scooping action upon the earth's surface, but, by the necessary conse- quence of the sense which we attach to the word, this ac- tion cannot be exercised upon spaces of great extent, for a torrent is a water-course which has a great declivity. Now, on account of the little height which the most ele- vated summits of the globe have in comparison with the extent of its surface, this action cannot be very exten- sive ; it can only, therefore, produce short and narrow ravines. This action, as ail who have visited high moun- tain chains may have seen, is only often local and instan- taneous ; it presents no remarkable effect but upon the heaps of debris which cover the declivities of the moun- tains, and on broken rocks, partially disintegrated by other causes, and lastly on moveable deposits. The results of this action contribute to confine it within narrower limits still, by heaping up at the mouths of torrents in the val- leys or plains, the debris carried down by these torrents. The elevation of the soil, which necessarily follows from the accumulation of these debris, diminishes with the de- clivity, the rapidity, and consequently the power of these water-courses. Great masses of water moving rapidly, have a marked transporting power. Striking examples of this power have but too often been seen in Holland, by the break- ing down of the dikes, and in Alpine mountains, in con- sequence of extraordinary rains during tempests, or from the rupture of some of the natural barriers of lakes. In these latter times (in 1818), the Vallee de Bagne expe- rienced the terrible effects of this devastating power. ON THE ACTION OF TORRENTS. 439 Masses of ice having fallen towards the upper part of this valley, and accumulated there, raised a dike suffi- ciently compact and strong to block up the course of the Dranse. The waters of this river, rapid and pent up in certain parts of its course, as are all those of the high Alps, accumulated above this barrier of ice, and formed a lake which attained, at its maximum, 130 metres of mean breadth, from 3000 to 4000 metres of length, and 36 of mean depth, and consequently a volume of water esti- mated at about 29,000,000 cubic metres. Although, by means of operations conducted with equal skill and cour- age, about the third part of this volume was let off without danger, the remaining part having suddenly broken through the barrier of ice, was precipitated with an almost unexampled impetuosity of 11 metres in the second, into the Vallee de Bagne. In the first part of its course, and in the space of half an hour which the mass of water took in traversing a league, it carried away trees, dwellings, enormous masses of debris, and rocks already separated from their mass, as M. Es- cher, expressly says ; it covered all the broad parts of the valley with rubbish, pebbles and sand, and carried the remainder of the substances which it had swept away, as well to the extremity of the valley, towards Martigny, as into the bed of the Rhone. The mass of water took an hour and a half in rushing from the glacier to Martigny. The same event took place from the same cause, and with nearly similar results, in 1595. Torrents may therefore scoop out ravines in certain formations, and produce effects which appear considera- ble, because we judge of them by comparison with our 440 ON THE ACTION OF RUNNING WATERS. own feeble means. But how diminutive and circumscrib- ed are these changes produced in the configuration of the globe, compared with the long and broad valleys which furrow in vast numbers the immense surface of the earth, and to the formation of which neither the torrents nor great rivers which exist at the present day have in any way contributed, as we shall presently demonstrate. 2. Action of Rivers. THE action of rivers must be examined under two very different circumstances, or at two different parts of their course. First, When they are compressed between mountains, whether at no great distance from their source, or even at the middle of their course. Secondly, When they have reached broad valleys, whose declivity is slight, or plains which commonly sur- round their mouth. In the first case, these rivers partake of the impetu- osity and power of torrents. They often run with ra- pidity, and in great quantity, at the bottom of narrow and deep valleys : they are as it were inclosed in chan- nels, whose vertical walls appear as if cut by art. The first idea which presents itself to all who have seen these appearances for. the first time, and who are satisfied with first impressions, is, that these streams, which are pret- ty powerfuland always very impetuous, have dug these deep grooves ; and if sometimes the hardness of the rocks and the height of the precipices which form their sides, ON THE ACTION OF RIVERS. 441 appear too great for those small streams that meander at their feet, what cannot be attributed to their immediate power is attributed to the continued action of time. Without examining how long a series of ages it would be necessary to admit, before the rivers which we have mentioned above, and the water-courses encased in the deep valleys of the Alps, Pyrenees, Jura, Grampians, &c. could have scooped their valleys, on which their present action is so slow that no one has yet been able to estimate it ; without examining if this long series of ages agrees with the phenomena, which preclude our attributing so remote an antiquity to the actual state of the earth's sur- face, a question of too much importance to be treated in- directly ; it will be sufficient to mention here four sorts of observations, in order to be persuaded, or at least to suspect, that the present rivers, even supposing them ten times the size that they are, could not have scooped ' out the deep channels at the bottom of which they run. 1. We must recur to the period when the ranges of hills which border the present valleys were not as yet scooped out, but were united in such a manner as not to leave any hollow between them, or merely a slight ori- ginal depression. This shallowness of the valley would be accompanied with an inconsiderable slope of its bottom. If, then, we suppose the same mass of water, it must run with less quickness, and consequently with much less power ; and yet a very great force must be attributed to it, before it could have had the power of removing a portion of rock nearly represented by a recumbent triangular prism, having often 500 metres of breadth by a sometimes equal 442 ON THE ACTION OF RUNNING WATERS. and often much greater vertical thickness. If, in order to get rid of this difficulty, we admit a volume of water incomparably larger than the present volume of the rivers to which so great effects are attributed, we must admit much more elevated and more extended mountains, to give rise to so great a volume of water. Were we only detained by this hypothesis, and did not direct observation oppose itself to the admission of this disaggregating power and its effect, we might pass it over ; but two other observations render the hypothesis inadmissible. 2. Historical records equally concur to prove that the rivers possessed of the greatest power which can be attributed to them, have no appreciable corroding action upon the rocks on which they move. No one has maintained that the greater number of the cascades, cataracts, or rapids, long known and mentioned on account of their celebrity, have disappeared or have even sensibly diminished, nor consequently that the na- tural dike which the water had encountered in its course, has been worn or even completely disrupted. We do not find that cascades have changed into cataracts, and these again into rapids. The cataracts of the Nile have been spoken of from time immemorial, as always oppos- ing an obstacle to the navigation of that river ; the same is the case with those of the Danube, of the fall of the Rhine at Schaffhausen, &c. The famous cascades of the Alps and Pyrenees have been cited ever since writing was in use ; and among all these examples we can scarcely find two or three cascades that have been lowered, or cataracts reduced in their level. The only cascade which we can point out as having ON THE ACTION OF 11IVEKS. 443 really diminished in height, is that of Tungasca in Sibe- ria. We do not, however, assert but that there may be others. So many causes different from those of erosion may concur to lower a cascade, or even make it disappear almost entirely, that we are rather astonished at the small number of examples mentioned, than embarrassed by the objections which these examples might present to the opinion vrhich we are defending : for the fall of a part of the rock which forms the cliff from which the cascade is precipitated ; an abundant accumulation of debris at the foot of the cliff ; a real destruction of the softer deposits, forming part of the strata of the mountain from which they fall, are sufficient causes for changing the height of waterfalls. These causes must present themselves pretty frequently ; but how different is their action from that of erosion ? This, if it existed, would extend from the source of the river to its mouth, and would have a considerable influence upon the configura- tion of the earth's surface. Those which we have men- tioned have, on the contrary, an action so limited and so local, as to be scarcely appreciable. 3. Allowing, for the moment, that a river, possessed of a vast erosive or disaggregating power, may have scoop- ed out the valley in the bottom of which it at present flows, in a state of feebleness very different from its ori-, ginal state, we must account for the disposal of a vast mass of earth and rock, which filled up the valley before the river had removed it. It is not possible to suppose that it has been transported into the sea, which is often more than a hundred leagues from the valley; for we know that when rivers, on reaching the plains, lose their rapidity, they allow the matters to be precipi- 444 ON THE ACTION OF RUNNING WATEttS. tated which they held in suspension. Besides, we have shown that many rivers, on leaving the mountains, tra- verse lakes, in which they deposit all the earthy matters suspended in their waters. This deposition is particularly striking in all the considerable rivers, which descend from the ridge of the Alps toward the north-west and south-east of that chain of mountains. These rivers meet, at the opening of the valleys they flow through, lakes, which they traverse, and which seem intended for their purification. Thus, on the northern side, we see the Rhone traversing the lake of Geneva ; the Aar, the Lakes of Brientz and Thun ; the Reuss, the Lake of the Four Cantons ; the Linth, the Lake of Zurich ; the Rhine, the Lake of Con- stance. On the south side, the Lac Majeur is traversed by the Tessin, the Lake of Como by the Adda, the Lake Disco by the Oglio ; the Lake of Guarda by the Mincio, Sec. Now, these lakes, which are only themselves deeper parts of the valley, would have been filled up by the debris conveyed to the valley, if this valley had the origin attributed to it. Proceeding from one hypothesis to another, it might perhaps be supposed that these lakes may have been sufficiently deep to swallow up all the de- bris of the valley, without being chocked up. But, ra- ther than admit such suppositions, why not grant that the same unknown cause which has scooped out the lake, has also scooped out the valley which is only a continuation of it ? 