BtRKElEY\ LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF LX EARTH SCIENCES LIBRARY \ k - ESSAY ON THE THEORY OF THE EARTH. ESSAY ON THE THEORY OF THE EARTH. BY M. CUVIER, PERPETUAL SECRETARY OF THE FRENCH INSTITUTE, PROFESSOR AND ADMINISTRATOR OF THE MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, &C. &C. WITH MIJYERdLOGICdL NOTES, AND AN ACCOUNT OF CUVIER'S GEOLOGICAL DISCOVERIES, BY PROFESSOR JAMESON. TO WHICH ARE NOW ADDERS, ^ ?"',*; I OBSERVATIONS ON THE GEOLOGY OF NORTH AMERICA; ILLUSTRATED BY THE DESCRIPTION OF VARIOUS ORGANIC REMAINS, FOUND IN THAT PART OF THE WORLD. BY SAMUEL L. MITCHILL, Eotan. Mineral, et Zoolog. in Univere, Nov. Eborac. Prof. &c. &c. PUBLISHED BY KIRK & MERCEIN, KO. 22 WALL-STREET. Priutd by W. A.Merceih, ^o. 93 Geid-Street. 18*8. EARTH SCIENCE^ 1 ".." **. .* Southern District of JVew-York, s, * BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the sixteenth day of February, in the forty- second year of the Independence of the United States of America, Kirk & Mercein, of the said District, have deposited in this office the title of a Book, the right where- of they claim as Proprietors, in the words following, to wit ; " Essay on the Theory of the Earth. By M. Cuvier, Perpetual Secretary of the French Institute, Professor and Administrator of the Museum of Natural History, &c. &c. With Mineralogical Notes, and an Account of Cuvier's Geological Disco- veries, by Professor Jameson. To which are now added, Observations on the Geology of North America ; illustrated by the Description of various Organic Re- mains, found in that part of the world. By Samuel L. Mitchill, Botan. Mineral, et Zoolog. in Umrers. Nov. Eborac. Prof. &c. &c." In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States, entitled " An Act for the encouragement of Learning, by securing the copies of Maps, Charts, and Books to the authors and proprietors of such copies, during the time therein mentioned." e Different parts of organized beings are distinguished. I had next to prepare myself 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 character of demonstration to the results of my investiga- tion in its ancient state ; but that review has afford- ed me, at the same time, a great body of rules and affinities which are no less satisfactorily de- monstrated; and the whole animal kingdom has been subjected to new laws in consequence of this Essay on a small part of the theory of the earth.* The importance of the truths which have been developed in the progress of my labours, has con- tributed equally with the novelty of my principal results to sustain and encourage my efforts. May it have a similar effect on the mind of the reader, and induce him to follow me patiently through the difficult paths in which I am under the necessity of leading him ! * This will be seen more at large in the extensive work upon Com- parative Anatomy, in which I have been employed for more than twenty-five years, and which I intend soon to prepare for publication. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 27 The ancient history of the globe, which is the ultimate object of all these researches, is also of itself one of the most curious subjects that can en- gage the attention of enlightened men ; and if they take any interest in examining, in the infancy of our species, the almost obliterated traces of so many nations that have become extinct, they will doubt- less take a similar interest in collecting, amidst the darkness which covers the infancy of the globe, the traces of those revolutions which took place anterior to the existence of all nations. We admire the power by which the human mind has measured the motions of globes which nature seemed to have concealed for ever from our view : Genius and science have burst the limits of space, and a few observations, explained by just reason- ing, have unveiled the mechanism of the universe. Would it not also be glorious for man to burst the limits of time, and, by a few observations, to ascer- tain the history of this world, and the series of events which preceded the birth of the human race? Astronomers, no doubt, have 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 philoso- phers thought that the heavens were formed of polished stone, and that the moon was no larger than the Peloponnesus ; but, after Anaxagoras, we have had our Copernicuses, and our Keplers, who pointed out the way to Newton ; and why should not natural history also have one day its Newton ? 28 THEORY OP THE EARTH* 2. Plan of this Essay. What I now offer comprehends but a few of the facts which must enter into the composition of this ancient history. But these few are important; many of them are decisive ; and I hope that the rigorous methods which I have adopted for the purpose of establishing them, will make them be considered as points so determinately fixed as to admit of no departure from them. Though this hope should only be realized with respect to some of them, I shall think myself sufficiently rewarded for my labour. In this preliminary discourse I shall describe the whole of the results at which the theory of the earth seems to me to have arrived. I shall men- tion the relations which connect the history of the fossil bones of land animals with these results, and the considerations which render their history pe- culiarly important. I shall unfold the principles on which is founded the art of ascertaining these bones, or, in other words, of discovering a genus and of distinguishing a species by a single frag- ment of bone, an art on the certainty of which depends that of the whole work. I shall give a ra- pid sketch of the results to which my researches lead, of the new species and genera which these have been the means of discovering, and of the different strata in which they are found deposited. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 29 And as the difference between these species and the species which still exist is bounded by certain limits, I shall show that these limits are a great deal more extensive than those which now distinguish the varieties of the same species ; and shall then point out how far these varieties may be owing to the influence of time, of climate, or of domestica- tion. In this way I shall be prepared to conclude that great events were necessary to produce the more considerable difterences which I have disco- vered: I shall next take notice of the particular modifications which my performance should intro- duce into the hitherto received opinions respect- ing the primitive history of the globe ; and, last of all, I shall inquire how far the civil and religious history of different nations corresponds with the re- sults of an examination of the physical history of the earth, and with the probabilities afforded by such examination concerning the period at which societies of men had it in their power to take up fixed abodes, to occupy fields susceptible of culti- vation, and consequently to assume a settled and durable form. 3. Of the first appearance of the Earth. When the traveller passes through those fertile plains where gently-flowing streams nourish in their course an abundant vegetation, and where the 30 THEORY OP THE EARTH. soil, inhabited by a numerous population, adorned with flourishing villages, opulent cities, and superb monuments, is never disturbed except by the rava- ges of war and the oppression of tyrants, he is not led to suspect that nature also has had her intes- tine wars, and that the surface of the globe has been much convulsed by successive revolutions and various catastrophes. But his ideas change as soon as he digs into that soil which presented such a peaceful aspect, or ascends the hills which border the plain; they are expanded, if I may use the expression, in proportion to the expansion of his view ; and they begin to embrace the full extent and grandeur of those ancient events to which I have alluded, ^when he climbs the more elevated chains whose base is skirted by these first hills, or when, by following the beds of the descending torrents, he penetrates into their inte- rior structure, which is thus laid open to his inspec- tion. 4. First Proofs of Revolutions on the Surface of the Globe* The lowest and most level parts of the earth, when penetrated to a very great depth, exhibit nothing but horizontal strata composed of various substances, and containing almost all of them in- numerable marine productions. Similar strata, * Note A, at the end of the Essay. < jj&i THEORY OF THE EARTH. 31 with the same kind of productions, compose the hills even to a greatheight. Sometimes the shells are so numerous as to constitute the entire body of the stratum. They are almost everywhere in such a perfect state of preservation, that even the small- est of them retain their most delicate parts, their sharpest ridges, and their finest and tenderest pro- cesses. They are found in elevations far above the level of every part of the ocean, and in places to which the sea could not be conveyed by any existing cause. They are not only enclosed in loose sand, but are often incrusted and penetra- ted on all sides by the hardest stones. Every part of the earth, every hemisphere, every conti- nent, every island of any size, exhibits the same phenomenon. We are therefore forcibly led to believe, not only that the sea has at one period or another covered all our plains, but that it must have remained there for a long time, and in a state of tranquillity ; which circumstance was necessary for the formation of deposits so extensive, so thick, in part so solid, and containing exuviae so perfect- ly preserved. The time is past for ignorance to assert that these remains of organized bodies are mere lusus natum, productions generated in the womb of the earth by its own creative powers. A nice and scrupulous comparison of their forms, of their con- texture, and frequently even of their composition, cannot detect the slightest difference between 32 THEORY OF THE EARTH. these shells and the shells which still inhabit the sea. They have therefore once lived in the sea, and been deposited by it; the sea consequently must haverest- ed in the places where the deposition has taken place. Hence it is evident the basin or reservoir containing the sea has undergone some change at least, either in extent, or in situation, or in both. 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 higher, and approach nearer to the foot of the great chains of mountains. There are still found many beds of shells; some of these are even larger and more solid ; the shells are quite as numerous and as en- tirely preserved ; but they are not of the same spe- cies with those which were found in the less eleva- ted regions. The strata which contain them are not so generally horizontal ; they have various de- grees of inclination, and are sometimes situated vertically. While in the plains and low hills it was necessary to dig deep in order to detect the suc- cession of the strata, here we perceive them by means of the valleys which time or violence has pro- duced, and which disclose their edges to the eye of the observer. At the bottom of these declivi- ties, huge masses of their debris are collected, and form round hills, the height of which is augmented by the operation of every thaw and of every storm. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 33 These inclined or vertical strata, which form the ridges of the secondary mountains, do not rest on the horizontal strata of the hills which are situat- ed at their base, and serve as their first steps ; but, on the contrary, are situated underneath them. The latter are placed upon the declivities of the former. When we dig through the horizon- tal strata in the neighbourhood of the inclined strata, the inclined strata are invariably found be- low. Nay sometimes, when the inclined strata are not too much elevated, their summit is surmounted by horizontal strata. The inclined strata are there- fore more ancient than the horizontal strata. And as they must necessarily have been formed in a hori- zontal position, they have been subsequently shift- ed into their inclined or vertical position, and that too before the horizontal strata were placed above them. Thus the sea, previous to the formation of the horizontal strata, had formed others, which, by some means, have been broken, lifted up, and over- turned in a thousand ways. There had therefore been also at least one change in the basin of that sea which preceded ours ; it had also experienced at least one revolution ; and as several of these in- clined strata which it had formed first, are elevated above the level of the horizontal strata which have succeeded and which surround them, this revolu- tion, while it gave them their present inclination, had also caused them to project above the level of 34 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the sea, so as to form islands, or at least rocks and inequalities; and this must have happened whe- ther one of their edges was lifted up above the water, or the depression of the opposite edge caused the water to subside. This is the second result, not less obvious, nor less clearly demonstrated, than the first, to every one who will take the trouble of studying carefully the remains by which it is illus- trated and proved. 5. Proofs that such Revolutions have been numerous. If we institute a more detailed comparison be- tween the various strata and those remains of ani- mals which they contain, we shall soon discover still more numerous differences among them, indi- cating a proportional number of changes in their condition. The sea has not always deposited stony substances of the same kind. It has observed a regular succession as to the nature of its deposits ; the more ancient the strata are, so much the more uniform and extensive are they ; and the more re- cent they are, the more limited are they, and the more variation is observed in them at small dis- tances. Thus the great catastrophes which have produced revolutions in the basin of the sea, were preceded, accompanied, and followed by changes in the nature of the fluid and of the substances which it held in solution ; and when the surface of the seas came to be divided by islands and project- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 35 ing ridges, different changes took place in everj separate basin. Amidst these changes of the general fluid, it must have been almost impossible for the same kind of animals to continue to live : nor did they do so in fact. Their species, and even their ge- nera, change with the strata; and although the same species occasionally recur at small distances, it is generally the case that the shells of the an- cient strata have forms peculiar to themselves ; that they gradually disappear, till they are not to be seen at all in the recent strata, still less in the ex- isting seas, in which, indeed, we never discover their corresponding species, and where several, even of their genera, are not to be found ; that, on the contrary, the shells of the recent strata resem- ble, as it respects the genus, those which still ex- ist in the sea; and that in the last-formed and loosest of these strata, there are some species which the eye of the most expert naturalists can- not distinguish from those which at present inhabit the ocean. In animal nature, therefore, there has been a succession of changes corresponding to those which have taken place in the chemical nature of the fluid ; and when the sea last receded from our con- tinent, its inhabitants were not very different from those which it still continues to support. 36 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Finally, if we examine with greater care these remains of organized bodies, we shall discover, in the midst even of the most ancient secondary stra- ta, other strata that are crowded with animal or ve- getable productions, which belong to the land and to fresh water; and amongst the most recent stra- ta, that is, the strata which are nearest the surface, there are some of them in which land animals are buried under heaps of marine productions. Thus the various catastrophes of our planet have not only caused the different parts of our continent to rise by degrees from the basin of the sea, but it has also frequently happened, that lands which had been laid dry have been again covered by the water, in consequence either of these lands sinking down below the level of the sea, or of the sea being raised above the level of the lands. The particular por- tions of the earth also which the sea has abandoned by its last retreat, had been laid dry once before, and had at that time produced quadrupeds, birds, plants, and all kinds of terrestrial productions ; it had then been inundated by the sea, which has since retired from it, and left it to be occupied by its own proper inhabitants. The changes which have taken place in the pro- ductions of the shelly strata have not, therefore, been entirely owing to a gradual and general re- treat of the waters, but to successive irruptions and retreats, the final result of which, however, has been an universal depression of the level of the sea. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 37 6. Proofs that the Revolutions have been sudden. These repeated irruptions and retreats of the sea have neither been slow nor gradual ; most ot the catastrophes which have occasioned them have been sudden ; and this is easily proved, especially with regard to the last of them, the traces of which are most conspicuous. In the northern regions it has left the carcasses of some large quadrupeds which the ice had arrested, and which are pre- served even to the present day with their skin, their hair, and their flesh. If they had not been frozen as soon as killed they must quickly have been decomposed by putrefaction. But this eter- nal frost could not have taken possession of the re- gions which these animals inhabited except by the same cause which destroyed them;* this cause, therefore, must have been as sudden as its effect. The breaking to pieces and overturnings of the strata, which happened in former catastrophes, *how plainly enough that they were sudden and v iolent like the last ; and the heaps of debris and rounded pebbles which are found in various places * The two most remarkable phenomena of this kind, and which must for ever banish all idea of a slow and gradual revolution, are the rhinoceros, discovered in 1771 in the banks of the Filhoui, and the ele- phant recently found by M. Adams near the mouth of the Lena. This last retained its flesh and skin, on Avhich was hair of two kinds ; one short, fine, and crisped, resembling wool, and the other like long brig- ties. The flesh was still in such high preservation, that it was eaten by dogs. 33 THEORY OP THE EARTH. among the solid strata, demonstrate the vast tbrce of the motions excited in the mass of waters by these overturnings. Life, therefore, has been often disturbed on this earth by terrible events calami- ties which, at their commencement, have perhaps moved and overturned to a great depth the entire outer crust of the globe, but which, since these first commotions, have uniformly acted at a less depth and less generally. Numberless living be- ings have been the victims of these catastrophes ; some have been destroyed by sudden inundations, others have been laid dry in consequence of the bottom of the seas being instantaneously elevated. Their races even have become extinct, and have left no memorial of them except some small frag- ment which the naturalist can scarcely recognise. Such are the conclusions which necessarily re- sult from the objects that we meet with at every step of our inquiry, and which we can always ve- rify by examples drawn from almost every country. Every part of the globe bears the impress of these great and terrible events so distinctly, that they must be visible to all who are qualified to read their history in the remains which they have left behind. But what is still more astonishing and not less certain, there have not been always living crea- tures on the^earth, and it is easy for the observer THEORY OF THE EARTH. 39 to discover the period at which animal produc- tions began to be deposited. 7. Proofs of the Occurrence of Revolutions before the Existence of Living Beings. As we ascend to higher points of elevation, and advance towards the lofty summits of the moun- tains, the remains of marine animals, that multi- tude of shells we have spoken of, begin very soon to grow rare, and at length disappear altogether. We arrive at strata of a different nature, which contain no vestige at all of living creatures. Ne- vertheless their crystallization, and even the na- ture of their strata, show that they also have been formed in a fluid ; their inclined position and their slopes show that they also have been moved and overturned; the oblique manner in which they sink under the shelly strata shows that they have been formed before these ; and the height to which their bare and rugged tops are elevated above all the shelly strata, shows that their summits have never again been covered by the sea since they were raised up out of its bosom. Such are those primitive or primordial moun- tains which traverse our continents in various di- rections, rising above the clouds, separating the basins of the rivers from one another, serving, by means of their eternal snows, as reservoirs for feed- ing the springs, and forming in some measure the 40 THEORY OF THE EARTH. skeleton, or, as it were, the rough frame-work of the earth. The sharp peaks and rugged indentations which mark their summits, and strike the eye at a great distance, are so many proofs of the violent manner in which they have been elevated. Their appear- ance in this respect is very different from that of the rounded mountains and the hills with flat sur- faces, whose recently formed masses have always remained in the situation in which they were quietly deposited by the sea which last covered TL them. These proofs become more obvious as we ap- proach. The valleys have no longer those gently sloping sides, or those alternately salient and re- entrant angles opposite to one another, which seem to indicate the beds of ancient streams. They widen and contract without any general rule ; their waters sometimes expand into lakes, and sometimes descend in torrents; and here and there the rocks, suddenly approaching from each side, form transverse dikes, over which the waters fall in ca- taracts. The shattered strata of these valleys ex- pose their edges on one side, and present on the other side large portions of their surface lying ob- liquely; they do not correspond in height, but those which on one side form the summit of the de- clivity, often dip so deep on the other as to be alto- gether concealed. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 41 . Yet, amidst all this confusion, some naturalists have thought that they perceived a certain degree of order prevailing, and that among these immense beds of rocks, broken and overturned though they be, a regular succession is observed, which is near- ly the same in all the different chains of mountains. According to them, the granite, which surmounts every other rock, also dips under every other rock ; and is the most ancient of any that has yet been dis- covered in the place assigned it by nature. The central ridges of most of the mountain chains are composed of it; slaty rocks, such as clay slate, granular quartz, (gres^) and mica slate, rest upon its sides and . form lateral chains ; granular, folia- ted limestone, or marble, and other calcarious rocks that do not contain shells, rest upon the slate, forming the exterior ranges, and are the last forma- tions by which this ancient uninhabited sea seems to have prepared itself for the production of its beds of shells.*! O-Vi--;,' '"''' On all occasions, even in districts that lie at a distance from the great mountain chains, where the more recent strata have been digged through, and the external covering of the earth penetrated to a considerable depth, nearly the same order of stratification has been found as that already de- scribed. The crystallized marbles never cover * See Pallas, in his Memoir on tlie Formation of Mountains?, t Note B. 6 42 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the shelly strata; the granite in mass never rests upon the crystallized marble, except in a few places where it seems to have been formed of granites of newer epochs. In one word, the fore- going arrangement appears to be general, and must therefore depend upon general causes, which have on all occasions exerted the same influence from one extremity of the earth to the other.* Hence, it is impossible to deny, that the waters of the sea have formerly, and for a long time, co- vered those masses of matter which now consti- tute our highest mountains; and farther, that these waters, during a longtime, did not support any living bodies. Thus, it has not been only since the commencement of animal life that these nume- rous changes and revolutions have taken place in the constitution of the external covering of our globe: For the masses formed previous to that event have suffered changes, as well as those wiiich have been formed since; they have also suffered violent changes in their positions, and a part of these assuredly took place while they existed alone, and before they were covered over by the shelly masses. The proof of this lies in the overturnings, the disruptions, and the fissures which are obser- vable in their strata, as well as in those of more recent formation, which are there even in greater number arid better denned. * NoteC. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 43 But these primitive masses have also suffered other revolutions, posterior to the formation of the secondary strata, and have perhaps given rise to, or at least have partaken of, some portion of the revolutions and changes which these latter strata have experienced. There are actually considera- ble portions of the primitive strata uncovered, al- though placed in lower situations than many of the secondary strata; and we cannot conceive how it should have so happened, unless the primitive strata, in these places, had forced themselves into view, after the formation of those which are se- condary. In some countries, we find numerous and prodigiously large blocks of primitive substances scattered over the surface of the secondary strata, and separated by deep valleys from the peaks or ridges whence these blocks must have been deriv- ed. It is necessary, therefore, either that these blocks must have been thrown into those situations by means of eruptions, or that the valleys, which otherwise must have stopped their course, did not exist at the time of their being transported to their present sites.*f Thus we have a collection of facts, a series of epochs anterior to the present time, and of which the successive steps may be ascertained with per- * The scientific journeys of Saussure and Deluc give a prodigious number of instances of this nature. f Note D. 44 THEORY OP THE EARTH, feet certainty, although the periods which inter- vened cannot be determined with any degree of precision. These epochs form so many fixed points, answering as rules for directing our in- quiries respecting thip ancient chronology of the earth. 8. Examination of the Causes which act at present on the Surface of our Globe. We now propose to examine those changes which still take place on our globe, investigating the causes which continue to operate on its sur- face, and endeavouring to determine the extent of those effects which they are capable of pro- ducing. This portion of the history of the earth is so much the more important, as it has been long 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 history, by an acquaintance with the passions and intrigues of the present day. But we shall presently see that unfortunately this is not the case in physical histo- ry; the thread of operation is here broken, the march of nature is changed, and none of the agents that she now employs were sufficient for the production of her ancient works. There still exist, however, four causes in full ac- tivity, which contribute to make alterations in the THEORY OF THE EARTH. 45 surface of our earth. These are rains and thaws, which waste down the steep mountains, and occa- sion their fragments to collect at their bottoms; streams of water, which sweep away these frag- ments, and afterwards deposit them in places where their current is abated; the sea which un- dermines the foundations of elevated coasts, form- ing steep cliffs in their places, and which throws up hillocks of sand upon flat coasts; and, finally, volcanoes, which pierce through the most solid strata from below, and either elevate or scatter abroad the vast quantity of matter which they eject. 9. Of SUps, or Falling Down of the Materials of Mountains. In every place where broken strata present their edges to the day in abrupt crags, fragments of their materials fall down every spring, and after every storm; these become rounded by rolling up- on each other, and their collected heaps assume a determinate inclination or external form, regulated by the laws of cohesion, forming at the bottom of the crag, whence they have fallen, taluses of great- er or lesser elevation, in proportion to the quanti- ty of the fragments. These taluses constitute the sides of the valleys in all elevated mountainous regions, and are covered over by abundant vege- tation, whenever these fallings-down of materials from higher mountains become less frequent; but 46 THEORY OF THE EARTH. their want of solidity subjects them also to slips, in consequence of being undermined by the waters of rivulets. On these occasions, towns and rich populous districts are sometimes buried under the ruins of a mountain; the courses of rivers are stopped up, and lakes are formed in places which were before the abodes of fertility and cheerful- ness. Fortunately such great slips occur but sel- dom; and the principal use of these hills, compos- ed of fragments and ruins of the high mountains, is to furnish materials for the ravages of the torrents to operate upon.* 10. Of Alluvial Formations.^ . The rains which fall upon the ridges and sum- mits of the mountains, the vapours which are con- densed there, and the snow which is melted, de- scend by an infinite number of rills along their slopes, carrying off some portions of the materials of which these ridges and summits are compos- ed, and marking their courses by numerous gut- ters. In their progress downwards, these small rills soon unite in the deeper furrows with which the surface of all mountains is ploughed up, run off through the deep valleys which intersect the bot- toms of the mountains, and at length form the streams and rivers which restore to the sea the waters that it had formerly supplied to the atmos- phere. / *NoteE. fNotcF. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 47 When the snow melts, or when a storm takes place, these mountain torrents become suddenly swelled, and rush down the declivities with a vio- lence and rapidity proportioned to their steepness : They dash against the feet of these taluses of fallen fragments which form the sides of all the elevated valleys, carrying along with them the rounded frag- ments of which they are composed, which become smoothed and still farther polished by rubbing on each other. But, in proportion as the swollen torrents reach the more level valleys, and the force of their current is diminished, or when they arrive at more expanded basins which allow their waters to spread out, they then throw out on their banks the largest of these stones which they had rolled down : The smaller fragments are deposited still lower ; and, in general, nothing reaches the great canal of the river except the minutest fragments, or the impalpable particles, which afterwards sub- side to form mud. It often happens also, before these streams unite to form great rivers, that they have to pass through large and deep lakes, where they deposit the mud brought down from the mountains, and whence their waters flow out quite limpid. The rivers in lower levels, and all the streams which take their rise in the lower mountains or hills, produce effects on the grounds through which they flow, more or less analogous to those of the tor- rents from the higher mountains. When swelled 48 THEORY OP THE EARTH. by great rains, they undermine the bottoms of the earthy or sandy hills which lie in their way, and carry their fragments to be deposited on the lower grounds which they inundate, and which are somewhat raised in height by each successive in- undation. Finally, when these rivers reach the great lakes, or the sea, and when of course that rapid motion by which they are enabled to keep the particles of mud in suspension has wholly ceased, these particles are deposited at each side of their mouths, where they form low grounds, by which the coasts or banks of the river are gradual- ly lengthened out into the sea or lake. And if these new coasts are so situated that the sea also throws up sand to contribute towards their in- crease, provinces, and even entire kingdoms, are thus as it were created, which usually become the richest and most fertile regions, if their rulers per- mit human industry to exert itself in peace. 11. Of the Formation of Downs* The effects produced by the sea alone, without the aid of rivers, are far less beneficial. When the sea coast is low, and the bottom consists of sand, the waves push this sand towards the shore, where, at every reflux of the tide, it becomes par- tially dried ; and the winds, which almost always blow from the sea, drift up some portion of it upon * Note G, THEORY OF THE EARTH. 49 the beach. By Jhis means, downs, or ranges of low sand-hills, are formed along the coast. These, if not fixed by the growth of suitable plants, either disseminated by nature, or propagated by human in- dustry, would be gradually, but certainly, carried towards the interior, covering up the fertile plains with their sterile particles, and rendering them unfit for the habitation of mankind; because the same winds which carried the loose dry sand from the shore to form the downs, would necessarily continue to drift that which is at the summit farther towards the land. 12. Of the Formation of Cliffs, or steep Shores. On the other hand, when the original coast hap- pens to be high, so that the sea is unable to cast up any thing upon it, a gradual, but destructive operation is carried on in a different way. The in- cessant agitation of the waves wears it away at the bottom, and at length succeeds in undermining it, causing the upper materials to slide and tumble down, and converting the whole elevation into steep sloping bluffs or cliffs. In the progress of this change, the more elevated materials which tumble down into the sea, have their softer parts washed out and carried away by the waves; while the harder parts, continually rolled about in the agi- tated water, form vast collections of rounded stones and pebbles* and of sand of various degrees of fine- ness, which at length accumulate into sloping banks 7 50 THEORY OF THE EARTH. or flat beaches, and protect the, bottoms of the cliffs against farther depredations. Such are the ordinary actions of water upon the solid land, which almost entirely consist in reducing it to lower levels, but not indefinitely. The frag- ments of the great mountain ridges are carried down into the valleys, while their finer particles and those of the lower hills and plains are floated to the sea. Alluvial depositions extend the coast at the expense of the interior hills, which last effect is most limited in its extent by means of vegetation. All these changes necessarily suppose the previous existence of mountains, valleys, and plains, and consequently the same causes could not have given rise to these inequalities on the surface of our globe. The formation of downs is the most limited of all these phenomena, both in regard to height and horizontal extent, and has no manner of relation whatever to those enormous masses^ the origin of which forms the peculiar object of geological research.* 13. Of Depositions formed in Water. Although we cannot obtain a precise knowledge of the actions exerted by water within its own bo- som, still it may be ascertained in a certain degree. * Note EL THEORY OP THE EARTH. 51 Lakes, low meadows, marshes, and sea-ports, into which rivulets discharge their waters, more espe- cially when these descend from near and steep hills, are continually receiving depositions of mud, which would at length fill them up entirely, if they were not carefully cleaned out. The sea is con- stantly accumulating quantities of sand and slime into its bays and harbours, or wherever its waters happen to become more quiet than ordinary. The currents also occasioned by the tides, are con- tinually washing large quantities of sand from the bottom of the sea, which they collect together and heap up on various parts of the coast, forming banks and flat shallows. 14. Of Stalactites. Certain waters, after dissolving calcarious sub- stances by means of the superabundant carbonic acid with which they are impregnated, allow these substances to crystallize, in consequence of the escape of the acid, and in this way form stalactites and other concretions. There are some strata, confusedly crystallized in fresh water, which are sufficiently extensive to be compared with other strata that have been left by the ancient sea. 15. Of Lithophites. In the torrid zone, where lithophites of many kinds abound, and are propagated with great ra- 52 THEORY OF THE EARTlf. pidity, (heir stony tree-like fabrics are intertwined and accumulated into the form of 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 on the tops of these rocky shelves, sometimes raises them above its own proper level, and forms islands of them, which are soon covered with a rich vegetation. 16. Of Incrustations. It is also possible that the animals inhabiting shells may leave their stony coverings when they die in some particular places ; and that these, ce- mented together by slime of greater or less con- sistence, or by some other means, may form exten- sive banks of shells. But we have no evidence that the sea has now the power of agglutinating these shells by such a compact paste, or indurated cement, as that found in marbles and calcarious sand-stones, or even in the coarse limestone strata in which shells are found enveloped. Still less do we now find the sea making any depositions at all of the more solid and silicious strata which have preceded the formation of the strata containing shells. In short, all these causes would not, though combined, form a single stratum of any kind, nor produce the smallest hillock, nor alter in any perceptible degree the ordinary level of the oeQan. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 53- It has been asserted that the sea is subject to a continual diminution in its level, and proofs of this are said to have been discovered in some parts of the shores of the Baltic. Whatever may have been the cause of these appearances, we certainly know that nothing of the kind has been observed upon our coasts ; and, consequently, that there has been no general lowering of the waters of the ocean. The most ancient sea-ports still have their quays and other erections at the same height above the level of the sea as at their first construction. Certain general movements have been supposed in the sea from east to west, or in other directions ; but no where has any person been able to ascertain their effects with the least degree of precision. 17. Of Volcanoes. The operation of volcanoes is still more limited and local than that of any of the agents which have yet been mentioned. Although we have no idea of the means employed by nature for feeding these enormous fires from such vast depths, we can judge decidedly, by their effects, of the changes which they were capable of producing upon the surface of the earth. When a volcano announces itself after some shocks of an earthquake, it forms for it- self an opening. Stones and ashes are thrown to a great distance, and lava is vomited forth. The more fluid part of the lava runs in long streams, 54 THEORY OF THE EARTH. while the less fluid portion stops at the edge of the opening, raises it all round, and forms a cone terminated by a crater. Thus volcanoes accumu- late substances on the surface that were formerly buried deep in the bowels of the earth, after having changed or modified their nature or appearances, and raise them into mountains. By these means, they have formerly covered some parts of the con- tinents, and have suddenly produced mountains in the middle of the sea. But these mountains and islands have always been composed of lava, and the whole of their materials have undergone the action of fire. Volcanoes have never raised up nor overturned the strata through which their aper- tures pass, and have in no degree contributed to the elevation of the great mountains which are not volcanic. Thus we shall seek in vain among the various forces which still operate on the surface of our earth, for causes competent to the production of those revolutions and catastrophes of which its ex- ternal crust exhibits so many traces : And if we have recourse to the constant external causes with which we have been hitherto acquainted, we shall have no greater success. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 33 18. Of Astronomical Causes of the Revolutions on the Surface of the Earth. The pole of the earth moves in a circle round 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 ascer- tained, are confined within certain bounds, and are much too limited for the production of those effects which we have stated. Besides, as these motions are exceedingly slow, they are altogether inadequate to account for catastrophes which must necessarily have been sudden. The same reasoning applies to all other slow motions which have been conceived as causes of the revolutions on the surface of our earth, chosen doubtless in the hope that their existence could not be denied, as it might always be asserted that their extreme slowness rendered them impercepti- ble. But it is of no importance whether these as- sumed slow motions be true or false, for they ex- plain nothing, since no cause acting slowly could possibly have produced sudden effects. Admitting that there was a gradual diminution of the waters; that the sea might take away solid matters from one place and carry them to another; that the temperature of the globe may have dimi- nished or increased; none of these causes could 56 THEORY OF THE EARTH. have overthrown our strata; enclosed great qua- drupeds with their flesh and skin in ice; laid dry sea-shells in as perfect preservation as if just drawn up alive from the bottom of the ocean; or utterly destroyed many species, and even entire genera, of testaceous animals. These considerations have presented themselves to most naturalists: And, among those who have endeavoured to explain the present state of the glohe, hardly any one has attributed the entire changes it has undergone to slowly operating causes, and still less to causes which continue to act, as it were, under our observation. The ne- cessity to which they were thus reduced, of seek- ing for causes different from those which we still observe in activity, is the very thing which has forced them to make so many extraordinary sup- positions, and to lose themselves in so many erro- neous and contradictory speculations, that the very name of their science, as I have elsewhere said, has become ridiculous in the opinion of prejudiced persons, who only see in it the systems which it has exploded, and forget the extensive and impor- tant series of facts which it has brought to light and established.* *When I formerly mentioned this circumstance, of the science of geology having become ridiculous, I only expressed a well-known truth, without presuming to give my own opinion, as some respecta- ble geologists seem to have believed. If their mistake arose from my expressions having been rather equivocal, I take this opportunity of explaining my meaning. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 57 19. Of former Systems of Geology. During a long time, two events or epochs only, the Creation and the Deluge, were admitted as comprehending the changes which have occurred upon the globe; and all the efforts of geologists were directed to account for the present actual state of the earth, by arbitrarily ascribing to it a certain primitive state, afterwards changed and modified by the deluge, of which also, as to its causes, its operation, and its effects, every one of them entertained his own theory. Thus, in the opinion of Burnet,* the whole earth at the first consisted of a uniform light crust, which covered over the abyss of the sea, and which, be- ing broken for the production of the deluge, form- ed the mountains by its fragments. According to Woodward^ the deluge was occasioned by a mo- mentary suspension of cohesion among the parti- cles of mineral bodies; the whole mass of the globe was dissolved, and the soft paste became pe- netrated by shells. Scheuchzer\ conceived that God raised up the mountains for the purpose of allow- ing the waters of the deluge to run offj and accord- ingly selected those portions which contained the greatest abundance of rocks, without which they * Telluris Theoria Sacra. Lond. 1681. f Essay towards the Natural History of the Earth. Lond. 1702. % Memoires de 1' Academic, 1708. 8 58 THEORY OP THE EARTH. could not have supported themselves. Whistori* fancied that the earth was created from the atmos- phere of one comet, and that it was deluged by the tail of another. The heat which remained from its first origin, in his opinion, excited the whole antediluvian population, men and animals, to sin, for which they were all drowned in the de- luge, excepting the fish, whose passions were appa- rently less violent. It is easy to see, that though naturalists might have a range sufficiently wide within the limits prescribed by the book of Genesis, they very soon found themselves in too narrow bounds: and when they had succeeded in converting the six days employed in the work of creation into so many pe- riods of indefinite length, their systems took a flight proportioned to the periods, which they could then dispose of at pleasure. -. - ^r -"#. Even the great Leibnitz, as well as Descartes^ amused his imagination by conceiving the world to be an extinguished sun, or vitrified globe; upon which the vapours condensing in proportion as it cooled, formed the seas, and afterwards deposited calcarious strata, t By Demaittet, the globe was conceived to have * A New Theory of the Earth. Lond. 1 708. f Leibnitz, Protogcea. Act. Lips. 1683 ; Gott. 1749. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 59 been covered with water for many thousand years. He supposed that this water had gradually retired; that all the terrestrial animals were originally in- habitants of the sea ; that man himself began his career as a fish: And he asserts, that it is not un- common, even now, to meet with fishes in the ocean, which are still only half men, but whose de- scendants will in time become perfect human be- ings.* The system of Buffon is merely an extension of that before devised by Leibnitz, with the addition only of a comet, which, by a violent blow upon the sun, struck off the mass of our earth in a liquefied state, along with the masses of all the other planets of our system at the same instant. From this sup- position, he was enabled to assume positive dates or epochs: As, from the actual temperature of the earth, it could be calculated how long time it had taken to cool 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 were still re- quired for cooling the greater ones, and how far the smaller ones were already frozen. In the present day, men of bolder imagina- tions than ever, have employed themselves on this great subject. Some writers have revived and greatly extended the ideas of Demaillet. * Telliamed. 