4. But if facts had proved that the waters degrade the rocks, scoop them out, and perpetually remove their de- bris, we might perhaps be induced to admit that un- known causes, of which we are absolutely ignorant, and of which we can form no idea, have given to the original ON THE ACTION OF RIVERS. 445 rivers the means of surmounting all these obstacles. Now, observation would seem absolutely to prove the contrary. We have remarked, that rapid rivers which, in the bottom of valleys, fall in cascades, from rock to rock, which beat with violence against the walls which contain them, do not in any degree alter these rocks, and that, far from corroding their surface, they allow it to be covered with a rich coating of mosses, confervae, &c. which could neither maintain itself, nor be formed at all, were the least portion of the surface of these rocks con- tinually or even only frequently removed. A much more striking fact is that which some of the great rivers present, such as the Nile, the Orinoco, &c. which flow in the equatorial regions. These powerful rivers, when they have arrived at places where they are contracted, and, as it were, jam- med in between two rocky walls, form impetuous cata- racts. Their waters, endowed by the celerity of this fall with the greatest erosive power that can be attributed to this fluid, must necessarily have corroded, or at least worn, the rocks which they have thus beat against since the creation of our present Continent. Now, so far from removing the surface, they cover it with a brownish varnish of a peculiar nature. It appears, therefore, well established, that water alone does not scoop those rocks, whose aggregation is complete, or which are solid ; and that it does not wear them in any way, whatever be its quantity of motion. We say water alone ; and we must insist on this dis- tinction, in order to make the preceding facts agree with other facts, which might seem contradictory. 446 ON THE ACTION OF RUNNING WATERS. We often see furrows scooped out on the walls that bound the narrows of rivers ; we also see rocks rounded, and entirely destitute of moss. But let the facts be examined with attention, and we shall find that this erosion always takes place in the parts of their course, where, on account of the nature of the neighbour- ing soil, the torrents carry with them, in their risings (or floods), debris and detached stones from their banks ; and it is by means of these stones that they wear the rocks which are in their bed. It is very easy to appreciate these circumstances. It is remarked, that this erosion has never taken place at the sources of powerful springs. All the pebbles which had to be carried off have been so long ago, and the mosses which grow abundantly on the rocks at the level of the water, and in the bed of these torrents, have nothing more to fear from the destructive action of these solid bodies. The case is the same with the parts which immediately succeed a lake, or a great excavation, capable of arresting all the hard bodies carried off by the river* There the mosses appear in abundance ; because they are not subjected to the action of any other sub- stance than of the water alone. The present rivers do not therefore appear to have any erosive power upon the rocks which are completely aggregated, when they act by themselves, and when no other cause, such as frost^ decomposition, &c. has disin- tegrated the rock. The absence of these foreign circum- stances is proved by the vegetation or the enamel which then cover the rocks exposed to the action of the water. These rivers, in proportion as they remove from the ON THE ACTION OF RIVERS. 447 rocks in, f the Moose. The measurements of the Edinburgh specimen are taken from Professor Jameson's memoir on organic remains, in the Supplement to the Encyclopedia Britannica. Moose Ft. In. R. D. Soc. U. of Edin. Ft. In. Ft. In. Length of the head, . . . 1 8* 1 8| Breadth of the skull between the orbits, 0 10* 0 9 Do. of skull at the occiput, 0 8 Diameter of the orbit, 0 2| 0 gi Distance between infra orbi- tar holes across the skull, 0 7 Length of alveolar processes of the upper jaw, Length of lower jaw, 0 6 1 51 0 6 0 3f Diam. of foramen magnum, 0 2 HORNS. Distance between the ex- treme tips, measured by the skull, 11 10 Ditto, in a straight line across, ... 9 2 6 8 Length of each horn, 5 9 5 1 Greatest breadth of the palm, Length of the beam, 2 10 1 9 Ditto of brow antler, . . . 0 81 Ditto of sur-antler, v vj Circumference of the beam at root of brow antler, 1 Of 3 7 0 6J 0 7J FOSSIL ELK OF IRELAND. 507 R. D. Soc. U. of Edin. Vfoose Ft. In. Ft, In. Ft. In. BODY. Length of spine, 10 10 9 8 Ditto of sternum, . . — 2 4 Height to the upper extre- mity of the dorsal spines, 6 6 Ditto to the highest point of the tip of the horn, . . . 10 4 EXTREMITIES. Greatest length of the sca- pula. 1 61 Ditto breadth at the base, A U2 0 lOf Ditto depth of its spine, . . . 0 2| Length of the humerus, . . . 1 4 1 Si Ditto of ulna and radius, 1 8 1 6 Ditto of carpus, 0 2! 0 2 Circumference of do V «V£ 0 9J Length of metacarpus, ... 1 OJ 1 OJ Length of phalanges, 0 7 0 6J From anterior superior spine of one ileum to that of the other, 1 4i 1 6* ^2 2 From anterior superior spine to the tuber ischii, 1 8 1 91 Greatest diameter of fora- ue men ovale, 0 4 0 3 Least do. of do 0 2f 0 2£ Length of the femur, 1 6J 1 5J Ditto of tibia, 1 6 1 6 Length of the tarsus, includ- ing the os calcis, ... .... 0 8 Ditto of the metatarsus, . . . 1 If 1 if 508 MAMMOTH, OR FOSSIL ELEPHANT. 2. Account of the Two Living1 Species of Elephant, and of the Extinct Species of Elephant, or Mam- moth. 1. ELEPHAS AFRICANUS. — The Elephant with round- ed skull, large ears, grinders, having rhomboidal-shaped marks on their crown, which we call the African Ele- phant (Elephas Africanus), is a quadruped which has hitherto been found only inhabiting Africa. There can be no doubt that it is this species which lives at the Cape, at Senegal, and in Guinea ; there is reason to be- lieve that it also occurs at Mosambique ; but it is not certain that individuals of the following species do not occur in this part of Africa. A sufficient number of individuals have not been figured or compared, to know if this species presents remarkable varieties. It is it that produces the largest tusks. Both sexes are equally fur- nished with tusks, at least at Senegal. The natural num- ber of the hoofs is four before, and three behind. The ear is very large, and covers the shoulder. The skin is of a deep and uniform brown. This species has not been domesticated in modern times. It appears, how- ever, to have been tamed by the ancients, who attributed to it less power and courage in that state than to the fol- lowing species ; but their observations do not appear to have been confirmed, at least in so far as refers to mag- nitude. Its natural manners are not perfectly known ; yet judging of them by the notices of travellers, they appear to resemble in every thing essential those of the following species. MAMMOTH, OR FOSSIL ELEPHANT. 509 2. ELEPHAS INDICUS. — The Elephant with elongated skull, concave forehead, small ears, grinders marked with undulating bands, which we call the Indian Ele- phant (Elephas Indicus), is a quadruped which has only been observed with certainty beyond the Indus. It ex- tends from both sides of the Ganges to the Eastern Sea and the south of China. They are also found in the Islands of the Indian Sea, in Ceylon, Java, Borneo, Su- matra, See. There is still no authentic proof that it exists in any part of Africa, although neither is the con- trary absolutely proved. The inhabitants of India having from time immemorial been in the habit of taking this species and taming it, it has been much better ob- served than the other. Varieties have been remarked as to size, lightness of form, the length and direction of the tusks, and the colours of the skin. The females and some of the males have tusks which are always small and straight. The tusks of the other males never attain so great a length as in the African species *. The natural number of the hoofs is Jive before and four behind. The ear is small, frequently angular. The skin is commonly grey, spotted with brown. There are individuals entirely white. The height varies from fifteen to sixteen feet. Its manners, the mode of taking it, and of treating it, have been carefully described by many travellers and na- turalists, from Aristotle down to Mr Corse Scott. * In A. W. Schlegel's Contributions to the History of the Ele- phant, in the Indische Bibliothek, i. 2, are enumerated many facts not generally known regarding the African and Asiatic Elephants, and the details are accompanied with interesting inferences. 510 MAMMOTH, OR FOSSIL ELEPHANT. 3. ELEPHAS PRIMIGENIUS, Blum, or MAMMOTH. — The Elephant with elongated skull, concave forehead ', very long alveoles for the tusks, the lower jaw obtuse, the grinders broader, parallel, marked with closer bands, which we name the Fossil Elephant (Elephas primige- nius, Blum.J, is the Mammoth of the Russians. Its bones are only found in the fossil state. No person has seen in a fresh state bones resembling those by which this species is peculiarly distinguished, nor have the bones of the two preceding species been seen in .the fos- sil state.* Its bones are found in great number in many countries, but in better preservation in the north than elsewhere. It resembles the Indian more than the Afri- can species. It differs, however, from the former in the grinders, in the form of the lower jaw, and many other bones, but especially in the length of the alveolae and tusks. This last character must have singularly modi- fied the figure and organisation of its proboscis, and given it a physiognomy much more different from that of the Indian species, than might have been expected from the similarity of the rest of their bones. It appears that its tusks were generally large, frequently more or less spirally arcuate, and directed outwards. There is no proof that they differ much according to differences of sex or race. The size was not much greater than that to which the Indian species may attain ; it appears to have been still clumsier in its proportions. It is al- ready manifest from its osseous remains, that it was a * According to Schleiermacher, Goldfuss and Von Bachr, fossil tusks, resembling those of the African Elephant, have been found some districts. Cuvier, however, questions their being in a true fossil state. MAMMOTH, OB FOSSIL ELEPHANT. 511 species differing more from the Indian, than the ass from the horse, and the jackal and isatis from the wolf and fox. It is not known what had been the size of its ears, or the colour of its skin ; but it is certain that, at least, some individuals bore two sorts of hair, namely, a red, coarse, tufted wool, and stiff black hairs, which, upon the neck and along the dorsal spine, became long enough to form a sort of mane. Thus, not only is there nothing impossible in its having been able to support a climate which would destroy the Indian species, but it is even probable that it was so constituted as to prefer cold cli- mates. Its bones are generally found in the alluvial and superficial strata of the earth, and most commonly in the deposits which fill up the bottom of valleys, or which border the beds of rivers. They scarcely ever oc- cur by themselves, but are confusedly mingled with bones of other quadrupeds of known genera, such as rhinoceroses, oxen, antelopes, horses, and frequently with remains of marine animals, particularly conchi- ferous species, some of which have even been found adhering to them. The positive testimony of Pallas, Fortis, and many others, does not allow us to doubt that this latter circumstance has frequently taken place, al- though it is not always observed. We ourselves have at this moment under our eyes a portion of a jaw covered with millepores and small oysters. The strata which cover the bones of elephants are not of very great thickness, and they are scarcely ever of a rocky nature. They are seldom petrified, and there are only one or two cases recorded in which they were found imbedded in a shelly or other rock. Fre- quently they are simply accompanied with our common 512 MAMMOTH, OR FOSSIL ELEPHANT. fresh water shells. The resemblance, in this latter res- pect, as well as with regard to the nature of the soil, be- tween the three places, of which we have the most de- tailed accounts, viz. Tonna, Cantstadt, and the Forest of Bondi, is very remarkable. Every thing, there- fore, seems to announce that the cause which has buried them, is one of the most recent of those that have con- tributed to change the surface of the globe. It is never- theless a physical and general cause ; the bones of fos- sil elephants are so numerous, and have been found in places so desert and even uninhabitable, that we cannot suppose that they had been conducted there by man. The strata which contain them and those which are above them, shew, that this cause was aque- ous, or that it was water that covered them ; and in many places these waters were nearly the same as those of our present sea, since they supported animals nearly the same. But, it was not by these waters that they were transported to the places. where they now are. Bones of this description have been found in almost every country that has been examined by naturalists. An irruption of the sea that might have brought them from places which the Indian elephant now inhabits, could not have scattered them so far, nor dispersed them so equably. Besides, the inundation which buried them has not risen above the great chains of mountains, since the strata which it has deposited, and which cover the bones, are only found in plains of little elevation. It is not, therefore, seen how the carcases of elephants could have been transported into the north, across the mountains of Thibet, and the Altaic and Uralian chains. FOSSIL ELEPHANT, OR MAMMOTH. 513 Further, these bones are not rolled ; they retain their ridges and apophyses ; they have not been worn by fric- tion. Very frequently the epiphyses of those which had not yet attained their full growth, are still attached to them, although the slightest effort would suffice to de- tach them. The only alterations that are remarked, arise from the decomposition which they have undergone during their abode in the earth. Nor can it with more reason be represented that the entire carcases had been violently transported. In this case, the bones would in- deed have remained entire ; but they would also have remained together, and would not have been scattered. The shells, millepores, and other marine pr6ductions which are attached to some of these bones, prove be- sides that they had remained at least some time stripped and separated at the bottom of the fluid which covered them. The elephants1 bones had therefore already been in the places in which they are found, when the fluid covered them. They were scattered about in the same manner as in our own country the bones of horses and other animals that inhabit it may be, and as the dead bo- dies are spread in the fields. Every circumstance, therefore, renders it extremely probable, that the elephants which have furnished the fossil bones, dwelt and lived in the countries where their bones are at present found. They could only, therefore, have disappeared by a revolution, which had destroyed all the individual* then living, o^byti change of climate, which prevented them from propagating. But whatever this cause may have been, it must have been sudden. The bones and ivory which are found in so perfect a state of preservation in the plains of Siberia, are only so Kk 514 FOSSIL ELEPHANT, OR MAMMOTH. preserved by the cold which congeals them there, or which, in general, arrests the action of the elements upon them. If this cold had come on by degrees and slowly, these bones, and still more the soft parts with which they are still sometimes invested, would have had time to decom- pose, like those which occur in warm and temperate coun- tries. It would especially have been impossible that an entire carcase, like that discovered by Mr Adams, could have retained its flesh and skin without corruption, if it had not been immediately enveloped by the ice which preserved it. Thus, all the hypotheses of a gradual cooling of the earth, or of a slow variation, whether in the inclination or in the position of the axis of the globe, fall to be rejected. If the present elephants of India were the descend- ants of these ancient elephants, which have been pre- served in that climate to the present day, from their be- ing there placed beyond the reach of the catastrophe which destroyed them in the others, it would be impos- sible to explain why their species has been destroyed in America, where remains are still found, which prove that they had formerly existed there. The vast empire of Mexico presented to them heights enough to escape from an inundation so little elevated as that which we must suppose to have taken place, arid the climate there is warmer than is requisite for their temperament. The various mastodons , the hippopotamus and \he fos- sil rhinoceros lived in %? same countries, and in the same districts, as the elephants, since their bones are found in the same strata and in the same state. Yet these ani- mals very assuredly no longer exist. Every thing there- fore, Cuvier maintains, concurs to induce a belief that GREAT MASTODON. 5] 5 the fossil elephant is, like them, an extinct species, al- though it resembles more than they one of the species at present existing, and that its extinction has been pro- duced by a sudden cause, by the same great catastrophe which destroyed the species of the same epoch. 3. On the Great Mastodon, or Animal of the Ohio. It appears that the Great Mastodon or Animal of the Ohio, was very like the elephant in its tusks and whole skeleton, the grinders excepted ; that it very probably had a proboscis ; that its height did not exceed that of the ele- phant, but that it was a little more elongated, and had limbs somewhat thicker, with a more slender belly. Not- withstanding all these points of resemblance, the peculiar structure of its grinders is sufficient to constitute it of a different genus from the elephant. It further appears, that it fed much in the same manner as the hippopotamus and boar, choosing by preference the roots and other fleshy parts of vegetables ; that this sort of food must have drawn it towards the soft and marshy places ; that, never- theless, it was not formed for swimming, and living often in the water like the hippopotamus, but that it was a true land animal. Its bones are much more common in North America than any where else. They are even perhaps exclusively confined to that country. They are better pre- served, and fresher, than any other fossil bones known ; and, nevertheless, there is not the slightest proof, the small- est authentic testimony, calculated to impress a belief that either in America, or any where else, there is still any living individual, for the various accounts which we have from time to time read in the journals respecting living mastodons, which had been observed in the forests or 516 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES plains of that vast continent, have never been confirmed, and can only pass for fables. NOTE ON THE CAVES IN WHICH BONES OF CARNIVOROUS ANI- MALS OCCUR IN GREAT QUANTITIES. THE extraordinary accumulations of fossil bones in caves and caverns in different districts, especially in those composed of limestone, have for many years engaged the attention of inquirers; and, of late, have afforded many interesting facts to the geologist and zoologist. In England, as will appear from the following details, many different fossil animals have been discovered in limestone caves ; but hitherto the caves in Scotland, which will probably be found to contain interesting documents of an ancient population, have not been examined. As the subject is a curious and interesting one, we shall, in the following pages, principally from Cuvier*s great work, lay before our readers a pretty full account of the diffe- rent caves, especially those that afford bones of carnivo- rous animals. Numerous caves, brilliantly decorated with stalactites of every form, succeeding each other to a great depth in the interior of mountains, communicating together by openings so narrow as scarcely to allow a man to enter them crawling, and which are yet found strewed with an enormous quantity of bones of large and small animals, are without dispute among the most remarkable pheno- mena which the history of fossil remains could present to OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 517 the contemplation of the geologist, especially when we re- flect that this phenomenon recurs in a great number of places, and over a very extended space of country. These caves have been the object of research of se- veral naturalists, some of whom have well described and figured the bones which they contain ; and even before they were explored by the naturalist, they were celebrat- ed among the common people, who, according to their custom, added many imaginary prodigies to the natural wonders which are really observed in them. The bones which they contain were long, under the name of fossil unicorn, an important article of commerce and materia medica, on account of the powerful virtues which were attributed to them ; and it is probable that the desire of finding these bones contributed much to the more accu- rate knowledge of these caves, and even to the disco- very of several of them. The most anciently celebrated is the cave of Bauman, situated in the country of Blarikenburg, which belongs to the Duke of Brunswick, to the south of the city of that name, to the east of Elbingerode, and to the north of the village of Rubeland, the nearest inhabited place, in a hill which forms one of the last declivities of the Hartz to- ward the east. It has been described by many authors, among whom we shall particularly mention the great Leibnitz, in his Protogcea, pi. i. p. 97, where he gives a map of it, borrowed from the Ada Eruditorum 1702, p. 305. Its general direction is east and west, but the entrance faces the north. It is very narrow, although it is un- der a pretty large natural vault. The first cave is the largest. From this to the second, one must descend by 518 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES another narrow passage, at first by creeping, and after- wards by a ladder. The difference of level is 30 feet. The second cave is the richest in stalactite of ' all forms. The passage to the third cave is at first the most difficult of all, and we have to climb with hands and feet ; but it afterwards enlarges, and the stalactites of its walls are those in which the imagination of the curious has pre- tended to see the best characterized figures. It has two lateral dilatations, of which the map of the Ada Erudi- torutn makes the third and fourth