60 THEORY OF THE EARTH, They suppose that every thing was originally fluid ; that this universal fluid gave existence to animals, which were at first of the simplest kind, such as the monads and other infusory microscopic ani- malcules ; that, in process of time, and by acquir- ing different habits, the races of these animals be- came complicated, and assumed that diversity of na- ture and character in which they now exist. It is by all those races of animals that the waters of the ocean have been gradually converted into calca- rious earth; while the vegetables, concerning the origin and metamorphoses of which these au- thors give us no account, have converted a part of the same water into clay ; and these two earths, after being stript of the peculiar characters they had received respectively from animal and vege- table life, are resolved by a final analysis into si- lex : Hence the more ancient mountains are more silicious than the rest. Thus, according to these authors, all the solid particles of our globe owe their existence to animal or vegetable life, and without this our globe would still have continued entirely liquid.* Other writers have preferred the ideas of Kep- ler, and, like that great astronomer, have consid- * See La Physique de Rodig. p. 106. Leipsic, 1801, and Tellia- med, p. 169. Lamark has expanded this system at great length, and supported it with much sagacity, in his Hydrogeologie, and Philoso- phic Zoologique. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 61 ered the globe itself as possessed of living faculties. According to them, it contains a circulating vital fluid. A process of assimilation goes on in it as \vell as in animated bodies. Every particle of it is alive. It possesses instinct and volition even to the most elementary of its molecules, which at- tract and repel each other according to sympathies and antipathies. Each kind of mineral substance is capable of converting immense masses of mat- ter into its own peculiar nature, as we convert our aliment into flesh and blood. The mountains are the respiratory organs of the globe, and the schists its organs of secretion. By the latter it- decomposes the waters of the sea in order to pro- duce volcanic eruptions. The veins in strata are caries, or abscesses of the mineral kingdom, and the metals are products of rottenness and disease, to which it is owing that almost all of them have so bad a smell.* It must, however, be noticed, that these are what may be termed extreme examples, and that all geologists have not permitted themselves to be carried away by such bold or extravagant concep- tions as those we have just cited. Yet, among those who have proceeded with more caution, and have not searched for geological causes beyond the es- * M. Patrin has used much ingenuity to establish this view of the subject, in several articles ef the Nouveau Dictionnaire d? Histoire Naturdle. 62 THEORY OF THE EARTH. tablishecl limits of physical and chemical science, there still remain much diversity and contradiction, According to one of these writers, every thing has been successively precipitated and deposited, nearly as it exists at present ; but the sea, which covered all, has gradually retired.* Another conceives, that the materials of the mountains are incessantly wasted and floated down by the rivers, and carried to the bottom of the ocean, to be there heated under an enormous pres- sure, and to form strata which shall be violently lifted up at some future period, by the heat that now consolidates and hardens them.f A third supposes the fluid materials of the globe to have been divided among a multitude of succes- sive lakes, placed like the benches of an amphi- theatre ; which, after having deposited our shelly strata, have successively broken their dikes, to descend and fill the basin of the ocean. J , i " tipjN - ; '' . According to a fourth, tides of seven or eight hundred fathoms have carried off from time to * In his Geology, Delematherie assumes crystallization as the chief cause or agent. t Button, and Playfair in his Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory of the Earth. Edirib. 1802. t See Lamanon, in various parts of the Journal de Physique. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 63 time the bottom of the ocean, throwing it up in mountains and hills on the primitive valleys and plains of the continent.* A fifth conceives the various fragments of which the surface of the earth is composed to have fallen successively from heaven, in the manner of meteoric stones, and alleges that they still retain the marks of their origin in the unknown species of animals whose exuviae they contain.t By a sixth, the globe is supposed to be hollow, and to contain in its cavity a nucleus of loadstone, which is dragged from one pole of the earth to the other by the attraction of comets, changing the centre of gravity, and consequently hurrying the great body of the ocean along with it, so as alter- nately to drown the two hemispheres. J 20. Diversities of the Geological Systems, and their causes. We might have cited twenty other systems, as different from one another as these just now enu- merated. And, to prevent mistake, we wish it to be distinctly understood, that it is by no means * Dolomieu, in the Journal de Physique. f M. M. de Marschall, in Researches respecting the Origin and De- velopement of the present State of the Earth. Geissen, 1802. t Bertrand, Periodical Renewal of the Terrestrial Continents. Ham- burgh, 1799. 64 THEORY OF THE EARTH. our intention to criticise their authors ; on the con- trary, we are ready to admit that these systems have generally been conceived by men ol science and genius, none of whom were ignorant of the facts on which they reasoned, and several of whom had made extensive journeys for the purpose of examin- ing them. Whence comes it then, that there should be so much contrariety in the solutions of the same prob- lem, that are given by men who proceed upon the same principles ? This may have been occasioned by the conditions of the problem never having been all taken into consideration; by which it has re- mained hitherto indeterminate, and susceptible of many solutions all equally good, when such or such conditions are abstracted ; and all equally bad, when a new condition comes to be known, or when the attention is directed to some known condition, which had been formerly neglected. 21. Statement of the Nature and Conditions of the Problem to be solved. 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 by which they were struck more forcibly than by others, have endeavoured to solve these in a way more or less probable, and have allowed others to remain unnoticed, equally numerous and equally important. For example, the only diffi- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 65 culty with one consisted in explaining the change which had taken place on the level of the seas ; with another it consisted in accounting for the so- lution of all terrestrial substances in the same fluid ; and with a third, it consisted in showing how ani- mals that were natives of the torrid could live un- der the frigid zone. Exhausting the whole of their ingenuity on these questions, they conceived that they had done every thing that was necessary, when they had contrived some method of answer- ing them ; and yet, while they neglected all the other phenomena, they did not always think of determining with precision the measure and ex- tent of those which they attempted to explain. This is peculiarly the case in regard to the secon- dary stratifications, which constitute, however, the most difficult and most important portion of the problem. It has hardly ever been attempted care- fully to ascertain the superpositions of their strata, or the connexions of these strata with the species of animals and of plants whose remains they en- close. 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 those which succeed ? Do these two kinds of species ever accompany one another? Are there altera- tions in their appearances ; or, in other words, does the first species appear a second time, and does the second species then disappear ? Have these ani- 9 66 THEORY OF THE EARTH. mals and plants lived in the places where their exuviae are found, or have they heen brought there from other places ? Do all these animals and plants still continue to live in some part of the earth, or have they been totally or partially destroyed ? Is there any constant connexion between the anti- quity of the strata, and the resemblance or non- resemblance of the extraneous fossils, to the ani- mals and plants that still exist ? Is there any con- nexion, in regard to climate, between the extra- neous fossils and the still living organized bodies which most nearly resemble them ? May it be con- cluded, that the transportation of these living or- ganized bodies, if such a thing ever happened, has taken place from north to south, or from east to west ; or was it effected by means that irregularly scattered and mingled them together ? And, final- ly, is it still possible to distinguish the epochs of these transportations, by attentively examining the strata which enclose the remains, or are imprinted by their forms ? If, from the want of sufficient evidence, these questions cannot be satisfactorily answered, how shall we be able to explain the causes of the pre- sently existing state of our globe ? It is certain, that so far from any of these points being as yet completely established, naturalists seem to have scarcely any idea of the propriety of investigating facts before they construct their systems. The cause of this strange procedure may be discovered, THEORY OP THE EARTH. 6? by considering that all geologists hitherto have either been mere cabinet naturalists, who had themselves hardly paid any attention to the struc- ture of mountains, or mere mineralogists, who had not studied in sufficient detail the innumerable di- versity of animals, and the almost infinite compli- cation of their various parts and organs. The for- mer of these have only constructed systems ; while the latter have made excellent collections of ob- servations, and have laid the foundations of true geological science, but have been unable to raise arid complete the edifice. 22. Of the Progress of Mineral Geology. The purely mineralogical portion of the great problem of the Theory of the Earth has been in- vestigated with admirable care by Saussure, and has been since explained in an astonishing degree by Werner, and by the numerous enlightened pu- pils of his school. The former of these celebrated philosophers, by a laborious investigation of the most inaccessi- ble mountain districts during twenty years of con- tinual research, in which he examined the Alps on all sides, and penetrated through all their defiles, has laid open to our view the entire disorder of the primitive formations, and has clearly traced the boundaries by which they are distinguishable from the secondary formations. The other equally ce* 68 THEORY OF THE EARTH. lebrated geologist, taking advantage of the nume- rous excavations in the most ancient mining dis- trict in the world, has fixed the laws which regu- late the succession of strata, pointing out their respective antiquity in regard to each other, and tracing each of them through all its changes and metamorphoses. From him alone we date the commencement of real geology, so far as respects the mineral natures of the strata : But neither he nor Saussure has denned the species of organized extraneous fossils in each description of the strata with that accuracy which has become necessary, now that the number of animals already known has become so great. Other naturalists, it is true, have studied the fos- . sil remains of organized bodies ; they have col- lected and represented them by thousands, and their works certainly will serve as a valuable storehouse of materials. But, considering these fossil plants and animals merely in themselves, in- f stead of viewing them in their connexion with the ' theory of the earth ; or regarding their netrifac- tions and extraneous fossils as mere curiosities, I rather than as historical documents ; or confining themselves to partial explanations of the particular bearings of each individual specimen ; they have almost always neglected to investigate the general laws affecting their position, or the relation of the extraneous fossils with the strata in which they are found. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 69 23. Of the Importance of Extraneous Fossils, or Petrifactions, in Geology. The importance of investigating the relations of extraneous fossils with the strata in which they are contained, is quite obvious. It is to them alone that we owe the commencement even of the Theo- ry of the Earth ; as, but for them, we could never have even suspected that there had existed any successive epochs in the formation of our earth, and a series of different and consecutive operations in reducing it to its present state. By them alone we are enabled to ascertain, with the utmost cer- tainty, that our earth has not always been cover- ed over by the same external crust ; because we are thoroughly assured that the organized bodies to which these fossil remains belong, must have lived upon the surface, before they came to be bu- ried, as they now are, at a great depth. It is only by means of analogy, that we have been enabled to extend to the primitive formations, the same conclusions which are furnished directly for the secondary formations by the extraneous fossils and if there had only existed formations or strata in which there were no extraneous fossils, it could never have been asserted that these several for- mations had not been simultaneous. It is also owing to these extraneous fossils, slight as is the knowledge we have hitherto acquired 70 THEORY OF THE EARTH. respecting them, that we have been enabled to discover the little that we yet know concerning the revolutions of our globe. From them we have learned that the strata, or at least those which contain their remains, have been quietly deposited in a fluid ; that the variations of the several strata must have corresponded with the variations in the nature of the fluid ; that they have been left bare by the transportation of this fluid to some other place ; and that this fact must have happened more than once. Nothing of all this could have been known with certainty, without the aid of ex- traneous fossils. The study of the mineralogical part of geo- logy, though not less necessary, and even a great deal more useful to the practical arts, is yet much less instructive so far as respects the objects of our present inquiry. We remain in utter igno- rance respecting the causes which have given rise to the variety in the mineral substances of which strata are composed. We are ignorant even of the agents which may have held some of these sub- stances in a state of solution ; and it is still dispu- ted respecting several of them, whether they have owed their origin to the agency of water or fire. After all, philosophers are only agreed on one point, which is, that the sea has changed its place ; and this could never have been certainly known, but for the existence of extraneous fossils. These fossils, then, which have given rise to the theory THEORY OF THE EARTH. 71 of die earth, have at the same time furnished its principal illustrations the only ones, indeed, that have as yet been generally received and acknow- ledged.* This is the consideration by which I have been encouraged to investigate the subject of extraneous fossils. But the field is extensive ; and it is only a very inconsiderable portion of it that can be cul- tivated by the labour of a single individual. It was necessary, therefore, to^select a particular de- partment, and I very soon made my choice. That class of extraneous fossils, which forms the pecu- liar subject of this Essay, engaged my attention at the very outset, because it is evidently the most fer- tile in affording precise results, yet at the same time less known than others, and richer in new ob- jects of research.fj 24. High Importance of investigating I fie Fossil Re- mains of Quadrupeds. It is obvious that the fossil remains of the bones of quadrupeds must lead to more rigorous conclu- sions than any other remains of organized bodies* and that for several reasons. * Note K. f My work on this subject \viil clearly show how far this inquiry is yot new, notwithstanding the excellent labours of Camper, Pallas, Blumenlweh, Merle, Scemmerring, Rosenmuller, Fischer, Fauja?, ami other learned men, whose works I have most scrupulously cited in puch of my chapters as their researches are connected with. t Note L. 72 THEORY OP THE EARTH. In the first place, they indicate much more clear- ly the nature of the revolutions to which they have been subjected. The remains of shells certainly indicate that the sea has once existed in the places where these collections have been formed : But the changes which have taken place in their spe- cies, when rigorously inquired into, may possibly have been occasioned by slight changes in the na- ture of the fluid in which they were formed, or on- ly in its temperature, and may even have arisen from other accidental causes. We can never be perfectly assured that certain species, and even genera, inhabiting the bottom of the sea, and occu- pying certain fixed spaces for a longer or shorter time, may not have been driven away from these by other species or genera. In regard to quadrupeds, on the contrary, every thing is precise. The appearance of their bones in strata, and stillmore of their entire carcasses, clearly establishes that the bed in which they are found must have been previously laid dry, or at least that dry land must have existed in its imme- diate neighbourhood. Their disappearance as certainly announces that this stratum must have been inundated, or that the dry land had ceased to exist in that state. It is from them, therefore, that we learn with perfect certainty the important fact of the repeated irruptions of the sea upon the land, which the extraneous fossils and other production^ of marine origin could not of themselves have THEORY OF THE EARTH. . 73 proved ; and, by a careful investigation of them, we may hope to ascertain the number and the epochs of those irruptions of the sea. Secondly, the nature of the revolutions which have changed the surface of our earth, must have exerted a more powerful action upon terrestrial quadrupeds than upon marine animals. As these revolutions have consisted chiefly in changes of the bed of the sea, and as the waters must have destroyed all the quadrupeds which they reached, if their irruption over the land was general, they must have destroyed the entire class, or, if con- fined only to certain continents at one time, they must have destroyed at least all the species in- habiting these continents, without having the same effect upon the marine animals. On the other hand, millions of aquatic animals may have been left quite dry, or buried in newly-formed strata, or thrown violently on the coasts, while their races may have been still preserved in more peaceful parts of the sea, whence they might again propa- gate and spread after the agitation of the water had ceased. Thirdly, this more complete action is also more easily ascertained and demonstrated; because, as the number of terrestrial quadrupeds is limited, and as most of their species, at least the large ones, are well known, we can more easily determine whether fossil bones belong to a species which still 10 74 THEORY OP THE EARTH. exists, or to one that is now lost. As, on the other hand, we are still very far from being acquainted with all the testaceous animals and fishes belong- ing to the sea, and as we probably still remain ig- norant of the greater part of those which live in the extensive deeps of the ocean, it is impossible to know, with any certainty, whether a species found in a fossil state may not still exist somewhere alive. Hence some naturalists persist in giving the name of oceanic or pelagic shells to belemnites and cornua-ammonis, and some other genera, which have not hitherto been found, except in the fossil state, in ancient strata; meaning by this, that al- though these have not as yet been found in a living or recent state, it is because they inhabit the bot- tom of the ocean, far beyond the reach of our nets. 25. Of the small Probability of discovering new Spe- cies of the larger Quadrupeds. Naturalists certainly have neither explored all the continents, nor do they as yet know even all the quadrupeds of those parts which have been explored. New species of this class are discover- ed from time to time ; and those who have not ex- amined with attention all the circumstances be- longing to these discoveries, may allege also, that the unknown quadrupeds, whose fossil bones have been found in the strata of the earth, have hitherto remained concealed in some islands not yet dis- covered by navigators, or in some of the vast de- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 75 serts which occupy the middle of Africa, Asia, the two Americas, and New Holland. But, if we care- fully attend to the kinds of quadrupeds that have been recently discovered, and to the circumstances of their discovery, we shall easily perceive that there is very little chance indeed of our ever find- ing alive those which have only been seen in a fossil state. Islands of moderate size, and at a considerable distance from the large continents, have very few quadrupeds, and these mostly very small. When they contain any of the larger quadrupeds, these must have been carried to them from other coun- tries. Cook and Bougainville found no other quad- rupeds besides hogs and dogs in the South Sea islands ; and the largest quadruped of the West India islands, when first discovered, was the agouti, a species of the cavy, an animal apparently between the rat and the rabbit, It is true, that the great continents, as Asia, Afri- ca, the two Americas, and New Holland, have large quadrupeds, and, generally speaking, con- taip species proper to each : Insomuch, that, upon discovering countries which are isolated from the rest of the world, the animals they contain of the class of quadrupeds were found entirely different from those which existed in other countries. Thus, when the Spaniards first penetrated into South America, they did not find it to contain a single 76 THEORY OP THE EARTH. quadruped exactly the same with those of Europe, Asia, and Africa. The puma, the jaguar, the ta- pir, the capybara, the lama, or glama, and vicug- na, and the whole tribe of sapajous, were to them entirely new animals, of which they had not the smallest idea. Similar circumstances have recurred in our own time, when the coasts of New Holland and the adjacent islands were first examined. The species of the kangaroo, phascoloma, dasyurus, pera- mela, phalanger, or flying opposum, with the hairy and spinous duck-billed animals denominated or- nithorinckus and echidna,* have astonished zoologists by presenting new and strange conformations, con- trary to all former rules, and incapable of being reduced under any of the former systems, If there still remained any great continent to be discovered, we might perhaps expect to be made acquainted with new species of large quadrupeds ; among which some might be found more or less similar to those of which we find the exuviae in the bowels of the earth. But it is merely sufficient to glance the eye over the map of the world, and ob- serve the innumerable directions in which naviga- tors have traversed the ocean, in order to be satis- * These are new animals of Australasia, or New Holland, only re- cently discovered, whose strange conformations, not analogous with the animals of the old world, or of America, have required the adop- tion of new generic terms by Cuvier and other naturalists. Trahsl. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 7? fied that there does not remain any large land to be discovered, unless it may be situated towards the antartic pole, where eternal ice necessarily for- bids the existence of animal life. i '&\. " Hence it is only from the interiors of the large divisions of the world already known, that we can now hope to procure any quadrupeds hitherto un- known. But a very little reflection will be sufficient to convince us, that our hopes from thence are not much better founded than from the larger islands. Doubtless, European travellers cannot easily penetrate througli vast extents of countries which are either uninhabited, or peopled only with fero- cious tribes ; and this is peculiarly the case in re- gard to Africa. But there is nothing to prevent the animals themselves from roaming in all direc- tions, and penetrating to the coasts. Even al- though great chains of mountains may intervene between the coasts and the interior deserts, these must certainly be broken in some parts, to allow the rivers to pass through ; and in these burning deserts the animals naturally follow the courses of rivers. The inhabitants of the coasts must also frequently penetrate inland along the rivers, and will quickly acquire a knowledge of all the re- markable living creatures, even to the very sources of these rivers, either from personal observation, or by intercourse with the inhabitants of the inte- rior. At no period of our history, therefore, could 78 THEORY OF THE EARTH. civilized nations frequent the coasts of large coun- tries for any length of time, without gaining some tolerable knowledge of all the animals they contain- ed, or at least of such as were any way remarkable for their size or configuration. This reasoning is sup- ported by well known facts. Thus, although the ancients seem never to have passed the mountains of Imaus, or to have crossed the Ganges towards the east of Asia, and never penetrated far to the south of Mount Atlas in Africa, yet they were ac- quainted with all the larger animals of these two grand divisions of the world ; and if they have not distinguished all their species, it was because the similarities of some of these occasioned them to be confounded together, and not because they had not seen them, or heard them talked of by others. The ancients were perfectly acquainted with the elephant, and the history of that quadruped is given more exactly by Aristotle than by Buflfon. They were not ignorant even of the differences which distinguish the elephants of Africa from those of Asia.* They knew the two-horned rhinoceros, which Domitian exhibited in his shows at Rome, and had stamped on his medals, and of which Pausanias has left a very good description. Even the one- * See this more particularly noticed in the history of the elephant, in the second volume of my Researches into the Extraneous or Fossil Remains of Quadrupeds. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 79 horned rhinoceros, although its country be far from Rome, was equally known to the Romans ; Pom- pey showed them one in the circus, and Strabo has described another which he saw at Alexandria.* The hippopotamus has not been so well de- scribed by the ancients as the two foregoing ani- mals ; yet very exact representations of it have been left by the Romans in their monuments rela- tive to Egypt, such as the statue of the Nile, the Prenestine pavement, and a great number of me- dals. It is known that this animal was frequently shown to the Romans, having been exhibited in the circus by Scaurus, Augustus, Antoninus, Corn- modus, Heliogabalus, Philipt, and CarinusJ. The two species of camel, the Bactrian and Ara- bian, were both well known to the ancients, and are very well described and characterized by Aristotle. The giraffe, or camelopardalis, was likewise known to the ancients, one having been shown alive in the circus during the dictatorship of Julius Ca3sar, in the year of Rome 708. Ten of them were shown at once by Gordian III., all of which * See the history of the Rhinoceros in my second volume, f See the history of the Hippopotamus, in my second volume. J Calphurnii, Eel VI. 66. \ Hist. Anim. lib. II. cap. I. . ,, $ 80 THEORY OF THE EARTH. were slain at the secular games of the emperor Philip.* . When we read with attention the descriptions given of the hippopotamus by Herodotus and Aristotle, which are supposed to have been bor- rowed from Hecatoeus of Miletus, we cannot fail to perceive that these must have been taken from two very different animals ; one of which is the true hippopotamus, and the other the griou, or an- telope gnu of Gmelin's edition of the Systema Naturae. The aper cethiopicus of Agatharcides, which he describes as having horns, is precisely the Ethio- pian hog, or engallo, of Buffbn and other modern naturalists, whose enormous tusks deserve the name of horns, almost as much as those of the ele- phantf The bubalus and the nagor are described by Pliny : the gazella by Elian ; the oryx by Oppian ; and the axis, so early as the time of Ctesias : all of them species of the antelope genus. Elian gives a very good description of the bos grunniens, or grunting ox, under the name of the ox having a tail which serves for a fly-flapper.f Jul. Capitol. Gord. III. cap. 23. . Anim. V. 27. { Id. XV. 14. THEORY OP THE EARTH, r Bl The buffalo was not domesticated by the an- cients ; but the bos Indicus, or Indian ox of Elian,* having horns sufficiently large to contain three am- phorae, was assuredly that variety of the buffalo which is now called the arnee. The ancients were acquainted with hornless oxen,f and with that African variety of the ox whose horns are only fastened to the skin,J and hang down dangling at the sides of the head. They also knew those oxen of India which could run as swift as horses, and those which are so small as not to exceed the size of a he-goat. || Sheep also with broad tails were not unknown to them,% and those other Indian sheep which were as large as asses.** Although the accounts left us by the ancients respecting the urus, or aurochs, the rein-deer, and the elk, are all mingled with fable, they are yet suffi- cient to prove that these animals were not unknown to them, but that the reports which had reached them had been communicated by ignorant or bar- barous people, and had not been corrected by the actual observations of men of learning. * .Elian. Anim. III. 34. }Id, 11.20. Ji Id. ibid. ** Id. IV. 32. fid. II. 53. ^ Id. XV. 24. IT Id. III. S. 11 82 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Even the white bear had been seen in Egypt while under the Ptolemies.* Lions and panthers were quite common at Rome, where they were presented by hundreds in the games of the circus. Even tigers had been seen there, together with the striped hyena, and the ni- lotic crocodile. There are still preserved in Rome some ancient mosaic, or tesselated pavements, con- taining excellent delineations of the rarest of these animals ; among which a striped hyena is very per- fectly represented in a fragment of mosaic in the Vatican museum. While I was at Rome, a tesse- lated pavement, composed of natural stones, ar- ranged in the Florentine manner, was discovered in a garden beside the triumphal arch of Galienus, which represented four Bengal tigers in a mo&t admirable manner. The museum of the Vatican has the figure of a crocodile in basalt, almost perfectly represented, except that it has one claw too many on the hind feet. Augustus at one time presented thirty-six of these animals to the view of the people.t It is hardly to be doubted that the hippotigris was the zebra, which is now only found in the southern * Athenais, lib. V. Dion. lib. LV. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 83 parts of Africa.* Caracalla killed one of these in the circus. It might easily be shown also that almost all the most remarkable species of the simice of the old world have been distinctly indicated by ancient writers under the names of pithed, sphinges, satyri, cephi, cynocephali, or cercopitheci.'f They also knew and have described several very small species of gnawers^, especially such of that order as possessed any peculiar conformation or remarkable quality ; as we find, for instance, the jerboa represented upon the medals of Cyrene, and indicated under the name of mus bipes, or two- legged rat. But the smaller species are not of much importance in regard to the object before us, and it is quite sufficient for the inquiry in which we are engaged, to have shown that all the larger spe- cies of quadrupeds, which possess any peculiar or remarkable character, and which we know to in- habit Europe, Asia, and Africa, at the present day, were known to the ancients ; whence we may fairly conclude, that their silence in respect to the small * Id. LXXVII, Compare also Gisb. Cuperi de Eleph, in nummis obyiis. ex. II cap. 7. f See Lichtenstein, Comment, de Simiarum quotquot veteribus in- notuerunt formis. Hamburg, 1791. \ Cuvier gives this name, rongeurs, here translated gnaivers, to the order denominated glires by Linnaeus, owing to their fore-teeth being peculiarly fitted for gnawing the roots, barks, and stems of vegetables. Transl ^ THEORY OF THE EARTH. quadrupeds, and their neglect in distinguishing the- species which very nearly resemble each other, as the various species of antelopes and of some other genera, was occasioned by want of attention and ignorance of methodical arrangement, and not by any difficulties proceeding from the climates or dis- tance of the places which these animals inhabited. We may also conclude with equal certainty, that as eighteen or twenty centuries at the least, with the advantages of circumnavigating Africa, and of pe- netrating into all the most distant regions of India, have added nothing in this portion of natural histo- ry to the information left us by the ancients, it is not at all probable that succeeding ages will add much to the knowledge of our posterity. 'HK. -..>. #*-, -' vet-- V 1 * # * Perhaps some persons may be disposed to em- ploy an opposite train of argument, and to allege that the ancients were not only acquainted with as many large quadrupeds as we are, as has been already shown, but that they actually described several others which we do not now know ; that we are rash in considering the accounts of all such animals as fabulous; that we ought to search for them with the utmost care, before concluding that we have acquired a complete knowledge of the ex- isting animal creation; and, in fine, that among these animals which we presume to be fabulous, we may perhaps discover, when better acquaint- ed with them> the actual originals of the bones of those species which are now unknown. Perhaps THEORY OF THE EARTH. 85 some may even conceive that the various monsters, essential ornaments of the history of the heroic ages of almost every nation, are precisely those very species which it was necessary to destroy, in order to allow the establishment of civilized so- cieties. Thus Theseus and Bellerophon must have been more fortunate than all the nations of more modern days, who have only been able to drive back the noxious animals into the deserts and ill-peopled regions, but have never yet succeeded in exterminating a single species. 26. Inquiry respecting the Fabulous Animals of the Ancients. It is easy to reply to the foregoing objectioa s by examining the descriptions that are left us by the ancients of those unknown animals, and by in- quiring into their origins. Now the greater num- ber of those animals have an origin purely mythor logical, and of this origin the descriptions given of them bear the most unequivocal marks ; as, in al- most all of them, we see merely the different parts of known animals united by an unbridled imagination, and in contradiction to every estab- lished law of nature. Those which have been invented by the poeti- cal fancy of the Greeks, have at least some grace and elegance in their composition, resembling the fantastic decorations which are still observable OH 86 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the ruins of some ancient buildings, and which have been multiplied by the fertile genius of Ra- phael in his paintings. Like these, they unite forms which please the eye by agreeable con- tours and fanciful combinations, but which are ut- terly repugnant to nature and reason ; being mere- ly the productions of inventive and playful genius, or perhaps meant as emblematical representations of metaphysical or moral propositions, veiled un- der mystical hieroglyphics, after the oriental man- ner. Learned men may be permitted to employ their time and ingenuity in attempts to decipher the mystic knowledge concealed under the forms of the sphinx of Thebes, the pegasus of Thessaly, the minotaur of Crete, or the chimera of Epirus ; but it would be folly to expect seriously to find such monsters in nature. We might as well en- deavour to find the animals of Daniel, or the beasts of the Apocalypse, in some hitherto unex- plored recesses of the globe. Neither can we look for the mythological animals of the Persians, creatures of a still bolder imagination such as the martichore, or destroyer of men, having a h u- man head on the body of a lion, and the tail of a scorpion ;* the griffin, or guardian of hidden trea- sures, half eagle and half lion ;f or the cartazonon, *Plin. VIII. fll. Aristot-- Phot. Bibl. art. 72. Ctes. Indie. ./Elian. Anim. IV. 21. . Anim. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 87 or wild ass, armed with a long horn on its fore- head.* Ctesias, who reports these as actual living ani- mals, has been looked upon by some authors as an inventor of fables ; whereas he only attributes real existence to hieroglyphical representations. These strange compositions of fancy have been seen in modern times on the ruins of Persepolis.t It is probable that their hidden meanings may never be , ascertained; but at all events we are quite certain that they were never intended to be representations of real animals. Agatharcides, another fabricator of animals, drew his information in all probability from a similar source. The ancient monuments of Egypt still furnish us with numerous fantastic representations, in which the parts of different kinds of creatures are strangely combined men with the heads of animals, and animals with the heads of men; which have given rise to cynocephali, satyrs, and sphinxes. The custom of exhibiting in the same sculpture, in bas-relief, men of very different heights, of making kings and conquerors gigantic, while their subjects and vassals are represented as only a fourth or fifth part of their size, must * Id. XVI. 20. Photii Bibl. art. .72 Ctes. Indie. f Le Brun. Voy. to Muscovy, Persia, and India, vol. II. See alse the German work by M. Heeren, on the Commerce of the^Ancients. 88 -THEORY OF THE EARTH. have given rise to the fable of the pigmies. In some corner of these monuments, Agatharcides must have discovered his carnivorous bull, whose mouth, extending from ear to ear, devoured every other animal that came in his way.* But no na- turalist scarcely will acknowledge the existence of any such animal, since nature has never joined cloven hoofs and horns with teeth adapted for cut- ting and devouring animal food. There may have been many other figures equally strange with these, either among those monuments of Egypt which have not been able to resist the ra- vages of time, or in the ancient temples of Ethio- pia and Arabia, which have been destroyed by the religious zeal of the Abyssinians and Mahometans. The monuments of India teem with such figures; but the combinations in these are so ridiculously extravagant, that they have never imposed even upon the most credulous. Monsters with an hun- dred arms, and twenty heads of different kinds, are far too absurd to be believed. Nay, the inhabitants of China and Japan have their imaginary animals, which they represent as *eal, and that too in their religious books. The Mexicans had them. In short, they are to be found among every people whose idolatry has not yet ac- * Phot Bibl. art. 250. -Agarthacid. Excerp. Hist, cap 39. Amm. XVII. 45 PKn. VIII, gl. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 89 quired some degree of refinement. But is there any one who could possibly pretend to discover, amidst the realities of animal nature, what are thus so plainly the productions of ignorance and super- stition? And yet some travellers, influenced by a desire to make themselves famous, have gone so far as to pretend that they saw these fancied be- ings; or, deceived by a slight resemblance, into which they were too careless to inquire, they have identified these with creatures that actually exist. In their eyes, large baboons, or monkeys, have be- come cynocephali, and sphinxes, real men w r ith long tails. It is thus that St. Augustin imagined he had seen a satyr. Real animals, observed and described with equal inaccuracy, may have given rise to some of these ideal monsters. Thus, we can have no doubt of the existence of the hyena, although the back of this animal be not supported by a single bone, and although it does not change its sex yearly, as al- leged by Pliny. Perhaps the carnivorous bull may only have been the two-horned rhinoceros, falsely described. M. de Weltheim considers the auri- ferous ants of Herodotus as the corsacs* of modern naturalists. * ' ' v- The most famous among these fabulous animals of the ancients was the unicorn. Its real existence * The Korsake, or Corsac fox of Pallas and Pennant Transl. 12 90 THEORY OF THE EARTH. has been obstinately asserted even in the present day, or at least proofs of its existence have been eagerly sought for. Three several animals are frequently mentioned by the ancients as having only one horn placed on the middle of the forehead. The oryx of Africa, having cloven hoofs, the hair placed reversely to that of other animals,* its height equal to that of the bull,t or even of the rhinoceros,J and said to resemble deer and goats in its form ;> the Indian ass, having solid hoofs ; and the monoceros, properly so called, whose feet are sometimes compared to those of the lion,|| and sometimes to those of the elephant,1[ and is there- fore considered as having divided feet. The horse unicorn** and the bull unicorn are doubtless both referable to the Indian ass, for even the latter is described as having solid hoofs.ft We may there- fore be fully assured that these animals have never really existed, as no solitary horns have ever found their way into our collections, excepting those of the rhinoceros and narwal. After careful consideration, it is impossible that we should give any credit to rude sketches made by savages upon rocks. Entirely ignorant of * Aristot. Anim. II. 1. and III. 2. Plin. XL 46. t Herodot IV. 192. J Oppian, Cyneg. II. vers. 551, ^ Plin. VIII. 53. || Philostrog. III. ii. IT Plin. VIII. 21. ** Onesecrit. ap. Strab. lib. XV, .Man. Anim.XJIL.4^ ft See Pliny and Solinus, THEORY OP THE EAnTH. 91 perspective, and wishing to represent the out- lines of a straight horned antelope in profile, they could only give the figure one horn, and thus they ^produced an oryx. The oryxes, too, that are seen on the Egyptian monuments, are nothing more, probably, than productions of the stiff style, im- posed on the sculptors of the country by religious prejudices. Several of their profiles of quadru- peds show only one fore and one hinder leg, and it is probable that the same rule led them also to represent only one horn. Perhaps their figures may have been copied after individuals that had lost one of their horns by accident, a circumstance that often happens to the chamois and the saiga, species of the antelope genus, and this would be quite sufficient to establish the error. All the an- cients, however, have not represented the oryx as having only one horn. Oppian expressly attributes two to this animal, and ^Elian mentions one that had four.* Finally, if this animal was ruminant and cloven-footed, we are quite certain that its frontal bone must have been divided longitudinally into two, and that it could not possibly, as it is very justly remarked by Camper, have had a horn placed upon the suture. It may be asked, however, What two*horned ani- mals could have given an idea of the ory#, in the forms in which it has been transmitted down to us, * JElian, Anim. XV. 14. 02 THEORY OF THE EARTH. 4 even independent of the notion of a single horn ? To this I answer, as already done by Pallas, that it was the straight-horned antelope oryx of Gmelin, improperly named pasan by Buffon. This animal inhabits the deserts of Africa, and must frequently approach the confines of Egypt, and appears to be that which is represented in the hieroglyphics. It equals the ox in height, while the shape of its body approaches to that of a stag, and its straight horns present exceedingly formidable weapons, hard almost as iron, and sharp-pointed like javelins. Its hair is whitish ; it has black spots and streaks on its face, and the hair on its back points forwards. Such is the description given by naturalists ; and the fables of the Egyptian priests, which have oc- casioned the insertion of its figure among their hieroglyphics, do not require to have been found- ed in nature. Supposing that an individual of this species may have been seen which had lost one of its horns by some accident, it may have been taken as a representative of the entire race, and errone- ously adopted by Aristotle to be copied by all his successors. All this is quite possible and even na- tural, and gives not the smallest evidence for the existence of a single-horned species of antelope. In regard to the Indian ass, of the alexipharmic virtues of whose horn the ancients speak, we find the eastern nations of the present day attributing exactly the same properties of counteracting poi- son to the horn of the rhinoceros. When this horn THEORY OF THE EARTH. 93 was first imported into Greece, nothing probably was known respecting the animal to which it belong- ed ; and accordingly it was not known to Aristotle. Agatharcides is the first author by whom it is men- tioned. In the same mariner, ivory was known to the ancients long before the animal from which it is procured ; and perhaps some of their travellers may have given to the rhinoceros the name of In- dian ass, with as much propriety as the Romans de- nominated the elephant the bull of Lucania. Every thing which they relate of the strength, size, and ferocity of their wild ass of India, corresponds suf- ficiently with the rhinoceros. In succeeding times, when the rhinoceros came to be better known to naturalists, finding that former authors mentioned a single-horned animal under the name of Indian ass, they concluded, without any examination, that it must be quite a distinct creature, having solid hoofs. We have remaining a detailed description of the Indian ass, written by Ctesias;* but, as we have already seen that this must have been taken from the ruins of Persepolis, it should go for no- thing in the real history of the animal. When there afterwards appeared more exact descriptions of an animal having several toes or hoofs on each foot, the ancients conceived it to be a third species of one-horned animals, to which they gave the name of monoceros. The^e double, *JElian.Anim. IV. 32. 