caves. At its extre- mity, we have still to ascend, in order to arrive at the real third cave, which forms a sort of portal. Behrens says, in his Hercynia curivsa, that it cannot be reached, be- cause it would be necessary to descend more than 60 feet ; but the above mentioned map, and the description of Von der Hardty which accompanies it, describe this third cave under the name of the Fifth, and place beyond it a narrow passage, terminated by two small grottoes. Last- ly, Silberschlag, in his Geogony, adds, that one of these grottoes leads to a narrow passage, which, descend- ing much, leads under the other caves, and terminates in a place filled with water. There are still many bones in these remote and little frequented parts. Most of those bones which are in collections from this cave, or which have been described, are of the bear genus. A second cave, nearly as celebrated as the former, and very near, is that which is named, after the unicorn, Enihornshcele, at the foot of the chateau of Scharzfels, in a part of the Electorate of Hanover which is named the Dutchy of Grubenhagen, and nearly upon the last southern declivity of the Hartz. It has also been de- scribed by Leibnitz, as well as by M. Deluc, in his Letters OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 519 to the Queen of England. The entrance is 10 feet high, and 7 broad. We descend vertically 15 feet into a sort of vestibule, the roof of which lowers to such a degree, that, at the end of 60 feet, we are obliged to creep. After a long passage, we come to two other caves, ac- cording to Leibnitz ; but Behrens adds three or four, and says, that, according to the country people, we might penetrate nearly two leagues. Bruckmann, who gives a map of this cavern (Epistol. Itin. p. 34.), represents only five caves, arranged nearly in a straight line, and connected by extremely narrow passages. The second is the richest in bones ; the third, which is the most irregular, has two small lateral caves ; the fifth is the smallest, and contains a fountain. Of the bones which have been taken from it, some are in the possession of M. Blumenbach and other naturalists ; and others have been figured by Leibnitz and Mylius, They belong to the bear, hyena, and tiger or lion genera. The chain of the Hartz also presents some other caves of less celebrity, although of the same nature mentioned by Behrens in his Hercynia curiosa, namely, The cave of Hartzburg, under the castle of the same name, above Goslar to the south. We do not know why Biisching disputes its existence. It is true that Behrens cites J. D. Horstius erroneously, for having seen bones of various animals taken from it ; for Horstius speaks only (Obs. Anat. dec. p. 10.) of the cave of Scharz- fels. The cave of Ufftrungen, in the county of Stollberg, to the south of the castle of that name. It is named in the country Heim-knohle, or Hiding-hole. Behrens thinks that fossil bones might be found in it. 520 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES Another cave of the same neighbourhood, is named Diebsloch, Thieves' Hole. Skulls have been found in it, which were supposed to be human. We shall not speak here of those caves of the Hartz in which bones have not been discovered. And even those in which they have been found, are, at the present day, almost exhausted, it being only by breaking the stalac- tite that any can be obtained, so much of them had been taken away for selling as medicines. The caves of Hungary come after those of the Hartz, with reference to the remoteness of the time at which they have been known. The first notice of them is due to Paterson Hayn, (Ephem. Nat. Cur. 1672, Obs. cxxxix. and cxciv.) Bruckmann, a physician of Wolfen- bilttely afterwards described them at length. (Epistola Iti- neraria, 77, and Breslauer Sammlung, 1725, First Trim, p. 628.) They are situated in the county of Lipfow, on the southern declivities of the Carpathian mountains. They are known in the country by the name of Dra- gons' Caves, because the people of the neighbourhood attribute to those animals the bones which occur in them, and with which they have been acquainted from time immemorial ; but all those which have been figured by authors belong to the Bear family, and to the species which is named the Great Cave Sear (Grand Ours des cav ernes). The caves of Germany the richest in bones are those of Franconia, of which J. F. Esper, a clergyman of the country of Bayreuth, has given a very detailed descrip- tion in a work, printed in French and German, entitled, Description des Zoolithes nouvellement decouvertes, &c. Nuremberg Knorr. 1774, folio, with 14 coloured OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 521 plates), and in a memoir inserted among those of the Berlin Society of Naturalists, vol. ix. 1784, p. 56. Another description was afterwards given, under the title of Objets dignes de remarque des environs de Mug- gendorf, by J. C. Rosenmiiller, folio, with coloured views, Berlin, 1804. And more lately, M. Goldfuss, at present Professor of Natural History at Bonn, and Se- cretary of the Academia Naturae Curiosorum, has made them the subject of a particular work printed in 1810 in German, under the title of Environs of Muggendorf, in which he describes them with the greatest care, as well as the surrounding country, of which he gives a very correct topographical chart. A great part of these caves is situated in a small bailiwick, named Streitberg, which was formerly a dependence upon the country of Bayreuth, but was inclosed in that of Bamberg, and now forms part of the kingdom of Bavaria. The great- est number occur in a small peninsula, formed by the river of Wiesent, which falls into the Pegnetz, and be- longs to the basin of the Main. However, the chief of all these astonishing caves, those of Gaylenreuth, are beyond the limits of this peninsula, being on the left bank of the Wiesent, to the north-west of the village from which it derives its name. The entrance is perforated in a vertical rock ; it is 7J feet high, and faces the east. The first cave turns to the right, and is upwards of 80 feet long. The unequal heights of the vault divide it into four parts ; the first three are from 15 to 20 feet high, the fourth is only 4 or 5. At the bottom of this latter, on the level of the floor, there is a hole 2 feet high, which affords a passage to the second cave : it has first a direction to the south, over a length of 60 feet by £22 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES 40 in breadth, and 18 in height ; it then turns to the west for 70 feet, becoming lower and lower until at length the height is only 5 feet. The passage which leads to the third cave is very inconvenient, and one has to turn through various corridores : it is 30 feet across, and from 5 to 6 in height. The ground in it is kneaded with teeth and jaws. Near the entrance is a pit of from 15 to 20 feet, to which one descends by a ladder. After having descended, we come to a vault of 15 feet diame- ter by 30 in height ; and towards the side at which the descent is made there is a cave strewed with bones. On still descending a little, a new arcade is met with, which leads to a cave 40 feet long, and a new pit of from 18 to 20 feet deep. After descending this, we reach a cavern about 40 feet high, all strewed with bones. A passage, of 5 feet by 7, leads to a grotto of 25 feet in length by 12 in breadth. Canals, 20 feet in length, con- duct to another grotto of 20 feet in height. Lastly, there is another cave, 83 feet broad and 24 high, in which more bones are found than in any of the others. The sixth cave, which is the last, has a northerly di- rection, so that the whole series of caves and passages nearly describes a semicircle. A fissure in the third cave led to the discovery, in 1784, of a new cave, 15 feet long and 4 broad, in which the greatest quantities of hyena and lions' bones were found. The aperture was much too small for these ani- mals to have passed through it. A particular canal which ended in this small cave has afforded an incredible number of bones and large skulls entire. In the Philosophical Transactions of 1822, pi. xxvi. there may be seen a profile of this cave, taken on the OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 523 spot in 1816, bylProfessor Buckland, in which is to be especially remarked an enormous mass, entirely com- posed of bones enveloped in the stalactite, and thus form- ing an osseous breccia, but of quite a different nature from those which occur at Gibraltar and other places *. The cave of Gaylenreuth is one of those the bones of which are most completely known, by the researches which have been made or caused to be made in it for a long time back by distinguished naturalists, such as MM. Esper, de Humboldt, Ebel of Bremen, Rosenmul- ler, Soemmering, Goldfuss, See., and by the numerous and rich collections which these researches have pro- duced. According to the examination which Cuvier has made of the principal of these collections, three-fourths of the bones found there belong to the Bear genus, and to two or three species of that genus. The others be- long to the hyena, tiger, wolf, fox, glutton, and polecat, or some nearly allied species. There are also found, al- though in much smaller number, bones of herbivorous quadrupeds, and, in particular, deer, of which fragments are in the possession of M. Ebel. It would even ap- pear from a passage of M. Scemmering's, that a par- cel of bones had been got in it belonging to an ele- phant's skull -f-. According to Rosenmiiller, there were found in it bones of men, horses, oxen, sheep, deer, roes, mules, badgers, dogs, and foxes, but which from the researches made by him in the cave itself, and from their state of preservation, must have been deposited at * This plate forms the frontispiece to the present work. f Scemmering uber die fossilien Knocken, welche in der Protogaa Von Leibnitz abgebildet sind : eine Abhandlung in der Magazin fur die Naturgeschichte des Menschen von C. Grosse, iii. 1790, s. 73. 524 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES periods much later than those of the bear, tigers and hyenas *. The small peninsula situate nearly opposite to this cave, presents several other caves, as the Schanstein, or Beauti- ful Rock, which contains seven contiguous caverns. The Brunnenstein, or Fountain RocJc, in which, according to Esper, there are only found bones of known species, such as badgers, dogs, foxes, hogs, and deer ; but Esper had too little anatomical knowledge for his testimony to be entirely relied on with respect to this. These bones are sometimes encrusted with stalactite. It contains also the Holeberg, or Hollow Mountain, in which eight or ten caves form a series of 200 feet in length, with two entrances. Bones of the same bears as at Gaylenreuth, are found here in various lateral depressions ; and there are also deer and hogs. — The Wizerloch, so named from an ancient Sclavonic deity formerly worshipped there, the most dismal cavern of the whole country, situate in its most elevated part, and in which some vertebrae have been found. It is more than 200 feet long. — The Wunderhoehle, which takes its name from its discoverer, has been known since 1773: its extent is 160 feet. — Lastly, the Cave of Klaustein, consisting of four grottoes, and upwards of 200 feet deep. Bones have been found in the third grotto, and most abundantly towards its ex- tremity. It might be supposed that the name Klaustein signified Claw-rock , and it would thus accord very well with a place where, without doubt, as at Gaylenreuth, a multitude of ungual phalanges of bears and animals of the tiger kind have been found. But M. Goldfuss as- • Rosenmuller, Beschreib. des Hohlenharen, s. 2. OP CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 525 serts, that it was called Klaustein, or St Nicholas's Rocky after a chapel of this name, which formerly stood upon it. — There are still the Geiss-knok, or Goat Cave, and a cave discovered in 1793. M. Rosenmiiller found in them two human skeletons already covered with sta- lactite. The country which surrounds this small peninsula has itself several caves, independently of that of Gaylen- reuth, as those of Mockas, Rabenstein, and Kirch-ahorn, three villages, situate, the first to the south, and the other two to the north-east of Gaylenreuth. Bones were formerly found in the first. The last bears in the coun- try the expressive name of Zahn-loch, or Tooth Cave; it also bears the name of Hohen-mirscJifeld, a viUage on whose ground it is situate; and the country people have long been in the habit of seeking in it those bones, which they imagined to be medicinal. MM. Rosenmiil- ler and Goldfuss have in fact found bear and tiger bones. There are two others in the territory of the same village, of which the one named Schneider-loch (Tailor's Hole), is said to have furnished the vertebrae of an elephant. That of Zewig, close upon Waschenfeld, at the very edge of the Wiesent, is nearly 80 feet deep ; and it is said that skeletons of men and wolves were found in it. All these hills, containing caves in their interior, and situate so near each other, seem to form a small chain, interrupted only by brooks, and which joins the more elevated chain of the Fichtelberg, in which are the highest mountains of Franconia, and from which flow the Main, the Saale, the Eger, the Naab, and many small rivers. M. Rosenmiiller, and after him, others assert, that those which are in the hills to the north of 525 GN CAVES CONTAINING BONES the Wiesenty contain not a single fragment of bone, while those to the south are filled with them. In 1799, a cave, remarkable for its situation, was dis- covered, which connects in some measure those of the Hartz with those of Franconia. It is the Cave of Glucksbrun, in the bailiwick of Altenstem, in the terri- tory of Meinungen, on the south-western declivity of the chain of the Thuringerwald (Blumenb. Archasol. Tetturis, p. 15. Zach. Monate. Corresp. 1800, January, p. 30.) It is the same which M. Rosenmliller names Libenstein, on account of its being on the road from Al- tenstein to this latter, which is a bathing place. There is a description of it by M. Kocher, in the Magazinjur Mineralogie, by M. C. E. A. De Hof, 1st band. heft. iv. p. 427. The limestone in which it is situate rests upon bituminous schist, and, rising much upwards, comes to rest upon primitive rocks. The limestone varies in hardness and in the nature of its fracture, and contains marine petrifactions, such as pectinites, echinites, &c. In making a road, there was discovered an opening, from which a very cold air issued, which determined the Duke of Saxe-Meinungen to have it farther examined. A narrow passage, of twenty feet in length, was found, which led to a cave of thirty-five feet, having a breadth of from three to twelve, and a height of from six to twelve, according to the places, and terminated by a large piece of rock, which was removed. The labour of two years discovered and cleared a series of caves con- nected together, and of which the bottom rose and fell alternately. They terminate in a place where water flows ; but various lateral fissures make it probable that there are still several caves which have not been opened, and that they perhaps form a sort of labyrinth. OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 527 The bottom and walls of this cave are furnished with the same mud as the others, but blacker. The. bones were pretty numerous, and tinged with the same colour, but only two tolerably entire skulls were obtained. That of which M. Kocher gives a figure, is the species of bear named Ursus spelceus. There are also caves of this kind in Westphalia. J. Es Silberschlag, in the Mem. des Naturalistes of Berlin (Schriften, vol. vi. p. 132), describes the one called Kluter-hcehle^ near the village of Oldenforde, in the county of Mark, on the edge of the Milspe and Ennepe, two streams which fall into the Ruhr, and with it into the Rhine. Its entrance is about half-way up a hill called Kluterberg^ is only three feet three inches high, and faces the south. The cave itself forms a true labyrinth in the interior of the mountain. Not far from this, in the same county, at Sundwich, two leagues from Iserlohn, is another cave, which, for about twenty-five years back, has furnished a very large quantity of bones, part of which has been carried to Berlin, and the rest has remained in the country in the hands of various individuals *. If we cast a glance upon a general map, it is not dif- ficult to perceive a certain continuity in the mountains in which these singular caves occur. The Carpathians join with the mountains of Moravia and those of Bohe- mia called Bcehmerzvald, to separate the basin of the Danube, from those of the Vistula, Oder and Elbe. The Fichtelgebirge separates the basin of the Elbe from " Further information in regard to these caves will be found in Leonhard Taschenb. der Min. vii. 2. S. 439 ; and in Noggerath's Gebirge in Rheinland-Westphalen, ii. S. 27. and iii. 1. 13. ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES , that of the Rhine. The Thuringerwald and the Hartz continue to limit the basin of the Elbe, by separating it from that of the Weser. These different chains have but slight intervals be- tween them. The caves of Westphalia alone are not connected in so evident a manner with the others. Very lately, bones have been discovered in a cavern, which extends more towards the south, and is even situate on the other or Italian side of the Alps. It is that of Adelsberg in Carniola, a place situate on the great road from Laybach to Trieste, and about half way between these two cities. The whole of this country is full of caverns and grottoes, which have given rise to numerous sinkings of the surface, thus giving a very singular appearance to the country. Several of these caverns have long been celebrated among natura lists. That of Adelsberg is generally visited by travel- lers, on account of its being near the highway, and be- cause a river called the Piuka or Polke is lost there, forming a subterranean lake, and emerging again on the north side, under the name of Unz. A hole which the Chevalier de Lowengreif discovered in 1816, in one of its walls, at the height of 14 fathoms, conducted him to a series of new caves of vast extent, and of incom- parable beauty, from the lustre and variety of their sta- lactites. A part of these caves was, however, known, and must be, or have been accessible, by some other place, for in- scriptions were found in them with dates, from 1393 to 1676, together with human bones, and entire carcases, that had been buried there. A German pamphlet was 1 OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 529 published at Trieste, in which are described all the wind- ings of these subterranean passages, their different halls, their domes, their columns, and all the other appearan- ces produced by their stalactites. We shall not follow the author (M. de Volpi, Director of the School of Com- merce and Navigation at Trieste) through this immense labyrinth. Let it suffice to say, that this zealous natu- ralist asserts his having proceeded more than three leagues, almost in a straight line, and that he was only stopped by a lake which rendered it impossible to go on. It was about two leagues from the entrance that he discovered bones of animals, of which he gives figures, and which lie describes under the name of Palaeotheria. He had the politeness to communicate to me, says Cuvier, his drawings the year before, but it appears my reply did not reach him, for he makes no mention of it in his book. Be this as it may, his figures clearly shewed that the bones in question belonged to the great cave-bear. In fact, several of these bones having been presented to the Congress of Lay bach, Prince Metternich, whose enlight- ened taste for the advancement cf knowledge has already been of so much service, had the goodness to address them to Cuvier, who disposed them in the Royal Cabinet, where any one may satisfy himself as to their species. There are, without doubt, caves in many other chains-, and several are known in France. Caves occur in Sua- bia, but no bones have been found in them ; and, in ge- neral, it appears, that, before the last discoveries, and especially that which has been made in Yorkshire, none were known but those of Germany and Hungary that were rich in bones of earnivora. In truth, the rock of Fouvent, L! 530 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES and which contains in one of its cavities bones of hyenas, and at the same time those of elephants, rhinoceroses and horses, might be considered as belonging to this order of phenomena ; but as it was not explored to any depth, it cannot be certain that it is so. The case is different with the Kirkdale Cavern. It ha- ving been visited immediately after its discovery by several well informed persons, and especially by Mr Buckland, every thing has been made known with respect to it. It is situated in the East Riding of the county of York,, twenty-five miles NNE. of the city of For A;, and at about the same distance to the west from the sea and the town of Scarborough. The small river of Hodgebeck is lost un- der ground in the neighbourhood, much in the same way as the Piuka, near Adelsberg. It is placed in one of the limestone hills which form the northern boundary of the vale of Pickering, the waters of which fall into the Der- went. Mr Buckland compares the stone to that of the last strata of the Alpine limestone, such as are seen near Aigle and Meillene. It was in the course of the year 1821, that some la- bourers working at a quarry, discovered by chance the opening, which was closed by rubbish, covered over with earth and turf. It is about 100 feet above the neighbouring brook. It can be entered to the distance of 150 or £00 feet, but we can only walk erect in some places, on account of the stalactites. On its sides there are seen spines of sea-urchins and other marine remainsr incrusted in the mass of the rock ; but it is on the bottom, and there only, that there is found the stratum of mud, of about a foot thick, stuck full of bones, as at Gay- OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 531 lenreuth. This mud, and the bones which it contains, are, in various places, covered or penetrated with stalac- tite, especially near places where the rock has lateral fissures. The discovery having acquired much celebrity, a great number of people procured bones from it, and placed them in various public depots. Specimens have been de- posited in the York Institution, that of Whitby and Bristol, the British Museum, the Museum of Oxford and Cambridge, and by Mr Young of Whitby, in the College Museum of Edinburgh ; but the finest collection of the bones of Kirkdale was presented to Cuvier, and by him de- posited in the Royal Cabinet in Paris. The greatest num- ber of these bones without comparison, belong to hyenas of the same species as those of the caverns of Germany ; but there are also many of other large and small animals, which Mr Buckland supposes to form twenty-one spe- cies. From the pieces which I have under my eye, says Cuvier, there indisputably occur bones of the elephant, hippopotamus ', liorse, an ox of the size of the common deer, rabbits, Jield-rats ; also bones of some other car- nivora, namely, of the tiger, wolf, fox, and weasel. All these bones and teeth are accumulated on the ground, broken and gnawed, and there are even seen marks of the teeth which have fractured them. There are even inter- mixed with them excrements which have been recognized as perfectly similar to those of the hyena *. • In England and Wales the following caves have been found to contain fossil bones : 1. Cave in Dunc&mbe Paris, not far from that of Kirkdale. It contains only recent bones. 