94 THEORY OF THE EARTH. and even triple references, are more frequent among ancient writers, because most of their works which have come down to us were mere compila- tions ; because even Aristotle himself has often mixed borrowed facts with those which had come under his own observation; and because the habit of critically investigating the authorities of previous writers, was as little known among ancient natu- ralists as among their historians. From all these reasonings and digressions, it may be fairly concluded, that the large animals of the ancient continent with which we are now acquaint- ed, were known to the ancients ; and that all the animals of which the ancients have left descrip- tions, and which are now unknown, were merely fabulous. It also follows, that the large animals of the three anciently known quarters of the world, were very soon known to the people who frequent- ed their coasts. It may also be concluded, that no large species remain to be discovered in America, as there is no good reason that can be assigned why any such should exist in that country with which we are un- acquainted, and in fact none has been discovered there during the last hundred and fifty years. The tapir, jaguar, puma, cabiai or capibara, glama, vi- cunna, red-wolf, buffalo, or American bison, ant- eaters, sloths, and armadillos, are all contained in the works of Margrave and Hernandez, as well THEORY OF THE EARTH, described as in BufFon and even better, for Buffbri has mistaken and confused the natural history of the ant-eaters, has mixed the description of the jaguar with that ojf the red wolf, and has confound- ed the American bison with the aurochs, or urus, of Poland. Pennant, it is true, was the first natu- ralist who clearly distinguished the musk ox ; but it had been long mentioned by travellers. The cloven-footed, or Chilese, horse of Molina, has not been described by any of the early Spanish travel- lers, but its existence is more than doubtful, and the authority of Molina is too suspicious to entitle us to believe that this animal actually exists. The Muflon of the blue mountains is the only American quadruped of any size hitherto known, of whick the discovery is entirely modern; and perhaps it may only have been an argali, that had strayed from eastern Siberia over the ice.* After all that has been said, it is quite impossible to conceive that the enormous mastedontes and gi- gantic megatheriarf whose bones have been disco- vered under ground in North and South America, * The argali had long before been mentioned by writers as inhabit- ing Kamtschatka, the Kurili islands, and probably the north-west coast of America and California. Transl. t These are new names devised to characterize the animals of whieh the bones and teeth have been found in large quantities in America, both in Virginia, on the banks of ths Ohio, and in Chili and Peru. 96 THEORY OF THE EARTH. can still exist alive in that quarter of the world, They could not fail to be observed by the hunting tribes, which continually wander in all directions through the wilds of America. Indeed they them- selves seem to be fully aware that these animals no longer exist in their country, as they have in- vented a fabulous account of their destruction, al- leging that they were all killed by the Great Spirit, to prevent them from extirpating the human race. It is quite obvious that this fable has been invented subsequently to the discovery of the bones; just as tjie inhabitants of Siberia have contrived one respecting the mammoth, whose bones have been found in that country, alleging that it still lives un- der ground like the mole: and just as the ancients had their fables about the graves of giants, who were thought to have been buried wherever the bones of elephants happened to be dug up. From all these considerations, it may be safely concluded, as shall be more minutely explained in the sequel, That none of the large species of qua- drupeds, whose remains are now found imbedded in regular rocky strata, are at all similar to any of the known living species : That this circumstance is by no means the mere effect of chance, or be- cause the species to which these fossil bones have belonged are still concealed in the desert and unin- habited parts of the world, and have hitherto es- caped the observation of travellers ; but,-^-That this astonishing phenomenon has proceeded from THEORY OF THE EARTH. &7 general causes, and that the careful investigation of it affords one of the best means for discovering and explaining the nature of these causes. 27. Of the Difficulty of distinguishing the Fossil Bones of Quadrupeds. thp study of the fossil remains of the greater quadrupeds is more satisfactory, by the clear results which it affords, than that of the re- mains of other animals found in a fossil state, it is also complicated with greater and more numerous difficulties. Fossil shells are usually found quite entire, and retaining all the characters requisite for comparing them with the specimens contained in collections of natural history, or represented in the works of naturalists. Even the skeletons of fishes are found more or less entire, so that the general forms of their bodies can, for the most part, be ascertained, and usually, at least, their ge- neric and specific characters are determinable, as these are mostly drawn from their solid parts. In quadrupeds, on the contrary, even when their en- tire skeletons are found, there is great difficulty in discovering their distinguishing characters, as these are chiefly founded upon their hair and colours, and other marks which have disappeared previous to their incrustation. It is also very rare to find any fossil skeletons of quadrupeds in any degree approaching to a comple state, as the strata for the most part only contain separate bones, scattered 13 , .,. % 98 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Confusedly, and almost always broken and reduced to fragments, which are the only means left to naturalists for ascertaining the species or genera to which they have belonged. It may be stated also, that most observers, alarm- ed by these formidable difficulties, have passed slightly over the foeeil remains of quadrupeds, and iiave satisfied themselves with classing them vague- ly, by means of slight resemblances, or have not even pretended to give them names. Hence this portion of the history of extraneous fossils, though the most important and most instructive, has been investigated with less care than any other.* Fortunately, comparative anatomy, when tho- roughly understood, enables us to surmount all these difficulties, as a careful application of its principles instructs us in the correspondence and dissimilarity of the forms of organized bodies of different kinds, by which "each may be rigorously ascertained, from almost every fragment of its va- rious parts and organs. Every organized individual forms an entire sys- *AsI have already remarked on a former occasion, it is not my intention, by these observations, to detract from the merits of Cam- per, Pallas, Blumenbach, Scemmering, Merk, Faujas, Rosenmuller, and other naturalists, in regard to extraneous fossils : But, though their observations have been of great value in my researches, and are quoted by me hi every stop, they are in general very incomplete. ."*; <. ..- *... THEORY OP THE EARTH. " lem of its own, all the parts of which mutually cor- respond, and concur to produce a certain definite purpose, by reciprocal reaction, or by combining towards the same end. Hence none of these se- parate parts can change their forms without a corresponding change on the other parts of the same animal, and consequently each of these parts, taken separately, indicates all the other parts to which it has belonged. Thus, as I have elsewhere shown, if the viscera of an animal are so organ- ized as only to be fitted for the digestion of recent flesh, it is also requisite that the jaws should be so constructed as to fit them for devouring prey; the claws must be constructed for seizing and tearing it to pieces ; the teeth for cutting and dividing its flesh ; the entire system of the limbs, or organs of motion, for pursuing and overtaking it; and the organs of sense, for discovering it at a distance. Nature also must have endowed the brain of the animal with instincts sufficient for concealing itself, and for laying plans to catch its necessary victims. Such are the universal conditions that are in- dispensable in the structure of carnivorous ani- mals; and every individual of that description must necessarily possess them combined together, as the species could not otherwise subsist. Under this general rule, however, there are several par- ticular modifications, depending upon the size, the manners, and the haunts of the prey for which each species of carnivorous animal is destined or 100 THEORY OF THE EARTH. fitted by nature ; and, from each of these particular modifications, there result certain differences in the more minute conformations of particular parts, all, however, conformable to the general prin- ciples of structure already mentioned. Hence it follows, that in every one of their parts we dis- cover distinct indications, not only of the classes and orders of animals, but also of their genera, and even of their species. In fact, in order that the jaw may be well adapt- ed for laying hold of objects, it is necessary that its condyle should have a certain form ; that the resistance, the moving power, and the fulcrum, should have a certain relative position with res- pect to each other ; and that the temporal mus- cles should be of a certain size ; The hollow or depression, too, in which these muscles are lodged, must have a certain depth ; and the zygomatic arch under which they pass must not only have a certain degree of convexity, but it must be suffi- ciently strong to support the action of the masseter. To enable the animal to carry off its prey when seized, a corresponding force is requisite in the muscles which elevate the head ; and this neces- sarily gives rise to a determinate form of the ver- tebrae to which these muscles are attached, ancj of the occiput into which they are inserted. THEORY OF THE EARTH. ' 101 In order that the teeth of a carnivores animaf maybe able to cut the flesh, they r^qiiir^'tcv'b^ \\\\ A sharp, more or less so in proportibn to 'the 'greater or less quantity of flesh that they have to cut. It is requisite that their roots should be solid and strong, in proportion to the quantity and the size of the bones which they have to break to pieces. The whole of these circumstances must necessarily influence the developement and form of all the parts which contribute to move the jaws. To enable the claws of a carnivorous animal to seize its prey, a considerable degree of mobility is necessary in their paws and toes, and a considera- ble strength in the claws themselves. From these circumstances, there necessarily result certain de- terminate forms in all the bones of their paws, and in the distribution of the muscles and tendons bj which they are moved. The fore-arm must pos- sess a certain facility of moving in various direc- tions, and consequently requires certain determi- nate forms in the bones of which it is composed. As the bones of the fore-arm are articulated with the arm-bone or humerus, no change can take place in the form and structure of the former with- out occasioning correspondent changes in the form of the latter. The shoulder blade also, or scapu- la, requires a correspondent degree of strength in all animals destined for catching prey, by which it likewise must necessarily have an appropriate form. The play and action of all these parts re- 102 THEORY OF THE EARTH. quire i^rfairi proportions in the muscles which set 'ttienrJiJ mo.tioiiv and the impressions formed by iiiese -lAH^oies cmust still farther determine the forms of all these bones. After these observations, it will be easily seen that similar conclusions may be drawn with respect to the hinder limbs of carnivorous animals, which require particular conformations to fit them for rar pidity of motion in general ; and that similar con- siderations must influence the forms and connexions of the vertebrae and other bones constituting the trunk of the body, to fit them for flexibility and readiness of motion in all directions. The bones also of the nose, of the orbit, and of the ears, re- quire certain forms and structures to fit them for giving perfection to the senses of smell, sight, and hearing, so necessary to animals of prey. In short, the shape and structure of the teeth regulate the forms of the condyle, of the shoulder-blade, and of the claws, in the same manner as the equation of a curve regulates all its other properties; and, as in regard to any particular curve, all its proper- ties may be ascertained by assuming each separate property as the foundation of a particular equa- tion; in the same manner, a claw, a shoulder- blade, a condyle, a leg or arm bone, or any other bone separately considered, enables us to discover the description of teeth to which they have be- longed; and so also reciprocally we may determine the forms of the other bones from the teeth. Thus, ' THEORY OP THE EARTH. 103 commencing our investigation by a careful survey of any one bone by itself, a person who is suffi- ciently master of the laws of organic structure, may, as it were, reconstruct the whole animal to which that bone had belonged. This principle is sufficiently evident, in its gene- ral acceptation, not to require any more minute demonstration ; but when it comes to be applied in practice, there is a great number of cases in which our theoretical knowledge of these relations of forms is not sufficient to guide us, unless assisted by observation and experience. For example, we are well aware that all hoofed animals must necessarily be herbivorous, because they are possessed of no means of seizing upon prey. It is also evident, having no other use for their fore-legs than to support their bodies, that they have no occasion for a shoulder so vigorously organized as that of carnivorous animals ; owing to which, they have no clavicles or accromion pro- cesses, and their shoulder-blades are proportion- ally narrow. Having also no occasion to turn their fore-arms, their radius is joined by ossification to the ulna, or is at least articulated by gynglymus with the humerus. Their food, being entirely her- baceous, requires teeth with flat surfaces, on pur- pose to bruise the seeds and plants on which they feed. For this purpose also, these surfaces require to be unequal, and are consequently composed of ^;; : -: ".*' '..-** 104 THEORY OF THE EARtH. alternate perpendicular layers of hard enamel and softer bone. Teeth of this structure necessarily require horizontal motions, to enable them to tritu- rate or grind down the herbaceous food j and, ac- cordingly, the condyles of the jaw could not be formed into such confined joints as in the carnivo- rous animals, but must have a flattened form, cor- respondent to sockets in the temporal bones, which also are more or less flat for their reception. The hollows likewise of the temporal bones., having sinaller muscles to contain, are narrower, and not so deep, &c. All these circumstances are deduci- ble from each other, according to their greater or less generality, and in such manner that some are essentially and exclusively appropriated to hoofed quadrupeds, while other circumstances, though equally necessary to that description of animals, are not exclusively so, but may be found in animals of other descriptions, where other conditions per- mit or require their existence. When w r e proceed to consider the different or- ders or subdivisions of the class of hoofed ani- mals, and examine the modifications to which the general conditions are liable, or rather the particu- lar conditions which are conjoined, according to the respective characters of the several subdivi- sions, the reasons upon which these particular con- ditions or rules of conformation are founded become less evident. We can easily conceive, in general, the necessity of a more complicated system of diges- THEORY OF THE EARTH, 105 tive organs in those species- which have less per- fect masticatory systems ; and hence we may pre- sume that these latter animals require especially to be ruminant, which are in want of such or such kinds of teeth; and may also deduce, from the same considerations, the necessity of a certain conformation of the esophagus, and of correspond- ing forms in the vertebrae of the neck, &c. But 1 doubt whether it would have been discovered, in- dependently of actual observation, that ruminant animals should all have cloven hoofs, and that they should be the only animals having that particular conformation; that the ruminant animals only should be provided with horns on their foreheads ; that those among them which have sharp tusks, or canine teeth, should want horns, &c. As all these relative conformations are constant and regular, we may be assured that they depend upon some sufficient cause; and, since we are not acquainted with that cause, we must here supply the defect of theory by observation* and in this way lay down empirical rules on the subject, which are almost as certain as those deduced from ra- tional principles, especially if established upon careful and repeated observation. Hence, any one who observes merely the print of a cloven hoof, may conclude that it has been left by a rumi- nant animal, and regard the conclusion as equally certain with any other in physics or in morals. Consequently, this single foot-mark clearly ijidi- 14 106 THEORY OF THE EARTH. cates to the observer the forms of the teeth, of the jaws, of the vertebrae, of all the leg-bones, thighs, shoulders, and of the trunk of the body of the ani- mal which left the mark. It is much surer than all the marks of Zadig. Observation alone, indepen- dent entirely of general principles of philosophy, is sufficient to show that there certainly are secret reasons for all these relations of which I have been speaking. Of these seventy-eight species, fifteen which be- long to eleven genera or sub-genera, are animals belonging to the class of oviparous quadrupeds; while the remaining sixty-three belong to the mam- miferous class. Of these last, thirty-two species are hoofed animals, not ruminant, and reducible to ten genera ; twelve are ruminant animals, belong- ing to two genera ; seven are gnawers, referable to six genera ; eight are carnivorous quadrupeds, be- longing to five genera ; two are toothless animals, of the sloth genus ; and two are amphibious ani- mals of two distinct genera.* * As the author has already referred fifteen other species to what THEORY OF THE EARTH. Ill 29. Relations of the Species of Fossil Bones, with the Strata in which they are found. Notwithstanding the considerable number of these fossil bones already discovered and ascer- tained, it would be premature to attempt estab- lishing any conclusions deduced from them in re- gard to the theory of the earth, as they are not in sufficient proportion to the entire number of genera and species which, in all probability, arfe buried in the strata of the earth. Hitherto the bones of the larger species have chiefly been collected, as more obvious to the labourers, while those of smaller animals are usually neglected, unless when they fall by accident in the way of a naturalist, or when some other remarkable circumstance, such as their extreme abundance in any particular place, at- tracts even the attention of common people. The most important consideration, that which has been the chief object of my researches, and which constitutes their legitimate connexion with the theory of the earth, is to ascertain the particu- lar strata in which each of the species was found, and to inquire if any of the general laws could be ascertained, relative either to the zoological sub- divisions, or to the greater or less resemblance be- he terms the oviparous class of quadrupeds, the two amphibious ani- mals here mentioned probably belong to the order of cetaceous mam- miferous animals, and not to the amphibia of the Linnsean system.*- Transl. 112 THEORY OF THE EARTH* tween these fossil species and those which still ex* ist upon the earth. The laws already recognised with respect to these relations are very distinct and satisfactory. It is, in the first place, clearly ascertained, that the oviparous quadrupeds are found considerably earlier, or in more ancient strata, than those of the viviparous class. Thus the crocodiles of Honfleur and of England are found underneath the chalk. The monitors of Thuringia would be still more an- cient, if, according to the Wernerian school, the copper-slate in which they are contained, along with a great number of fishes supposed to have belonged to fresh water, is to be placed among the most ancient strata of the secondary or fla3tz for- mations. The great alligators, or crocodiles, and the tortoises of Maestricht, are found in the chalk formation ; but these are both marine animals. This earliest appearance of fossil bones seems to indicate, that dry lands and fresh waters must have existed before the foundation of the chalk strata. Yet neither at that early epoch, nor during the for- mation of the chalk strata, nor even for a long pe- riod afterwards, do we find any fossil remains of mammiferous land-quadrupeds. We begin to find the bones of mammiferous sea- animals, namely, of the lamantin and of seals, in the coarse shell limestone which immediately co- THEORY 0F THE EARTH. 113 vers the chalk strata in the neighbourhood of Paris. But no bones of mammiferous land-quad- rupeds are to be found in that formation ; and notwithstanding the most careful investigations, I have never been able to , discover the slightest traces of this class, except in the formations which lie over the coarse limestone strata ; but imme- diately on reaching these more recent formations, the bones of land-quadrupeds are discovered in great abundance. As it is reasonable to believe that shells and fish did not exist at the period of the formation of the primitive rocks, we are also led to conclude that the, oviparous quadrupeds began to exist along with the fishes, and at the commencement of the period which produced the secondary for- mations; while the land-quadrupeds did not ap- pear upon the earth till long afterwards, and un- til the coarse shell limestone had been already deposited, which contains the greater part of our genera of shells, although of quite different species from those that are now found in a natural state. It is remarkable that those coarse limestone strata, which are chiefly employed at Paris for building, are the last formed strata which indicate a long and quiet continuance of the water of the sea above the surface of our continent. Above them, indeed, there are found formations contain- ing abundance of shells and other productions of 15 114 THEORY OP THE EARTH. the sea ; but these consist of alluvial materials, sand, marie, sandstone, or clay, which rather indi- cate transportations that have taken place with some degree of violence, than strata formed by quiet depositions ; and where some regular rocky strata, of inconsiderable extent and thickness, appear above or below these alluvial formations, they ge- nerally bear the marks of having been deposited from fresh water. All the known specimens of the bones of vivi- parous land quadrupeds, have either been found in these formations from fresh water, or in the al- luvial formations ; whence there is every reason to conclude that these animals have only begun to exist, or at least to leave their remains in the strata of our earth, since the last retreat of the sea but one, and during that state of the world which pre- ceded its last irruption. There is also a determinate order observable in the disposition of these bones in regard to each other, which indicates a very remarkable suc- cession in the appearance of the different species* All the genera which are now unknown as thepa- Iceotheria, anaplotherid, &c. with the localities of which we are thoroughly acquainted, are found in the most ancient of those formations of which we are now treating, or those which are placed direct- ly over the coarse limestone strata. It is chiefly they which occupy the regular strata that have THEORY OF THE EARTH. been deposited from fresh water, or certain allu- vial beds of very ancient formation, generally composed of sand and rounded pebbles ; which were perhaps the earliest alluvial formations of thje ancient world. Along with these there are also found some lost species of known genera, but in small numbers ; together with some oviparous quadrupeds and some fish, which appear to have been inhabitants of fresh water. The strata con- taining these are always more or less covered with alluvial formations, filled with shells and other productions of the sea. The most celebrated of the unknown species belonging to known genera, or to genera nearly al- lied to those that are known, as the fossil elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and mastodon, are never found along with the more ancient genera ; but are only contained in alluvial formations, some- times along with sea-shells, and sometimes with fresh-water shells, but never in regular rocky stra- ta. Every thing found along with these species is either, like them, unknown, or at least doubtful. Lastly, the bones of species which are appa- rently the same with those that still exist alive, are never found except in the very latest alluvial de- positions, or those which are either formed on the sides of rivers, or on the bottoms of ancient lakes or marshes now dried up, or in the sub- stance of beds of peat, or in the fissures and ca- 116 THEORY OF THE EARTH. verns of certain rocks, or at small depths below the present surface, in places where they may have been overwhelmed by debris, or even buried by man : And, although these bones are the most re- cent of all, they are almost always, owing to their superficial situation, the worst preserved. It must not, however, be thought that this clas- sification of the various mineral repositories is as certain as that of the species, and that it has near- ly the same character of demonstration. Many reasons might be assigned to show that this could not be the case. All the determinations of spe- cies have been made, either by means of the bones themselves, or from good figures ; whereas it has been impossible for me personally to examine the places in which these bones were found. Indeed I have often been reduced to the necessity of satis- fying myself with vague and ambiguous accounts, given by persons who did not know well what was necessary to be noticed ; and I have still more fre- quently been unable to procure any information whatever on the subject. Secondly, these mineral repositories are subject to infinitely greater doubts in regard to their suc- cessive formations, than are the fossil bones re- specting their arrangement and determination. The same formation may seem recent in those places where it happens to be superficial, and ancient where it has been covered over by sue- THEORY OP THE EARTH. 117 ceeding formations. Ancient formations may have been transported into new situations by means of partial inundations, and may thus have covered over recent formations containing bones; they may have been carried over by debris so as to sur- round these recent bones, and may have mix- ed with them the productions of the ancient sea, which they previously contained. Anciently de- posited bones may have been washed out from their original situations by the waters, and been afterwards enveloped in recent alluvial formations. And, lastly, recent bones may have fallen into the crevices and caverns of ancient rocks, where they may have been covered up by stalactites or other incrustations. In every individual instance, there- fore, it becomes necessary to examine and appre- ciate all these circumstances, which might other- wise conceal the real origin of extraneous fossils; and it rarely happens that the people who found these fossil bones were aware of this necessity, and consequently the true characters of their reposi- tories have almost always been overlooked or mis- understood. Thirdly, there are still some doubtful species of these fossil bones, which must occasion more or less uncertainty in the result of our researches, until they have been clearly ascertained. Thus the fos- sil bones of horses and buffaloes, which have been found along with those of elephants, have not hi- therto presented sufficiently distinct specific cha- 118 THEORY OF THE EARTH. racters ; and such geologists as are disinclined to adopt the successive epochs which I have endea- voured to establish in regard to fossil bones, may for many years draw from thence an argument against my system, so much the more convenient as it is contained in my own work. Even allowing that these epochs are liable to some objections, from such as have slightly considered some particular fact, I am not the less satisfied that those who shall take a comprehensive view of the phenomena, will not be checked by inconsiderable and partial dif- ficulties, but will be led to conclude, as I have done, that there has at least been one succession, and very probably two, in the class of quadrupeds, before the appearance of those races which now inhabit the surface of our globe. 30. Proofs that the extinct Species of Quadrupeds are not Varieties of the presently existing Species. The following objection has already been start- ed against my conclusions. Why may not the pre- sently existing races of mammiferous land-quadru- peds be mere modifications or varieties of those ancient races which we now find in the fossil state, which modifications may have been produced by I change of climate and other local circumstances, and since raised to the present excessive diffe- rence, by the operation of similar causes during a Jong succession of ages ? THEORY OP tHfc EARTH. 119 This objection may appear strong to those who believe in the indefinite possibility of change of forms in organized bodies, and think that during a succession of ages, and by alterations of habitudes, all the species may change into each other, or one of them give birth to all the rest. Yet to these persons the following answer may be given from their own system : If the species have changed by degrees, as they assume, we ought to find traces of this gradual modification. Thus, between the palcEothcrium and the species of our own days, we should be able to discover some intermediate forms ; and yet no such discovery has ever been made. Since the bowels of the earth have not pre- served monuments of this strange genealogy, we have a right to conclude, That the ancient and now extinct species were as permanent in their forms and characters as those which exist at present ; or at least, That the catastrophe which destroyed them did not leave sufficient time for the produc- tion of the changes that are alleged to have taken place. In order to reply to those naturalists who ac- knowledge that the varieties of animals are re- strained by nature within certain limits, it would be necessary to examine how far these limits ex- tend. This is a very curious* inquiry, and in it- self exceedingly interesting under a variety of relations, but has been hitherto very little attend- ed to. It requires that we should define accu- 120 THEORY OF THE EARTH. rately what is, or ought to be, understood by the word species, which may be thus expressed : Jl species comprehends all the individuals which descend from each other, or from a common parentage, and those ivhich resemble them as much as they do each other. Thus the different races which they have genera- ted from them are considered as varieties but of one species. Our observations, therefore, respect- ing the differences between the ancestors and the descendants, are the only rules by which we can judge on this subject ; all other considerations being merely hypothetical, and destitute of proof. Taking the word variety in this limited sense, we observe that the differences which constitute this variety depend upon determinate circumstances, and that their extent increases in proportion to the intensity of the circumstances which occasion them. * Upon these principles it may be observed, that the most superficial characters are the most va- riable. Thus colour depends much upon light ; thickness of hair upon heat; size upon abundance of food, &c. In wild animals, however, even these varieties are greatly limited by the natural habits of the animal, which does not willingly migrate from the places where it finds insufficient quanti- ty what is necessary for the support of its species, and does not even extend its haunts to any great distances, unless it also finds all these circumstan- ces conjoined. Thus, although the w r olf and the THEORY OP THE EARTH. 121 ibx inhabit all the climates from the torrid to the frigid zone, we hardly find any other differences among them, through the whole of that vast space, than a little more or a little less beauty in their furs. I have compared the skulls of foxes from the most northern regions and from Egypt with those of France, and found no differences but what might naturally be expected in different in- dividuals. The more savage animals, especially those which are carnivorous, being confined with- in narrower limits, vary still less ; and the only dif- ference between the hyena of Persia and that of Morocco, consists in a thicker or a thinner mane. Wild animals which subsist upon herbage feel the influence of climate a little more extensively, because there is added to it the influence of food, both in regard to its abundance and its quality. Thus the elephants of one forest are larger than those of another ; their tusks also grow somewhat longer in places where their food may happen to be more favourable for the production of the sub- stance of ivory. The same may take place in re- gard to the horns of stags and rein-deer. But let us examine two elephants the most dissimilar that can be conceived, we shall not discover the small- est difference in the number and articulations of the bones, the structure of the teeth, &c. Besides, the species of herbivorous animals, in their wild state, seem more restrained from migra* 16 122 THEORY OF THE EARTH. ting and dispersing than the carnivorous species, being influenced both by climate and by the kind of nourishment which they need. Nature appears also to have guarded against the alterations of species which might proceed from mixture of breeds, by influencing the various species of animals with mutual aversion from each other. Hence all the cunning and all the force that man is able to exert is necessary to accomplish such unions, even between species that have the near- est resemblances. And when the mule-breeds that are thus produced by these forced con- junctions happen to be fruitful, which is seldom the case, this fecundity never continues beyond a few generations, and would not probably proceed so far, without a continuance of the same cares which excited it at first. Thus we never see in a wild state intermediate productions between the hare and the rabbit, between the stag and the doe, or between the martin and the weasel. But the power of man changes this established order, and contrives to produce all these intermixtures of which the various species are susceptible, but which they would never produce if left to them- selves. The degrees of these variations are proportional to the intensity of the causes that produce them, namely, the slavery or subjection under which those animals are to man. They do not proceed THEORY OF THE EARTH. 123 far in half-domesticated species. In the cat, for example, a softer or harsher fur, more brilliant or more varied colours, greater or less size these form the whole extent of the varieties in the spe- cies ; the skeleton of the cat of Angora differs in no regular and constant circumstances from the wild cat of Europe. In the domesticated herbivorous quadrupeds, which man transports into all kinds of climates, and subjects to various kinds of management, both in regard to labour and nourishment, he pro- cures certainly more considerable variations, but still they are all merely superficial. Greater or less size; longer or shorter horns, or even the want of these entirely ; a hump of fat, larger or smaller on the shoulder; these form the chief dif- ferences among particular races of the bos taurus, or domestic black cattle ; and these differences continue long in such breeds as have been transported to great distances from the countries in which they were originally produced, when proper care is taken to prevent crossing. The innumerable varieties in the breeds of the ovis aries, or common sheep, are of a similar na* ture, and chiefly consist in differences of their fleeces, as the wool which they produce, is a very important object of attention. These varieties^ though not quite so perceptible, are yet sufficient- ly marked among horses. In general the forms 124 THEORY OF THE EARTH. of the bones are very little changed ; their con* nexions and articulations, and the form and struc- ture of the large grinding teeth, are invariably the same. The small size of the tusks in the domes- ticated hog, compared with the wild boar of which it is only a cultivated variety, and the junction of its cloven hoofs into one solid hoof, observable in some races, form the extreme point of the dif- ferences which man has been able to produce among herbivorous domesticated quadrupeds. The most remarkable effects of the influence of man are produced upon that animal which he has reduced most completely under subjection. Dogs have been transported by mankind into every part of the world, and have submitted their ac- tions to his entire direction. Regulated in their sexual unions by the pleasure or caprice of their masters, the almost endless varieties of dogs differ from each other in colour ; in length and abun^ dance of hair, which is sometimes entirely want- ing ; in their natural instincts ; in size, which va- ries in measure as one to five, amounting, in some instances, to more than an hundred fold in bulk ; in the forms of their ears, noses, and tails ; in the relative length of their legs ; in the progressive de- velopement of the brain in several of the domes- ticated varieties, occasioning alterations, even in the form of the head ; some of them having long slender muzzles with a flat forehead ; others having short muzzles, with the forehead convex, &c. inso- much that the apparent differences between a mas- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 12 3 tiff and a water-spaniel, and between a greyhound and a pug-dog, are even more striking than be- tween almost any of the wild species of a genus. Finally, and this may be considered as the maxi- mum of known variation in the animal kingdom, some races of dogs have an additional claw on each hind-foot, with corresponding bones of the tarsus; as there sometimes occur in the human species some families that have six fingers on each hand. Yet, in all these varieties, the relations of the bones with each other remains essentially the same, and the form of the teeth never changes in any perceptible degree, except that in some individuals one additional false grinder occasion- ally appears, sometimes on the one side, arid sometimes on the other.* It follows from these observations, that animals have certain fixed and natural characters, which resist the effects of every kind of influence, whether proceeding from natural causes or human inter- ference ; and we have not the smallest reason to suspect that time has any more effect upon them than climate. I am well aware that some naturalists lay pro- digious stress on the thousands of years which they can call into action by a dash of their pens, * See, in the Annals of the Museum, XVIII. 333., a memoir by my brother on the varieties of dogs, which he drew up at my request, from a series of skeletons of all the varieties of dogs, prepared by me expressly on purpose. 126 THEORY OP THE EARTH. In such matters, however, our only way of judging as to the effects which may be produced by a long period of time, is by multiplying, as it were, such as are produced by a shorter known time. With this view I have endeavoured to collect all the an- cient documents respecting the forms of animals ; and there are none equal to those furnished by the Egyptians, both in regard to their antiquity and abundance. They have not only left us represen- tations of animals, but even their identical bodies embalmed and preserved in the catacombs. I have examined with the greatest attention the engraved figures of quadrupeds and birds upon the numerous obelisks brought from Egypt to an- cient Rome; and all these figures, one with another, have a perfect resemblance to their in- tended objects, such as they still are in our days. My learned colleague, M. Geoffroy Saint Hi- laire, convinced of the importance of this research, carefully collected in the tombs and temples of Upper and Lower Egypt as many mummies of ani- mals as he could procure. He has brought home the mummies of cats, ibises, birds of prey, dogs, monkies, crocodiles, and the head of a bull ; and after the most attentive and detailed examination, not the smallest difference is to be perceived be- tween these animals and those of the same species which we now see, any more than between the hu- man mummies and the skeletons of men of the pre- THEORY OF THE EARTH. 127 sent day. Some slight differences are discover- able between ibis and ibis, for example, just as we now find differences in the descriptions of natural- ists ; but I have removed all doubts on that sub- ject, in a memoir on the Ibis of the ancient Egyp- tians, in which I have clearly shown that this bird is precisely the same in all respects at pre- sent that it was in the days of the Pharaohs.* I am aware that in these I only cite the monuments of two or three thousand years back ; but this is the most remote antiquity to which we can resort in such a case. From all these well-established facts, there does not seem to be the smallest foundation for supposing, that the new genera which I have dis- covered or established among extraneous fossils, such as the palceotherium, anoplotherium, megalonyx^ mastodon, pterodactylis, &c. have ever been the sources of any of our present animals, which only dif- fer so far as they are influenced by time or climate. Even if it should prove true, which I am far from believing to be the case, that the fossil elephants, rhinoceroses, elks, and bears, do not diner far- ther from the presently existing species of the same genera, than the present races of dogs dif- fer among themselves, this would by no means * In that dissertation, the ibis of the ancient Egyptians is shown to be a species of numenius, or curlew, denominated by Cuvier nw- menius ibis ; the same bird described in Bruce's Travels under the name of abU'hannes.TrtsnsL 128 THEORY OF THE EARTH. be a sufficient reason to conclude that they were of the same species; since the races or varieties of dogs have been influenced by the trammels of domesticity, which these other animals never did, and indeed never could experience. Farther, when I endeavour to prove that the rocky strata contain the bony remains of seve- ral genera, and the loose strata those of several species, all of which are not now existing animals on the face of our globe, I do not pretend that a new creation was required for calling our - present races of animals into existence. I only urge that they did not anciently occupy the same places, and that they must have come from some other part of the globe. Let us suppose, for instance, that a prodigious inroad of the sea were now to cover the continent of New-Holland with a coat of sand and other earthy materials ; this would necessarily bury the carcasses of many animals belonging to the ge- nera of kanguroo, phascoloma, dasyurus, peramela, fly- ing-phalangerSi echidna, and ornithorynchus, and would consequently entirely extinguish all the species of all these genera, as not one of them is to be found in any other country. Were the same revolution to lay dry the numerous narrow straits which sepa- rate New-Holland from New-Guinea, the Indian islands, and the continent of Asia, a road would be opened for the elephants, rhinoceroses, buffaloes, horses, camels, tigers, and all the other Asiatic ani- mals, to occupy a land in which they are hitherto THEORY OF THE EARTH. 129 unknown. Were some future naturalist, after be- coming well acquainted with the living animals of that country in this supposed new condition, to search below the surface on which these ani- mals were nourished, he would then discover the remains of quite different races. What New Holland would then be, under these hypothetical circumstances, Europe, Sibe- ria, and a large portion of America, actually now are. Perhaps hereafter, when other countries shall be investigated, and New Holland among the rest, they also may be found to have all under- gone similar revolutions, and perhaps may have made reciprocal changes of animal productions. If we push the former supposition somewhat far- ther, and, after the supply of Asiatic animals to New Holland, admit that a subsequent catastro- phe might overwhelm Asia, the primitive country of the migrated animals, future geologist^y^nd na- turalists would perhaps be equally at a loss to dis- cover whence the then living animals of New Hol- land had come, as we now are to find out the ori- ginal habitations of our present fossil animals. 32. Proofs that there are no Human Bones in a Fos- sil State. I now proceed to apply the previous reasonings to the human race. It is quite undeniable that no human remains have been hitherto discovered 17 130 THEORY OF THE EARTH, among the extraneous fossils ; and this furnishes a strong proof that the extinct races which are now found in a fossil state, were not varieties of known species, since they never could have been subjected to human influence. When I assert that human bones have not been hitherto found among extraneous fossils, I must be understood to speak of fossils, or petrifications, properly so called : As in peat depositions or turf bogs, and in alluvial formations, as well as in an- cient burying-grounds, the bones of men with those of horses, and other ordinary existing species of animals, may readily enough be found ; but among the fossil palceotheria, the elephants, the rhinoce- roses, &c. the smallest fragment of human bone has never been detected. Most of the labourers in the gypsum quarries about Paris are firmly per- suaded that the bones they contain are in a great part human : but after having seen and carefully examined many thousands of these bones, I may safely affirm that not a single fragment of them has ever belonged to our species. I carefully examined at Pavia the collection of extraneous fossil bones brought there by Spalan- zani from the island of Cerigo ; and, notwithstand- ing the assertion of that celebrated observer, I affirm that there is not a single fragment among them that ever formed part of a human skeleton. THEORY 0F THE EARTH* 131 In my fourth volume, the homo dilumi testis of Scheuchzer is restored to the proteus, its true ge- nus ; and in a still more recent examination of it at Haerlem, allowed by the politeness of M. Van Marum, who even permitted me to uncover some parts that were before enveloped in the stone, I obtained decisive proof of what I had before an- nounced. Among the fossil bones discovered at Cronstadt, the fragment of a jaw, together with some articles of human manufacture, was found ; but it is well known that the ground was dug up without any precautions, and no notes were taken of the dif- ferent depths at which each article was found. Everywhere else, the fragments of bone consid- ered as human have been found to belong to some animal, either when the fragments themselves have been actually examined, or even when their en- graved figures have been inspected. Such real human bones as have been found in a fossil state, belonged to bodies which had fallen into crevices of rocks, or had been left in the forsaken galleries of ancient mines, and were covered up by incrus- tation. The same has been the case with all ar- ticles of human fabric. The pieces of iron which have been found at Montmartre, are fragments of the iron tools used in the quarries for putting in blasts of gunpowder, and which sometimes break in the stone. 132 THEORY OF THE EARTH. Yet human bones preserve equally well with those of animals, when placed in the same circum- stances ; and there is no observable difference in this respect in Egypt between the mummies of men and those of quadrupeds. I have picked up, from the excavations made lately in the ancient church at St. Genevieve, human bones that had been in- terred below the remains of the first race, which may even have belonged to some princes of the family of Clovis, and which still retained their forms very perfectly.