2. Cave of Hutton, a village in Somersetshire, at the foot of the .532! ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES The hills in which these caverns occur resemble each other in their composition : they are all of limestone, and Mendip Hills. Bones of elephants, horses, hogs, of two species of deer, of oxen, the nearly entire skeleton of a fox, and the metacar- pal bone of a large bear, have been found in it. 3. Cave of Derdham Down, near to Clifton, to the westward of Bristol. Bones of horses were found in it. 4. Cave of Balleye, near to Warksworth, in Derbyshire. In 1663, teeth of elephants, some of which are still preserved, were found in it. 5. Cave of Dream, at the village of Callow, near to Warkswortlt,. It was discovered in the year 1822, by some miners in search of lead- ore. Nearly all the bones of a rhinoceros, in a good state of preser- vation, were found enclosed in a bed of mud in this cave. 6. Fissures and caves at Oreston. These are in transition lime- stone. Bones of the rhinoceros, hysena, tiger, wolf, deer, ox, and horse, have been found in them. 7- Cave of Nicholaston, near the coast of Glamorgan, in the Bay of Oxwich. In the year 1792, bones of the elephant, rhinoceros, ox, deer, and hyaena, were found in it. 8. Caves of Paveland, hi the county of Glamorgan, between the Bay of Oxwich and Cape Worms, at the entrance of the English Channel. There are two openings in a cliff thirty or forty feet above the level of the sea, which we cannot reach but at low water. The clergyman and the surgeon of the neighbouring village of Por- tinan found in them a tusk and grinder of an elephant ; afterwards other bones of the elephant, rhinoceros, horse, bear, hysena, fox, wolf, ox, deer, rat, of birds, the skeleton of a woman, and splinters of bones, were also found. But many of these bones are modern ; and the diggings made at remote and unknown periods have displaced the ancient bones, and mixed them with the modern, and also with shells of the present sea. Professor Goldfuss, in the llth volume of the Nova Acta Phyai- co-medica Academic Ccesarea Leopoldino-Carolince Naturae Curiosorum, published in 1823, gives an account of the fossil bones he met with in the caves of Westphalia and Franconia. Speaking of the Cave of G-aylenreuth, he says, that Esper has the following remarks on the quantity of bones taken from these caves : OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 533 all produce abundance of stalactites. These stalactites line the walls, narrow the passages, and assume a thou- On first examination, there were collected, in a very short time, in the dust of the * floors of these caves, upwards of 200 different teeth ; and we may assume that, by the end of the year 1774, some thousands were collected. It is difficult to form a conception of the number of these zoolithes, and of the earth in which they are con- tained ; and I do not hesitate in believing, thai, at the lowest esti- mate, several hundred waggons load would not remove the whole. The animal earth, with intermingled bones, was, in many places, eight or ten feet deep. Esper calculated that, in his time, 180 skulls had been taken out of the loose animal earth, the conglomerate not having been broken up for this purpose. Of late years, the conglo- merate afforded, in the space of three years, 150 skulls ; and we may estimate that ttvice as many more were destroyed in breaking them out of the hard stalactitic matter. If we add to this the pieces of skulls which occur in this repository, more frequently than perfect skulls, we may estimate that more than a thousand individuals lie buried here. These bones occur now, as formerly, irregularly dispersed ; that is, teeth, cylindrical bones, cranial bones, and vertebrae of different species, and of different individuals of different ages, and of various sizes, occur conglutinated together. We never find the under jaw of the same skull near to it, and rarely the two separated portions of the same lower jaw together ; the skulls occurring all in the deep- er places : and Esper found the teeth forming a bed by themselves. The bones still possess their sharper edges, and are neither rubbed nor gnawed^ If we assume a thousand buried individuals, the proportion of the different species will be, according to Dr Goldfuss, as follows : 1. Hyaena spelaea, :::i** - 25 2. Canis spekeus, 50 3. Felis spelaea, .' -H . - 25 4. Gulo spelseus, X'ii * 30 5. Ursus priscus, -'" - 10 ' 6. Ursus arctoideus, 60 7- Ursus spelaeus. - - 800 534 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES sand various forms. The bones are nearly in the same state in all these caverns : detached, scattered, partly bro- ken, but never rolled, and consequently not brought from a distance by water ; a little lighter and less solid than recent bones, but still in their true animal nature, very little decomposed, containing much gelatine, and not at all petrified. A hardened, but still easily frangible or pulverisable earth, also containing animal parts, and sometimes blackish, forms their natural envelope. It is The bones of small animals, mentioned by Esper, are now no longer met with ; and, in the collections of Esper and Frischmann, Dr Goldfuss saw only a few dozen of the glutton (Gulo.) The contents of a peculiar conglomerate described by Esper, cannot now be determined. It consisted of a confused assemblage of very small bones, the fracture surfaces of which were fibrous, and contained also the thigh-bone and rib of a bird, which were conjectured to equal in size those of the eagle ; hence Esper inferred that the mass was made up of the remains of reptile and fish bones. No remains have hitherto been found in these caves ; but in form- er times we are told that teeth of the elephant were found in the Zahnloch, and a vertebra, supposed, of a rhinoceros, in the Schnei- derloch. The bones of domestic animals, such as deer, roes, foxes, and badgers, frequently found in the caves, shew, at a glance, that they have come into their present situation accidentally, at a mo- dern period. The cave at Mockas formerly contained in its deepest fissures, teeth and fragments of bones of bears, associated with rolled stories, and enveloped in earthy marl. The entrance to this cave is situ- ated on the acclivity of a hill. Goldfuss ascended to the entrance of it by means of a rope, and found in its interior many narrow, wide extended hollows, which are generally so confined that we can only visit them by creeping. Here and there there are small widenings, and frequently narrow outlets occur in the roof. The Zahnloch and the Schneiderloch, which also contain single bones of bears, are small vaults, with wide openings, into which we can penetrate without difficulty. OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 535 often impregnated and covered with a crust of stalactite. A covering of the same nature invests the bones in va- rious places, penetrates their natural cavities, and some- times attaches them to the walls of the cavern. This stalactite is often coloured reddish by the animal earth which is mixed with it. At other times its surface is stained black ; but it is easy to see that these appearances are caused by modern occurrences, and have no imme- diate connection with the cause which brought the bones into these cavities. We even daily see the stalactite in- creasing and enveloping here and there groups of bones which it had formerly respected. This mass of earth, penetrated by animal matter, indis- criminately envelopes the bones of all the species ; and, if we except some found at the surface of the ground, and which had been transported there at much later pe- riods, which may also be distinguished by their being much less decomposed, they must all have been interred in the same manner, and by the same causes. In this mass of earth there are found, confusedly mingled with the bones {at least in the cave of Gaylenreuth), pieces of a bluish marble, of which all the corners are rounded and blunted, and which appear to have been rolled. They singularly resemble those which form part of the osseous brecciae of Gibraltar and Dalmatia. Lastly, what further conspires to render this pheno- menon very striking, is, that the most remarkable of these bones are the same in these caverns, over an extent of more than two hundred leagues. Three-fourths and up- wards belong to species of bears, which are now extinct. A half, or two-thirds of the remaining fourth, belong to a species of hyena, which is equally unknown at the pre- 536 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES sent day. A smaller number belong to a species of the tiger or lion kind, and to another of the wolf 'or dog ge- nus ; lastly, the most diminutive have belonged to va- rious small carnivora, as the fox, the polecat , or at least species very nearly allied to them, &c. The Kirkdale Cavern, however, forms a notable ex- ception, inasmuch as none, or very few, bones of bears are found in it, and in its being the hyena that appears to predominate among the carnivora. The species so common in the alluvial formations, the elephants, rhinoceroses, horses, oxen or aurochs, and tapirs, are of very rare occurrence in the caves of Ger- many. There are even some in which no one is said to have found them, and the only bones of herbivora men- tioned are remains of deer. In this point also, however, the Kirkdale cave differs much from the others, inas- much as it abounds almost as much in bones of large and small herbivora, as in bones of carnivora. All the great pachydermata of the alluvial formations are seen in it : the elephants, rhinoceroses and hippopotami. There are also seen in it bones of oxen, deer, and even small bones of mice and birds. But there are no bones of ma- rine animals of any species, either at Kirkdale or in Ger- many. Those who have pretended that they saw bones of seals, morses, or other similar species, have been led into error by the hypothesis which they had previously adopted. These bones of carnivora, so numerous in the caves, are rare in the great alluvial strata; the hyena alone has been seen in any quantity at Canstadt, near Aichstedt, and in some other places. There have also been found some traces of bears in Tuscany and Austria, but their OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 537 relative proportion is always infinitely less than in the caves ; and it is always sufficiently proved by these cir- cumstances, that these various animals have lived to- gether in the same countries, and have belonged to the same epoch. Cuvier concludes, there can only be imagined three ge- neral causes which