* We do not find in ancient fields of battle, that the skeletons of men are more wasted than those of horses, except in so far as they may be influenced by size, and we find among extraneous fossils the bones of animals as small as rats, perfectly well preserved. Every circumstance, therefore, contributes to establish this position That the human race did not exist in the countries in which the fossil bones of animals have been discovered, at the epoch when these bones were covered up ; as there can- not be a single reason assigned why men should have entirely escaped from such general catas- trophes ; Or, if they also had been destroyed and covered over at the same time, why their remains should not now be found along with those of the other animals. I do not presume, however, to conclude that man did not exist at all before these * M. Fourcroy has given an analysis of these bones. THEORY OP THE EARTH. 133 epochs. He may have then inhabited some nar- row regions, whence he went forth to repeople the earth after the cessation of these terrible re- volutions and overwhelmings. Perhaps even the places which he then inhabited may have been sunk into the abyss, and the bones of that destroy- ed human race may yet remain buried under the bottom of some actual seas ; all except a small number of individuals who were destined to con- tinue the species. However this may have been, the establish- ment of mankind in those countries in which the fossil bones of land-animals have been found, that is to say, in the greatest part of Europe, Asia, and America, must necessarily have been posterior not only to the revolutions which covered up these bones, but also to those other revolutions, by which the strata containing the bones have been laid bare. Hence it clearly appears, that no argument for the antiquity of the human race in those coun- tries can be founded either upon these fossil bones or upon the more or less considerable collections of rocks or earthy materials by which they are covered. 31. Proofs of the recent Population of the World, and that its present Surface is not of very ancient Forma- tion. On the contrary, by a careful investigation of what has taken place on the surface of the globe 134 THEORY OP THE EARTH. since it has been laid dry for the last time, and its continents have assumed their present form, at least in such parts as are somewhat elevated above the level of the ocean, it may be clearly seen that this last revolution, and consequently the es- tablishment of our existing societies, could not have been very ancient. Thik result is one of the best established and least attended to, in rational zoology ; and it is so much the more valuable, as it connects natural and civil history together ia one uninterrupted series. When we endeavour to estimate the quantity of effects produced in a given time by any causes still acting, by comparing them with the effects which these causes have produced since they be- gan to operate, we may determine nearly the pe- riod at which their action commenced 5 which must necessarily be the same period with that in which our continents assumed their presently exis- ting forms, or with that of the last retreat of the wa- ters. It must have been since that last retreat of the waters, that the acclivities of our mountains have begun to disintegrate, and to form slopes or taluses of the debris at their bottoms and upon their sides ; that our rivers have begun to flow in their present courses, and to form alluvial depo- sitions ; that our existing vegetation has begun to extend itself, and to form vegetable soil ; that our present cliflfe, or steep sloping coasts, have feegun to be worn away by the waters of the sea ; THEORY OF THE EARTH. 135 that our actual downs, or sand-hills, have begun to be blown up by the winds. And, dating from the same epoch, colonies of the human race must have then begun, for the first or for the second time, to spread themselves, and to form new estab- lishments in places fitted by nature for their re- ception. I do not here take the action of volcanoes in- to the account, not only because of the irregula- rity of their eruptions, but because we have no proofs of their not having been able to act below the sea ; and because, on that account, they can- not serve us as a measure of the time which has elapsed since its last retreat. MM. Deluc and Dolomieu have most carefully examined the progress of the formation of new grounds by the collection of slime and sand wash- ed down by the rivers; and, although exceeding- ly opposed to each other on many points of the theory of the earth, they agree exactly on this. These formations augment very rapidly ; they must have increased with the greatest rapidity at first*, when the mountains furnished the greatest quan- tity of materials to the rivers,* and yet their extent still continues to be extremely limited. * One instance will be found appended to this Essay, of modern alluvial formations proceeding with considerably increased rapidity. 136 THEORY OF THE EARTH. The memoir by M. Dolomieu respecting Egypt,* tends to prove that the tongue of land on which Alexander caused his famous commer- cial city to be built, did not exist in the days of Homer ; because they were then able to navigate directly from the island of Pharos into the gulf afterwards called Lams Mareotis ; and that this ^gulf, as indicated by Menelaus, was between fif- teen and twenty leagues in length. Supposing this to be accurate, it had only required the lapse of nine hundred years, from the days of Homer to the time of Strabo, to reduce matters to the situa- tion described by this latter author, when that gulf was reduced to the state of a lake only six leagues long. It is a more certain fact, that since that time a still greater change has taken place. The sands, which have been thrown up by the sea and the winds, have formed, between the isle of Pharos and the site of ancient Alexandria, an isthmus more than four hundred yards broad, on which the mo- dern city is now built. These collections of sand have also blocked up the nearest mouth of the Nile, and have reduced the lake Mareotis almost to no- thing; while,in the course of the same period,theNile in the researches of M. Prony, respecting the alluvial depositions at the mouths of the PoTransl. * In the Journal de Physique, vol. XLIL THEORY OP THE EARTH. 137 has deposited alluvial formations all along the rest of the coast. In the time of Herodotus, the coast of the Delta extended in a straight line, and is even represented in that direction in the maps con- structed for the geography of Ptolemy : but since then the coast has so far advanced as to have as- sumed a semicircular projection into the Mediter- ranean, The cities of Rosetta and Damietta, built on the sea-coast less than a thousand years ago, are now two leagues distant from the sea. We may learn in Holland and Italy, how rapidly the Rhine, the Po, and the Arno, since they have been confined within dikes, now elevate their beds, and push forward the alluvial grounds at their mouths towards the sea, forming long projecting promontories at their sides ; and it may be con- cluded, from this assured fact, that these rivers have not required the lapse of many centuries to deposit the low alluvial plains through which they now flow. Many cities, which were flourishing sea-ports in well-known periods of history, are now seve- ral leagues inland, and several have even been ruined by this change. The inhabitants of Venice at present find it exceedingly difficult to preserve the lagunes, by which that once celebrated city is separated from the continent of Italy, from fil- ling up ; and there can be no doubt that she will 18 138 THEORY OP THE EARTH. some day become united to the main land, in spite of every effort to preserve her insular situation.* We learn from Strabo, that Ravenna stood among lagunes, in the time of Augustus, as Ve- nice does now; but Ravenna is now at the dis- tance of a league from the sea. Spina had been originally built by the Greeks on the sea-coast ; but in the time of Strabo the sea was removed to the distance of ninety stadia. This city has been long since destroyed. Adria, which gave name to the Adriatic, was, somewhat more than twenty centuries ago, the chief port of that sea, from which it is now at the distance of six leagues. The Abbe Fortis has even produced strong evi- dence for believing that the Euganian hills may have been islands, at a period somewhat more remote. M. de Prony, a learned member of the Insti- tute, and inspector-general of bridges and high- ways, has communicated to me some very valu- able observations, to explain the changes which have taken place on the flat shores usually deno- minated the Littoral of the Adriatic, and which will be found appended to this Essay. Having been directed by government to examine and re- port upon the precautions which might be em- See a Memoir qn the Lagunes of Venice, by M. Forfait. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 139 ployed for preventing the devastations occasion- ed by the floods of the Po, he ascertained that this river has so greatly raised the level of its bot- tom, since it was shut in by dikes, that its present surface is higher than the roofs of the houses in Ferrara. At the same time, the alluvial additions produced by this river have advanced so rapidly into the sea, that, by comparing old charts with the present state, the coast appears to have gained no less than fourteen thousand yards since the year 1604, giving an average of an hundred and eighty to two hundred feet* yearly ; and in some places the average amounts to two hundred feet. The Adige and the Po are both at present higher than the intervening lands ; and the only remedy for preventing the disasters which are now threatened by their annual overflowings, would be to open up new channels for the more ready discharge of their waters, through the low grounds which have been formed by their alluvial depositions. Similar causes have produced similar effects along the branches of the Rhine and the Maese ; owing to which all the richest districts of Holland have the frightful view of their great rivers held up * In the appended extract from the Memoir of M. Prony, the older average yearly increase is stated at 25 metres, or 82 English feet and a quarter of an inch ; and the average of the last 200 years at 70 metres, or 229 feet 7 inches and 9-tenths yearly. TransL 140 THEORY OF THE EARTH. by dikes, at the height of twenty or even thirty feet above the level of the land. M. Wiebeking, director of bridges and highways in the kingdom of Bavaria, has given an excellent memoir upon this subject, so highly important to be known and understood thoroughly, both by the people and the government, in all countries liable to these changes. In this memoir he has demon- strated that all rivers are continually elevating the levels of their beds, more or less, according to cir- cumstances. This formation and increase of new grounds by alluvial depositions, proceeds with as much rapidi- ty along the coasts of the North Sea as on those of the Adriatic. These additions can be easily traced in Friesland and Groningen, where the epoch of the first dikes, constructed by the Spanish governor, Gaspard Robles, is well known to have been in 1570. An hundred years afterwards, the alluvial depositions had added in some places three quarters of a league of new land on the outside of these dikes: And the city of Groningen, partly built upon the ancient soil which has no connexion with the present sea, being a calcarious formation, in which the same species of shells are found as in the coarse limestone formations near Paris, is only six leagues from the sea. Having been upon the spot, I can give my testimony to the facts already so well stated by M. Deluc in his Letters to the- THEORY OP THE EARTH. 141 Queen of England. The same phenomenon is as distinctly observable all along the coasts of East Friesland, and the countries of Bremen and Hoi- stein, as the period at which the new grounds were enclosed by dikes for the first time is perfectly well known, and the extent that has been gained since can be easily measured. These new alluvial lands, left by the sea and the rivers, are of asto- nishing fertility, and are so much the more valuable as the ancient soil of these countries, being mostly covered by barren heaths and peat-mosses, is almost incapable of cultivation ; so that the alluvial lands alone produce subsistence for the many po- pulous cities that have been built along these coasts since the middle age, and which probably might not have reached their present flourishing condition, without the aid of these rich grounds, which have been, as it were, created by the rivers, and to which they are continually making ad- ditions. If the size which Herodotus attributed to the sea of Asoph, which he says was equal to the Euxine,* had been less vaguely indicated, and if w r e could certainly ascertain what ne understood to be the Gerrhusrf we should there find strong ad- ditional proofs of the great changes produced by the rivers, and of the rapidity with which these * Melpomene, LXXXVI. f Ibid. LVI, 142 THEORY OP THE EARTH. have been made. The alluvial depositions of these rivers, in the course of 2250 years since the time of Herodotus, have reduced the sea of Asoph to its present comparatively small size; have shut up entirely that branch of the Dneiper which formerly joined the Hypacyris, and discharged its waters along with that river into the gulf called Carcinitcs, now the Olu-Dcgnitz ; and have now almost reduced the Hypacyris and the Gerrhus to nothing.* We should possess proofs no less strong of the same thing, could we be certain that the Oxus or Sihon, which flows at present into Lake Aral, for- merly reached the Caspian sea : But the proofs which we possess on all these points are too vague, and even contradictory, to be admitted in support of physical propositions, and besides, we are in possession of facts sufficiently conclusive, without being under the necessity of having recourse to those which are doubtful. The downs or sand-hills which are thrown up by the sea upon low flat coasts, when the bed of the sea happens to be composed of sand, have been * See the Geography of Herodotus by M. Rennel, and the Physical Geography of the Black Sea, fcc. by M. Bureau de la Halle. In the latter work, p. 170, M. Bureau supposes Herodotus to have said that the Boristhenes and the Hypanis flowed into the Palus Meotis: But Herodotus, in Melpomene, LIII. only says that these two rivers discharged their waters into the same marsh; that is, into the Liman, exactly as in the present day ; and Herodotus does not carry the Gerrhus and the Hypacyris any farther. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 143 already mentioned. Wherever human industry has not succeeded to fix these downs, they advance as surely and irresistibly upon the land, as the al- luvial formations from the rivers encroach upon the sea. In their progress inland, they push before them great pools of water, formed by the rain which falls on the neighbouring grounds, and which has no means of running off in consequence of the ob- structions interposed by the downs. In several places these proceed with a frightful rapidity, overwhelming forests, houses, and cultivated fields, in their irresistible progress. Those upon the coast of the Bay of Biscay* have overwhelmed a great number of villages, which are mentioned in the re- cords of the middle age ; and even at present, in the single department of Landes, they threaten no fewer than ten with almost inevitable destruction. One of these, named Mimigan, has been in danger for the last fifteen years from a sand-hill of more than sixty feet in perpendicular height, which obvi- ously continues to advance. In the year 1802, the pools overwhelmed five fine farm-houses belonging to the village of St. Julian, f They have long covered up an ancient Roman road, leading from Bourdeaux to Bayonne, and which could still be seen about thirty years ago, when the waters were lower than they are now.f * See Report respecting the Downs of the Gulf of Gascony, or Bay ef Biscay, by M. Tassin, Mont-de-Marsan, an. X. f Memoir on the Means of fixing the Downs, by M. Bremontier. \ Report of M. Tassin, formerly cited. 144 THEORY OP THE EARTH. The river Adour, which is formerly known to have passed Old Boucat to join the sea at Cape Breton, is now turned to the distance of more than two thousand four hundred yards. The late M. Bremontier, inspector of bridges and highways, who made several extensive works to endeavour to stop the progress of these downs, estimated their progress at sixty feet yearly, and in some places at seventy-two feet. According to this calculation, it would require two thousand years to enable them to arrive at Bourdeaux ; and, on the same data, they have taken somewhat more than four thousand years to reach their present situations.* The turbaries, or peat-mosses, which have been formed so generally in the northern parts of Europe, by the accumulation of the remains of sphagnum and other aquatic mosses, afford another means of estimating the time which has elapsed since the last retreat of the sea from our present continents. These mosses increase in height in proportions which are determinate in regard to each. They surround and cover up the small knolls upon which they are formed; and several of these knolls have been covered over within the memory of man. In other places -the mosses gra- dually descend along the valleys, extending down- wards like the glaciers ; but these latter melt every * Memoir of M. Brsmontier. THEORY 01 THE EARTH. 145 year at their lower edges, while the mosses are not stopped by any thing whatever in their regular in- crease. By sounding their depth down to the solid ground, we may form some estimate of their anti- quity ; and it may be asserted respecting these mosses, as well as respecting the downs, that they do not derive their origin from an indefinitely an- cient epoch. The same observations may be made in regard to the slips, or fallings, which sometimes take place at the bottom of all steep slopes in moun- tainous regions, and which are still very far from having covered these over. But as no precise measures of their progress have hitherto been ap- plied, we shall not insist upon them at any greater length. < 32. Proofs, from Traditions, of a great Catastrophe^ and subsequent Renewal of Human Society. From all that has been said, it may be seen that nature everywhere distinctly informs us that the commencement of the present order of things can<- not be dated at a very remote period ; and it is very remarkable, that mankind everywhere speak the same language with nature, whether we consult their natural traditions on this subject, or consider their moral and political state, and the intellectual attainments which they had made at the time when they began to have authentic historical monu- 19 J46 THEORY OP TrfE EARTH. ments. For this purpose we may consult the tories of nations in their most ancient books, en* deavouring to discover the real facts which they contain, when disengaged from the interested fic- tions which often render the truth obscure. The Pentateuch has existed in its present form at least ever since the separation of the ten tribes under Jeroboam, since it was received as authen- tic by the Samaritans as well as by the Jews ; and this assures us of the actual antiquity of that book being not less than two thousand eight hundred years.* Besides this, we have no reason to doubt of the book of Genesis having been composed by Moses,, which adds five hundred years to its an- tiquity. Moses and his people came out of Egypt, which is universally allowed by all the nations of the west to have been the most anciently civilized kingdom on the borders of the Mediterranean. The legis- lator of the Jews could have no motive for short- ening the duration of the nations, and would even have disgraced himself in the estimation of his own, if he had promulgated a history of the humaR race contradictory to that which they must have learnt by tradition in Egypt. We may therefore conclude, that the Egyptians had at this time no * Introduction to the Books of the Old Testament, by Eichhorn. j 189$, THEORY OP THE EARTH. 147 tfther notions respecting the antiquity of the hu- man race than are contained in the book of Genesis. And, as Moses establishes the event of an univer- sal catastrophe, occasioned by an irruption of the waters, and followed by an almost entire renewal *)f the human race, and as he has only referred it to an epoch fifteen or sixteen hundred years pre- vious to his own time, even according to those co- pies which allow the longest interval, it must ne- cessarily have occurred rather less than five thou- sand years before the present day.* The same notions seem to have prevailed in Chaldea on this subject ; as Berosus, who wrote at Babylon in the time of Alexander, speaks of the Deluge nearly in the same terms with Moses, and supposes it to have happened immediately be- fore Belus, the father of Ninus.t Whatever may be the authenticity of the wri- tings attributed to Sanconiatho, he does not ap- pear to have mentioned the Deluge in his His- tory of Phcemcia.J Yet this event seems to have * Joseph. Antiq. Jud. lib. I. cap. 8. Eusebii, Praep. Evang. lib. IX. cap. 4. Syncelli, Chronogr. f Eusebii, Praep. Ev. lib. I. cap. 10. t The Deluge, according to the Hebrew text of the scriptures, took place 2348 years before the commencement of the Christian era, or 4160 years before the present year 1813. The creation of the world, on the same authority, was 5817 years ago; but the Samaritan text extends that event to the distance of 6513 years, and the Septuagint to 7685 years. Trtmsl. 148 THEORY OF THE EARTH. been believed in Syria, as they showed in the tem- ple of Hieropolis, at a period indeed long after, the abyss through which they pretended that its waters had run off.* Even in Egypt this tradition appears to have been forgotten, as we do not find any traces of it in the most ancient remaining fragments from that country. All of these indeed are posterior to the devastations committed by Cambyses ; and the little agreement there is among them suffi- ciently proves that they had been derived from mutilated fragments : For we cannot establish the smallest probable conformity between the lists of the kings of Egypt, as given by Herodotus in the era of Artaxerxes, by Erastosthenes and Manetho under the Ptolemies, and by Diodorus in the reign of Augustus : neither do they agree among them- selves in the extracts which they pretend to have taken from the writings of Manetho.t Yet the Egyptian mythology seems to allude to these great events in the fabulous adventures of Typhon and Osiris. Besides, if the priests of Sais really gave the accounts to Solon, which are repeated by Cri- tias in the writings of Plato, we must conclude that they had preserved some very exact traditions of a great revolution, though they had removed its epoch much farther back than was done by * Lucian, de Dea Syria. t See the English Ancient Universal History, vol. I. - ''*''' ' **"*' THEORY OP THE EARTH. 119 Moses. They had even theoretically devised a series of alternate revolutions ; one set occasion- ed by means of water, and the other by means of fire ; which notion had also prevailed among the Assyrians, and even in Etruria. The Greeks, who derived their civilization at a late period from Phoenicia and Egypt, mixed the confused ideas which they had received of the mythologies of these nations with the equally con- fused vestiges of their own earliest history. The sun, personified under the name of Ammon, or the Egyptian Jupiter, was converted into a prince of Crete. Phta, the grand artisan or creator of all things, was converted into Hephestes, or Vulcan, a smith of Lemnos. CAom, another symbol of the sun, or of the divine power, was transformed into Heracles, or Hercules, a prodigiously strong hero of Thebes. The cruel Moloch of the Phoenicians, the same with the Remphah of the Egyptians, be- came with them Cronos, or Time, who devour- ed his own children, and was afterwards meta- morphosed into Saturn, King of Italy.* When any violent inundation took place during the reign of any of their princes, the Greeks afterwards de- * See Jablonsky, Pantheon .^Egyptiacum, and Gatterer, de Theo- gonia Egyptiorum, in the seventh volume of the Gottingen Memoirs. These two authors do not agree any more than the ancients, as to the significations of the Egyptian divinities ; but they perfectly agree with each other, and with the ancient writers, as to the gross altera- tions made respecting them by the Greeks. 15U THEORY OP THE EARTH. scribed it with all the circumstances which had been handed down to them by tradition respect- ing the great deluge ; and they represented Deu- calion as having repeopled the earth, yet allowed a lengthened posterity to his uncle Atlas. The incoherence of all these traditionary tales, while they attest the barbarism and ignorance of all the tribes around the Mediterranean, attest also the recentness of their establishments; and this very circumstance is in itself a strong proof of the existence of a great catastrophe. The Egyptians, it is true, spoke of hundreds of cen- turies, but these were filled by a succession of gods and demi-gods ; and it is in a great degree ascertained in modern times, that the long series of years and of successive human kings which they placed after the demi-gods, and before the usur- pation of the shepherds, belonged only to the suc- cessions of contemporaneous chiefs of several small states, instead of a single series of successive kings f all Egypt. Macrobius* assures us that collections of ob- servations of eclipses made in Egypt were preserv- ed, which presupposed uninterrupted labour for at least twelve hundred years before the reign of Alexander. How comes it then, had this been the case, that Ptolemy should not have availed *Jhij5oxnnio Scipionis, 21, THEORY OP THE EARTH. 151 himself of any of these observations, though made in the country where he wrote ? There was no great empire as yet established in Asia at the time of Moses. Even the Greeks, notwithstanding their ingenuity in inventing fa- bles, did not pretend even to invent an antiquity for their own nation ; for the most ancient colo- nies from Egypt and Phoenicia, by which they were reclaimed from a state of barbarism, are not car- ried back more than four thousand years from the present era; and the most ancient authors in which these colonies are mentioned, are a thou- sand years posterior to the events. The Phoeni^ eians themselves had only been recently establish- ed in Syria, when they began to form establish- ments in Greece. The astronomical observations of the Chal- deans, sent by Calisthenes to Aristotle, are said, to have gone back for a period of four thousand years, if Simplicius is to be credited, who reports the story six hundred years after Aristotle. But the authenticity of this is exceedingly doubtful, as the Chaldean observations of eclipses actually preserved and cited by Ptolemy, do not go back more than two thousand five hundred years.* At * It is not quite obvious, from the language of the author, whether these are meant as pointing backwards from the respective epoch of Aristotle and Ptolemy, or only from the present day: the latter mtfsti kewerer, be the case. TrtuisL 152 THEORY OP THE EARTH. all events, the Babylonian, or first Assyrian em- pire, could not have been long powerful, as there remained all around many unsubjected tribes, such as all those of Syria, until after the establishment of what is called the Second Kingdom of Assyria, The thousands of years therefore which the Chal- deans assumed, must have been equally fabulous with those of the Egyptians ; or rather may be con-, sidered as astronomical periods, calculated back- wards upon the basis of inaccurate observations : or merely as imaginary and arbitrary cycles, mul- tiplied into themselves.* The most reasonable among the ancients were of the same opinion, and have only carried back the reigns of Ninus and Semiramis, the earliest of the conquerors, a little more than four thou- sand years. After them history continues long silent;t whence it may even be strongly suspected that these were only late inventions of the his- torians. Our existing civilization and learning have been uninterruptedly transmitted down to us from the Egyptians and Phoenicians, through the Greeks and Romans; and we have derived immediately from the Jews our more pure ideas of morals and religion. Some small portions of knowledge have * See Memoire of D. de Guignes in the Acad. des Belles Lettre?, Tom. XL VII. and the voyage of M. GentH. I. 41. f See Velleius Paterculus and Justin. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 153 also come down to us from the Jews and Greeks, which they had derived variously from the Chal- deans, the Persians, and the Indians ; and it is a most remarkable circumstance, that all these na- tions form only one original race, resembling each other in their physiognomies, and even in many conventional matters, such as their divinities, the names of the constellations, and even in the roots of their languages.* The Hindoos, perhaps the most anciently ci- vilized people on the face of the earth, and who have least deviated from their originally establish- ed forms, have unfortunately no history. Among an infinite number of books of mystical theology and abstruse metaphysics, they do not possess a single volume that is capable of affording any dis- tinct account of their origin, or of the various events that have occurred to their communities. Their Maha-Bharata, or pretended great history, is nothing more than a poem. The Pouranas are mere legends ; on comparing which with the Greek and Latin authors, it is excessively difficult to es- * For the analogy of the languages of India, Persia, and our west- ern world, see the Mithridates of Adelung. On the analogy of the deities of the Indians, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, consult the works of Jablonsky and Gatterer, already cited ; as also the Memoir of Sir William Jones, with the notes of M. Langles, in the first volume of the French translation of the Calcutta Memoirs, p. 192, et seq. The identity of the constellations, especially of the signs of the Zodiac, be- tween the Hindoos and the most western nations, with the names given to the days of the week, &c. are now universally known, 20 154 THEORY OF THE EARTH. tablish a few slight coincidences of chronology, and even that is continually broken off and interrupted, and never goes back farther than the time of Alex- ander.* It is now clearly proved that their famous as- tronomical tables, from which it has been attempt- ed to assign a prodigious antiquity to the Hindoos, have been calculated backwards ;t and it has been lately ascertained, that their Surya-Siddhanta, which they consider as their most ancient astro- nomical treatise, and pretend to have been re- vealed to their nation more than two millions of years ago, must have been composed within the seven hundred and fifty years last past.J Their Vedas, or sacred books, judging from the calen- dars which are conjoined with them, and by which they are guided in their religious obser- vances, and estimating the colures indicated in these calendars, may perhaps go back about three thousand two hundred years, which near- ly coincides with the epoch of Moses. Yet the Hindoos are not entirely ignorant of the re- * Consult the elaborate Memoir of M. Paterson, respecting the kings of Magadaha, emperors of Hindostan, and upon the epochs of Vicramadityia and Salahanna, in the Calcutta Memoirs, vol. IX. f See Expos, du Syst. du Monde, by M. de la Place, p. S30. | See the Memoir by M. Bentley, on the Antiquity of the Surya-Sidd- hanta, in the Calcutta Memoirs, vol. VI. p. 537, and the Memoir by the same Author on the Astronomical Systems of the Hindoos, ibid. vol. IX. p. 195. ^ See the Memoir by M. Colebrooke upon the Vedas, and particu- larly p. 493, in the Calcutta Memoirs, vol. VIII. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 155 volutions which have affected the globe, as their theology has in some measure consecrated certain successive destructions which its surface has already undergone, and is still doomed to ex- perience ; and they only carry back the last of those, which have already happened, about five thousand years;* besides which, one of these revo- lutions is described in terms nearly corresponding with the account given by Moses.f It is also very remarkable, that the epoch at which they fix the commencement of the reigns of their first human sovereigns, of the race of the Sun and Moon, is nearly the same at which the ancient authors of the west have placed the origin of the Assyrian monarchy, or about four thousand years ago. * Voyage to India by M Le Gentil, I. 235. Bentley in the Calcut- ta Memoirs, vol. IX. p. 222. Paterson, in ditto, ibid. p. 86. f Sir William Jones, in the Calcutta Memoirs, French translation, vol. I. p. 170. The English reader may be gratified by the following extract from this dissertation of Sir William Jones. Transl. "We may fix the time of Buddah, or the ninth great incarnation of Vishnu, in the year 1014 before the birth of Christ. The Cashmi- rians, who boast of his descent in their kingdom, assert that he appeared on earth about two centuries after Crishna, the Indian Apollo We have therefore determined another interesting epoch, by fix. ing the age of Crishna near the year 1214, before Christ. As the three first avatars or descents of Vishnu, relate no less clearly to an Univer- sal Deluge, in which eight persons only were saved, than the fourth and fifth do to the punishment of impiety and the humiliation of the proud ; we may for the present assume that the second, or silver age of the Hindus, was subsequent to the dispersion from Babel; so that we have only a dark interval of about a thousand years, which were employed in the settlement of nations, and the cultivation of civi- lized society."- Works of Sir William Jones, I, 29, 4to. London, 1799. j.56 THEORY OP THE EARTH. It were quite in yain to attempt looking for any indications of these great events among the people of more southern regions, such as the Arabians or Abyssinians, as their ancient books are no longer existing; and the only histories they possess rela- tive to remote antiquity are of recent compilation, and have been modelled after our Bible: hence all that their books contain respecting the de- luge is borrowed from Genesis, and does not con- tribute any support to its authority. The Gue- bres, however, or Parsis, who are now the sole depositories of the doctrines of Zoroaster and the ancient Persians, speaks also of an universal de- luge as having happened before the reign ofCayou- niarats, their first king. In order to recover some truly historical traces of the last grand cataclysma, or universal deluge, we must go beyond the vast deserts of Tartary, where? in the north-east of our ancient continent, we meet with a race of men differing entirely from us, as much in their manners and customs, as they do in their form and constitution. Their oral language is entirely monosyllabic, and they use arbitrary hieroglyphics instead of writing. They only pos- sess a system of political morals, without any es- tablished religion ; as the superstitions of the sect of Fo have been imported by them from India. Their yellow skins, high cheek-bones, narrow and oblique eyes, and thinly scattered beards, give them an appearance so entirely different from us. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 157 that one is almost tempted to suspect that their an- cestors and ours had escaped from the last grand catastrophe at two different sides : but, however this may have been, they date their deluge nearly at the same period with ours. The Chou-King,* the most ancient of the Chi- nese books, is said to have been compiled by Con- fucius, about two thousand five hundred years ago, from fragments of more ancient works. Two hun- dred years afterwards, under the Emperor Chi- hoang-ti, the men of letters were persecuted, and all books were destroyed. About forty years af- ter this persecution, an old literati restored a por- tion of the Chou King from memory, and another portion was recovered that had been concealed in a tomb; but nearly the half was lost for ever. This, which is considered as the most authentic of all the Chinese books, begins the history of the country with an emperor named Yao, whom it re- presents as having let loose the waters, in the fol- lowing terms : Having raised himself to heaven, Yao bathed the feet even of the highest mountains, covered the less elevated hills, and rendered the plains impassable. According to some accounts, the reign of Yao was four thousand five hundred years ago ; while others only carry it back to three thousand nine hundred and thirty years before the present time. * S^e the preface to the translation of the Chou-King, by M. de Guigne.s. 158 THEORY OP THE EARTH. The same book, only a few pages farther on* introduces one YW, prime minister and chief en- gineer, re-establishing the courses of the rivers, building dikes, digging canals, and regulating the taxes of all the provinces of China, that is, of an empire which extends six hundred leagues in all directions. But the utter impossibility of such operations, immediately after such events, shows clearly that the whole story can only be consid- ered as a moral and political romance. More modern Chinese historians have intro- duced a long series of emperors before Yao, which they have combined with a multitude of fabulous circumstances, yet without venturing to assign any fixed dates to their reigns. These writers also continually differ from each other, both in the number and names of the kings ; and none of them are universally approved on this subject by their countrymen. The introduction of astronomy into China is attributed to Yao; but the real eclipses recorded by Confucius, in his Chronicle of the Kingdom of Low, only go back two thousand six hundred years, hardly half a century higher than those of the Chaldeans, as related by Ptolemy. In the Chou- King indeed, there is an eclipse mentioned which goes back three thousand nine hundred and sixty- five years, but which is related with the addition of so many absurd circumstances, that it has been THEORY OF THE EARTH. probably invented at a subsequent period. A con- junction also is stated as having happened four thousand two hundred and fifty-nine years ago, which would therefore be the most ancient known astronomical observation, but its authenticity is contested. The earliest observation that ap- pears to rest upon good grounds, is one made by means of a gnomon, two thousand nine hundred years ago. It is not to be conceived that mere chance should have thus given rise to so striking a coin- cidence between the traditions of the Assyrians, the Hindoos, and the Chinese, in attributing the origins of their respective monarchies so nearly to the same epoch, of about four thousand years before the present day. The ideas of these three nations, which have so few features of resemblance, or rather which are so entirely dissimilar in lan- guage, religion, and laws, could not have so ex- actly agreed on this point, unless it had been founded upon truth. We do not require any specific dates from the natives of America, who were not possessed of any real writing, and whose most ancient traditions only go back a few centuries before the arrival of the Spaniards. Yet even among them some traces of a deluge are conceived to have been found in 'their barbarous hieroglyphics.* * See the excellent and magnificent work of Humboldt, upon the monuments of the Mexican?. 160 THEORY OP THE EARTH. The Negroes, the most degraded race men, whose forms approach nearest to those of the inferior animals, and whose intellect has riot yet arrived at the establishment of any re- gular form of government, nor at anything which has the least appearance of systematic know- ledge, have preserved no sort of annals or of tradition; and from them therefore we are not to expect any information on the subject of our present researches. Yet even the circumstances of their character clearly evince that they also have escaped from the last grand catastrophe, perhaps by another route than the races of the caucassan and altaic chains, from whom perhaps they may have been long separated before the epoch of that catastrophe. Thus all the nations which possess any records or ancient traditions, uniformly declare that they have been recently renewed, after a grand revo- lution in nature. This concurrence of historical and traditionary testimonies, respecting a com- paratively recent renewal of the human race, and their agreement with the proofs that are furnished by the operations of nature, which have been al- ready considered, might certainly warrant us in refraining from the examination of certain equivo- cal monuments, which have been brought forward by some authors in support of a contrary opinion.* ft But even this examination, to judge of it by some attempts already made, will probably do nothing THEORY OF THE EARTH. 161 else than add some more proofs to that which is furnished by tradition. 33. Proofs derived from several Micellaneous Consideration. It does not now appear that the famous zodiac in the porch of the temple at Dendera, can sup- port the opinion which some have been disposed to deduce from it, respecting the high antiquity of the present race of mankind. Nothing can be drawn for this purpose, from its division into two bands of six signs each, as indicative of the posi- tion of the colures produced by the precession of the equinoxes, or to show that these do not merely answer to the commencement of the civil year of the Egyptians at the period when it was drawn. As the civil year in Egypt consisted exactly of three hundred and sixty-five days, it made the tour of the zodiac in fifteen hundred and eight years ; or, according to the Egyptians, which shows that they had not observed it in fourteen hundred and sixty years. In the same temple there is another zodiac, in which the sign Virgo is represented as beginning the year. If these cir- cumstances were connected with the position of the solstice, this other zodiac in the interior of the temple must have been drawn two thousand years before that in the porch ; but supposing it to re- present the commencement of the civil year, an in- terval of very little more than a hundred years is 21 162 THEORY OP THE EARTH. quite sufficient to reconcile the two zodiacs with each other. It may be inquired also, whether our zodiac may not contain some internal proofs of its antiquity, and whether the figures which have been employ- ed to represent its signs or constellations, may not have some reference to the colures at the epoch when they were adopted. All, however, that has been advanced on this subject, is founded on alle- gories, supposed to be contained in the several figures. Thus it has been supposed, that Libra, or the balance, indicated the equality of the days and nights ; Taurus, or the bull, the season of la- bouring the earth ; Cancer, or the crab, a retrogra- dation of the sun; Virgo, the season of gathering in the fruits of the earth ; and so of the rest. All this is mere bold conjecture : But besides, these explanations must necessarily vary for every coun- try ; and it would be requisite to assign a different epoch to each separate zodiac, according to the climate of the country in which it is supposed to have been invented ; nay, perhaps, there may be no climate and no epoch in conformity with which rational explanations could be devised for all the signs. It is also possible, that these names may have been given at a very remote period, without reference at all to the divisions of time or space, or to the different states of the sun in its course, just as they are now given by astronomers : and may Jiave been applied to the constellations or THEORY OF THE EARTH. 1 63 groups of stars, as referring to a particular epoch merely by chance ; so that nothing whatever can be deduced from their significations.* It may be objected, that the advanced state of astronomy among these ancients is a striking proof of their high antiquity, and that it must have re- quired a vast many centuries of observations by the Chaldeans and Indians to enable them to ac- quire the knowledge which they certainly possess- ed nearly three thousand years ago, respecting the length of the year, the precession of the equinoxes, the relative motions of the sun and moon, and several other important circumstances. But to ex- plain all this, without the necessity of any prodi- gious antiquity, it may be remarked, that a nation may well be expected to make rapid progress in any particular science that has no other to attend to ; and that with the Chaldeans especially, the perpetual serenity arid clearness of their sky, the pastoral life which they led,t and the peculiar su- * See the dissertation by M. de Guignes respecting the zodiacs of the oriental nations, in the Memoirs of the Academy of Belles Let- tres,vol. XLVII. f It may he here noticed, that our present shepherds have infinitely more practical knowledge of astronomy, merely from being so much in the open air, almost unemployed, than all the other ordinary ranks in society. An instance of astonishingly rapid progress in that science was exhibited in our own day by the celebrated James Ferguson, who constructed an accurate map of the heavens when a herd-boy, entirely from his own untutored genius. Had astronomy been then a non- existent science, even he might have carried it almost as far as the Chaldeans in a single lifetime; and perhaps, in mapping the he.ave.Ds he went farther even than all the astronomers of Chaldea. Transl. 164 THEORY OP THE EARTH. perstition to which they were addicted, rendered the stars a general object of attention. They had also colleges, or societies of their most respectable men, appointed to make astronomical observations, and to put them upon record. Let us suppose, also, that among so many persons who had nothing else to do, there were two or three possessed of singular talents for the study of geometrical science, and every thing known to that people might easily have been accomplished in a very few cen- turies. Since the time of the Chaldeans, real astrono- my has only had two eras ; that of the Alexandrian school, which lasted four centuries, and that of our own times, which had not yet lasted so long. The learned period of the Arabs hardly added anything to that science, and all the other ages of the world were mere blanks with respect to it. Three hundred years did not intervene between Copernicus and De la Place, the celebrated author of the Mecanique Celeste ; yet some wish to believe, that the Hindoos must have had many thousand years to discover their astronomical rules. After all, even were every thing that has been fancied respecting the antiquity of astronomy as fully proved as it appears to us destitute of proof, it would establish no conclusion against the great catastrophe, which has left in other respects so many convincing monuments of its own existence. All that it is necessary to admit, even on that sup- THEORY OF THE EARTH. position, is, what some moderns have thought, That astronomy was among the number of the sciences that were preserved by the small number of men who escaped from that catastrophe. The antiquity of certain mining operations has also been prodigiously exaggerated by some wri- ters. A recent writer pretends that the mines of the island of Elba, to judge from their wastes, must have been explored above forty thousand years ago ; while another author, who has also examined these wastes with much attention, reduces the in- terval to somewhat more than five thousand years, supposing that the ancients wrought out every year one-fourth only of the quantity that is wrought out in the present day.* We have no reason, however, to believe that the Romans, who consum- ed so much iron in their armies, were so slow in their mining operations as this high antiquity of the mines of Elba would imply ; and besides, even if these mines had been wrought for no more than four thousand years, how should it have been that iron was so little known among the ancients in the first ages of Greece and Rome ? 34. Concluding Reflections. I am of opinion, then, with M. Deluc and M. * See History of China, before the Deluge of the Ogigians, by 3VL de Fortin d'Urban, II. 33. 166 THEORY OF THE E Dolomieu, That, if there is any circumstance thoroughly established in geology, it is, that the crust of our globe has been subjected to a great and sudden revolution, the epoch of which cannot be dated much farther back than five or six thou- sand years ago ; that this revolution had buried all the countries which were before inhabited by men and by the other animals that are now best known; that the same revolution had laid dry the bed of the last ocean, which now forms all the coun- tries at present inhabited ; that the small number of individuals of men and other animals that escaped from the effects of that great revolu- tion, have since propagated and spread over the lands then newly laid dry; and consequently, that the human race has only resumed a progressive state of improvement since that epoch, by forming established societies, raising monuments, collecting natural facts, and constructing systems of science and of learning. Yet farther, That the countries which are now inhabited, and which were laid dry by this last re- volution, had been formerly inhabited at a more remote era, if not by man, at least by land animals ; that, consequently, at least one previous revolution had submerged them under the waters ; and that, judging from the different orders of animals of which we discover the remains in a fossil state, THEORY OP THE EARTH. 167 they had probably experienced two or three irrup- tions of the sea. These alternate revolutions form, in my opinion, the problem in geology that is most important to be solved, or rather to be accurately defined and circumscribed ; for, in order to solve it satisfacto- rily and entirely, it were requisite that we should discover the cause of these events, an enterprise involving difficulties of a very different nature. We are able to discover with sufficient preci- sion all that takes place on the surface of our world in its present state, and we have sufficiently ascertained the uniform progress and regular suc- cessions of the primitive formations ; but the study of the secondary formations is as yet scarcely commenced. The wonderful series of unknown marine moluscae and zoophites, followed by fossil remains of serpents and of fresh-water fish, equally unknown, which are again succeeded by other moluscse and zoophites more nearly allied to those which exist at present: All these land animals, these moluscae, and other unknown animals of fresh water, which next occupy the formations, and which are finally succeeded by other molusca? and other animals resembling those of our present seas ; the relations between these various animals and the plants whose remains are mixed among them, and the relations of both with the mineral strata 168 THEORY OP THE EARTH. in which they are imbedded ; the little resemblance between these extraneous fossils of animals and plants, as contained in the different basins of former waters : All these form a series of phenomena which imperiously demands the attention of phi- losophers. This study is rendered interesting, by the va- riety of productions of partial or general revolu- tions which it affords, and by the abundance of the different species which alternately offer themselves to view ; it neither has that dull monotony which attaches to the study of the primitive formations, nor does it force us, like the latter, almost necessa- rily into hypotheses. The facts with which it is conversant are so prominent, so curious, and so obvious, that they may suffice to occupy the most ardent imagination; and the conclusions which they afford from time to time, even to the most cautious observer, have nothing vague or arbitrary in their nature. Finally, by the careful investiga- tion of these events, which approach, as it were, to the history of our own race, we may hope to be able to discover some traces of more ancient events and their causes ; if, after so many abortive at- tempts already made on the same subject, we may yet flatter ourselves with that hope. These ideas have haunted, and I may even say, have tormented me, during all my researches into the fossil remains of bones, of which I now offer the THEORY OF THE EA&TH. 169 results to the public ; and though these only con- tain a very small portion of the phenomena con- nected with the immediately preceding period of the history of the earth, they yet connect them- selves most intimately with the rest. It was hard- ly possible to avoid endeavouring to examine these phenomena in the country immediately round Paris ; and my excellent friend M. Brongniart, led by other studies to have similar views, associated himself with me in the investigation, by which we laid the foundation of our Essay on the Mineral Geography of Paris. That work, however, al- though it bears my name, has become almost en- tirely the work of my friend, in consequence of the infinite care he has bestowed, ever since the first conception of our plan, and during the exe- cution of our several surveys and researches, in the thorough investigation of all the objects of our research, and in the composition of the Essay itself. The Essay on the Mineral Geography of the Environs of Paris, affords the most complete and satisfactory evidences of the principal facts and circumstances which I have endeavoured to esta- blish in this discourse. It contains a history of the most recent changes which have taken place in one particular basin, and leads us as far as the chalk formation, which is infinitely more extended over the globe than the formations composed of those materials which are found in the basin of Paris. The chalk formation, which was before 22 170 THEORY OF THE EARTH. conceived to be of very modern origin, has been shown in that extensive examination to have ori- ginated at a period considerably far back in the age before the last; or, in other words, to have owed its origin to causes connected with the revo- lution and catastrophe before the last general irruption of the waters over our present habitable world. It would now be of great importance to examine the other basins containing chalk formations, and in general to pay particular attention to the strata which rest upon that formation, that these may be compared with those we found in the environs of Paris. Perhaps the chalk itself may be found to contain some successive depositions of organic re- mains. It is surrounded and supported by the compact limestone, which occupies a great pro- portion of France and Germany, and the extra- neous fossils of which are extremely different from all those of our basin. But, in following the com- pact limestone, from the chalk to the limestone of the central ridges of Jura, which are almost devoid of shells, or to the aggregated rocks of the acclivities oftheHartz, the Vosges, and the Black Forest, we shall probably find abundance of varia- tions: And the gryphites, the cornua ammonis, and the entrochi, with which it abounds, may per- haps be found distributed by genera, or at least by species. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 171 This compact limestone formation is not every- where covered over by chalk. Without that inter- vening, it surrounds basins in several places, or supports elevated flats or table lands not less wor- thy of examination than those which are limited by chalk. We should derive great information, for in- stance, from a history of the gypsum quarries of Aix, in which, as well as in those of Paris, reptiles and fresh-water fishes are found ; and probably land-animals will be also discovered by careful re- search ; while we are assured that nothing similar occurs in the entire interval between these two places, which are almost two hundred leagues dis- tant from each other. The long ranges of sand-hills which skirt both slopes of the Appenines through almost the entire length of Italy, contain everywhere perfectly well- preserved shells, which are often found retaining their colours, and even their natural pearl-like po- lish, and several of which resemble those still found in our seas. It would be of great impor- tance to be well acquainted with these, and to have all their successive strata accurately examin- ed, determining the extraneous fossils found in each, and comparing them with those that are con- tained in other recent strata ; such, for example, as those in the environs of Paris. In the course of this investigation, it would be proper to connect the series, on the one hand, with 172 THEORY OF THE EARTH. the most solid and most ancient formations, and on the other, with the recent alluvial depositions made by the Po, the Arno, and their tributary streams ; as also, to determine their relations with the innu- merable masses of volcanic productions which are interposed between them ; and, finally, to ascertain the mutual situations of the various sorts of shells, and of the fossil bones of elephants, rhinoceroses, hippopotami, whales, cachalots, and dolphins, in which several of these hills abound. I have only a very superficial knowledge of these lower hills of the Appenine chain, acquired in the course of a journey devoted to other objects; but I am of opinion that they contain the true secret of the last operations of the sea. There are many other strata, even celebrated for their extraneous fossils, which have not been hitherto so accurately examined as to enable them to be connected with the general series, and whose relative antiquity, therefore, has not been ascer- tained. The copper slate of Thuringia* is said to be filled with the remains of fresh-water fish, and to be older than most of the secondary or floetz formations. We are also as yet uninformed of the real position of the stinkstone slate of Oen- irigen, which is also said to be full of the remains of fresh-water fish ; of that of Verona, evidently abounding in the remains of sea-fish, but which * Bituminous marl slate. Jameson's Mineralog3 r , vol. ii. p. 1 97. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 173 have been very improperly named by the natural- ists who have described them ; of the black slate of Glacis ; of the white slate of Aichstedt, also filled with the remains of fishes, of crabs, and of other marine animals different from shells. All these desiderata have as yet received no satisfactory ex- planation in books of geology ; neither has it been as yet explained, why shells should be found almost everywhere, while fish are confined only to a few places. It appears to me, that a consecutive history of such singular deposits would be infinitely more va- luable than so many contradictory conjectures re- specting the first origin of the world and other planets, and respecting phenomena which have confessedly no resemblance whatever to those of the present physical state of the world ; such con- jectures finding, in these hypothetical facts, neither materials to build upon, nor any means of verifica- tion whatever. Several of our geologists resemble those historians who take no interest in the history of France, except as to what passed before the time of Julius Caesar. Their imaginations, of course, must supply the place of authentic documents; and accordingly each composes his romance ac- cording to his own fancy. What would become of these historians, if they had not been assisted in their combinations by the knowledge of posterior facts ? But our geologists neglect exactly those posterior geological facts, which might, at least in 174 THEORY OF THE EARTH. some measure, dispel the darkness of the preced- ing times. It would certainly be exceedingly satisfactory to have the fossil organic productions arranged in chronological order, in the same manner as we now have the principal mineral substances. By this the science of organization itself would be improv- ed ; the developements of animal life ; the succes- sion of its forms; the precise determinations of those which have been first called into existence; the simultaneous production of certain species, and their gradual extinction; all these would perhaps instruct us fully as much in the essence of organization, as all the experiments that we shall ever be able to make upon living animals : And man, to whom only a short space of time is allotted upon the earth, would have the glory of restoring the history of thousands of ages which preceded the existence of the race, and of thousands of animals that never were contemporaneous with his species. END OF THE ESSAY. SUPPLEMENT: Being an Extract from the Researches of M. de Prony, on the Hydraulic System of Italy : Containing an Account of the Displacement of that Part of the Coast of the Adriatic which is occupied by the Mouths of the Po. JL HAT portion of the shore of the Adriatic which lies between the lake, or rather lagune, of Comma- chio and the lagunes of Venice, has undergone con- siderable alterations since ancient times, as is at- tested by authors worthy of entire credit, and as is still evidenced 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. We are, however, certain, that the city of Ha- now called Mria, was formerly situated on 176 THEORY OP THE EARTH. the edge of the coast; and by this we attain a known fixed point upon the primitive shore, whence the nearest part of the present 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.f The inhabitants of Adria have formed exagge- rated pretensions, in many respects, as to the high antiquity of their city, though it is undeniably one of the most ancient in Italy, as it gave name to the sea which once washed its walls. By some re- searches made in its interior and its environs, a stratum of earth has been found mixed with frag- ments of Etruscan pottery, and with nothing what- ever 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 curious collections, in which these re- * Equal to 27,340 yards and 10 inches English measure, or 15 1-& miles and 60 yards. In these reductions of the revolutionary French metres to English measure, 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 ap- pears to have extended to 21 miles 5 furlongs and 16 yards. Transh THEORY OF THE EARTH. 177 mains of antiquity are* separately classed; and having some years ago observed to the viceroy, that it would be of great importance, both to his- tory and geology, to make a thorough search into these buried remains at Adria, carefully noticing the levels in comparison with the sea, both of the primitive soil, and of the successive alluvial beds, his highness entered 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 Jlthesis or Adige, and of the Fossa Philistina^ of which the remaining trace corresponds 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 oc- cupied the place where the lake or lagune of Commachio is now situated. This delta was. traversed by seven branches of the Eridanus or Po, formerly called also the Vadis Padus or Po- dincus : winch river, at the diramification of these seven branches, and upon its left or northern bank, had a city named Trigoboli, whose site could not be far from where Ferrara now stands. Seven lakes, enclosed within this delta, were called Septem Maria, and Hatria was sometimes denominated Urbs Septum Marium, or the city of the seven seas* or lakes, 23 178 THEORY OP THE EARTH* Following the coast from Ilatria to the north- wards, we come to the principal mouth of the ^thesis or Adige, formerly named Fossa Philistina. and afterwards Estuarium Altini, an interior sea, se- parated, 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 seated. The Estuarium Mini is what is now called the lagune of Venice, and no longer communicates with the sea, except by five passages, the small islands of the archipelago having been united into a continu- ous dike. To the east of the lagunes, and north from the city of Este, we find the Euganian mounts, or hills, forming, in the midst of a vast alluvial plain, a re- markable isolated group of rounded hillocks, 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 inflamed 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 Adriatic at the mouths of the Po, only begin to be precise in the twelfth century. At that epoch THEORY OF THE EARTH. 179 the whole waters of this river flowed to the south of Ferrara, in the Po de Volano and the Po di Pri~ maro, branches which enclosed the space occupied by the lagune of Commachio. The two branches which were next formed by an irruption of the wa^ ters of the Po to the north of Ferrara, were named the river of Corbolo, Langola, or Maszorno, and the river Toi. 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 derived 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. 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 Ft- carolo, 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 * Equal to 10,936 or 12,030 yards English measure. Transl. f Or 2,186 yards 2 feet English. Transl. I Or 20,778 yards 1 foot 10 inches. Transl. 180 THEORY OF THE EARTH. had been produced by the effects of human la- bours ; and the historians who have recorded this remarkable fact only differ from each other in some of the more minute details. The tendency of the river to flow in the new channels, which had been opened for the more ready discharge of its waters when in flood, continually increased; owing to which the two ancient chief branches, the Voaho and Prtmaro, rapidly decreased, and were reduced in less than a century to their present comparative- ly insignificant 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-men- tioned canals of Mazzorno and 7W, becoming in- sufficient for the discharge, others were dug ; and the principal mouth, called Bocco Tramontane or the northern mouth, having approached the mouth of the Adige, the Venetians became alarmed in 1 604 ; when they excavated a new canal of dis- charge, named Taglio de Porto Viro, or Po delle For- naci, by which means the Bocco Maestro, was divert- ed from the Adige towards the south. During four centuries, from the end of the twelfth to that of the sixteenth, the alluvial forma- \ ions of the Po gained considerably upon the sea. The northern mouth, which had usurped the situ- ation of the Mazzarno canal, becoming the Ramo di Tramontane^ had advanced in 1600 to the distance THEORY OF THE EARTH. 181 of 20,000 metres* from the meridian of Adria ; and the southern mouth, which had taken possession of the canal of Toi, was then 17,000 metres^ ad- vanced beyond the same point. Thus the shore had become extended nine or ten thousand metres^. to the north, and six or seven thousand to the south. Between these two mouths there was formerly a bay, or a part of the coast less ad- vanced than the rest, called Sacca 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 cultivated. 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 Pb. In proportion as their entrances into the sea extend from the original land, the yearly quantity of allu- vial depositions increases in an alarming degree, owning to the diminished slope of the streams, which was a necessary consequence of the prolon- gation of their bed, to the confinement of the waters between dikes, and to the facility with * Or 21,372 yards. Transl. f Or 18,591 yards Transl. } Equal to 9,842 or 10,936 yards. Transl. ^ Equal to 6,564 or 7,655 yards Transl 182 THEORY OP THE EARTH. which the increased cultivation of the ground en- ahled the mountain torrents which flowed into them to carry away the soil. Owing to these causes, the bay called Sacca di Goro was very soon filled up, and the two promontories which had been formed by the two former principal mouths of Mazzorno and Toi, were united into one vast projecting cape, the most advanced point of which is now 32,000 or 33,000 metres* beyond the meri- dian of Adria : so that in the course of two hun- dred years, the mouths or delta of the Po have gained about 1 4,000 metres^ upon the sea. From these facts, of which I have given a brief enumeration, the following results are clearly established. 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 passage had been opened for the waters of the Po at FicarolO) on its left or northern bank, the shore had been already 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. \ Or 15,366 yards. Transl. f Equal to 9,842 or 10,936 yards. Transl. THEORY OF THE EARTH. 183 Thirdly, The extremities of the promontories formed by the two principal branches of the Po, before the excavation of the Taglio di Porto Viro, had extended by the year 1600, or in four hundred years, to a medium distance of 18,500 metres* be- yond Adria; giving, from the year 1200, an ave- rage yearly increase of the alluvial land of 25 metres.^ Fourthly, That the extreme point of the present single promontory, formed by the alluvions of the existing branches, is advanced to between thirty- two and thirty-three thousand metres^ beyond Adria; whence the average yearly progress is about seventy metres^ during the last two hundred years, being greatly more rapid in proportion than in former times. * Or 20,231 yards. Transl. f Exactly 27 yards 1 foot and l-4th of an inch English. Transl. \. Already stated at from 19 3-4 to 20 1-2 miles; or more precise- ly, from 34,995 yards 1 foot 8 inches, to 36,089 yards 10 inches Eng- lish measure. TransL ^ Equal to 76 yards 1 foot 7 inches and 9-loth- APPENDIX, CONTAINING MINERALOGICAL NOTES, AND AN ACCOUNT OF CUVIER'S GEOLOGICAL DISCOVERIES, 24 NOTES. NOTE A. 4. p. 30. On the Subsidence of Strata. CUVIER adopts the opinion of De Luc, that all the older strata of which the crust of the earth is composed, were originally in an horizontal situation, and have been raised into their present highly-inclined position, by subsidences that have taken place over the whole surface of the earth. It cannot be doubted, that subsidences, to a consider- able extent, have taken place ; yet we are not of opi- nion, that these have been so general as maintained by these geologists. We are rather inclined to believe, that the present inclined position of strata is in general their original one ; an opinion which is countenanced by the known mode of connexion of strata, the pheno- mena of veins, particularly cotemporaneous veins, the crystalline nature of every species of older rock, and the great regularity in the direction of strata throughout the globe. The transition and flcetz-rocks also are much more of a chemical or crystalline nature than has been generally 188 ON PRIMITIVE ROCKS. imagined* Even sandstone, one of the most abundant of the flcetz-rocks, occasionally occurs in masses, many yards in extent, which individually have a tabular or stratified structure : but when viewed on the great scale, appear to be great massive distinct concretions. These massive concretions, with their subordinate tabular structures, if not carefully investigated, are apt to be- wilder the mineralogist, and to force him to have re- course to a general system of subsidence or elevation of the strata, in order to explain the phenomena they ex- hibit. NOTE B. 7. p. 39 & 41. On Primitive Rocks. As the enumeration of primitive mountain rocks in the text is incomplete, we have judged it useful to give in this note a more full account of them. Primitive moun- tains, in general, form the highest and most rugged por- tions of the earth's surface, and extend in the form of chains of mountain-groups throughout the whole earth. These mountain-groups are generally highest in the middle, and lowest towards the sides and extremities ; and the mountain-rocks of which they are composed, are so arranged, that in general the middle and highest portions of the group are composed of older rocks than the lateral and lower portions. As far as we know at present, granite is the oldest and first formed of all the primitive rocks. This rock is composed of felspar, quartz, and mica, and varies in its struc- ture from coarse to very small granular. It sometimes alternates with beds of quartz and felspar, and is often traversed by cotemporaneous veins of granite, of quartz, and of felspar. The newer or upper portions of the formation contain cotemporaneous masses of porphyry, syenite, hornblende rock, limestone, &c. It frequently CRYSTALLIZED MARBLES. 189 forms the highest, and at the same time the central part of mountain-groups. The next rock, in point of anti- quity, or that which rests immediately upon the granite^ is gneiss, which has a distinct slaty structure, is stratified, and, like granite, is composed of felspar, quartz, and mica. It alternates with the newer portions of the gra- nite, and sometimes cotemporaneous veins of the one rock shoot into masses of the other. It contains subor- dinate formations of granite, porphyry, syenite, trap, quartz, limestone, and conglomerated gneiss. The next rock in the series is mica-slate, which rests upon the gneiss. It is composed of quartz and mica, and has a distinct sfaty structure, and is stratified. It alternates with gneiss, and contains various subordinate formations, as granite, porphyry, syenite, trap, quartz, serpentine, limestone, and conglomerated mica-slate. It is often traversed by cotemporaneous veins, from the smallest discernible magnitude to many yards in width. The mica-slate is succeeded by clay-slate, which rests upon it, and sometimes alternates with it. It differs from mica-slate, gneiss, and granite, in its composition, being in general a simple rock ; and in some instances princi- pally composed of mica, in others to all appearance of felspar. Besides granite, porphyry, trap, syenite, lime- stone, serpentine, conglomerated clay-slate,* quartz, it also contains the following formations; flinty-slate, whet-slate, talk-slate, alum-slate, and drawing-slate. The calcarious rocks mentioned by Cuvier. as resting upon the slate, do not belong to this class ; they are transi- , * The primitive conglomerated rocks, mentioned as above, as occur- ring in gneiss, mica-slate, and clay-slate, are sometimes named grey- wacke, 190 MOUNTAINS OF JURA. tion limestone, and contain, although rarely, testaceous petrifactions. NOTE C. 7. p. 42. Crystallized Marbles resting on shelly Strata. M. Cuvier says, " the crystallized marbles never cover the shelly strata." This observation is not perfectly correct ; for transition limestone, and certain magnesian floetz limestones, which are to be considered as crystal- lized marbles, contain testaceous petrifactions, and alter- nate with other strata that contain petrified shells. Crystallized marble, or granular foliated limestone, occur, along with floetz trap rocks, in the coal formation, in different parts of Scotland, as upon the Lomonds, in Fifeshire, &c. NOTE D. 7. p. 43. Rolled Masses upon the Mountains of Jura. Numerous large blocks, or masses of mountain rocks, are met with in almost every country of Europe, and frequently very far removed from their original situa- tions. Switzerland and the surrounding countries pre- sent numerous and very interesting appearances of this kind. On the mountains of Jura, immediately in the line of direction of the Vallais, and nearly to the height of 6000 feet, enormous blocks of granite are found resting upon the limestone rocks of that range of mountains. These blocks are of that species of granite which forms the mountain of Ornex, belonging to the group of Mont Blanc ; hence it is inferred that they must have been transported by the force of water from that region to their present situation. MOUNTAINS OF JURA. 191 Masses of conglomerate also occur upon the Jura mountains, of the same varieties as those which occur in fixed rocks at Valorsine, and other places in the vicinity of Mont Blanc. Blocks of greywacke and of black limestone are amongst the rolled blocks, and these also can be traced as fixed rocks in the Vallais. Many phenomena of the same description are to be observed in Scotland. It would be an interesting and valuable addition to the geology of Great Britain, to have a map constructed representing the distribution of these blocks over the whole surface of the island. NOTE E. 9. p. 46. Salisbury Craigs. The front of Salisbury craigs, near Edinburgh, affords a fine example of the natural chronometer, described in the text. The acclivity is covered with loose masses that have fallen from the hill itself; and the quantity of debris is in proportion to the time which has elapsed since the waters of the ocean formerly covered the neighbour- ing country. If a vast period of time had elapsed since the surface of the earth had assumed its present aspect, it is evident, that long ere now the whole of this hill would have been enveloped in its own debris. We have here, then, a proof of the comparatively short period since the waters left the surface of the globe, a period not ex- ceeding a few thousand years. * NOTE F. 10. p. 46. On the diluvial Land of the Danish Islands in the Baltic, and on the Coast of Sleswick. In this section, Cuvier gives a clear and distinct ac- count of several kinds of alluvial formations. M. De Luc, in the first volume of his Geological Travels, de- 192 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. scribes the alluvial formations that cover and bound many of the islands in the Baltic and upon the coast of Denmark, and gives so interesting an account of the modes followed by the inhabitants in preserving these alluvial deposites, that we feel pleasure in communi- cating it to our readers. During my stay at Husum, I had the advantage of pas- sing my evenings very agreeably and profitably at the house of M. Hartz, with his own family, and two Danish officers, Major Behmann, commandant at Husum, and Captain Baron de Barackow. The conversation often turned on the objects of my excursions, and particularly on the natural history of the coasts and of the islands ; re- specting which M. Hartz obligingly undertook to give me extracts from the chronicles of the country. This led us to speak of the Danish islands; and those officers giving me such descriptions of them as were very inte- resting to my object, I begged their permission to write down in their presence the principal circumstances which they communicated to me. These will form the first addition to my own observations ; I shall afterwards proceed to the information which I obtained from M. Hartz. The two principal islands of the Danish Archipelago, those of Funen and Seeland (or Zeland), as well as some small islands in the Kattegate, namely, Lenoe, Anholt, and Samsoe, are hilly, and principally composed ofgeest;* and in these are found gravel and blocks of granite, and of * By geest is understood the alluvial matter which is spread over the surface both of the hilly and low country, and appears to have been formed the last time the waters of the ocean stood over the surface of the earth. J. GEEST LAND. 193 other stones of that class, exactly in the same manner as in the country which I have lately described, and it islands in the North Sea. On the borders of the two first of these Danish islands, there are also blocks in the sea; but only in front of abrupt coasts, as is the case with the islands of Poel and Rugen, and along the coasts of the Bal- tic. The lands added to these islands of geest are in most part composed of the sand of the sea, the land-waters there being very inconsiderable ; and to the south of them have been formed several islands of the same nature, the chief of which are Laland and Falster, near Seeland. These, like the marsch islands in the North Sea, are sand- banks accumulated by the waves, and, when covered with grass, continuing to be farther raised by the sedi- ments deposited between its blades. In the Baltic, where there are no sensible tides, such islands may be inhabited without dikes, as well as the extensions of the coasts ; because, being raised to the highest level of that sea, while their declivity under water is very small, and being also more firm in their composition, the waves die away on their shores ; and if, in any extraordinary case, the sea rises over them, it leaves on them fresh deposits, which increase their heights. These soils are all per- fectly horizontal, like those added to the coasts of the con- tinent. Some of these islands approach entirely or in part to the nature of that of Rugen. This island of Seeland, on. that side which is called Hedding, has a promontory composed of strata of chalk with its flints. The island of Moen, (or Mona,) on the south of the latter, has a simi- lar promontory near Maglebye and Mandemark ; and the island of Bornholm, the easternmost of those belonging to Denmark, contains strata of coal, covered by others of sandstone. Phenomena like these, evident symptoms 194 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. of the most violent catastrophes at the bottom of the an- cient sea, proceeding, as I think I have clearly shown, from the subsidence and angular motions of large masses of strata, which must have forced out the interior fluids with, the utmost impetuosity, it is not surprising that so many fragments of the lowermost strata are found dis- persed over this great theatre of ruins. I now proceed to the details which I received from M. Hartz ; beginning by a specific designation of the islands dependent on the province of Sleswigh, such as they are at present, belonging to the three classes already defined. To commence from the north ; Fanoe, Rom, Sylt, and Amrom, were originally islands of the same na- ture as the neighbouring continent, but have been since extended by marsches.* The soil of these islands, with its gravel and blocks of primordial stones, was at first barren, as the geest is naturally every where ; but is be- come fertile by manure, of which there has been no de- ficiency, since those grounds have been surrounded with marsch, where the cattle are kept in stables during the winter. In the island of Sylt, there are spaces consist- ing of moor ; but its head of land, which extends on the south as far as Mornum, is composed entirely ofmarsch, and is bordered with dunes towards the open sea, be- cause, the sediments of the rivers not reaching any far- ther, the sea-sand impelled against it by the waves re- mains pure, and is thus raised by the winds in hillocks on the shore. The shallow bottom of the sea, between this island and that of Fora, is of geest : at low water, it * By marsch is understood the new land added to the coasts since the last retiring of the water of the globe from the surface of the earth, and is formed by the sediments of rivers, mixed more or less with sand from the bottom of the sea. 3. MARSCH LANDS. 195 may be passed over on foot ; and there are found on it gravel and blocks of granite. But on the same side of Fora there is a great extent of marsch, beginning from St. Laurencius. Among the islands consisting entirely of marsch and surrounded with dikes, the most considera- ble are Pellworm and Nord Strand ; and among the Hal- ligs, or those inhabited without dikes, the chief are Olant, Nord-marsh, Langne, Groode, and Hooge. Such are the islands on this coast, in their present state, now rendered permanent by the degree of perfec tion at which the art of dike-making is arrived. But, in former times, though the original land was never attack- ed by the sea, which, by adding to it new lands, soon formed a barrier against its own encroachments, the lat- ter, and the islands composed of the same materials, were subject to great and sudden changes, very fatal to those who are engaged to settle on them by the richness of their soil, comparatively with the continental. The inha- bitants, who continued to multiply on them during seve- ral generations, were taught, indeed, by experience, that they might at last be invaded by the element which was incessantly threatening them ; but having as yet no know- ledge of natural causes, they blindly considered those that endangered them as supernatural, and for a long time used no precautions for their own security. They were ignorant of the dreadful effects of a certain association of circumstances, rare indeed, but, when occurring, abso- lutely destructive of these marsches. This association consists of an extraordinary elevation of the level of the North Sea, from the long continuance of certain winds in the Atlantic, with a violent storm occurring during the tides of the new or full moon; for then the sea rises above the level of all the marsches; and before they were secured against such attacks, the waves rolling over them, 196 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. and tearing away the grass which had bound their sur- face, they were reduced to the state of mere banks of sand and mud, whence they had been drawn, by the long course of ordinary causes. Such were the dreadful acci- dents to which the first settlers on these lands were ex- posed ; but no sooner were they over, than ordinary causes began again to act ; the sand-banks rose ; their surface was covered with grass ; the coast was thus ex- tended, and new islands were formed ; time effaced the impression of past misfortunes ; and those among the in- habitants of these dangerous soils, who had been able to save themselves on the coast, ventured to return to settle on them again, and had time to multiply, before the re- currence of the same catastrophes. This has been the general course of events on all the coasts of the North Sea, and particularly on those of the countries of Sleswigh and Holstein. it is thus that the origin and progress of the art of dikes will supply us with a very interesting chronometer in the history of the conti- nent and of man, particularly exemplified in this part of the globe. A Lutheran clergyman, settled in the island of Nord Strand, having collected all the particulars of this history which the documents of the country could afford, published it in 1668, in a German work, entitled The North Frisian Chronicle. It was chiefly from this work, and from the Chronicle ofDankwerth, that M. Hartz extracted the information which he gave to me, accom- panied by two maps, copied for me, by one of his sons, from those of Johannes Mayerus, a mathematician ; they bear the title of Frisia Cimbrica ; one of them respecting the state of the islands and of the coast, in 1240, as it may be traced in the chronicles, and the other, as it was in 1651. GREAT RISE OF THE OCEAN. 197 According to these documents, the first inhabitants of the marsches were Frisii or Frisians, designated also under the names of Cimbri and Sikambri : the latter name, M. Hartz conjectures, might come from the ancient German words SecJcampfers, 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-Fries- land,) and of that Friesland which forms one of the United Provinces ; but this common origin is very obscure. Even at the present day, the inhabitants of the marsches, from near Husum to Tondern, or Tunder to the North, though themselves unacquainted with it, speak a language which the other inhabitants of the country do not under- stand, and which is supposed to be Frisian. It is the same at a village in the peninsula of Bremen, by which I have had occasion to pass. The Sicambri or North Frisians, are traced back to some centuries before the Christian era. At the commence- ment 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 Ilengist 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 circumstances of the history of this Frisian colony, recorded in the chronicles of which I have spoken ; but the history here interesting to us is that of the lands whereon they settled. It appears that these people did not arrive here in one body, but successively, in the course of many years : they spread themselves over various parts of the coaits of the 198 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. North Sea, and even a considerable way up the borders of the Weser and the Elbe ; according to documents which I have mentioned in my Lettres sur VHistoire de la Terre et de PHomme. These new settlers found large marches, formed, as well in the wide mouths of those ri- vers as along the coasts, and around the original islands ofgeest; 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 Eyderstede: there were marsches likewise around all the other original islands ; besides very large islands of pure marsch in the intervals of the former. AH 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 eminences 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 multiplied, they ventured to begin inhabiting the marsches ; but afterwards, some great inundations having shown them the dangers of that situation, they adopted the practice followed by those who had settled on the marsches of the province of Gro- ningen, and still continued on the Haligs ; that of raising artificial mounts called werfs, on which they built their houses, and whither they could, upon occasion, withdraw their herds; and it likewise appears that, in the winter, they assembled in greater numbers on the spots originally the highest, in the islands, as well as OB some parts of the coasts. ENCLOSING THE MARSCHES. 199 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, raore.than 600 of them perished by one of the concurrences of fatal circumstances already defined. It was then that they undertook the astonish- ing enterprise of enclosing these lands. They dug ditches around all the marsches, heaping up on their exte- rior 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 contribute more to the safety of their dwellings, than to remove 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 process by which they effected this, after I shall have recalled 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 un- derstood, that the common effects of the waves and of the tides is to bring materials from the bottom of the sea to- wards the coasts ; and that the process continues in every state of the sea. The land winds produce no waves on the coasts, which carry back to the bottom of the sea what has been brought thence by the winds blowing against the shore ; and as for the tides, it may have been already comprehended, (and shall soon by proved,) that the ebb carries back but very little of what has been brought by the flood. So that, but for some extraordinary circum- itances, the materials continually impelled towards the shore, which first form islands, would at last unite against 200 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. the coast in a continuous soil. The rare events, pro- ductive of great catastrophes, do not carryback these materials towards the bottom of the sea ; they only, as it has been said before, ravage the surface, diminishing the heights, and destroying 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 formed 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 begin- ning 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 deter- mine the accumulation of the mud in the intervals be- tween those islands. In this manner a large marsch island, named Everschop, was already, in 987, united to Eyder- stede 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 increase 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 these labours the islands were so considerably enlarged in size, and the intervals be- tween them so much raised, that at low water it was pos- sible 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 divided into three provinces, two of which comprehended the islands, and the third com- prised the marsches contiguous to the coast ; and the same UNITING THE ISLANDS. 201 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 inhabited them more than ten centuries, had not yet understood the possibility of that combination of fatal circumstances above described against which their dikes formed but a very feeble rampart ; the North Sea, by the extraordinary elevations of its level, being much mere formidable in this respect than the ocean, where the changes of abso- lute level are much less considerable. I shall give an abridged account of the particulars extracted by M. Hartz from the chronicle of Dankwerth, relative to the great catastrophes which these marsches successively underwent, previously to the time when experience 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 un- usual combination of defective causes ; the sea passing over its dike, and forming within it large excavations like lakes. In 1114 and 1158, considerable parts of Eyderstede were carried away ; and in 1204, the part called Sudhever in the marsch of Utholm was destroyed. All these catastrophes were fatal to many of the marsch settlers ; but in 1216, the sea having risen so high that 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 expe- rienced 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 demo- lished, and the tides have ever since preserved their 26 202 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. 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 separated 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- 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 wheelbar- rows, the use of which was only then introduced. For this purpose they much enlarged and deepened the inte- rior 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 preservative of dikes was at first ill managed; and the use of it was so slowly BUILDING OF DIKES. 203 spread, that it was not adopted in Nord Strand and in Ey- derstede, 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 the tempests, 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, see- ing that the expense of remedying these evils would be greater than they could afford, while at the same time it was indispensable to their safety, addressed themselves to their bishops and to their prefect, of whom they re- quested pecuniary assistance ; and having obtained 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 Frederichstadt. 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 waters of the geest, and, at low water, discharges them from both its extremities by sluices. At the same time, the islands of Pelhvorm and Nord 204 ON ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. 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 enclosed with dikes. After the dikes had been thus elevated, and their sur- face rendered firm by the straw ropes, though the latter were not yet properly fixed, the inhabitants of the marsches for some time enjoyed repose ; but on the 1 1th October, 1634, the sea, rising to an excessive height, carried away, during the great tempest, the hoogs which had produced the junction between Pellworm and Nord Strand, these having ever since continued distinct islands ; it also vio- lently attacked Ditmarsch ; and its ravages extended over the whole coast, as far as the very extensive new lands of Jutland. Prince* then came forward zealously to the re- lief of their subjects. In particular, Frederic III., Duke of Sleswigh, seeing that the inhabitants of Nord Strand were deficient both in the talents and in the means ne- cessary for the reparation and future security 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, request- ing them to send him an engineer 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 ca- tholics, and the inhabitants of the island Lutherans.. The duke agreed to this, on condition that they and their pos- terity 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 N THE SAND FLOOP. 205 of it which consists in covering them solidly with straw, has become common to all the marsches ; and the Dutch families, w r hich have contributed to this fortunate change, continue to inhabit the same island, and to enjoy the free exercise of their religion. NOTE G. 11. p. 48. On the Sand Flood. In different parts of Scotland, as in Aberdeenshire, Morayshire, Hebrides, and Shetland Islands, there are examples of the natural chronometer, mentioned in the text. One of the most striking examples I at present recollect of this phenomenon in foreign countries, is that described by M. De Luc's brother, in the Mercure de France, for September, 180T* 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- rets, to reflect that yonder were cultivated fields, that 206 ON THE SAM) FLOOD. 