might have placed these bones in such quantity in these vast subterranean cavities. Either they are the remains of animals which inhabited these abodes, and which died peaceably there ; or inundations and other violent causes have carried them into these cavities ; or, lastly, they had been enveloped in rocky strata, the dis- solution of which produced these caverns, and they have not been dissolved by the agent which carried off the mat- ter of the strata. This last cause is refuted by the fact, that the strata in which the caves occur contain no bones ; and the se- cond by the entireness of the smallest prominences of the bones, which does not permit us to think that they had been rolled ; for if some bones are worn, as Mr Buckland has remarked, they are only so on one side, which would only prove that some current has passed over them, and in the deposit in which they are. We are, therefore, ob- liged to have recourse to the first supposition, whatever difficulties it presents on its part, and to say that these caves served as a retreat to carnivorous animals, and that these carried there, for the purpose of devouring them, the animals which formed their prey, or the parts of these animals. Mr Buckland has observed, that the hyena bones are not less broken and splintered than those of the herbivo- rous animals ; from which he concludes, that the hyenas 538 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES had devoured the dead bodies of their own species, as those of the present day still do. These animals attack each other during their life ; for the fossil head of a hyena is preserved, which had evi- dently been wounded and afterwards healed *. * The fact mentioned in the text brings to our recollection an interesting Memoir of Professor Walther, entitled, " On the Anti- quity of diseases in Bones," printed in Grasse and Walther's Jour- nal der Chirurgie und Augenheil Kunde, viii. From eleven speci- mens of bones of cave-bears found in the Caves of Sundwich. de- scribed by Walther, a proof is obtained, that the common forms of osseous diseases occur in them, just as they are observed at pre- sent in the human species, viz. necrosis, anchylosis, caries, exosto- sis, formation of new bony matter, thickening, thinning, and arthri- tic properties of diseased bones. Most of those diseases are such as would result from violent injuries, and the consequent very tedious organ o- vital reaction. Such mechanical injuries would give rise to necrosis, caries, exostosis, &c. We can easily conceive, says Walther, how that the rapacious animals of a former world may have been exposed to violent mechanical injuries of their bodies, and of single parts of them. It is worthy of remark, that most of the diseased bones are of the lower jaw, the alveolar processes of it and the walls of single alveolae. During the combats of the cave bears for their prey amongst themselves, or with other gigantic ani- mals, the jaws and teeth must have experienced the greatest me- chanical injuries. The necroses of the humeral bones are such as might result from a bruising of the bones, and the caries of the up- per surface of the bodies of the lumbar vertebrae, may have been occasioned by external violence. Walther is also of opinion, that the cave-bears suffered from diseases of the bones not referrible to mechanical injuries. He remarks of a radius and a vertebra, whose arthritic condition he carefully describes, " These bones have ex- perienced pathological changes, which could only arise from a long continued diseased condition of the nutritive process. They are very light, have an extremely thin crust, the greater part of their mass is of a spongy, very porous substance, and are uncommonly fragile. OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 539 This supposition is moreover confirmed by the animal nature of the earth in which these bones are found *. This much is certain, that the establishment of these animals in the caves has taken place at a much later epoch than that at which the great rocky strata have been formed, not only those which compose the mountains in which the caves are situated, but the strata of much newer origin. No permanent inundation has penetrated into the subterranean dens, and formed a regular rocky deposit. The mud arising from the proper decomposi- tion of these animals, and the stalactites that have been filtered through the wall of the caves, are the only mat- ters which cover these remains, and these stalactites in- crease so rapidly, that M. Goldfuss already found a layer Such a change could not be produced by any external mechanical in- jury, nor by any slight action of the weather ; but must proceed from a tedious constitutional disease, connected with a total change of the organo-forming plastic activity, and proceeding from a pecu- liar dyscrasia." Hence it is probable, these cave-bears even suffer- ed from gout, scrophula, and other similar diseases. * According to Laugier, in 100 parts of the earth in which the bones in the caves of Gaylenreuth are imbedded, he found the fol- lowing proportional quantity of constituent parts; 1. Lime, with a little magnesia, in the state of carbonate, 32.0 2. Carbonic acid and moisture, - r ->,;,',•*> - 24.0 3. Phosphate of lime, - , -.r, ,,,. -rr . -| 21'5 4. Animal matter and water, - ... 10.0 5. Alumina slightly coloured with manganese, - - 4.0 6. Silica coloured with iron, - .... 4.0 7« Oxide of iron, probably combined with phosphoric acid, 3.5 8. Loss, - - 1.0 100.0 540 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES. of them covering the names of MM. Esper and Rosen- muller, whose visits did not date thirty years before his own. The rolled stones that are met with, and the marks of detrition observed on some bones, announce, at the very utmost, but passing currents. But how have so many ferocious animals which peo- pled our forests been extirpated ? All the reply we can make is, that they must have been destroyed at the same time, and by the same cause, as the large herbivora, which, like them, also peopled these forests, and of which no traces remain at the present day any more than of them. ACCOUNT OF THE CAVE CONTAINING BONES AT ADELS- BEBG IN CARNIOLA. THE following interesting account of the cave, slight- ly noticed at pages 524 and 525, is extracted from a me- moir by M. Bertrand Geslin, Member of the Natural History Society of Paris, published in the number of the Annales des Sciences Naturelles for April 1826. M. Cuvier, says Gesler, speaking of the Adelsberg Cave, from the account published by M. Volpi of Trieste, says, that it was nearly two leagues from the entrance where he discovered bones of animals. Having visited this cave myself, I am obliged to say that M. VolpTs assertion as to this matter is not very correct. On my way to Trieste, in July 1823, before going to Adelsberg, I had the advantage of seeing M. Volpi. In shewing me the bones collected by him at OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 541 Adelsberg, he also assured me that they were found two leagues from the entrance of the cave, and only in a very compact block of several cubic feet, from which it was not possible to procure more, as he had taken all that he could easily remove. Notwithstanding this discouraging account, I betook myself to Adelsberg, in order to see a sample of those immense caverns of secondary limestone. The entrance of the cave is situated in a white compact secondary limestone, lying in great beds inclined to the south-west, at an angle of from 30 to 35 degrees. At fifty paces from the entrance, we find ourselves as in a large apartment, which crosses the torent of the Pinka. After passing to the left bank of this torrent, we enter a rather low and not long passage, which leads to a second apartment of an elongated form. It is here that the line of chambers truly commences. They are of large but variable dimen- sions, and are situated nearly upon a horizontal plane. On entering this second chamber, I saw that the ground was formed of a yellow and reddish clayey mud, from one to two feet thick, and more or less impregnated and covered with crusts of yellow stalag- mites. In the places where it offered little resistance, I dug it up with the point of my hammer, and was fortu- nate enough to disunite some fragments of bone, al- though, from what had been said to me, I ought not to have expected to find them. From this I was convinced, that if M. Volpi had only found bones at a distance of two leagues from the entrance, it was because he had not been at the trouble to search for them nearer. I fell to work with more ardour, and succeeded in digging 542 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES up some in good preservation, such as radii, cubiti, fe- mora, humeri, fragments of jaws, calcarea, toes, verte- brae, &c., belonging to bears of different sizes, of the species termed Ursus spelceus. It would appear that the hyena tribe is rather rare here, for 1 only procured a single bone belonging to it. It was particularly in two small lateral chambers, near the narrow passage, that I obtained a great quantity of these bones, the clay there having been dug up by the guides, in order to make the floor of the great apartment even with it. I continued to dig as I advanced, and everywhere found bones more or less broken and enveloped in the clayey mud. After proceeding for half an hour, I fell in with a mass, in an apartment of considerable dimen- sions, which was of a conical form, and composed of blocks of compact white limestone, of all sizes, mixed with yellowish clayey mud. These blocks had their edges as sharp as if they had only been lately broken. The mass, which reached to the right wall of the cave, might be fifteen feet in height, and twenty in diameter at its base : it was covered with stalactite in several places. It was in this mass, at about ten feet above the floor of the cave, in the clayey mud that filled up the interstices between the blocks, that I found the entire skeleton of a young bear, in a space of two square feet at most. The bones which I dug out were the frontal part of the head, the lower jaw of the left side, the seventh cervical and eighth dorsal vertebrae ; the eighth and fourteenth ribs of the right side ; two tibia, femora, and cubiti, and two large canine teeth of another bear. If I could have raised up the limestone blocks, between which these bones lay, I might without doubt have pro- OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 543 cured a great part of this skeleton. There are still found here and there in the cave some small heaps of clayey mud, with fragments of white secondary lime- stone, as well as large isolated limestone blocks, which the guides are daily destroying, to make the floor even for the convenience of visitors. I had only advanced an hour and a quarter's progress into the cave, always finding bones, when the oil of my lamps beginning to fail, I was obliged to return without reaching the block in which M. Volpi had found the first bones. This block is without doubt owing to the same causes as the heap of which I have spoken above. The manner in which these heaps exist, being compo- sed of blocks of compact white secondary limestone, si- milar to that which forms the walls of the cave, with sharp edges, and piled upon each other, made me ima- gine that they might have fallen from the roof. As I returned, I examined the ceiling of the vaults with atten- tion. As it was all covered over with