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 these 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 remarka- ble 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 disap- pear, her wants had been abundantly supplied. Now, if we fix our attention on this fact, and reflect on the con- sequences which would have attended it if thousands, or only some hundreds of centuries had elapsed since our continents first existed above the level of the sea, does it not evidently appear that all the country on the west of the Nile would have been buried under this sand before ON THE SAND FLOOD. 207 the erection of the cities of ancient Egypt, how remote aoever that period may be supposed ; and that, in a coun- try so long afflicted with sterility, no idea would even have been formed of constructing such vast and nume- rous edifices? When these cities indeed were built, another cause concurred in favouring their prosperity. 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 merchandise 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 increasing 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 on 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 brilliant period of Thebes and Memphis should be re- established, she could never again attain the same de- gree of splendour. Thus the reefs of coral which had been raised in the Red Sea on the east of Egypt, and the sands of the desert which invade it on the west, concur in attesting this 1208 ACTION OF THE SEA UPON COASTS. truth : That our continents are not of a more remote antiquity than has been assigned to them by the sacred his- torian in the book of Genesis, from the great era of the Deluge. NOTE H. 12. p. 50. Action of the Sea upon Coasts. The ocean, in its action upon the cliffs and banki situated on the coasts, break them down to a greater or less extent, and either accumulates the debris at their basis in the form of sea breaches 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, became united to the land, and thus secures 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 on the west and north of Great Britain. 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 upon both sides of the Frith of Forth, not only in exposed, but also in sheltered situations, and the solid strata, as well as the looser alluvial formations, which owe their origin to the destroying agency of the ocean at a former period, are again yielding to its action. At Saint Andrews, the fa- mous castle of Cardinal Beatoun, which is said originally to have been some distance from the sea, now almost overhangs it: From St. Andrews 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 ACTION OF THE SEA UPON COASTS. 209 the change it may have undergone. It is certain, how- ever, 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 farther northward, on account of the wasting and shifting 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 quarters of a mile within flood mark. At the ancient town of Burghhead, to the north of the Spey, an old fort or establishment of the t)anes, was built upon a sandstone cliff, which tradition says, had a very considerable tract of land beyond it ; but is now washed by the waves, and overhangs the sea. The old town of Findhorn was destroyed by the sea, and the site of it is now overflowed by every tide. At Fort George, some of the projecting bastions, formerly at a distance from the sea, are now in danger of being undermined by the water. In Orkney, the Start-Point of Sanday, which is now formed into an island every flood tide, was even in the recollection of some old people still alive, one continu- ous tract of firm ground ; but at present, the channel be- tween Sariday and the Start Island, as it is now called, is hardly left by the water in neap tides ; and since a light- house was erected upon this point about ten years ago, the channel appears to have been worn down at least two feet. Similar destroying effects of the water of the ecean are observed on the coasts of England. 27 21 (J O.N CORAL ISLANDS. 15. p. 51. On Coral Islands. Of all the genera of lythophytes, 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 islands 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. Several different species of madrepore contribute to form these coral reefs ; but by far the most abundant is the muricated madrepore, madrepora muricata of Lin- naeus. These lithophytic animals not only add to the magnitude of land already existing, but, as Cuvier re- marks, they form whole islands. Dr. Forster, in his Ob- servations made during a Voyage round the World, gives a curious account of the formation of these coral islands in the South Sea. All the low isles, he says, seems to me to be a production 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 high- er. The materials are a kind of lime mixed with some animal substance. 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 in- cluded a large deep lagoon. To the east and north-gast PN CORAL ISLANDS. 211 of the Society Isles, are 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 wa- ter, and others are constantly under water. The ele- vated parts consist of a soil formed by a sand of shells and coral rocks, mixed with a light black mould, produ- ced from putrefied 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 lagoon in the middle, which is full of the finest fish ; and 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. rlHMliWPl v^vr.'t.'.TiU' V^v.-r..' -fri*^ 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 coral 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 com- monly grow on the sea-shore, are thrown up, and begin to vegetate ; and by their annual decay and reproduc- tion from seeds, create a little mould, yearly 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 io all kinds of soil ; and thus may all these low isles have became cover- ed with the finest cocoa-nut trees. 21*2 ON eORAL ISLANDS. The animalcules forming these reefs, went to shel- ter their habitation from the impetuosity of the winds* and the power and rage of the ocean ; but as, within the tropics, the winds blow commonly from one quarter, they, by instinct, endeavour to stretch only a ledge, with- in which is a lagoon, which is certainly entirely screen- ed against the power of both : this therefore might ac- count for the method employed by the animalcules in building only narrow ledges of coral roclss, to secure m their middle a calm and sheltered place : and this seems to me to be the most probable cause of THE ORIGIN of all THE TROPICAL LOW ISLES, over the whole South Sea. 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 of four miles long, affords shelter from the southeast 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 Torres' 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 Torres' 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 vege- ^ * Vol. II. p. 114, 115, 116. ON CORAL ISLANDS. 213 tation; whilst others are overflowed with every return- ing 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 rishig bank, an8 die in their turn to increase, but principally to elevate, this monument of their won- derful 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 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 a 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 cp- .214 OS CORAL ISLANDS. 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 gra- dually assumed; and last of all comes man to take pos- session. 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, coral, 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 calcarious substances when the cohesion began, were enclosed 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 sub- stances 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. NOTE K. 16. p. 53. On the Diminution of the Waters of the Ocean. That the water of the ocean has diminished, and is still diminishing, can scarcely be doubted ; yet the rate of decrease since the period of the deluge has been so gradu- al, being now effected not by the conversion of the water into the earthy materials of which the globe is composed, but principally by the agency of animals, vegetables, and volcanoes, that, on a general view, it may be said to be nearly imperceptible. The facts mentioned by Celsius and OX THE DIMINUTION OF THE WATERS, &C. 215 tHhers, in regard to the rapid diminution of the waters of the Baltic, have been much insisted on by some geolo- gists, although they cannot correctly be employed in il- lustrating the supposed general diminution of the waters of the globe ; because the Baltic is a nearly enclosed sea, receiving rivers of considerable magnitude. Professor Playfair, in his elegant geological work, remarks in re- gard to the diminution of the waters of 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 ^ forty inches in a century. Celsius observed, that several rocks which are now above the water, were not long ago sunken rocks, and dangerous to navigators ; and he took particular notice of one which in the year 1680, was on the surface of the water, and in the year 1T31 was 20 Swedish inches above it. From an inscrip- tion near the Aspo, in the lake Melar, which communi- cates 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 enume- rate, make the gradual depression, not only of the Baltic, but of the whole Northern Ocean, a matter of certainty." PLAYFAIR'S Illustrations, p. 445. That indefatigable and accurate observer De Luc, has 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 these seas were indeed a matter of certainty; for the best mithenticated and thq Jeafst eqtiivocal monuments of their 216 ON THE DIMINUTION OF THE WATERS, &C. c change would then abound along all their coasts. But proofs are every where found that such a change is chime- rical : 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 areequal- ly,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 for~ jnation commenced, evidently show that the water dis- placed 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 subversion of a pre- judice of such ancient date, the examples of these pe- remptory proofs of its total want of foundation. 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 were acquainted with its terms, 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 run- ning 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 his conclusion, however, from these few facts, con- trary to every thing observed on the coasts of this sea, Mr. Play fair thinks himself authorized to maintain that the gradual depression, not only of the Baltic, but of the whole NATURAL HISTORY OF PETRIFACTIONS. 217 northern ocean, is a matter of certainty; afterwards he ex- amines 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 accordance with the Huttonian Theory." NOTE L. (A.) 23, Werner's Views of the Natural History of Petrifactions. From the observation in section 22, Cuvier does not appear to have known how much Werner has done for the advancement of the natural history of fossil organic remains. He did not rest satisfied with the developement of the mere mineralogical branch of the theory of the earth ; on the contrary, early in life he began to investi- gate the relations of all the classes of fossil organic re- mains, being well convinced, that without an accurate and comprehensive knowledge of these interesting bodies, geological speculation would have excited but compara- tively little notice. Many years ago he embodied all that was known of petrifactions into a regular system. He insisted on the necessity of every geognostical cabinet containing, besides complete series of rocks for illustra- ting the mineralogical relations of the globe, an exten- sive collection not only of shells, but also of the various productions of the class zoophyta, of plants, particularly of sea plants and ferns; and an examination of the re- mains of quadrupeds in the great limestone caves and al- luvial soils of Germany, soon pointed out to him the ne- cessity of attaching to the geognostical cabinet also one of comparative osteology. As his views in geognosy en- larged, he saw more and more the value of a close and deep study of petrifactions. He first made the highly im- portant observation, that different formations can be dis- criminated by the petrifactions they contain. It was 28 21$ NATURAL HISTORY during the course of his geognostical investigations thai he ascertained the general distribution of organic remains in the crust of the earth. He found that petrifactions appear first in transition rocks. These are but few in number, and of animals of the zoophytic or testaceous classes. In the older flretz rocks they are of more per- fect species, as of fish and amphibious animals ; and in the newest floetz and alluvial rocks, of birds and quadrupeds, or animals of the most perfect kinds. He always main- tained that no fossil remains of the human species had been found in floetz rocks, or in any of the older alluvial for- mations ; but was of opinion that such remains might be discovered in the very newest of the alluvial depositions. He was also led to believe, from his numerous observa- tions, that sea plants were of more ancient origin than land plants. A careful study of the genera and species of petrifactions disclosed to him another important fact, viz, that the petrifactions contained in the oldest rocks are very different from any of the species of the present time ; that the newer the formation, the more do the re- mains approach in form to the organic beings of the pre- sent creation ; and that in the very newest formations, fossil remains of the presently existing species occur. He also ascertained, that the petrifactions in the oldest rocks are much more mineralized than those in the newer rocks, and that in the newest rocks they are merely bleached or calcined. He found that some species of petrifaction were confined to particular beds ; others were distributed throughout whole formations, and others seemed to occur in several different formations ; the ori- ginal species found in these formations appearing to have been so constituted as to live through a variety of changes which had destroyed hundreds of other species, which we find confined to particular beds. OP PETRIFACTIONS. 219 NOTE M. 23. On tht Distribution of Petrifactions in the different Classes of Roc/$s As an account of the distribution of fossil organic re- mains throughout the strata, of which the crust of the earth is composed, cannot fail to prove interesting, even to the general reader, we shall here give a very short sketch of what is known on the subject. Fossil organic remains, or petrifactions, have not hitherto been disco- vered in any of the primitive rocks ; indeed it would ap- pear that animals and vegetables were not called into ex- istence until the period when the transition rocks began to be formed. Hence it is, that petrifactions have not been met with in any rock older than those of the transi- tion class. TRANSITION ROCKS. The principal transition rocks are greywacke, grey- wacke slate, clay slate, limestone, greenstone, amygda- loid, syenite, porphyry, and granite. All of them do not afford petrifactions, these bodies having been hitherto found only in limestone, greywacke, greywacke slate, and clay slate. 1 . Transition Limestone. Fossil corallitic bodies, such as madreporites, tubipo- rites, and milleporites, of different species, abound in many varieties of this limestone. It is in general difficult to determine the species of these genera, owing to their being much intermixed with each other, and with the matter of limestone. On a general view, they certainly approach in external characters to those corals we at present meet within a living state in the tropical regions of the globe. Intermixed with these corals, or in separate strata, we find various species of orthoceratites, lituites, 220 NATURAL HISTORY ammonites, belemnites, nautilites, lenticulites, chamites, terebratulites, anomites, and patellites. 2. Greywacke. This is a rock, including in a basis of quartzy clay slate, variously shaped masses of clay slate, greywacke slate, flinty slate, and sometimes also masses and grains of felspar, and scales of mica. It very rarely contains petrifactions. Hence in maay extensive tracts of coun- try where it predominates, not a single fossil organic re- main is to be seen. The animal petrifactions which have been discovered in this rock are ammonites, and madreporites, of the same species as those met with in clay slate, and greywacke slate ; also solenites, mytu- lites, tellinites, and large orthoceratites. The vegetable petrifactions are alleged to be fruits, stems and leaves of palm-like vegetables, and parts of reeds. 3. Clay Slate. It rarely contains petrifactions ; and the only kinds hitherto met with in it appear to be ammonites and tri- lobites. V 4. Greywacke Slate. This rock seldom contains petrifactions. Where it borders on the clay slate, it contains the same kinds of ammonites as occur in that rock, and in the vicinity of greywacke and transition limestone, we observe in it orthoceratites, corrallites, and fossil remains of reeds and marine plants. The orthoceratites gracilis of,Blu- menbach, the Molossus of Montfort, and also the coral- liolites orthoceratoides, which are found in this rock r seem to belong to those remarkable corals that form a kind of connecting link between shells and corals. Par- ticular beds of siliceous and ferruginous nature, subor- OP PETRIFACTIONS. 221 dinate to the greywacke slate, abound more in petrifac- tions. They contain principally some species of madre- porites; also screw-stones, (schraubensteine), which ap- pear to be derived from the coralliolites epithonius, and whole families of terrebratulites, with a few species of turbinites, and striped chamites. It appears from the preceding statement, that in ge- neral the different species of transition rocks contain similar petrifactions, and that they are principally dis- tinguished by the number of corals and orthoceratites imbedded in them. TLffiTZ ROCKS. Fossil organic remains are much more abundant, and more varied in the rocks of this than of the preceding class. We shall enumerate the rocks of this class ac- cording to their relative antiquity, and begin with the lowest or first formed number of the series, which is named. I. First Sandstone, or Old Red Sandstone. This rock is characterized by its colour, composition, imbedded minerals, strata with which it is associated, the veins that traverse it, and its position in regard to the other rocks of which the crust of the earth is composed. It rests upon the transition rocks, and is very intimately connected with them, as transitions are to be observed from the one into the other. On a general view, it might be viewed as the newest member of the transition class, rather than the oldest of the flcetz rocks. The red sand- stone contains but few petrifactions, and the&e are princi- pally of trunks or branches of trees, some of which appear to resemble those of the tropical regions. The great coal formation sometimes rests upon this sandstone. In the 222 NATURAL HISTORY sandstone whioh is associated with the coal, and also in the slate clay with which it alternates, there frequently occur remains of common and of arborescent ferns, gi- gantic reeds, palms, and leaves of a tree which resembles the casuarina, and which was long considered as an equise- tum. In the limestone, slate clay, &c. of the coal fields in this country, many petrifactions occur, such as ortho- ceratites, ammonites, nautilites, serjpulites, patellites, he- licites, turbites, buccinites, trochites, mytulites, cardites, anomites, pectinites, echinites, entrochites, and millepo- rites. Bones and teeth of fishes are said to have been also found in the coal formation. II. First Fleet z Limestone. This limestone rests immediately on the first sandstone formation. It is divided into the following members : 1. Alpine limestone. 2. Bituminous marl slate. 3. Zech- stein. 4. The coal subordinate to the formation in ge- neral. 1. Alpine Limestone.* This is the most highly crystallized limestone of the series. It is principally characterized by the ammonites and lenticulites it contains. In it we also meet with single coralliolites, encrinites, terebratulites, ostracites, bucci- nites, chamites, echinites, belemnites, and gryphites. '. 2. Bituminous Marl Slate. This remarkable limestone is very widely distributed, and often contains abundance of petrified fishes, which * This limestone appears to agree in many characters with the mountain or matalliferous limestone of England, and like that rock to rest sometimes upon old red sandstone, and sometimes upon grey- wacke. If is very intimately related to both these great formations^ OF PETRIFACTIONS. 223 are in general most numerous in those places where the rock occurs in basin-shaped strata. Many attempts have been made to determine the genera and species of these animals, but hitherto with little success. It would ap- pear that the greater number are fresh-water species, and a few marine species. But the most remarkable fossil organic remain hitherto found in this limestone, is that of an animal of the genus monitor, of the class amphibia, of which Cuvier has given an interesting account in his great work on Fossil Organic Remains. Petrifactions of vegetables rarely occur in this lime- stone ; we sometimes meet with branches of plants ana- logous to the lycopodiumj and more rarely fragments of ferns, and of plants allied to the genus phalaris, Amongst these fresh-water productions, we meet with various fossil remains of marine animals, such as gry- phites, pentacrinites, trilobites, and corallophites. 3. Zechstein. This rock, in some of its characters, resembles the al- pine limestone, but does not contain so many petrifac- tions. Ammonites occur in it ; and pentacrinites fasci- culosus, and whole families of gryphites aculeatus. It contains more rarely the gryphites rugosus, terebratulites alatus, terebratulites lacunosus, and probably also the te- rebratulites striatissimus, T. obliquus, and T. variabilis. It affords nearly the same species of milleporites and coralliolites as are found in the bituminous marl slate. It is worthy of remark, that nearly all the petrifactions found in this formation are much broken. 4. Coal Beds of coal occur in the zechstein, and also, accordr ing to some mineralogists, in the alpine limestone, ac- NATURAL HISTORY companied with slate clay, bituminous slate, and other rocks, all of which frequently contain petrifactions of bi- valve shells, and impressions of plants. The shells re- semble those met with in the alpine limestone, and also in the Jura limestone ; and the vegetable impressions are of lycopodiums and ferns, resembling those found in the old coal formation. But, besides these, we observe remains of plants of the palm tribe, some of which re- semble the carica papaya, a native of Senegal. III. Second or variegated Sandstone Formation. Third Sandstone Formation. The second sandstone rests upon the first limestone and gypsum, and also upon coal,^ but the position of the third sandstone has not been accurately ascertained. The following are some of the petrifactions mentioned by au- thors as occurring in them. Encrinites trochitiferus. Schlottheim. Brunswick. Dentalites striatus. Schlottheim. Mecklenburg. Trochilites scheuchzeri. St. Gallen. Turbinites torquatus. Knorr. Neufschatel. regensbergensis. Knorr. Regenberg, near Blankenburg. australis. Schlottheim. France. Muricites volutinus. Bourg. T. 34. F. 223. St. Gallen. nisus. Bourg. T. 34. F. 226. St. Gallen. assimilis, Bourg. T. 24. F. 228. St. Gallen. Bullites reticulatus. Bourg. T. 37. F, 240, St. Gallen. senilis. Bourg. T. 87. F. 250. St. Gallen. Pectinites punctatus. Volkm. Sites, subterr. T. 23 F. 3. * In the lower parts of Dumfries- shire it rests upon the coal forma- tion. OF PETRIFACTIONS. 225 Pectinites radiatus. Id. T. 32. F. 6. reticulatus. Id. T. 33. F. 1. longicolli. Id. T. 33. F. 9. anomalus. Id. T. 34. F. 13. gigas. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. F. 1. 2. Orten- berg. polonicus. Schlottheim. Wieliczka. Chamites transversim punctatus. Volkra. Siles. subterr. T. 33. F. 7. Ostracites labiatus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. II. &** Fy. 2. Pirna. Anomites paradoxus. Scheuchz. F. 96. Pinnites diluvianus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. D. X. F, 1. 2. Pirna. Gryphites rugosus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. 1. d. F. 7. Wieliczka. Muscuiites sablonatus. Bourg. T. 23. F. 142. 143. rugosus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. vi. F. 3. Silesia. Tellinites musculitiformis. Knorr, P. II. 1. T. B. II. St. Gallen. raargaritaceus. Schlottheim. Mecklenburg. IV. Second Floztz Limestone, or Jura Limestone. This formation, which rests on the rocks of the se- cond sandstone formation, and is remarkable for the abundance and variety of petrifactions it contains, in- cludes beds of coal, marl, sand-stone, stink-stone, and probably also of gypsum. The petrifactions occur prin- cipally in the beds of marl, sand-stone and stink stone, arid more sparingly in the other strata. The following are the genera of petrifactions that have been met with in it : Serpulites, asterialites, encrinites, echinites, orthoceratites, belemnites, ammonites, nauti- 29 226 NATURAL HISTORY lites, lenticulites, helicites, trochilites, buccinites, pate I- lites, chamites, buccardites, donacites, venulites, ostra- cites, terebratulites, anomites, gryphites, musculites, and coraliiolites. Some varieties contain petrified fishes of various genera and species, and also fossil amphibious animals. The vegetable petrifactions that occur in this formation are of stems and leaves, as those of the popu- lus and rhamnus, and of flowers, as the ranunculus. V. Third Flcttz, or Shell Limestone. This formation is newer than either the second lime- stone or sandstone ; and the following list contains the names of several of the petrifactions found in it. Asteriatites eremita. Schlottheim. Gotha. Encrinites trochitiferus. Blumenb. Abbild. F. 60. Pentacrinites Gottingensis. Heimberg, near Gottingen. Britannicus. Blum. Abbild. T. TO. F. a. I. Dorsetshire.^ Echinites ruralis. Schlottheim. Tonna. Dentalites obsoletus. Schlottheim. Tonna. Bitubulites problematicus. Bl. Abb. T. II. F. 9. Belemnites paxillosus. Schlottheim. Heimberg, near Gottingen. Ammonites nodosus. Mus. Tessin. T. 4. F. 3. Thuringia. franconicus. Knorr. P. II. 1. A. 2. F. 1. Koburg. margaritatus. Montf. Fol. 90. Antwerp, amaltheus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. A. II. F. 3. France. planulites. Monf. F. T8. dubius. Bourg. T. 39. F. 163. spatosus. List. Anim. Angl. T. 6. F. 3. Got- tingen. * Does this really belong to the shell limestone ? PETRIFACTIONS. 227 Ammonites pusillus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. papiraceus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. seneus. Bourg. T. 40. F. 266. Nautilites pseudopompilus. Schlottheim. Weimar. rusticus. Schlottheim. Heimberg, near Got- tingen. Helicites girans. Oryct. Nor. T. III. F. 29. planorbiformis. Schlottheim. Near Arensberg Thuringia. Helicites pseudopomarius. Knorr. T. B. vi. a. F. 10. Quedlenburg. Trpchilites speciosus. Oryct. Nor. T. vii. F. 20. nodosus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. uiiibilicatus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. lasvis. Schlottheim. Heimberg. cutus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. Neritites spiratus. Schlottheim. Arensburg. gryphus. Schlottheim. Minden. Turbinites strombiformis. Naturf. 1. S. 1. T. III. F. 3. Palatinate. communis. Schlottheim. socialis. Schlottheim. Wissbaden. approximatus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. Strombites Jenensis. Know. P. II. 1. T. C. vi. F. 7. Jena. canaliculatus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. Buccinites annulatus. Schlottheim. Halberstadt. gregarius. Schlottheim. Heimberg. Porcellanites Seelandicus. Schlottheim. Zeeland. Patellites Vinariensis. Naturf. 5. St. T. III. F. 4. Wei- mar. Discites aequilateralis. Schlottheim. Tonna. Chamites laevis. Bourg, T. 31. F. 120. auritus. List Anim. Angl. T. 9. F. 51. striatus. Bourg. T. 25. F. 154. sulcatus. List Anim. Angl. T. 9. F. 54. 228 NATURAL HISTORY Pectinites subreticulatus. Schlottheim. Teutleben. . Baccardites cordicalis. Oryct. Nor. T. 7. F. 29. cardissaeformis. Schlottheim. Heimberg. Donacites clausus. Schlottheim. Tonna. Venulites trigonatus. Schlottheim. Tonna. Ostracites sulcatus. Blumenb. Spec. Arch. Tel. T. 1. F. 3. plicatus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. D. i. F. 14. pusilius. Oryct. Nor. T. viii. F. 8. pyramidans. Oryct. Nor. T. iv. F. 1. spondyloides. Schlottheim. Tonna. Terebratulites communis. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B, iv. F. 2. giganteus. Blumenb. Abb. T. i. F. 4. Osnabruck. regularis. Oryct. Nor. T. v. F. 23. oblongus. Oryct. Nor. T. v. F. 24. squamiger. Oryct. Nor.' T. v. F. 19. artifex. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. iv. F. 7. 8. sustarcinatus. Oryct. Nor. T. vii. F. 35. subhistericus. Oryct. Nor. T. vii. F. 37. parasiticus. Schlottheim. Tonna, fragilis. Schlottheim. Herda. bicanaliculatus. Schlottheim. Tonna. Trigonellites pes anseris. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. II. 6. F. 8. Thuringia. communis. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. II. b. simplex. Schlottheim. Sachsenberg. Anomites obsoletus. Schlottheim. Lohberg. Solennites annulatus. Oryct. Nor. T. iv. F. 12. 13. Winkelheid. Gryphites. Ratisbonensis. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. D. III. c. F. 1. 3. suillus. Schlottheim. Heimberg. laevis. Schlottheim. Heimberg. Musculites gibbosus. Oryct. Nor. T- vii. F. 25, OF PETRIFACTIONS. 229 Musculites coraprimatus. Oryct. Nor. T. vii. F. 23. mytiloides. Oryct. Nor. iv. F. 2. Pholadites caudatus. Halberstadt. Mytilites sociatus. Thuringia. costatus. Lohberg, near Tonna. Tellinites paganus. Oryct. Nor. T. vii. F. 26. 27. comprimatus. Sachsenburg. minutus. Schlottheim. Sachsenburg. Balanites porosus. Blumenb. Abb. T. i. F. 1. Near Osnabruck. parasiticus. Lohberg. Tonna. Trilobites cornigerus. Schlottheim. Near Reval. Fossil remains of fishes, and, it is said, also of birds, have been found in this formation. VI. Chalk Formation. This, which is one of the newest of the floetz lime- stones, contains many different petrifactions, as will ap- pear from the following enumeration. Serpulites contortuplicatus. Mont. P. II. p. 25. Peters- berg. peniformis. Schlottheim. Petersberg. exuviatus. Schlottheim. Island Rugen. Osteriatites siderolites. Mont. P. 1. p. 150. Petersberg. Asteriatites spinosus. Schlottheim. Petersberg. pentagonatus. Schlottheim. Petersberg. Echinites poundianus. Schlottheim. Kent. varians. Bourg. T. li. F. 337339. anomalus. List. Anim. Angl. T. vii. F. 25. melitensis. List. Anim. Angl. T. xxvii. cordiformis. List. Anim. Angl. T. vii. F. 28, Breynianus. Breyn. Opusel. T. iv. F. 1.2. fenestratus. Knorr. T. E, 7. a. T. iii. 2:50 NATURAL HISTORY Echinites canaliculatus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. E. iv. F. 1. 2. ursinus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. E. 1. a. F. 4. hexagonatus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. E. V. F. 12. cruciatus. Knor. Suppl. T. ix. d. F. 3. sideralis. Naturf. 9 St. T. iv. F. 7. Petersberg. echinometrites. Bourg. T. liii. F. 361. Dentalites minutus. Schlottheim. Island Moen. Orthoceratites gigsa. Knorr. Suppl. T. xii. F. 1 5. Telebois annulatus. Montf. P. 1. p. 366. Island of Goth- land. Baculites vertibralis. Montf. P. I. p. 343. Belemnites reticulatus. Montf. P. I. p. 379. St. Cathe- rine. pyrgopolon mosas. Montf. P. I. p. 394. mucronatus. Breyn. opuscl. Tabula Belem- nit. T.I. a. 2. b. Faujas. paxillosus. Montf. P. I. p. 3,52. lanceolatus. Breyn. Tab. Bel. F. 7. a. Ammonites mammillatus. Naturf. 1. St. T. II. F. 3. elipsolites funatus. Montf. P. I. p. 86. St. Catherine. Nautilites pseudopompilius. Fatij. Petersberg. T. xxi. F. 1 , puppis. Fauj. T. xxv. F. 9. Petersfoerg. pulcher. Fauj. T. xx. F. 3. Petersberg. Srombites globulatus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. C. vii. Buccinites Belgicus. Petersberg. Muricites turrilitis costatus. Montf. P. I. 118. Rouen. Volutites coniformis. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. C. ii.* F. 6. 7. Patellites acutus. Fauj. T. xxv. F. 1. Petersberg. mitratus. Knorr. P. II. ii. T. N. F. 3. Meck- lenburg, melitensis. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. B. 1. c. F. 5. 6. Suppl. T. v. c. F. 6. regularis. Fauj. T. T. xxiii. F. 2. Petersberg. irregularis. Fauj. T. xxiii. F. 3. Petersberg, OF PETRfFACTIONS. 231 Ostracites mysticus. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 5. Petersberg. ungulatus. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. D. vii. F. 5. 6. Petersberg. crista urogalli. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. D. vii. F. 3. 6. laurifolium. Knorr. P. II. 1. T. D. vii. F. 1. 2. plicatissimus. Naturf. 9. St. T. iv. F. 6. a b. Kent. approximate. Fauj. T. xxiii. F. 5. Petersberg. crista meleagris. Fauj. T. xxiii. F. 6. Pe- tersberg. haliotiformis. Fauj. T. xxiii. F. 4. Petersberg. mactroides. Schlottheim. Champagne. Terebratulites communis. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 5. Peters- berg. scaphula. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 8. chrysalis. Fauj. T. xxvii. F. 7. & 9, varians, Fauj. T. xxvii. F. 1. microscopicus. Fauj. T- xxvi. F. 2. limbatus. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 4. chitoniformis. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 6. peltatus. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 11. plicatellus. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 10. vermicularis. Fauj. T. xxvi. F. 12- pectiniformis. Fauj. T. xxvii. F. 5- tenuissimus. Fauj. T. xxvii. F. 7. concavus. Fauj. T. xxvii. F. 6. papillatus. Fauj. T. xxvii. F. 8. gracilis. Schlottheim. Kent. Pinnites cretaceus. Fauj. T. xxii. F. 1. & 3. Gryphites politus. Schlottheim. Island Moen. Tellinites asserculatus. Knorr. Suppl. T. v. c. F. 2. Mecklenburg. Besides these petrifactions, the following are enume- rated by authors as occurring in chalk : spondylites, pec- 232 NATURAL HISTORi tinites, chamites, teeth and bones of fish, also fish much mutilated, tortoises, crabs, alcyonites, madreporites, spon- gites, and encrinites.* VII. Flcetz Trap Rocks. These rocks occur in several of the floetz formations already mentioned, either as subordinate beds, or in mountain masses. In the red sandstone formations they occur in beds, veins, and mountain masses, and appear in single hills, as Salisbury Craig, near Edinburgh, or in ranges of hills, as the Pentlands and Ochils, also near Edinburgh. The only rock of the series which contains petrifactions is the trap-tuff, which includes a few vege- table impressions. Flo3tz trap rocks also occur in the floetz limestone for- mation, either in beds or mountain masses; and some- times we meet with whole ranges of such hills belonging to the floetz limestone. I do not know that petrifactions have ever been found in the trap of these formations. The Coal Formation, which forms a great tract of country on both sides of the Frith of Forth, contains beds and veins of floetz trap rocks. The only trap rock of this series which contains petrifactions is the trap- tuff, and it very rarely presents a few vegetable impres- sions. VIII. Newest Flcetz Trap. The newest floetz trap formation of Werner, which is of a very late date, contains very few petrifactions. * I enumerate in this list the petrifactions discovered by Faujas St. Fond in the Petersberg, near Msestrich, as it is the opinion of some naturalists that it belongs to the chalk formation. OF PETRIFACTIONS. 233 From the short account now given, it appears, that the floetz trap-rocks, in whatever situation they occur, con- lain very few organic remains.* IX. Newest Flcetz Formations. Over the chalk rests a series of calcarious and siliceous formations, which, in general, abound in petrifactions. They appear to have been deposited from the water of lakes or inland seas, some of which are conjectured to have been alternately filled with fresh and salt water ; and hence, in a general view, are of a more local nature than those which have been deposited from the waters of the ocean. The newest members of the series are of so loose a texture, the fossil organic remains they contain so nearly resemble those that now inhabit the earth, and they are so nearly related to the alluvial formations which are daily forming, that it is often extremely difficult, nay even sometimes impossible, to determine whether they belong to the alluvial or newest floetz formation. There appears to be a gradation or transition from the one into the other. The petrifactions they contain are of zoo- phytes, shells, fishes, and amphibious animals ; and fossil remains of birds and quadrupeds here for the first time appear enclosed in strata. The country around Paris, that of the Isle of Wight, and other districts in the south of England, as particularly described in Note K (B), be- long to these newer formations. X. diluvial Formations. The mineral substances included under this class are considered to be of newer formation than any of the iloctz rocks ; and the following are the most frequent and * This is the formation considered by many geologists as entirely of volcanic origin. 30 234 NATURAL abundant of these, viz. gravel, sand, clay, loam, marl, ealc-tufT, calc-sinter, brown coal, and peat. Petrifactions frequently occur distributed through these deposites either in a regular or irregular manner, and are sometimes whole, sometimes more or less broken, but angular, or are so much rounded as to show that they have suffered by attrition. Several different allu- vial formations may be pointed out, which are charac- terized by the organic remains they contain. Thus, one formation found in this neighbourhood contains shells of the common oyster, common muscle, patella vulgaris, 4}ucinura undatum and lapillus, nerita littoralis, and turbo Jittoreus, all of which are still inhabitants of the Frith of Forth. Another contains bones of ruminating animals, as those of the horse, ox, and stag, but differing from those of the living species ; and in a third, which con- tains such marl and many fresh-water shells, there occur the bones of several extinct species of the elephant r rhi- noceros, hippopotamus, and also of the Irish elk, which is no longer a native of this country.* I'V-'wYjWa,,? . ?,. . ^:^4 1803, the fifth year of this discovery, the enormous carcass became entirely disengaged, and fell down from the ice- crag on a sand-bank forming part of the coast of the Arctic ocean. In the month of March of that year, the Tungusian carried away the two tusks, which he sold for the value of fifty rubles ; and at this time a drawing was made of the animal, of which I possess a copy. * This singular discovery is given by Professor Cuvier, as taken from a Report in the Supplement to the Journal du Nord, No. xxx. by M Adams, adjunct member of the Academy of St. Petersburgh. J'OSSIL ELEPl-IAxVT, OR MAMMOTH. Two years afterwards, or in 1806, Mr. Adams went to exarutne this animal, which still remained on the sand- bank where it had fallen from the ice, but its body was then greatly mutilated. The Jukuts of the neighbour- hood had taken away considerable quantities of its flesh to feed their dogs ; and the wild animals, particularly the white bears, had also feasted on the carcass; yet the skeleton remained quite entire, except that one of the fore-legs was gone. The entire spine, the pelvis, one shoulder-blade, and three legs, were still held together by their ligaments and by some remains of the skin ; and the other shoulder-blade was found at a short dis- tance. The head remained, covered by the dried skin, and the pupil of the eyes was still distinguishable. The brain also remained within the skull, but a good deal shrunk and dried up; and one of the ears was in excellent preservation, still retaining a tuft of strong bristly hair. The upper lip was a good deal eaten away, and the un- der lip was entirely gone, so that the teeth were distinct- ly seen. The animal was a male, and had a long mane on its neck. " The skin was extremely thick and heavy, and as much of it remained as required the exertions of ten raen to carry away, which they did with considerable difficulty. More than thirty pounds weight of the hair and bristles of this animal were gathered from the wet sand-bank, having been trampled into the mud by the white bears while devouring the carcass. Some of the liair was presented to our Museum of Natural History by M. Targe, censor in the Lyceum of Charlemagne* It consists of three distinct kinds. One of these is stiff* black bristles, a foot or more in length ; another is thin- ner bristles, or coarse flexible hair, of a reddish brown eolour; and the third is a coarse reddish-brown woolj FOSSIL HOG AND MASTODOX. 255 which grew among the roots of the long hair. These afford an undeniable proof that this animal had belong- ed to a race of elephants inhabiting a cold region, with which we are now unacquainted, and by no means fitted to dwell in the torrid zone. It is also evident that this enormous animal must have been frozen up by the ice at the moment of its death. " Mr. Adams, who bestowed the utmost care in col- lecting all the parts of the skeleton of this animal, pro- poses to publish an exact account of its osteology, which must be an exceedingly valuable present to the philoso- phical world. In the mean time, from the drawing I have now before me, I have every reason to believe that the sockets of the teeth of this northern elephant have the same proportional lengths with those of other fossil elephants, of which the entire skulls have been found in other places."^ Sns. Hog. Only single bones and teeth of this tribe have been hi- therto met with, and these appear to belong to the sus scrofa, or common hog. They are found in peat mosses, r in very new alluvial deposites. Mastodon. This is entirely a fossil genus, no living species having- hitherto been discovered in any part of the world. It is more nearly allied to the elephant than to any other ani- * It is worthy of remark, that although fossil bones of the elephant were described as such in the middle of the 10th century by Aldrovan- dus, it was not until two centuries afterwards that this opinion was credited. In the intermediate time they were described as lusus na- turae, bones of giants, skeletons of fallen angels, remains of marine ani- mals, or of colossal baboons. 256 FOSSIL MASTODON* mal of the present creation ; it appears to have been a herbivorous animal ; and the largest species, the great mastodon of Cuvier, was equal in size to the elephant. Five species are described by Cuvier. 1. Great Mastodon. This species has been hitherto found in greatest abundance in North America, near the river Ohio, and remains of it have been also dug up in Siberia. It has been frequently confounded with the mammoth or fossil elephant, and in North America it is named mammoth. In plate 2d we have given an engrav- ing of one of the grinding teeth of this animal. 2. Mastodon with narrow Grinders. The fossil remains of this species have been dug up at Simorre and many other places in Europe, and also in America. 3. Little Mastodon -with small Grinders. This species is much less than the preceding, and was found in Saxony and Montabusard. 4. Mastodon of the Cordilleras. This species was dis- covered in South America by Humboldt. Its grinders are square, and it appears to have equalled in size the great mastodon. 5. Humboldien Mastodon. This, which is the smallest species of the genus, was found in America by Hum- boldt. All the fossil species of quadrupeds we have just enu- merated have been found in the alluvial soil which covers the bottoms of valleys, or is spread over the surface of plains. All of them are stangers to the climate where these bones now rest. The five species of mastodons alone may be considered as forming a distinct and hither- to unknown genus, nearly allied to that of the elephant. GEOLOGICAL SPECULATIONS. All the others belong to genera still existing in the tor- rid zone. Three of these genera, viz. the rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and elephant, occur only in the old world; the fourth, the tapir, exists only in the new world. But the fossil species have not the same geographical distri- bution : It is in the old world that we dig up the bones of the tapir, and some remains of the elephant have been discovered in the new world. The fossil species includ- ed under the known genera differ sensibly from the present species, and are certainly not mere varieties. Of all the eleven fossil species, the large hippopotamus is the only one which we cannot say with certainty does not belong to the present living species of that genus. The small hippopotamus and gigantic tapir are unquestiona- bly new species ; there is scarcely a doubt of the fossil rhinoceros being a distinct species ; and although the fossil elephant and the little tapir are not so well marked as new species, yet, as Cuvier remarks, there are reasons sufficient to convince the experienced anatomist of their being different from any of the present existing species. These different fossil bones are found almost everywhere in beds of nearly the same kind ; they are often promis- cuously mixed with bones of animals resembling the spe- cies of the present time. These beds are generally allu- vial, either sandy or marly, and always near the earth's surface. It is therefore probable that these bones have been enveloped by the last, or one of the last, catastro- phes to which our earth has been subjected. In many places they are accompanied with accumulations of ma- rine animal remains, and in other places the sand and marl which cover them contain only fresh water shells. Wo have no authentic account of their having been found covered with figetz, or other solid strata contain- ing marine animals, and therefore cannot affirm that they were for a long time covered with a tranquil sea. 33 258 GEOLOGICAL SPECULATIONS. The catastrophe, then, which has covered them, appears to have been a transient marine inundation. This inun- dation does not appear to have reached to the high mountains, because the formation in which these re- mains are found does not occur there, and these bones are not found in the high valleys, if we except a few in the warmer parts of America. The bones are neither rolled nor in skeletons, but dispersed, and in part bro- ken or fractured. They have not therefore been brought there from a distance by an inundation, but have been found by it in the places where it has covered them, as might be expected, if the animals to which they belong- ed had dwelt in these places, and had there successively died. Hence it appears, that before this catastrophe these animals lived in the countries where we now find their bones: It is this inundation which has destroyed them ; and as we do not find them elsewhere, the species must have been aneihilated. It would thus appear, that the northern parts of the globe formerly nourished species belonging to the elephant, hippopotamus, rhino- ceros, tapir, and mastodon tribes; and all of these, with exception of the mastodon, which is entirely a fossil ge- nus, have species living, but only in the torrid zone. Nevertheless there is nothing to countenance the belief, that the species of the torrid zone have descended from the ancient animals of the north, which have been gra- dually or suddenly transported toward the equator. They are w>t the same ; and we may see, by the exami- nation of the most ancient mummies, as those of the ibis, that fio established fact authorizes the belief of changes 50 great as those which must be assumed for such a trans- formation, especially in wild animals. Nor are there any decisive proofs of the temperature of northern cli- mates having changed since this epoch. The fossil spe- cies do not differ less from the living, than certain north- ern animals differ from their co-genera of the south ; FOSSIL FALjEOTHERIUM. 259 the isatis of Siberia, for example, (canis lagopus) from the chacal of India and of Africa (canis aureus). They therefore ought to have belonged to much colder cli- mates. Palazotherium.* This is a new and entirely fossil genus, which was found by Cuvier in the rocks around Paris. The follow- ing are the characters of the genus and the species: Denies 44. Primores utrinque 6. Laniarii 4, acuminati paulo longiores, tecti. Molares 28, utrinque 7. Superior es quadrati ; inferiors bi- lunati. Nasus productior, flexilis. Palmes, etplantce tradactylas. 1. P. Magnum. Statura Equi. 2. P. Medium. Statura Suis ; pedibus strictis, subelongatis. 3. P. Crassum. Statura Suis ; pedibus latis, brevioribus. 4. P. Curtum. Pedibus ecurtatis patulis. 5. P. Minus. Statura Ovis ; pedibus strictis, digitis laU- ralibus minoribus. Besides these five species found in the gypsum quarries around Paris, remains of others have been discovered in other parts of France, either imbedded in the fresh water limestone, or in alluvial soil. Cuvier enumerates and de- scribes the following species : 6. P. Giganteum. Statura Rhinoccrotis. 7. P. Tapiroides. Statura Bovis; molarium inferiorum colliculis fere rectis, transversis- * Palseotherium signifies ancient large animal, or beast. 260 FOSSIL ANOPLOTHERIUM. 8. P. Buxovillanum. Statura Suis ; molaribm inferior ibm extus sub gibbosis* 9. P. Aurelianensl. Statura Suis j molarium inferiorum an- gulo intermedia bicorni' 10 P. Occitanicum. Statura Ovis; molarium inferiorum an- gulo intermedio bicorni* Anoplotherium. * This also is another fossil genus first discovered by Cuvier. The following are its characters: Denies 44, serie continue,- Primores utrinque 6. Laniarii primoribus similes, ceteris non longiores- Molares 28, utrinque 7* Anteriores compressi. Posteriores superiores quadrati- Inferiores 'bilunati. Palmce etplantce didactylce, ossibu* metacarpi et metatarsi dis- cretis ; digitis accessoriis in quibusdam. 1. A- Conimune- Digito accessorio duplo breviori, in pal- mis tantum ; cauda corporis longitu- dine crassissima- Magnitude JLsini aut Equi minor is- Habitus elongatus et depressus Lutrce. Verisimiliter natatorius- 2. A. Secundarium. Similis prcecedenti, sed statura Suis. E tibia et molaribus aliquot cognitum. 3- A. Medium. Pedibus elcmgatisj digitis, accessoriis nul- lis. Magnitude et habitus elegans Gazelles- 4. A. Minus. Dignito accessorio utrinque, in palmis et plantis, mtermedios fere cequante. Magnitude et habitus Leporis. * Anoplotherium signifies beast without weapons ; thus referring to its distinguishing character, its want of canine teeth. FOSSIL BEAVER, SEAL, AND LAMANTIN. 261 5. A. Minimum. Statura pavice Cobayce, e maxilla tantuni cognitum- Habit atio omnium, olim, in regione ubi nunc Lutetia Parisiorum. ORDER. PALMATA. FAMILY. GLIRES. Castor. Beaver. Cuvier describes two species of beaver found in allu- vial strata. The one, \vhich is nearly allied to the castor fiber, or common beaver, is found in France ; the other, found on the shores of the sea of Azof by M. Fischer, differs from the former, and is named castor trogontherium. FAMILY. FER.E. Phoca. Seal. The remains of a species of seal nearly three times the size of the common seal, or phoca vitulina, have been found in the coarse marine limestone of the department of the Maine and Loire. Another species of this genus, but somewhat less than the common, is also described by Cuvier, as occurring in the same limestone. / FAMILY. BRUTA. Lamantin. Two species of this remarkable genus have been found imbedded in the coarse marine limestone of the depart- ment of the Maine and Loire. 262 FOSSIL STARLING, QUAIL, TERN, &C. CLASS. AVES. Sturnus. Starting. Fossil remains of species of this genus occur in the for- mations around Paris. Coturnix. Quail. Bones of this tribe of birds have been found in the strata near Paris. Sterna. Tern. Bones of terns are occasionally found along with those of the quail in the Parisian strata. Grallce. Wadders. Bones of birds resembling those of the order grallae have been found near Pans enclosed in the solid rocks. Ptlicanus. Pelican. Bones nearly resembling those of the pelican tribe oc- cur in the Paris formations. CLASS. AMPHIBIA. ORDER. REPTILES. Testudo. Tortoise. Fossil remains of this genus are met with in different parts of Europe. Thus, fossil tortoises, of unknown spe- cies, are found imbedded in coarse marina limestone at FOSSIL CROCODILE. 263 the village of Melsbroeck, in the environs of Brussels. Fossil remains of unknown species of tortoises are also met with in the coarse chalk or limestone of the hill of Saint Peter, near Maestricht. They are irregularly dis- tributed throughout the masses of the rock, along with different marine productions, and bones of the gigantic monitor. All of them are remains of jsea-tortoises, named chelonii by French zoologists; but of species different from any of those at present known. Remains of a marine, but unknown species of tortoise were found in the limestone slate of Glaris ; and remains of unknown species kave also been dug out of the rocks- of a formation analogous to that around Paris, situated in the vicinity of Aix. And fossil fresh-water species have been found in the gypsum quarries near Paris. Crocodilus. Crocodile. Two extinct species of fossil crocodiles, nearly allied to the gavial (Lac. gangeticus) or gangetic crocodile, sccur in a pyritical bluish-gray compact limestone, at fche bottom of the cliffs of Honfleur and Havre ; and one of these species at least is found in other parts of France, as at Aler.^on and elsewhere.^ It would also appear that the skeleton of a crocodile, discovered at the bottom of a cliff of pyritical slate, about half a mile from Whitby, by Captain William Chapman, probably belongs to one of these species. And it may further be remarked, that the fragments of heads of crocodiles found in the Vicen- tine, may be referred to the same species. 2. That the fossil heads, found at Altorf, are different from those of * Cuvier describes bones of a crocodile found in the slaty limestone of Altorf, which had been considered as remains of the human species. 264 FOSSIL MONITOR. the gavial, and have a longer snout than that of the ani- mal of Honfleur, and may therefore belong to the other fossil species found in France. 3. That the remains of an unknown species of fossil crocodile was found near New- ark, in Nottinghamshire, by Dr. Stukely. 4. That the supposed crocodiles found along with fish in the cop- per slate, or bituminous marl slate, of Thuringia, are reptiles of the genus monitor. 5. Lastly, that all these fossil remains of oviparous quadrupeds belong to very old flo3tz strata, far older than the floetz rocks that con- tain unknown genera of quadrupeds, such as the palce- otheriums and anoplotheriums ; which opinion, however, does not oppose the finding of the remains of crocodiles with those of these genera, as has been done in the gyp- sum quarries.^ Monitor. In the well-known quarries of Macstricht there occur remains of a large fossil monitor. This species, which is one of the most celebrated of all the fossil species of oviparous quadrupeds, occurs in a soft limestone which contains flint, and the same kinds of petrifactions as are observed in the chalk near Paris. Even so early as the year 1T66 it had engaged the attention of inquirers, and up to the present day has not ceased to be an object of discussion and investigation among naturalists. Some have described it as a crocodile, others as a whale; and it has even been arranged along with fishes. Cuvier, after * Sir Everard Home has described, in the Transactions of the Royal Society of London for the year 1814, the fossil remains of an animal possessing characters partly of the crocodile, partly of the species of the class of fishes. It was found in a blue-coloured clayey limestone, named .Lias, on the estate of Henry Host Henley, Esq. between Lyine and Charmoutji, in Dorsetshire, and is now in the museum of Mr Bullock of London, FOSSIL MONITOR. 265 a careful study of its osteology, ascertained that it must have formed an intermediate genus between those ani- mals of the lizard tribe, which have a long and forked tongue, and those which have a short tongue and the pa- late armed with teeth. The length of the skeleton ap- pears to have been nearly twenty-four feet. The head is a sixth of the whole length of the animal ; a proportion approaching very near to that of the crocodile, but dif- fering much from that of the monitor, the head of which animal forms hardly a twelfth part of the whole length. The tail must have been very strong, and its width at its extremity must have rendered it a most powerful oar, and have enabled the animal to have opposed the most agi- tated waters. From this circumstance, and from the other remains which accompany those of this animal, Cuvier is of opinion that it must have been an inhabitant of the ocean. We have here then an instance of an animal far surpassing in its size any of the animals of those genera to which it approaches the nearest in its general charac- ters ; at the same time, that, from its accompanying or- ganic remains, we find reason to believe it to have been an inhabitant of the ocean, whilst none of the existing lizard tribe are known to live in salt water. However remarkable these circumstances are, still they are not more wonderful than those we contemplate in many of the numerous discoveries in the natural history of the an- cient world. We have already seen a tapir of the size of an elephant ; the megalonix, an animal of the sloth tribe, as large as a rhinoceros ; and here we have a monitor pos- sessing the magnitude of a crocodile. Salamandra. Salamander. In the valley of Aitmiihl, near Aichsted and Pappen- heim, and also at Aeningen, there is a formation of calca- rious slate rich in petrifactions. One of the most re- 34 26(5 FOSSIL TOAD AND SAL'llUS. ruarkable of these is that described by Scheuchzer, un- der the name " Homme Fossile," and which some natu- ralists, as Gesner, maintained to be the siluris glanis oi Linnaeus, but which is, in reality, nothing more than an unknown, and probably extinct species of salamander or proteus. It was found imbedded in the limestone of Aeningen, Bufo. Toad. Fossil remains of an animal of this tribe occur in the slaty limestone of Aeningen. Dr. Karg, who has pub- lished a long description of the Aeningen quarries, is of opinion, that this petrifaction is that of a common toad ; whereas Cuvier is inclined to refer it to some species nearly allied to the bufo calamita. Fossil Saurus of Cuvier. Only one specimen of this remarkable fossil animal has hitherto been found, and is now, I believe, in the cabi- net of the King of Bavaria. It was formerly in the pos- session of Collini, and, according to the German journal- ists, was long concealed, to be out of the reach of the French, who, it is alleged, wished to secure for their own Museum so valuable an object of natural history. This is denied by M. Cuvier, who, in a letter to me on this subject, declares, that after the time of the Directory no plundering was authorized ; on the contrary, that the French government rather bestowed donations than com- mitted robberies. In regard to this remarkable specimen, it may be re- marked, that some naturalists have taken it for a bird, others for a bat, but Cuvier is of opinion that it belongs to the class amphibia. Its true nature is still unascer- FOSSIL PISCES AND OSSEOUS BRECCIA. 267 tained, although it appears more nearly allied to the class mammalia than to any of the others in the system. CLASS. PISCES. Cuvier has not devoted much of his attention to the natural history of fossil fishes. He only mentions in a very general way, in his great work, the few genera met with in the gypsum quarries around Paris. Five species are mentioned. The first described belongs to a new genus allied to that named amier, and is conjectured to be a fresh water species. The second is nearly allied to two fresh water genera, viz. the mormyrus of La Cepide, natives of the river Nile, and the pcscilia of Bloch, na- tives of the fresh waters of Carolina. The third appears to be a species of sparus, different from any of the present species. The fourth and fifth are very dubious. Osseous Conglomerate, or Breccia. Cuvier gives a very interesting account of the osseous conglomerate, or breccia, which occurs in the rock of Gibraltar, and in other limestone rocks and hilk upon the coasts of the Mediterranean. This breccia occurs in a gray-coloured compact dis- tinctly stratified floetz limestone, which abounds in the Islands and on the coasts of the Mediterranean. It is not intermixed with the limestone, nor does it alternate with it in beds, but occurs filling up fissures, or in caves si- tuated in it. It is composed of angular fragments of the limestone, of bones, usually of ruminating animals, ge- nerally broken, and never in skeletons, and land shells, cemented together by a reddish brown coloured ochry ^alcarious basis. The base is sometimes vesicular, and 268 O.SbEOLS BRECCIA, the vesicles are more or less completely filled with calca- rious spar ; and the spar sometimes traverses the con- glomerate in the form of veins, or is more or less inter- mixed with it. Cuvier describes the osseous breccia of different; tracts of country in the following order : 1. Gibraltar. The mineralogical nature of this famous rock is well known, from the excellent description of it by our countryman Colonel Imrie. It is principally com- posed of limestone, and is frequently traversed by fis- sures, or hollowed into caves, in which the osseous brec- cia is contained. Cuvier found in it the bones of a ru- minating animal allied to the antelope, and of a smaller animal of the order glires, which he conjectures maybe- long to the genus lagomys. All the shells contained in the breccia are fresh water or land species. 2. Cette. The breccia in this tract, like that of Gib- raltar, occurs in limestone. In it Cuvier found bones of an animal not unlike the common rabbit; others of a species one-third less than the common rabbit; also bones of a species of mus, nearly allied to the field-mouse (mus arvalis, Lin.) ; of a bird of the order passeres ; nu- merous vertebras of a serpent somewhat resembling the coluber natrix ; lastly, bones of a ruminating animal, pro- bably of the same species as that found in the breccia of Gibraltar. Shells also occur. Three kinds are mention- ed, viz. two helices, and one pupa, and all of them land- shells. 3. Nice and Antibes. The limestone rocks of Nice con- tain this osseous breccia. Cuvier found in it bones of the horse, and of two species of ruminating animals. All the shells it contains are land species. The lime- OSSEOUS BRECCIA. 269 stone rocks of Antibes, near Nice, also costain os- seous breccia, in which Cuvier found remains of rumi- nating animals, apparently the same as those of Nice. 4. Corsica. The limestone rocks containing the osse- ous breccia^occur near Bastia, and agree in all their cha- racters with that of Gibraltar. The osseous remains are principally of smaller quadrupeds, but they do not, like those of Cette, belong to species now living in the sur- rounding country ; for Cuvier discovered there the head of an animal nearly resembling the lagomys alpinus, a species which inhabits the wildest and most mountainous regions of Siberia, immediately under the snow line. He also found enormous quantities of the bones of a species of gnawer, somewhat resembling the mus terrestris of Linnaeus, and of another very nearly allied to the water- rat. 5. Dalmatia. The breccia is found throughout a great extent of limestone country. It agrees perfectly in its characters with that of Gibraltar. All the bones it con- tains, as far as Cuvier had an opportunity of examining, appear to be of the same size as those of the fallow-deer, and perhaps belong to the animal whose remains are found at Gibraltar. The remains of the horse have also been found in the breccia of this district ; for the late John Hunter found the os hyoides of that animal in some masses of conglomerate from Dalmatia. 6. Island of Ccrigo. The only descriptions we have of this breccia, are those of Spallanzani and Fortis, from which it appears that it possesses the same characters as that of Gibraltar, &c. Spallanzani was of opinion that the bones belonged to the human species. Many years OSSEOUS BRECCIA. ago Blumenbach refuted this opinion, and Cuvier shows that all of them belong to ruminating; animals. 7. Concudy near Teruel in Arragon. Bowles, in his Na- tural History of Spain, describes limestone rt>cks, con- taining an osseous breccia, as occurring at Concud. Cu- vier is of opinion that it belongs to the same formation as that of Gibraltar. It contains bones of the ox, ass, of a small kind of sheep, and many terrestrial and fresh wa- ter shells. 8 Osseous Incrustations in the Vicentim and Veronese. The natural history of these incrustations, or conglome- rates, is still very imperfect. Cuvier found in them bones of the stag and ox. Cuvier finishes his description of this osseous conglo- merate, or breccia, with the following observations : 1. The osseous breccias have not be formed by either a tranquil sea, or by a sudden irruption of the sea. 2. They are even posterior to the last resting of the sea on our continent, since no traces are found in them of any sea-shells, and they are not covered by other beds. 3. The bones and the fragments of rock which they contain, fell into the rents of the rocks successively, and as they fell became united together by the accumulation of the sparry matter- 4. Almost all the fragments contained in the fissures are portions of the bounding rock. 5. All the well-ascertained bones belong to herbivorous animals. 6. The greater number belong to known animals, and to species that at present live in the neighbouring country. T. The formation of these breccias, therefore, appears to be modern, in comparison of the floetz rocks, and the allu- vk.1 strata, that contain remains of unknown land animate MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OF PARIS. 27 1 8. It is nevertheless still ancient, with respect to us, since nothing shows that such breccias are formed at the pre- sent day ; and some of them, as those of Corsica, contain also the remains of unknown animals. 9. The most essen- tial character of this phenomenon consists more in the fa- cility with which certain rocks have been split, than the matters contained in the fissures. 10. This phenomenon is very different from that exhibited by the caverns in Germany, which contain the bones of carnivorous ani- mals only, spread over the bottom, in an earthy tuff, part- ly of an animal and partly of a mineral nature ; although the rocks in which these caverns are situated do not ap- pear to be very different from those which contain the osseous brecciae. NOTE K (B.) 28. p. 103. Mineralogical Description of the Country around Paris. As the very short account of the mineralogy of the country around Paris, in Note K (A), may not prove sa- tisfactory to those who wish a more particular detail, we here insert a description, which, with the assistance of the plate, (Plate IV.) will, we trust, enable the reader to form a distinct conception of all the important features of that remarkable district.* The country in the environs of Paris is entirely com- posed of newer floetz rocks, of which the oldest, or low- est, is common chalk ; the uppermost, or newest, alluvial. Interposed between these are nine different formation?, principally of limestone, sandstone, and gypsum. The whole series of formations, according to Cuvier and * The description is drawn up in conformity with the observations of Cuvier and Brongniart, in their valuable 'work, entitled" Essaisirr la Geographic Mineralogique des Environs de Paris." 4to. 1811. 272 MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OF PARIS. Brongniart, appear to be arranged in the following order, from below upwards. 1. The chalk formation, with flint. 2. Plastic clay, with sand (argile plastique.) 3. Coarse marine limestone (calcaire grassier), with its marine sandstone (gres marine inferieur.) 4. Siliceous limestone (calcaire silicieux). 5. Gypsum and marl, containing bones of animals (marnes du gypse d'ossements.) 6. Marine marl, abounding in bivalve shells ; and the upper layers, abounding in oyster shells. 7. Sandstone and sand, without shells. 8. Upper marine sandstone (gres marine superieur.) 9. Millstone, or buhrstone, without shells (meuliere sans coquilles.) 10. Flint and siliceous limestone or the upper or se- cond fresh water formation, millstone, flint, and limestone (terrein d'eau douce superieur , meuliere, silex, et calcaire.) 11. Older and newer alluvial deposites (Limon d'atter- rissement.) FIRST FORMATION. Marine Origin. Chalk. This chalk agrees, in external characters, with that found in other countries. It occurs in indistinct hori- zontal strata, in which we observe either interrupted lay- ers or tuberose shaped masses of flint, which pass into the chalk at their line of junction, or kidneys of hard chalk, having the same shape and position with the flint. This formation is well characterized by the petrifactions it con- tains, which differ not only in the species, but sometime? PLASTIC CLAY FORMATION. also in the ge.nus, from those that occur in the coarse lime- stone- Two species of belemnite occur in the chalk, and these appear to be different from those found in the lime- stone, and are considered to characterize it. The chalk forms the bottom of the basin or gul in which are deposited tjie different formations that occur around Paris. Its surface must have presented numerous inequalities before the present strata were deposited over it, because we observe promontories and islands of chalk rising through the newer formations. SECOND FORMATION. Fresh water Origin.* Plastic Clay. All around Paris, we find the chalk covered with a de- posite of plastic clay, which is dug and used in the manu- facture of different kinds of pottery. This clay varies in colour, being white, gray, yellow, red, and black, some- times contains a layer of sand, very rarely (only the purer varieties) organic remains, viz. cytherea, turtellae, bituminous wood, and in some places fragments of chalk have been observed in it. It is neither intermixed with the chalk at its line of junction with it, nor is it more calcarious where in contact with that mineral, than at a distance from it ; hence Cuvier conjectures, that it has been deposited after the chalk, and is therefore a se- parate formation. * I designate the formationsyresTi water and marine, according to the idea of Cuvier and Brongniart ; although I do not agree with these philosophers in their opinion of the alternate play of salt and fresh water. 35 274 MINERALOGY OP THE ENVIRONS OF PARIS* THIRD FORMATION.- Marine Origin. Coarse Marine Limestone, with its Marine Sandstone. This formation presents much greater variety than the chalk. Several different strata, or series of strata, sucli as limestone, clay-marl, limestone-marl, slate-clay, occur in it. These are arranged in a determinate order, and the strata of limestone are well characterized by their ge- ognostic characters and by the petrifactions they contain ; the same system of strata always possessing the same gene- ral characters and species of petrifactions. First System of Strata. The lowest system of strata, or first system of strata, of the coarse limestone formation, is very sandy, and some- times contains a substance resembling green earth ; it is still better characterized by containing a great variety of well preserved shells, many of which still retain the pearly lustre, and differ more from the present existing species, than those in the upper strata of this formation. It is particularly characterized by the nummulites it con* tains. The following are the petrifactions enumerated byCu- vier and Brongniart, as occurring in it. Nummulites lasvigata } , f These are always found in numismalis $ the lowest part of the bed. Madrepora At least three species. Astraea Three species at least. Carophyllia Three simple, and one branched species. Fungites. MARINE LIMESTONE FORMATION. Cerithum giganteum. Lucina lamellosa. Cardiura porulosum. Voluta cithara. Crassatella lamellosa. Turritella multisulcata. Ostrea flabellula. Cymbula. Second System of Strata. The limestone of these strata is of a grayish yellow co- lour, is in part oolitic, or composed of small roundish grains, and contains remarkable cotemporaneous cavi- ties, that traverse the strata, and which are filled with loam, sand, and flint. It is still very rich in shells ; nearly all the bivalves found by M. Defrance at Grignon belong to it. It also contains a few impressions of leaves and stems of vegetables, and single fresh-water shells. The most characteristic petrifactions of this sysr tern of strata are the following. Cardita avicularia. Orbitolites plana. Turritella imbricata. Terebellum convolutum. Calyptrasa trochiformis. Pectunculus pulvinatus. Citheraea nitidula. elegans. Miliolites It is very abundant. Cerithium Probably several species ; but neither the lapidum and petricolum, nor cinctum and plicatum, which latter belong to the second marine formation which covers the gypsum. 276 MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OP PARIS. Of these petrifactions, the most characteristic is the eerites. Third System of Strata.* . The third system of strata is already less abundant in petrifactions, and contains fewer species than the two preceding. The following have been observed. Miliolites Very rare. Cardium Lima, et obliquum, Lucina saxorum. Ampullaria spirata. Cerithium tuberculatum. } . ... I Almost all the other species, mutabile. ... > with exception of the gi- lapidum. 1 \ ganteum. petncolum. Corbula anatina ? striata. Also impressions of the leaves of a fucus. The strata of the second and third systems sometimes contain beds of sandstone, or masses of hornstone filled with marine shells. Tn some cases the sandstone takes the place of the limestone. Land shells and fresh-water shells (Limncea et Cyclostomce) have also been observed in this sandstone. The sandstone and the hornstone, con- taining marine shells, rest either immediately on the ma- rine limestone, or are contained in it. The following list contains the names of those species of petrifactions which occur most frequently in the sandstone. Calyptraea trochiformis ? Oliva laumontiana. * This is the limestone used for building at Paris. MARINE LIMESTONE FORMATION. 277 Ancilla canalifera. Voluta harpula. Fusis bulbiformis. Cerithium serratum. tuberculosum. coronatum. lapidum. mtitabile. Ampullaria acuta, or spirati. patula. Nucula deltoidea. Cardiura lima. Venericardia imbricata. Cytherea nitidula. elegans. teilinaria. Venus callosa ? Lucina circinaria. saxorum. Two species of oyster still undetermined ; the one ap- pears allied to ostrea deltoidea, the other to ostrea cym- bula. Fourth System of Strata. This set of strata consists of hard calcarious marl, soft calcarious marl, clayey marl, and calcarious sand, which is sometimes agglutinated, and contains horizontal layers of hornstone, crystals of quarte, and rhomboidal crystals of calcarious spar, and small cubical crystals of fluor spar. Petrifactions occur very rarely. FOURTH FORMATION. Siliceous Limestone without Shells. This formation occurs alongside the coarse marine limestone, on the same level with it, and in no instance 278 MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OP PARIS. either above or below it. It rests immediately on the plastic clay. It consists of strata, not only of a white limestone, but also of a gray, compact, or fine granular limestone, which is penetrated in all directions with sili- ca ; and its numerous cavities are lined with siliceous stalactites, or quartz crystals. It is destitute of petrifac- tions. A species of millstone sometimes occurs in it, which appears to be the siliceous limestone deprived of its cal- carious ingredient by some agent unknown to us. This rock is scarcely entitled to the rank of a distinct forma- tion : it appears to be one of the members of the pre- ceding series without petrifactions. It may be remarked that it is not uncommon to observe in the same forma- tion beds with and without petrifactions. FIFTH AND SIXTH FORMATIONS. Fresh Water and Marine Origin- Gypsum Formation, and the Marine Marl Formation* This formation is not entirely of gypsum, but contains also beds of clay marl and calcarious marl. These are ar- ranged in a determinate order when they all occur together, which, however, is not always the case. They lie over the coarse marine limestone ; and the gypsum, which is the principal mass of the formation, does not occur in wide extended plateaus, like the limestone, but in single conical or longish masses, which are sometimes of considerable extent, but always sharply bounded. Montmartre presents the best example of the whole members of the formation, and there three beds of gypsum are to be observed su- perimposed on each other. ,, . .. ,, - .3 ,i.*\ r < '' ;j ; "^5* / '7 - The first bed consists of alternate layers of gypsum solid caicarious marl, and of thin slaty argillaceous marl or adhesive slate. The layers of gypsum are thin, and MARINE MARL FORMATION. 279 full ofselenite crystals; and in the clay marl or adhesive slate, occurs imbedded menilite. Marine shells occur in several of the layers of the marl, and it is remarked that wherever the gypsum rests immediately on the sand of the marine sandstone containing shells, it contains sea shells. The former bottom of the sea, however, appears to have been frequently covered with a bed of white marl, on which the lower beds of gypsum rest, and this bed is filled with fresh-water shells. The second bed re- sembles the first, and only differs from it in being thicker, and containing fewer beds of marl. The only petrifac- tions it contains are those of fishes ; but it encloses masses of celestine, or sulphat of strontian. The third, or upper bed, is by far the greatest, being in several places more than sixty feet thick. It contains few beds of marl ; and in some places, as at Montmorency, it lies almost immedi- ately under the soil. The lower strata of this upper gyp- sum contain flint, which appears to be intermixed with it, and to pass into it by imperceptible gradations facts which show their cotemporaneous formation. The middle strata of this bed split naturally into large prisma- tic concretions, with many sides. The uppermost strata, of which five generally occur, and extend to a great dis- tance, are thinner than the others, and are intermixed with marl, and also alternate with beds of it. Numerous quarries are situated in this upper gypsum, and which daily afford skeletons, or single bones of un- known birds and quadrupeds. To the north of Paris these are found in gypsum itself, where they are hard, and simply invested with marl ; and to the south of Paris similar remains, but in a friable state, are met with in the marl which separates the beds of gypsum. Bones of tortoises, and skeletons of fish, are found in the same feed, and more rarely fresh-water shells of the genus cy- 280 MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OF PARIS. clostoma. This latter fact, Cuvier remarks, shows the plausibility of the opinion of Lamanon, and other natura- lists, who maintain, that the gypsums of Montmartre, and other hills in the basin of Paris, have been deposited from fresh-water lakes. The occurrence of skeletons of quad- rupeds particularly characterizes the upper bed of gyp- snm, because remains of the same nature have not hi- therto been discovered in the middle or lower beds of gypsum. Beds of calcarious and clayey marl rest immediately over the gypsum. Woodstone, or petrified wood of a kind of palm tree, occurs in a white friable chalky marl ; and in quarries which are worked in it, remains of fishes and of shells, of the genera lymnasus, and planorbis, are met with. The two latter do not differ very much from those found in the marshes in France, a fact which seems, in the opinion of Cuvier, to show, that this marl, as well as the subjacent gypsum, have been deposited from fresh water. In the numerous and thick beds of clayey and calcarious marl which rest over this white friable chalky marl, petrifactions are so rare, that we cannot form any satisfactory opinion as to their forma- tion. Over the beds of clayey and calcarious marl there rests a bed of yellowish slaty marl, three feet three inches thick. Kidneys of earthy calestine occur in the lower part of it ; somewhat higher up we meet with a bed of small bivalve shells, which are referred to the genus Citherea, and between the uppermost layers of the marl other species of citherea, with cerites spirobites, and bones of fish, occur. This bed is not only remarkable on account of its great extent, (it has been traced ten leagues in one direction, and four leagues in another. MARINE MARL FORMATION. 281 and throughout its whole extent of the same thickness), but also because it is considered as marking the upper boundary of the first fresh water formation, and the be- ginning of a neAV marine formation. All the shells that occur in the niarl above this bed belong to the ocean. A great bed of greenish clayey marl, without petrifac- tions, rests immediately over the yellowish marl, and contains kidneys of clayey calcarious marl, and also of celestine. Immediately over these follows a bed of yel- low clay-marl, which abounds in fragments of marine bivalve shells, cerites, trochites, mactrites, cardites, ve- nites, &c. and fragments of the tail of two species of ray have also been found in it. The beds of marl which rest over these contain princi- pally bivalve marine shells ; and in the uppermost bed of calcarious marl, immediately under the clayey sand, there occur two distinct beds of. oysters, of which the un- dermost contains large and thick oysters, and the upper, which is sometimes separated from the under by a thin bed of white marl, without shells, numerous, small, thin, and brown oyster shells. This latter bed of oysters is very thick, is divided into many layers, and is scarcely ever wanting in the hills of gypsum. These oysters appear to have lived on the spot where we at present find them, because they are arranged as we find them in oyster-banks in the ocean; and the greater number of them are whole, and with both valves. Lastly, M. Defrance found, near Roquencourt, at the height of the formation of the marine gypseous marl, rounded fragments of marly shell limestone, pierced with :|)holades. and with oyster shells attached to them. The 36 282 MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OP PARIS. formations sometimes terminate with a bed of clayey iand, in which no petrifactions occur. The whole of the beds, from the layer immediately over the marine limestone, to that containing the oysters, constitute the gypsum formation. Guvier considers them as constituting two formations, viz. the gypsum and ma- rine marl formations. It is, however, evident that all the beds belong to one formation, because they exhibit all those relations which occur in sets of strata, considered as belonging to the same formation. In the following Table are enumerated the petrifac- tions that belong to the gypsum, and to the marine for- mation which rests on it. GYPSUM AND MARINE MARL FORMATIONS. 283 Petrifactions of the Gypsum and the Marine Marl resting upon it. FRESH WATER FORMATION. Palaeotherium magnum, medium, crassum. curtum. Fossil quadrupeds in gypsum Birds - Reptiles - - - Fishes minus. Anoplotherium commune. secundarium, medium. minus. minimum. A pachidermatous animal, allied to the hog. Canis Parisiensis. Didelphis Parisiensis. ^Viverra Parisiensis. - Three or four species. f Trionix Parisiensis, and another J tortoise. j A species of saurius, which appears ^ to be a crocodile. - Three or four species. Molluscous animals Cyclostoma mumia. rPalms. Upper white marl J Fragments of fishes, j Limneus. l^Planorbes. Slaty yellow __i > marl, MARINE FORMATION. The shells of these petrifactions are Cytheree bombee. Spirobes Bones of fishes. Cerithium plicatum, Cytheree planes. Bones of fish. generally in a powdery state, or we have only their mould or impres- sion. MINERALOGY OP THE ENVIRONS OF PARIS- Green marl. No fish. Yellow [ marl, mix- ed with brown slaty marl. Parts of the ray. Ampullaria patula? Cerithium plicatum. cinctum. Cytherea elegens. semisulata. Cardium obliquum. Nacula margaritacea. Calcarious marl, con- taining large oy- sters. Ostrea hippopus. pseudochama. longirostris. canalis. Calcari6us marl, con- taining small oy- sters* Ostrea cochlearia. cyathula. spatulata. linguatula. Ballanites. Shells of crabs. Almost all these shells are broken, and difficult to as- certain. The two species of cerites > of the marine for- mation, which co- vers the gypsum, do not appear to occur any where else. The two beds of oy sters are often se- parated from each other by marl with- out shells; and al- though we cannot say with any cer- tainty whether or not the particular species here enu- merated are shells that belong more to the one bed than to the other; yet it cannot be doubted, that the oysters of this marl do not occur in the coarse lime- stone, and that they are more nearly allied to the species at present living in our seas, than to those found in the limestone. UPPER MARINE SANDSTONE AND SAND. SEVENTH FORMATION. Of Sandstone and Sand zcithout Shells. The sandstone with shells is one of the latest forma- tions. It always rests on those already described, and in general is only covered with the millstone without shells, and the upper fresh water formation.* Its strata are often of considerable thickness, are intermixed with beds of sand of the same nature, and both are often so fine that they are used in manufactories. EIGHTH FORMATION. Marine Origin. Upper Marine Sandstone and Sand. This sandstone^ or last marine formation, rests on the gypsum, marine maft^TETiTl PHjtt.upon.the sandstone and sand without shells. It varies in colour, compactness, and even in composition. Sometimes it is a pure sand- stone, but friable, and of a red colour, as at Montmartre : sometimes it is a red coloured clayey sandstone, as at Romainville ; sometimes it is a grayish sandstone, as at Levignan ; lastly, its place is occasionally occupied with a thin bed of calcarious sand filled with shells, which covers the great masses of gray, hard sandstone, and without shells, at Nanteiulle-Haudouin. This sandstone contains marine shells, which are some- times different from those found in the sandstone of the lower marine formation, and approach more to the spe- cies met with in the calcarious marl, which surmounts * It appears, as we shall afterwards show, that 'it is in some places covered by a formation of marine sandstone or limestone. - 286 MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OP PARIS. the gypsum, as will appear from the following enumera- tion. Shells found in the Upper Marine Sandstone* Oliva mitriola. Fussus ? allied to longasvus. Cerithium cristatum. lamellosum. mutabile ? Solarium ? Lam. PI. viii. fig. 7. Melania costellata ? Melania? Pectuneulus pulvinatus. Crassatella compressa. Donax retusa? Citherea nitidula. laevigata. elegans ? Corbula rugosa. Ostrea flabellula. This formation, and the one preceding it, although arranged by Cuvier and Brongniart as distinct forma- tions, are evidently members of one and the same forma- tion. NINTH FORMATION. '.#&':: '.-, '&-.&:*: ^;. ^J^^r^^U %** Millstone without Shells. This formation consists of iron-shot clayey sand, green- ish, reddish, and whitish clay marl, and millstone ; and al- though separated by Cuvier from the flint and siliceous limestone formation, appears to be a member of that se- ries. This millstone is a quartz, containing a multitude of irregular cavities which are traversed by siliceous SECOND FORMATION. 2#7 iibres, disposed somewhat like the reticular texture in bones. These cavities are sometimes lined or filled with red ochre, clay marl, or clayey sand, and they have no communication with each other. Most of the millstones found around Paris have a red or yellowish tint, but the rarer and most esteemed varieties have a bluish shade of colour. The bluish variety is the most highly prized, because it affords the whitest coloured flour; and a mill- stone of this kind, six feet and a half in diameter, sells at 1200 francs. We never observe ID 'its cavities any silice ous stalactites, orcry stallized quartz ; and this character enables us to distinguish, in hand specimens, this millstone from that found in the siliceous limestone. It is some- times compact. It has been analyzed by Hecht in the Journal des Mines, No. xxii. p. 333, and appears to be almost entirely composed of silicea. Another geognos- tic character of the millstone, properly so called, is the absence of all fossil animal and vegetable productions, whether of fresh or salt water origin. It often rests on a bed of clay marl, which appears to belong to the gypsum formation ; in some places it is separated from it by a bed varying in thickness, of sand- stone or sand without shells. It is sometimes imme- diately covered with vegetable earth, but in other in- stances it has resting on it the upper fresh water forma- tion, or the alluvial formation.^ * The most extensive mass of this millstone occurs in the plateau which extends from La Ferte sous Jouarre (on the Marne, 16 leapies oast from Paris) nearly to Montmirail ; and here, near the first town, it has been quarried upwards of four hundred years for the excellent mill- stones it affords. The lower part of the plateau is marine limestone ; the upper part, on the edges, and toward the Marne, of marl and gyp- sum ; hut in the middle, of an iron-shot and clayey sand, which forma a bed upwards of 60 feet thick. The millstone occurs in this great bed MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OF PARIS. TENTH FORMATION. Fresh water Origin. TAe Flint and Siliceous Limestone Formation. We have already described a formation which, accord- ing to Cuvier, has been deposited from fresh water, be- cause the fossil animals it contains are analogous to those we find in our fresh Crater lakes. This formation, which consists of gypsum and marl, is separated from another and more superficial fresh water formation, of which we are now to give an account, by the upper marine sand- stone already described. The second fresh water formation, in the vicinity of Paris, consists of two sorts of stone,, flint and siliceous limestone. These substances sometimes occur indepen- dent of each other; in other instances they are intimately mixed together. The nearly pure limestone is the most common ; the next in frequency is a mixture of flint and iimestone ; but large masses of pure flint are the rarest. of sand, extends nearly throughout the whole plateau, and varies in thick- ness from three to five fathoms ; but millstones cannot be made of every portion of the mass; hence we must not expect to find it throughout the whole bed. A bed of rolled masses of millstone, about a foot and half thick, lies over it ; over this a thin bed of iron-shot sand, contain- ing smaller pieces of millstone, and above this bed is one of sand, from 12 to 17 yards thick. If the stone rings when struck with a hammer, it will answer for large millstones. The bed never affords more than three millstones in the direction of its thickness. It frequently hap- pens, that the fissures allow the workmen to extract the masses in a perpendicular direction, and these are the best. Millstones are formed Ijy joining many of these parallelopipedal pieces together, and confin- ing the whole with an iron hoop. These pieces are exported frous Franco, to England and America. SECOND FfcESH WATER FbR&ATiOtf. 289 The flint is sometimes nearly pure; sometimes approaches to pitchstone or to jasper and quartz; and, lastly, it has a corroded shape when it has all the characters of true millstone, but which is in general more compact than the millstone without shells. The limestone of this formation is white or yellowishlgray ; sometimes nearly friable, like marl or chalk; sometimes compact and solid, with a fine grain and cdnchoidal fracture : the concholdal varieties are rather hard, but easily broken into sharp-edged frag- ments, somewhat like flint. These characters apply only to the limestone near Paris; Tor, at a considerable distance, the limestone occurs very compact, of a grayish-brown co- lour, and which readily cuts and polishes. The limestone of Mont-Abusar, near Orleans, which contains bones of the Palaeotherium, belongs to this formation* Even the hardest varieties of this limestone^ after exposure to the air for a time, soften ; and hence it is used as a marl for manuring the ground. All the varieties, both hard and soft, are traversed by empty vermicular cavities, whose walls are sometimes of a pale green colour. Where the siliceous minerals and the limestone are intermixed, the latter is always corroded, full of cavities, and its irregu- lar cells are filled with calcarious marl. Tire essential character of this formation is, that it contains fresh water and land shells, nearly all of which belong to genera that now live in our morasses, but no marine shells ; at least in such places as are distant from the subjacent marine formation. The following is a list of those fossil organic remains that belong particularly to the upper fresh water formation. Cyclostoma elegans antiquum, Potamides Lamarkii. Planorbis rotundatus. cornu. 37 290 MINERALOGY OF THE ENVIRONS OF PARIS* Planorbis prevostinus. Limneus corneus. fabulum. ventricosus. inflatus. Bulimus pygmeus. terebra- Pupa Defrancii. Helix Lamani. Desmarestina. Dicotyledonous wood, petrified with silica. Stems of arundo or tipha. Articulated stems, resembling the thorn. Peniculated ov.oidal grains. Canaliculated cylindrical grains. Olive-shaped bodies, with an irregular streaked surface- The potamides, helicites, and limneus corneus, are the petrifactions that most frequently characterize this second fresh water formation,, and the cyclostoma mumia has never been found in it. The first or lowest fresh water formation, on the contrary, has its characteristic petrifac- tions, the cyclostoma mumia, and Limneus longiscatus, and palludinus, but it never contains potamides, or heli- cites. It is remarkable that no bivalve shells occur in this formation, and that it contains numerous small round- ish groved bodies named Gyrogonites, whicjh appear to be the fruit of a marsh plant of the Chara tribe. This second fresh water formation extends for thirty leagues to the south of Paris, and has also been met with in the department of Cher, Alliere, Nievre, Cantal, Puy de Dome, Tarn, Lot, and Garonne, in the southeast of France, and more lately the same interesting formation has been discovered in the Roman states^ in Tuscany, and ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS, 291 in the vicinity of Ulm, Mayence, Silesia, in Estremadura, near Burgos, and other places in Spain. From the few observations we have made in the course of our enumeration of the formations of Cuvier, it ap- pears that some of his distinctions are unnecessary, and that the whole of the formations may be more satisfac- torily arranged in the following manner : 1 . Chalk. 2. Plastic clay. 3. Limestone. 4. Gypsum. 5. Sandstone. 