stalactites, I could not discover any fissure. From this short excursion in the Adelsberg cave, I am induced to believe, that the bones exist along the whole extent of the cave, and that they occur in two dif- ferent ways ; \st, scattered in the clayey mud which forms the floor of the chambers ; and, Qdly, buried in heaps formed of blocks of white secondary compact limestone, and yellow clayey mud. The hypothesis which M. Cuvier admits as the most probable for explaining the presence of these bones in the caves, is that which would make these caves to have served as a retreat to carnivorous animals. The presence of bones in the clayey mud of the floor 544 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES of the Adelsberg cave accords well with this hypothesis ; but the case is different with those which I found in the heaps of limestone blocks and clayey mud. The bones are not at the surface of the heap, but rather towards its middle part, buried among the blocks, and crushed by them. From this position, and the height at which the skeleton mentioned above occurs from the floor of the cave, it cannot be supposed that it formed part of the bones with which the bottom of the cave is strewed, nor that the blocks had fallen upon it. The bones contain- ed in the heap in question must have been brought into their present position at the same time, and by the same cause as the limestone blocks. They could not, there- fore, have belonged to animals which inhabited these caves, and died there peaceably. If it be remarked, that these blocks, which are some- times very large, heaped up above one another, and mixed with clayey mud, have their angles perfectly fresh, and are of the same nature as the limestone of the walls of the cave, it cannot be admitted that they have been brought from a distance. This mode of arrangement could only have been produced by their falling from the roof of the cave. The following facts also give support to this opinion, In the cave of Gaylenreuth, a fissure of the third grotto, was the means, in 1784, of disclosing a new one, fifteen feet long and four broad, where the greatest quantity of hyena or lion bones were found. The aperture was much too small for these animals to have passed through it. In a cave discovered in 1824, in the district of La- narjk in Upper Canada, Mr Bigsby observed, that the OF CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS. 545 floor was covered with debris of brown granular lime- stone, similar to that of the walls, and that the bones especially formed a heap there. He thinks that the ani- mal, whose bones have been found in this cave, was much too large to have got into it alive or entire. — Sil- limari's Journal, June 1825, p. 354. It must therefore be also admitted here, . either that the bones could only have got into the cave in the same manner as the heaps of blocks found in the Adelsberg cave ; that is to say, by falling from the roof, or that the apertures have been closed since the period at which the animals were buried. If it be now considered, 1st, That the surface of the secondary limestone mountains of Carniola is covered with a layer of reddish clay ; and, Qdly, That the clayey mud of the heap in the Adelsberg cave is mineralogical- ly the same as that which forms the floor of the cave ; may it not be supposed, that the same catastrophe which produced the heaps in the cave may have, at the same time, introduced into it the reddish clayey mud of the surface, which, by extending itself over the floor of the cave, would have contributed to cover the bones that were lying there ? Moreover, may it not have been the case, that, after the caves had been inhabited by the carnivorous animals, the substances falling from above, and coming from the surface of the soil, may have carried along with the clay- ey mud and the bones of bears, the spoils of large her- bivorous animals, which they may have met with, and which cannot be supposed to have sought refuge in these caves during life. There will, no doubt, be objected to me, that opinion M m 546 ON CAVES CONTAINING BONES, &C. which maintains, that the bones of herbivora have been dragged into the caves by the carnivorous animals. This might certainly have been the case with regard to small species, but it is not probable that the bones of large spe- cies could have been introduced in the same manner. Admitting as certain, at least with regard to the Adels- berg cave, that the limestone blocks and the bear bones which accompany them, have fallen from the ceiling, the phenomenon of caves containing bones would connect it- self pretty well with that of osseous brecciae in a geolo- gical point of view. As M . Cuvier observes, " The na- ture of the rocks which contains the one and the other is not very different ; and, besides, the fissures of caves being generally pretty wide, the bones would not have stuck, but would have fallen to the bottom, while those of the osseous brecciae being much narrower, and not so deep, would have retained the bones at no great distance from the surface of the soil. Thus, from the facts observed in the caves of Germany and England, and from that of the Adelsberg cave, which I have described above, we may conclude, 1st, That the presence of bones in caves has been produced at two different periods, which, without doubt, have not been very distant from each other ; the first, that when the animals inhabited these caves ; the other, that when they had been transported there by a somewhat general catastrophe ; &%, That the second epoch was contem- poraneous with the osseous brecciae, and was produced, like them, by a phenomenon or process of filling up. 547 TABULAR VIEW OF The GENERA of FOSSIL MAMMIFERA, GET ACE A, AVES, REP- TILIA, and INSECT A, — exhibiting their Geognostical Number and Distribution. Number o Genera which are found Species. 3 •= fi 1 "S ll I i NAMES OF GENERA. iL 11 ••^ Jfr § Su II 1 II I ! OBSERVATIONS. 1 l| 1^ 1: 1 i 3 3c£ fi JB.2 5S £•§ £ a MAMMIFERA, Ursus , - - - - 4 Mustek, - - - 2 Canis, - - -i 4 Hyaena, - - 1 Felis, - - - 2 Phoca, - - - 2 Didelphis, - - 2 Castor, - - - 1 Arvicola, - - 2 Lagomys, v - 2 Lepus, - '. I . 2 Megalonyx, - - Megatherium, * # 1 1 Elephas, - - - Mastodon, - - » 6 Hippopotamus, - • 4 Sus, .... ^ 1 Anoplotherium, # 2 Xiphodon, - - * 1 Dichobunus, - - * 3 Anthracotherium, Ht 2 Adapis, ... 4k 1 Chseropotamus, - Rhinoceros, - - # * 1 4 Palaeotherium, - K 8 Lophiodon, - .. * 5 548 TABLE— continued. Genera which are found Number of Species. 5 d 2^ I i^ 1 i 1 B § 'cS *s &'e3 W rr> NAMES OF GENERA. 0 I g 1 n \ |f 11 1 5 1 OBSERVATIONS. 3 a >» 1 * |2 li 1? 1 i al 2 eS c.2 c.g C B MAMMIFERA. Tapirus, - '-,'"'••* « 1 Elasmotherium, - » 1 Equus, p - - - 1 Mus, ---- 1 * Cervus, - - - 5 Bos, - - - - 4 Myoxus, - - - 2 CETACEA. Manatus, - - - * 0 1 It is extremely difficult to make Delphinus, - - Balaena, - - - * a 4 3 out the genera of the Birds, whose remains AVES. occur in a fossil state, and there Sturnus, - - - • 0 1 are more of them Pelecanus, »'j • '— * 0 1 than those men- Charadrius, - - » 1 tioned. RE PT ILIA. Testudo, - - - 0 g 6 Crocodilus, - - * 6 Plesiosaurus, - - » Ichthyosaurus, - Pterodactylus, - * !! i Rana, - *- - - 0 „, Mosasaurus, - - * Salamandra, - - » • 549 TABLE — continued. Number of Genera which are found Species .73 *** 1 ^ . 4 . & 1 1 i| » l| n 3 NAMES OF GENERA. I m 1 8 ~ I IS I c« fi.g cES 1 1 OBSERVATIONS. a If 1 3 £ If £3 SI II £u ^2 SI 1 a 1 c INSECTA. .-In the lignite; Silpha, - - * * 1 the number of < species cannot J be given in the V insects. Curculio, - - * * In amber. Scorpio, - - * * Do. Musca, ... * * Do. Blatta, - - - * * Do. T ipula, - - * * Do. Aranea, - - * 0 Do. Ichneumon, - • • Do. Libellula, - - * * /• In the fissil J rocks, accord- 1 ing to the old authors. Scarabaeus, - * * Do. Scolopendra, - • * Do. Fapilio, - - * * Do. Hemerobia, - * • Do. Carabue, - - * * Do. 550 TABULAR VIEW OF The CLASSES, ORDERS, or FAMILIES, of ANIMALS, occurring in a Living and Fossil State, with their Geognostical Distribution. Number of Genera which are found t Number of Species NAMES OF | §™ 1 ll 1 L i | 1 CLASSES, ORDERS, 1 » a 11 o 21 1 .i d OR FAMILIES. 3 5 1 I H en il B 1 OBSERVATIONS. ** f 3* If || j~ 3 1 1 fil 3 si •S-s flq si H s ,5 Polyparia, - - 23 30 52 47 19 36 105 527 414 Stellaridse, - 4 2 4 4 76 4 Echinidse, - - 2 6 3 7 8 5 11 95 112 Annulosa, - - 2 1 1 1 2 3 17 29 Serpulacea, - 2 3 1 3 3 3 6 36 69 Cirripeda,. - 8 2 1 2 10 50 17 t Tubicolse, - - 1 3 2 5 6 11 16 Pholadaria, 2 2 2 12 4 Bivalve shells, 18 61 24 44 25 51 103 1009 1104 [Jnivalve shells, 33 87 28 27 16 93 148 1945 1544 Genera IHtlel known, . - J 4 3 1 4 5 Crustacea, - - 21 5 5 2 9 28 54 Pisces, - .* _ 54 6 11 2 55 60 183 Mammifera &•» Cetacea, - - 24 12 36 36 89 The fossil remains of birds being very difficult to be re- Aves, - - . 3 3 3 c cognised, the num- ber of genera in that state is un- doubtedly much I more considerable. Reptilia, t 4 4 3 2 4 8 23 Insecta, - 14 14 14 Vegetabilia, 14 10 12 1 15 24 THE END. 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BOOKS PRINTED FOR WILLIAM BLACKWOOD, EDINBURGH. A New Edition, entirely re-composed, in 4 large vols. 8vo. L. 3, A SYSTEM OF CHEMISTRY. BY THOMAS THOMSON, M.D. F.R.S. &c. &c. In one vol. 8vo. with Four Maps of the Constellations, and a Plate of the figures illustrative of the Work. The Second Edition, corrected and improved. Price 9s. AN ELEMENTARY TREATISE ON ASTRONOMY; Or, an Easy Introduction to a Knowledge of the Heavens, Intended for the Use of those who are not much conversant in Mathematical Studies. By the REV. A. MYLNE, D. D. Minister of Dollar, Honorary Member of the Royal Physical Society, and Fellow of the Society of Scottish Antiquaries. Handsomely Printed in 8vo. the Second Edition, Price 14s. of WERNER'S NOMENCLATURE OF COLOURS, With Additions, so as to render it highly useful to the Arts and Sciences, parti cularly .Zoology, Botany, Chemistry, Mineralogy, and Morbid Anatomy. An. nexed to which are examples selected from well-known objects in the Ani- mal, Vegetable, and Mineral Kingdoms. By PATRICK SYME, Flower. Painter, Edinburgh ; Painter to the Wernerian and Caledonian Horti- cultural Societies. " Having the good fortune to possess a colour-suite of minerals, made, under the eye of Werner, by my late friend H. Meuder of Freyberg, and being desi- rous of making this collection as generally useful as possible, I mentioned my wish to Mr Syme, who readily undertook to make a delineation of all the varie- ties in this collection. This he executed with his usual skill and accuracy ; add- ing, at the same time, to the series several other colours, which he has distin- guished by appropriate names, and arranged along with those in the Wernerian system. The whole has been published in a series of Tables, in a Treatise which ought to be in the hands of every Mineralogist, and indeed in the possession of Naturalists of every description." — Professor JAMESON'S Characters of Minerals. In One Volume large 8vo. Price 14s. HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE PROGRESS OF DISCOVERY, NAVIGATION, AND COMMERCE, From the earliest Records to the beginning of the Nineteenth Century. BY WILIJAM STEVENSON, ESQ. %* This HISTORICAL SKETCH has been drawn up with reference to, and in order to form the 18th and concluding Volume of KERR'S VOYAGES and TRA- VELS. But though drawn up with this object, it is strictly and entirely an in- dependent and separate Work. 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