6. Flint and siliceous limestone. The names salt and fresh water formations being hypothetical, ought to be abandoned, and others expressive of some of the charac- ters of the formation adopted in their stead, ELEVENTH FORMATION. diluvial. This appears also to be a deposite from fresh water. It consists of sand of many different colours, marl, clay, and even of mixtures of the whole three, which is inter- mixed, and coloured brown and black with carbonaceous matter, also of rolled masses of different kinds ; and what particularly characterizes it, large trunks of trees, and bones of elephants, oxen, deer, and other large mamma- lia. Although this formation is new, in comparison* of those we have just described, yet it is of high antiquity in regard to man, as its formation extends to a period not far removed from the earliest periods of our history, when the earth supported vegetables and animals dif- ferent from those that at present live in these or any other countries on the globe. The alluvial substances around Paris occur in two different situations, viz. first, in the present valleys; and, secondly, on the plains. IB valleys they either cover the bottom, and then they con- sist of sand, loam, or peat ; or they form in them wide 292 MINERALOGY OP THE SOUTH OP ENGLAND. Extended plains, which lie high above the present river courses, and then they consist of gravel and sand, it is difficult to distinguish the alluvial mud, situated at a dis- tance from the valleys, from the fresh water formations, and it even, in some places, seems to pass into it. It ap- pears, however, to be older than that of the valleys. GENERAL OBSERVATIONS. The eleven different formations now described are considered by Cuvier and Brongniartto be partly of ma- rine, partly of fresh water origin, these distinctions de- pending on their containing salt or fresh water petrifac- tions. On this principle the formations are viewed as follows : Formation. 1. Chalk. 2. Plastic clay, bed of gypsum. 3 T. Sandstone and sand without shell. 8. Marine sandstone and sand. 9. Millstone without shells. 10. Flint siliceous limestone. Origin. Marine Fresh water. Marine. Not determined. Fresh water. Marine. Fresh water. Marine. j Not determined, Marine. Not determined Fresh water, ALLUVIAL FORMATIONS. 293 The marine formations are conjectured to have been deposited from the waters of the ocean, but the fresh water rocks from the waters of lakes. This hypothesis supposes an alternate flux and reflux of the waters of the ocean, and an appearance and disappearance of the wa- ters of lakes. However amusing such an hypothesis may be, we must confess that it is not consistent with the usual course of nature in the mineral kingdom, and that it is also contradicted by the geognostical relations of the individual formations themselves. In describing a formation, we cannot rest satisfied with the mere enume- ration and description of the organic remains it contains ; these alone will never enable us to characterize it as an unity in the great series of rock formations : in order to determine it with accuracy, we must state the characters of each individual bed, describe the imbedded and veni- genous minerals they contain, the relation of the beds to each other, in regard to position, transition, intermix- tures, &c., and lastly describe the fossil organic remains enclosed in it. But this is not exactly the method follow- ed by M. Cuvier and Brongniart; they seem to consider the fossil organic remains as affording characters of supe- rior importance to all the others; in short, that from them 'alone the principal and gole distinction amongst flpetz for- mations are to be made. Thus the gypsum formation in its lowest part, where it rests on the marine limestone, con- tains fresh water organic remains ; hence it is said to be a fresh water deposite ; the part of the same formation immediately above this contains salt water petrifactions, it is therefore formed from the waters of the ocean ; the thick bed of gypsum in the middle and upper part of the formation, from its containing remains of fresh water shells and of quadrupeds, is another fresh water formation ; ^nd the uppermost part of the formation, the marine marl, from the nature of its organic remains, is maintained to MINERALOGY OP THE SOUTH OP be a deposite from the ocean. But we have only to read Cuvier and Brogniart's description of this set of rockg to be convinced, that all the strata and beds of which it is composed, from the low marl resting on the limestone to that immediately under the marine sandstone, have those mutual relations and agreements observable in every well characterized formation, thus proving that all of them have been formed by the same process and from the same fluid. But in most of these fresh and salt water formations *we find an intermixture of both classes of remains, the fresh water and salt water, a fact which shows the insuf- ficiency of the distinctions attempted to be established. To Cuvier and Brongniart we are indebted for much va- luable information in their description of the country around Paris, but we must protest against the use they have made of fossil organic remains in their geognostical descriptions and investigations. They have too often lost sight of the mineralogical relations of the rocks, and wish to fix the attention of naturalists principally on the organic remains. Thus, in some degree, separating what must always be conjoined when we wish to describe rocks and characterize formations. Several of these new flcetz formations, as already men- tioned, have been discovered in other parts of Europe ; and we may now add, that lately a series of rocks of the same general nature has been observed resting on the chalk formation in the south of England. The newer for- mations in this island were first pointed out, and described by Mr. Webster, in a valuable Memoir in the second volume of the Transactions of the Geological Society. That gentleman is of opinion, that two basins of chalk, filled with the newer formations, occur in the southern ISLE OF WIGHT AND LONDON BASINS. 295 parts of England ; one he names the Isle of Wight Basin, the other the London Basin. 1. Isle of Wight Basin. The southern side of this basin extends from the high- ly inclined chalk at the Culver cliffs, at the east end of the Isle of Wight, to White Nose, in Dorsetshire, five miles west of Lulworth. The north side of it may be traced in that range of hills called the South Downs, ex- tending from Beachy Head, in Sussex, to Dorchester, in Dorsetshire. The strata of which these hills are com- posed, dip generally from 15 to 5 to the south ; the in- clination varying in different places. The south side of the basin, therefore, must have been extremely steep, while the slope of the north side was very gentle. The closing of the basin at the west cannot be distinctly traced ; but the east is now entirely open, the sea passing through it. 2; London Basin. The south side of the basin is formed by a long line of r,halk hills, including those of Kent, Surry, Hampshire, called the North Downs, extending through Basingstock to some distance beyond Highclere Hill, in Berkshire. Its western extremity is much contracted, and seems to lie somewhere in the vicinity of Huagerford. Its north- western side is formed by the chalk hills of Wiltshire, Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire,, and Hertford- shire. The most southern part of this boundary has not yet been well determined. On the east it is open to the sea, the coasts of Essex, Suffolk, and Norfolk, being sec- tions of the strata deposited in it. The dip of the chalk of the North Downs, from Dover to Guilford, is from 15 to 10; but in the narrow ridge of chalk, called the Hog's Back, extending from Guilford to Farnham, the 296 MINERALOGY OF THE SOXJTH OF ENGLAND. dip is very considerable, being about 45. On the dip of the other sides, no observations have hitherto beenmade The depth of the chalk below the surface at London must be very considerable; since, though wells have been sunk several hundred feet, it has never been reached; but at a few miles south of the metropolis, the chalk is fre= quently come to. The formations described by Mr. Webster as lying over the chalk, and in these basins in the south of Eng- land, are the following : 1. The lowest marine formation over the chalk, inclu- ding the plastic clay, and sand, together with a particular clay, named the London Clay. 2. The lower fresh water formation, which rests im- mediately on the preceding formation. 3. The upper marine formation. 4. The upper fresh water formation* 5. Alluvium. Chalk Formation. The chalk which forms the sides and bottom of the basins, occurs distinctly stratified, and the strata vary in thickness from a few inches to several feet. The whole formation may be considered as com- posed of three great stratified beds, the undermost of which is named chalk marl ; the second hard chalk, with- out flint ; the third or uppermost, soft chalk, with flint. The chalk marl varies in colour, being gray, yellowish, brown : it is softer than true chalk, and on exposure to the weather it rapidly disintegrates. It contains cotem- poraneous nodules, and also beds of a more indurated marl, named gray chalk, from its dark colour. Like all argillaceous limestones, it possesses, in a considerable de- gree, the property of setting under water, when calcined LONDON BASIN. 297 and made into mortar. It contains the following petri- factions, viz. ammonites, scaphites, turrellites, trochites, and madreporites. The middle bed, the hard chalky is in general harder than the bed above it, although Mr. Webster remarks, that it appears from some observations he made in Dorsetshire, that the hardness does not al- ways mark a particular bed, the flint chalk being in some places much harder than that without flints in others. It contains a greater variety of petrifactions than the chalk marl, as appears from the following list of the genera ob- served by Mr. Webster. Several echini of the same fami- lies as those met with in the chalk with flint ; but many of them, particularly the cassides, differing much in their forms from those found in that bed. Spines of echini ; and particularly those described by Brard as resembling the Belemnites. Patellites. Trochites. Serpulites, several species. Belemnites. Lima? Fish, too much mutilated to ascertain the genus. Palates, scales, verte- brae, and teeth of fish. Cancri. The upper bed, the soft chalk with flints, forms the upper part of the formation, and is distinguished from the preceding by its softness, and always containing flints. It also differs from it in the petrifactions it contains, of which the following are enumerated by Mr. Webster. Asterise. Echini of seve- ral families. Spines of the foregoing, resembling belem- nites. Serpulites. Cardium. Spondylus. Ostrea, several species. Pecten, several species. Chama ? Terebretula, many species. Alcyonia, sponges, and numerous un- known zoophytes. A ramose madrepore. Several spe- cies of minute encrini, figured by Mr. Parkinson. 1 . Lower Marine Formation. This formation is separated into two great divisions, 1. Sand and plastic clay. 2. London clay. 38 208 MINERALOGY OF THE SOUTH OP ENGLAND. 1. Sand and Plastic Clay. Of these two minerals the sand is the most extensive and continuous, and the clay occurs filling up basins and hollows in it. The clay va- ries in colour, being white, gray, yellowish-brown, and red. The white and gray varieties are potters' clay. It sometimes contains beds of brown coal, from one foot to three feet thick ; and beds of ironstone, and ferruginous sand, occur connected with it, and generally lying over it. 2. London or Blue Clay. The bed which has received this name, is found immediately under the gravelly soil on which London is situated. Of all the strata over the chalk in the south of England, it is of the greatest extent and thickness ; and the number, beauty, and variety of the petrifactions which it contains, render it the most in- teresting, and the most easily distinguishable. It consists generally of a blackish clay, sometimes very tough, and occasionally mixed with green earth and sand, or with calcarious matter. It contains also numerous flat sphe- roidal cotemporaneous nodules of hard marl, or clayey limestone, which lie in regular horizontal layers, at une- qual distances, generally from four to forty feet apart. These nodules are well known by the name of Ludus Helmontii, or Septaria, from their being divided across by partitions or veins of calcarious spar, which are ge- nerally double. In their cavities are frequently found crys- tals of calcarious spar, and of heavy spar. The septaria are surrounded by crusts which contain a smaller propor- tion of carbonate of lime than the central part. They of- ten contain organic remains. Besides the clay, marl, sand, and carbonate of lime, of which the main body of this bed consists, several other substances are dispersed through it in smaller quantities. LOWER MARINE FORMATION. 299 Of these the chief is iron pyrites, which is frequently the mineralizing matter both of the vegetable and animal re- mains included in the blue clay. Selenite is also very abundant ; and sulphat of iron sometimes effloresces, when the clay is exposed to the air, from the decomposition of the pyrites contained in it. .Phosphat of iron is also some- times found; and it abounds in Epsom salt, and in fossil organic remains. In some places, as at Bognor, it assumes a new charac- ter; instead of a blue clay, we find a number of rocks now appearing as detached masses in the sea, though evidently forming portions of a stratum once continuous. The lowest part of these rocks is a dark gray limestone, or perhaps rather a sandstone, containing much calcari- ous matter, enclosing many organic remains belonging to the blue clay. The upper part is siliceous sandstone. This clay abounds in petrifactions, and of those the fol- lowing copious list isgiveH in Mr. Webster's paper: Organic Remains in the Lower Marine Formation above the Chalk in England. NAMES GIVEN BY LAMARCK- LINN^AN NAMES. Astroitae. Astroitas. Calyptrea trochiformis. Trochus apertus. Brander. Conus. Conus. Cyprea pediculus. Cyprea pediculus. Terebellum convolutum. Bulla sopita. Brander. OHva. Voluta. Voluta spinosa. Strombus spinosus. rnusicalis. luctator. bicorona. ambiguus. crenulata. Murex suspensus, 300 MINERALOGY OP THE SOUTH OP ENGLAND. NAMES GIVEN BY LAMARCK. Buccinum undatum. Harpa. Cassis carinata. Rostellaria macroptera. Marex tripterus. tricarinatus. tubifer. Fusus longaevus. Murex clavellatus. rugosus. Pyrula nexilis. Pleurotoma ? Cerithium gigantum* Cerithium, another variety, but too mutilated to as- certain the species. Trochus agglutinans. monilifer. Solarium caniculatum. or Delphiriula ? Turritelia terebellatta. imbricatoria. multisulcata. Ampullaria patula. Dentalium elephantinum. entails, dentalis. straitulum. Serpula. Nautilus imperialis. pompilius. LINNJEAN NAMES. Buccinum nodosum. Brando Strombus amplus. Murex tripterus. asper. pungens. contrarius. whirls the right way. longaevus. Murex deformis. porrectus. nexilis. Murex. Murex. Trochus umbiiicaris.Brand. nodulosus. r Turbo, tab. 1. fig. 7& 8. ) Brander. ( Turbo, tab. 1. fig. ?. Brand. Turbo terebra. editus. vagus. Helix niutabilis. Dentalium elephantium. entalis. dentalis. straitulum. Serpula. LOWER MARINE FORMATION. 301 NAMES GIVEN BY LAMARCK. Nautilus centrah's. Lenticulina rotulata. Nummulites laevigata. Pinna, 2 species. Mytilus raodiola. Pectunculus pulvinatus. Cardiuin porulosum. asperulum. obliquurn. Crassatellata lamellosa. Venericardia planicosta. Capso rugosa. Chama lamellosa. calcarata. sulcata. Ostrea edulis. Pyrus bulbiformis. Caryophillia. Teredo navalis. Jaw of a crocodile. Testudo, or Turtle. Various Fish, but too muti- lated to ascertain the spe- cies. Fish teeth, supposed by some to belong to the shark. Molar teeth of fish, called Bufonites. Palatum Scopuli, and other palates of fish. Tongue of a fish of the ge- nus Raia. T.INNJEAN NAMES. Pinna. Mytilus. Area glycejneris. noae. Cardium porulosum, asperulum. obliquum. Tellina sulcata. Venus deflorata. Chama squamosa. Ostrea edulis. Turbinated madrepores. Teredo navalis. 302 MINERALOGY OF THE SOUTH OP ENGLAND. NAMES GIVEN BY LAMARCK. LINNJEAN NAMES. Tail of the Sting Ray. Scales of fish. Vertebrae of various species of fish. Cancer, above 20 species of crabs. Gammarus, or lob- ster. Crangon, or prawn. Wood, often pierced by the Terredo navalis, and filled with pyrites or calcarious spar. Fruits, branches, excrescen- ces, ligneous seed vessels, and berries impregnated with pyrites. These fossil remains very nearly resemble those found in the lower marine formation in the basin of Paris, a point of agreement of great importance, as it leads us to the probable inference, that the lower marine formation of the south of England belongs to the same deposite. This inference is strengthened, when we compare toge- ther the minerals of the different beds in the English and French formations. Thus the plastic clay in the Paris basin agrees in most of its external characters with that found in the Isle of Wight and London basins; and further, both agree iri the purer clays being destitute of organic remains, whilst the upper contains fossil cythera and turritellas. A spe- cies of coal also occurs in the lower strata of the Paris LOWER FRESH WATER FORMATION- 303 basin, and appears to be analogous to that found in a si- milar situation in the Isle of Wight basin ; and the French sands agree in characters with those found in the Isle of Wight basin. In the English basins there occur but few rocks that can be identified with the coarse marine limestone of the Paris basin. The rocks of Bognor appear to be the most easily referable to some of the beds of the coarse lime- stone of France; yet, in the Paris formation, there is no single rock possessing the same external characters as those exhibited by the London clay. But the London clay contains the same petrifactions as the coarse lime- stone; and if we could suppose a blending or mixture between the French plastic clay, which is blackish, and contains organic bodies, and the lower beds of the coarse limestone with its green earth and petrifactions, we should have a compound agreeing sufficiently near with the London clay under all its varieties; with this difference, that that of the French basin would have a greater pro- portion of the calcarious, and of ours of argillaceous matter. But with respect to the upper beds of the coarse limestone of France, no strata have as yet been disco- vered in England that correspond to them.* 2. Lower Fresh Water Formation. It consists of a series of beds of sandy, calcarious, and argillaceous marls. Some of them appear to consist al- most wholly of the fragments of fresh water shells, viz. lymenus, planorbis, cyclostoma, and others resembling helices, and mytuli. In its lower part it alternates with beds containing marine remains. This formation occurs in the Isle of Wight, but not in the London basin. * Webster's Geological Transactions, vol. ii. p 209, 304 MINERALOGY OF THE SOUTH OP ENGLAND. According to Mr. Webster, it is in this formation, in the Paris basin, that the gypsum beds are situated. 3. Upper Marine Formation. Over the lower fresh water formation in the Isle of Wight, a stratum occurs, consisting of clay and marl, which contains a vast number of fossil shells wholly ma- rine. Ten of the species agree with those found in the London clay, but they differ from them in their state of preservation. Most of them appear to have undergone but little change, and some of the species are even scarcely to be distinguished from recent shells. Delicate marine shells, in a state of perfect preserva- tion, occur in some parts ; thus showing that they could not have been brought from great distances, but must have lived near to the spots where they are now found. In other beds we meet with banks of large fossil oyster shells, the greater part of which are locked into each other in the way in which they usually live, and many have their valves united. It is therefore evident, that these oysters had not been removed from a distance to their present situation. If we depend upon petrifactions as one of the means of enabling us to discriminate the different floetz strata, we shall see reason to believe, that the last of the marine de- positions in the south of England are nearly allied to the upper marine formation in the basin of Paris. In this bed in the Isle of Wight, Mr. Webster found the following petrifactions : UPPER MARINE FORMATION* 305 LINN^AN NAMES, Murices. Venus. Venus. Voluta. Voluta. Helices. NAMES GIVEN BY LAMARCK^ Cerithium plicatura. lapidura. mutabile. semicoronatum. cinctum* turritellatunii tricarinatum. Cyclas deltoidea. Cytherea scutellaria. Ancilla buccinoides. subulata. Ampullaria spirita. depressa? Murex reticulatus. Bivalve, apparently of the genus Erycina. Helicina? Murex nodularius. Melania ? Natica Canrena. Ostrea, approaching to del- toidea. specific characters not evident, but different from the last. In the same formations at Harwich, in Essex, the fol- lowing petrifactions occur: NAMES GIVEN BY LAMARCK, Patella spirorostris, LINN JEAN NAM1S Patella ungaria. lasvis* fusca. 39 306 MINERALOGY OF THE SOUTH OF ENGLAND, NAMES GIVEN BY LAMARCK. Fissurella labiata. emarginula. Calyptrea sinensis. Eburna glabatra. iLINN-EAHf NAMES, fissura. Patella sinensis. Buccinum glabratum, Murex corneiis* erinaceus. contrarius. Trochus sulcatus. alligatus. Area senilis. Venus galina. Solen siliqua. Ostrea deformis. Ampullaria rugosa. Natica canrena. glaucina. Mactra. Venericardia senilis. Lucina. PhoJas crispata. Pecten plebeius. infirmatus. Balanus. Some of these, however, may belong to the lower marine clay. Mr. Webster appears to consider the Bagshot sand, which extends over a considerable tract of country in Surrey, and the blocks of granular quartz, named gray weathers, met with in Berkshire and Wiltshire, as mem- bers of this formation, and somewhat allied to the sand and sandstone of the upper marine formation in the Paris basin. UPPER FRESH WATER FORMATION. 307 4. Upper Fresh Water Formation. This formation also occurs in the Isle of Wight, in the hill of Headen, where it rests immediately on the last mentioned, or upper marine formation. It is an ex- tensive calcarious bed, fifty-five feet in thickness, every part of which contains fresh water shells in great abun- dance, without any admixture whatever of marine or- ganic remains. The marl is soft, and easily affected by the weather, but includes a harder variety, which is so durable as to be employed as a building stone. Many of the shells found in this bed are quite entire, and these are intermixed with numerous fragments of the same species. They consist, like the lower fresh water for- mation, of several kinds of lymnei, helices, and planor- bes ; and from the perfect state of preservation in which they are found, appear to have lived in the places where they now are, the shells of these animals being so friable, that they could not have admitted of removal from their native situations without being broken. Over this bed is another of clay, eleven feet in thick- ness, containing numerous fragments of a small non-de- script bivalve shell. Upon this lies another bed of yel- low clay without shells, and then a bed of friable calca- rious sandstone, also without shells. To this sandstone succeed other calcarious strata, containing a few fresh water shells. In these are parts of extreme compactness, and other parts contain masses of a loose chalky matter, ?Tiost of which are of a round form; and among these also are many beds of a calcarious matter, extremely dense, and much resembling those incrustations that have been formed by deposition from water on the walls of ancient buildings in Italy. Through all these last strata are veins, ^frequently several inches in thickness, of ra- 308 MINERALOGY OF THE SOUTH OP ENGLAND. diated calcarious spar. It contains the following fossil shells: Planorbis, much resembling that which Brongniart says approaches to P. cornu. Planorbis, two other species. Planorbis, much resembling P. prevostinus. Ampullaria. Cyclostoma. Limneus longiscatus. acuminatus. corneus. Gyrogonites is the petrified seed of a species of chara* This formation is the latest of the flcetz rocks hitherto observed in this island, and it agrees nearly with its cor- responding formation in the Paris basin, with this differ- ence, however, that it contains no siliceous beds. 5. Alluvial Formations. The floetz rocks already described, are in many places covered with various alluvial deposites. In the Isle of Wight and London basins, the alluvium, besides the vegetable earth, clays, marls and sands, pontains a vast quantity of rounded quartpse pebbles, of various kinds and sizes, which are irregularly distributed, in some places forming thick beds, mixed with clay, sand, and small fragments of flints; in others are mixed with shells of various kinds, and sometimes almost without any other substance. This compound is named Flint Gravel.^ * Some of these pebbles are evidently fragments of the flint origin- ally belonging to the chalk formation ; but other varieties are of calce- dony and hornstone. Another remarkable class of siliceous pebbles is ALLUVfAL FORMATIONS. 309 The alluvial deposites in the south of England also contain fossil bones of quadrupeds; and these, according to Mr. Webster, are of different dates. * The most an- cient are entirely petrified, and where found in gravel, are conjectured to have been washed out of the strata in which they were originally imbedded. Of this kind are probably remains of the mastodon, mentioned by Mr. Parkinson. The next class contains the bones of the elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and the Irish elk, which are frequently accompanied with marl, and fresh water shells. They are, however, not petrified ; and though generally in a state of decay, yet are sometimes quite perfect. They are particularly abundant in Suffolk and Norfolk, but have also been found at Brentford, in found either mixed with the flints, calcedonies, and hornstones, or alone, or cemented into a pudding stone. These, according to Mr. Webster, appear to have been originally formed of concentric coats or layers of different colours, which vary in almost every specimen. The colours are for the most part yellow, brown, red, bluish, black, gray, and white ; but these run into each other by an infinite number of shades. Others are spotted, or clouded with different tints, and have much the appearance of Egyptian pebbles. They take an ex- cellent polish, and are then often extremely beautiful. These last ap- pear rather more to resemble agates than chalk flints. They are never found of large size, seldom exceeding two inches in diameter, and ge- nerally are not more than one inch. They are of an oval or flattened form, which appears to have been their original figure, although they have evidently been subjected to a certain degree of attrition. The well known pudding stone of Hertfordshire is composed of these con- centric pebbles, imbedded in a basis of granular quartz. These con- centric pebbles, like the imbedded masses of flint in chalk, of agate in trap, and of felspar in porphyry, are to be viewed as having been formed at the same time with the rock in which they were formerly included. * It is still uncertain whether or not all the substances named allu- Fial, are strictly of this nature. The geognostic relations of many al- luvial alleged Deposites are still but imperfectly known. 310 MINERALOGY OF THE SOUTH OP ENGLAND. the Isle of Sheppey, and several other places. Other bones of ruminating animals, as those of the horse, ox, and stag, not different from the living species, are fre- quently dug up at small depths, and are covered by peat, gravel, loam, &c. Similar organic remains occur in the alluvial strata, over the new floetz rocks around Paris. The following tabular view of the upper formations in the southeast of England, will convey to the reader a distinct conception of the new formations just enume- rated, and also of several of those immediately below them.* 1. Alluvial. The debris of previously existing strata, formed either by the present existing causes, or by others that have acted at an early period. The substances are principally water- worn fragments of flints, mixed with sand and clay in various proportions. 2. Upper Fresh Water Formation. This, in the Isle of Wight, consists of a limestone containing numerous imbedded fresh water shells. It agrees in several of its characters with the correspond- ing formation in the basin of Paris, and other parts of the continent of Europe. Traces of a fresh water forma- tion are also to be observed in the London basin, be- tween the alluvium and the London clay, consisting of marl with fresh water shells, and containing also nume- rous bones of land animals, as the elephant, hippopota- mus, buffalo, elk, ox, &c. These have been chiefly found at Sheppey, Brentford, Essex, Suffolk, and Nor- * See Webster, in Sir H. Englefield's interesting and valuable work on the Isle of Wight. FORMATIONS ABOVE CHALK. 311 folk. In other places, as at Sheppey, Erasworth in Sus- sex, &c. vast quantities of the fruits of tropical countries have been found in a corresponding situation. 3. Upper Marine Formation. This bed consists of bluish or greenish marl and clay, containing a great number of fossil marine shells, which, in general, are different from those found in the London clay. It is known in this country, with certainty, only in the Isle of Wight; 4. Lower Fresh Water Formation. This formation is ascertained in the Isle of Wight. It is placed under the last, and consists of clay, marl, and sand, with vegetable matter resembling an imper- fect coal, or peat, and contains numerous fragments of fresh water shells. At the bottom is formed a mixture of marine with fresh water shells. As the alternation of marine with fresh water strata has not been observed in any other part of this country, except the Isle of Wight, the traces of a fresh water formation in the London ba- sin cannot perhaps be referred to this. 5. Sand without Shells. In the Isle of Wight this sand is extremely pure ; it is dug at Alum Bay, and is used for making the best glass. The Bagshot Sand, perhaps, belongs to this ; and possi- bly the Gray weathers ; but the position of these has not yet been accurately determined. 6. London Clay. This is the blue clay of London, Highgate, Sheppey, Portsmouth, Stubbington, Hordwell, Southend, Harwich, &c. It is distinguished by its septaria, and its beautiful and numerous organic remains. In Alum Bay it is the 312 MINERALOGY OF THE SOUTH OF ENGLAND. most northerly of the vertical strata. Bognor rocks are subordinate to this bed. It agrees in its petrifactions, and geognostic situation, with the lower beds of the coarse marine limestone of the Paris basin. T. Plastic Clay and Sand. The clay in this formation is often extremely pure, and fit for the potter. It is much employed in the pot- teries in Staffordshire. It is seen in Alum Bay, the trough of Poole, and at the bottom of the blue clay in many parts of the London basin. A kind of bituminous wood is sometimes found in it. This formation is con- jectured to correspond to the French plastic clay, which lies over the chalk. 8. Chalk with Flints; This formation is not known in Scotland, but in Eng- land extends from Flamborough Head, in Yorkshire, to a little beyond Lyme Regis to Devonshire ; and where it is not covered with the newer floetz rocks, forms the chalk-hills or downs. It is distinguished by the regular layers of flint nodules. 9. Chalk without Flints. The inferior stratum of chalk in the southeast part of England is always without flints ; when the chalk with flints is wanting, it forms the surface. The relations of both may be seen at the Culver, and Compton Bay, in the Isle of Wight, Handfast Point, Beachy-head, Guil- ford, Dorking, &c. It differs from the former princi- pally in the absence of flints, in the beds being thicker, and the chalk being sometimes a little harder. 10. Chalk Marl. This stratum consists of chalk and an intimate mixture FORMATIONS BELOW CHALK. 313 it is always found below the two last strata. Jt may be readily distinguished from chalk by its falling in pieces on being wetted and dried again. Some va- rieties of it, when burnt, form an excellent cement for building ; it is also a valuable manure, 1 1 . Green Sandstone, This formation consists of siliceous earth united by salcarious matter; and contains also mica and green earth. From the variety in the proportion of the latter ingredient, it is by some divided into the green sand and gray sand, a distinction which cannot always be made, since these alternate and pass into each other. It is found in the wealds of Kent and Sussex, at the foot of the chalk downs ; and is dug at Rygate and Measham for freestone. It is seen also at Folkstone, Beachy-head, the Culver and Compton Bay, in the Isle of Wight, Pew- sey, in Wiltshire, &c. Alternating with it are often beds of limestone, as a JMaidstone, in Kent, where they are called Kentish Rag; also in the Undercliff, Isle of Wight, beds of hornstone occur in it. It abounds in or- ganic remains. 12. Blue Marl. This bed may be seen under the former very distinctly in the Isle of Wight; as at Sandown Bay, many parts of the Undercliff, Niton, and Compton, Jt contains very few petrifactions. 13. Ferruginous Sand. This formation consists of an alternation of quartzy sandstone, clay, and limestone. The sandstone contains always more or less oxide of iron, sometimes in such quantity, as in the wealds of Kent and Sussex, that it was formerly employed as an ore of iron. The clay tracts of 40 314 MINERALOGY OP THE SOUTH OF ENGLAND. / the wealds belong to it. This formation may be also seen at Sandown Bay, Blackgang, and Compton Chines, Swan- wich Bay, Hastings, Tunb ridge Wells, &c. Fossil shells are rarely found in it ; but brown coal is met with fre- quently. 14. Purbeck Shell Limestone. This formation consists of numerous beds of shells and fragments of shells, cemented together by calcarious spar, and alternating with shell and marl. The Purbeck, and perhaps the Petworth marbles, form part of the se- ries ; and it is further remarkable for containing nume- rous fresh water shells and bones of the turtle ; hence it is conjectured to have been formed from fresh water. 15. Clay with Gypsum. At Swanwich, in Dorsetshire, this is dug under the shell limestone. The gypsum does not occur in great quanti- ty, but is employed for plaister. 16. Portland Oolite. This includes the stone of Tillywhim and Windspit quarries in the Isle of Wight, called Purbeck Portland, and that from Portland Island. It is entirely calcarious, and is formed of small grains or concretions adhering together. It is the only stone used for the fronts of pub^ lie buildings in London. Some of its beds contain many marine shells ; also fossil wood and hornstone. 1 7. Bituminous Shale, containing the Kimmeridge Coal. This formation may be seen at Kimmeridge, Encombe, and the Isle of Portland. The discoveries of Cuvier, Brongniart, and Webster, of which we kave now given a pretty full account, have FORMATIONS BELOW CHALK, 315 added a most interesting and curious set of rocks to the geognostic system. They have connected, more nearly than heretofore, the alluvial with the ficetz formations, and have thus rendered more complete the series of rocks which extends from granite to gravel. Not the least in- teresting of the consequences resulting from the discove- ries of these Naturalists, is the extension they give to our views in regard to the former nature of the animal world, and of the changes it has experienced during the different periods of the earth's formation. THE following extract of a letter addressed to me by Mr. Marsden, the author of the well known and ex- ceilent Account of Summatra, ought to have been in- serted in another part of the work, but was until thi* moment mislaid* " In your instructive Notes to the Translation of M Cuvier's Essay on the Theory of the Earth, you observe, that I appear to have misunderstood that able naturalist, when I say that he accuses me of confounding the hip- popotamus with the dugong. You will not, I am per- suaded, think me unreasonably pertinacious, when I take the liberty of pointing out to you the passage in M. Cuvier's writings that drew from me the remark (in the last edition of the Summatra) which you have done me the honour of quoting, and which you will find to be quite distinct from that where he supposes that I may have confounded with the former the succotyro of Niew- hoff. This supposition, indeed, I should not have thought of controverting, as the animals, if not in fact the same, have a general resemblance to each other, and I do not myself make pretension to any critical know- ledge in zoology ; but with respect to the dugong (or duyong) the matter was different, and it became neces- sary to vindicate myself from the charge of so palpable a mistake* *f*. " Le nom de vache marine (says M. Cuvier, Annales du Museum d'Histoire Naturelle. Tome treizieme. Sur EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM MR. MARSDEN. POsteologie du Lamantin, par G. Cuvier. p. 302.) ayant ete donne par les Hollanders et par quelques autres peu* pies, a Phippopotame, aussi bien qu'au dugong, certains voyageurs, trompes par cette homonyme, ont place des hippopotames dans quelques pays ou ils avoient entendu dire qu'il y avoient des vaches marines, tandis qu'on ne vouloit leur parler que de dugongs. J'ai une preuve re* cente de ce meprise. Un voyageur tres-instruit me soutenoit avoir apporte des dents d'hippopotames des Molluques; quand il me les montra, je vis que c'etoient des dents de dugong; et je suis maintenant fort porte a croire que c'est de cette maniere que Marsden aura crtt pouvoir donner des hippopotames a Tile de Sumatra." I certainly was guilty of an omission in referring my readers only to one of the passages in M. Cuvier's writ- ings in which my name was introduced, and not to that which would have been the most to my purpose. With regard to the consistency of the two, I shall only say that there appears something like a desire of supporting an hypothesis at any rate. " Perhaps in a future edition of your Book (which will, I have not a doubt, be immediately called for) you may think it right to notice briefly, that I had stronger grounds for my remark than were at first apparent, and that I had not misunderstood the particular passage to which it had reference. At all events, I feel a satisfac* tion in setting myself right, as I trust I do> in your opi- nion, as well as in the opportunity it gives me of sub* scribing myself, with much esteem, Dear Sir, Your faithful Humble Servant, W, MARSDEN.'* OBSERVATIONS ON THE GEOLOGY OF NORTH AMERICA; ILLUSTRATED BY THE DESCRIPTION OF VARIOUS ORGANIC REMAINS FOUND IN THAT PART OF THE WORLD. BY SAMUEL L. MITCHILL, Botan. Mineral. etZoolog. in Univers. Nov. Eborac. Prof. &c, &c. INTRODUCTION. THE spirited disposition repeatedly manifested by the publishers, has induced me to furnish an article for their New- York impression of Professor Jameson's edition of the Chevalier Cuvier's Theory of the Earth. A work composed under peculiar advantages by a happy genius in France, comes to us, recommended and improved by the talents of a leading naturalist in Scotland. I should be proud to accompany those illustrious men on a tour through the United States. For myself, it becomes to state some of the opportuni- ties, which have prepared me for so serious an under- taking. While I resided in Paris, I endeavoured to acquire as much information as possible from the admirable institu- tions there. But, the present constellation of science, had not then risen. During several visits to London I became an industri- ous visiter to the museums, libraries, galleries, and even 41 322 INTRODUCTION. the environs of the city. The rapid and increasing march of knowledge, since I was there, has outdone all former example. My continuance in Edinburgh, enabled me to study under able masters. My tours around that great seat of learning-, and an excursion to the mountains, rendered me more than an admirer of natural scenes in perspective. I was taughf to penetrate beyond the surface, and to con- ceive something of geognostic formation. Now, how* ever, the light of science shines wider, and deeper, and brighter ; and enables her favourite labourers, more than ever, to share the benefit of its rays. On my return to North America, I found my fellow citi- zens of New-York occupied in a negotiation with the Five Indian Nations, for the purchase of their land, situ- ated to the westward of Fort Schuyler, and extending away to Lakes Ontario and Erie. I became convinced, on attending that important treaty in 1T88, that a proper acquaintance with the productions within its limits and along its confines would add most important materials to natural history. After all that the travellers and ob- servers had done, from Father Hennepin to John Bartram and Lewis Evans, there appeared to be a boundless field for investigation. I had an opportunity to make further observations when, in 1796, 1 performed an excursion at the request of the So- ciety for the Promotion of Agriculture, Arts and Manu- factures> for the purpose of exploring the region near the banks of the Hudson river and its tributary streams, for minerals. I made a report on the several tracts of coun- try I had visited. These I divided into, 1. the Graniti. cal ; 2. The Shistic; 3. The Sand-stone; 4. The Lime- INTRODUCTION. 323 stone, and 5. The Alluvial. This was published in the Transactions of that excellent Society, and in the first and third volumes of the Medical Repository. Mr. Vol- ney, who has written the best account of the mountainous chains and atmospheric currents in the United States, did me the honour to quote my performance with respect. Since that time, tours to Lower Canada and Quebec, to Niagara and the adjacent part of Upper Canada, and to Virginia, have contributed to increase my knowledge ; as have also several journeys by land and a voyage by water, to explore Long-Island and the rocks, islands and shoals in its vicinity. My information too has been ex- ceedingly increased by the intercourse with sensible men, and by the acquisition of fossil specimens. On a survey of the whole ground, it appeared to me there was room for a geological classification in a four- fold order ; thus, 1 . The most ancient foundation of the globe. 2. The depositions from inland seas or reservoirs of salt water. 3. The depositions from fresh water. 4. Modern depositions from the briny ocean. During this period, individuals in several places began to form mineral collections, and to travel for the sake of procuring information and specimens. In a particular manner, William Maclure, Esq. took a broad survey of the Fredonian States, and deline- ated upon a chart the several geological regions ac- cording to the system of Professor Werner. He com- posed a memoir, in explanation of his map, which is 324 INTRODUCTION. rich in original and scientific intelligence. This per- formance is the more valuable, inasmuch as the able and discerning author went extensively over the coun- try and examined its geognostic condition with his own eyes. He had the satisfaction of seeing them publish - ed in the Transactions of the American Philosophical Society. He afterwards laid them before the learned world, in French at Paris. And he has, very lately, publish- ed a new and improved edition in the United States. I agree with that gentleman (p. 26.) in his Observations on the Geology of the United States, &c. that "the shells and other remains of organized matter, have not been examined with that accuracy necessary to form just con- clusions. The notice he takes of such reliquiae in p. 27. 54, 55, and other parts of his work, show the importance he attaches to them. Among the early promoters of mineralogical inquiry, Archibald Bruce, M. D. deserves to be remembered. The four numbers of his Mineralogical Journal, contain so much new and interesting matter, that a sentiment of universal regret prevails on account of its discontinuance. His lectures and his museum prove his successful exer- tions. Mineralogy owes much to the enterprising spirit of Col. George Gibbs. By a happy concurrence of fortune with inclination, this gentleman has enriched his country with extensive and splendid collections from transatlan- tic countries. While New-Haven extols his munificence, his friends in New- York have received his promise that something worthy of himself arid of the science, should be done for their institution. His example has gained him fame and followers. It is charming to observe in tfee young gentlemen who have studied at Yale College, INTRODUCTION. I the intellectual heat and light which, like the collision of flint and steel, his grand cabinet has excited in their minds. Professor Cleaveland has done a full proportion toward the advancement of mineralogical and geological science. His late publication is a manual of instruction for all who are disposed to learn. In the compilation, he has descri- bed the modern method as it ought to be ; he has been liberal to his cotemporaries, and just to his country. Much commendation is due to John G. Bogert, Esq, who has evinced a most commendable and successful zeal both in the collection of specimens, and in the gene- rous use he makes of them. He deserves to be ranked among the first friends and ablest promoters of this kind of knowledge. His Excellency Dewitt Clinton has contributed greatly toward the promotion of this as well as other sciences. A lover alike of sound learning and of those who excel in it, he has proved himself both an admirer and a proficient, By exertions of his own and of the meritorious men be has patronized, he has accumulated a body of important facts and intelligence. He has proved himself as capable of philosophizing as of collecting. By the brightness of his lamp, his neighbour sees no less comfortably than himself. Many gentlemen might bq mentioned, for the aid they have afforded to this branch of science, such as Schaef- fer, Steinhauer, Haines, Griscom, Akerly, Silliman, Coo- per, Beck, Conrad, Low, Seybert, Mease, Godon, We- therall, Collins, Nuttal, Bradbury, and more than I can enumerate at this time. Suffice it, to observe, that with- 326 INTRODUCTION. in a few years, the attention of our citizens has been turn- ed to the pursuit of geology and mineralogy with an inte- rest and success never known before. It is in consequence of the information brought home by tourists and travellers, and that which I have collected during many trips and excursions of my own, that I was enabled to com- pose a memoir on the organic remains of the region around New-York, and read the same to the Literary and Philosophical Society. In that paper I described up- wards of twenty animals which I presumed to be extinct, because there were no living vestiges of them known. Many new facts have been disclosed since that time. I am satisfied that New-York is as important a centre of geological productions and occurrences, as London, Pa- ris, or Rome. Under this persuasion, I have consented to add a brief memorandum concerning American fos- sils, and some of the geognostic features of those dis- tricts where they lie. It may serve as an outline of the great work, now just begun, and perhaps as a direction to the inquiries of those who shall engage in these or simi- lar investigations. GEOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS, The Original Saltness of the North American Lakes. THE remains of marine animals in the soil and rocks ad- jacent to the lakes, may be cited as proofs that the ocean once filled the basins of the latter and covered the surface of the former. Lithophytous and testaceous relicks are so plain and numerous, that it is impossible to resist the evidence. Organic remains abound in the greater part of the distance from lake Erie through the counties of Ni- agara, Genesee, Ontario, Seneca, Cayuga, and Onondaga. They exist plentifully too in the counties of Lewis, Jef- ferson, St. Lawrence, Madison, Essex, Oneida, Montgo- mery, Washington, Chenango, and various others. At the remarkable sulphureous spring in the town of Phelps, eleven miles northwest of Geneva, they appear like corallines arid madrepores. On both sides of the Ge- nesee and Tonewanto rivers, they resemble marine shells. While on the east and west banks of Niagara river, they assume, in addition to the already enumerated forms, those that have erroneously been called petrified wasps' nests and honey-combs. They are hereabout mostly bedded in fetid limestone. Sometimes they are blended with 328 ORIGINAL SALTNESS OF pyrites. In others they are penetrated by the petroleum called Seneca-oil. On viewing these productions, the mind endeavours to fix that unascertained time when the oceanic water of the primitive globe rolled over this region ; how the dams and barriers which restrained the floods gave way and laid bare the land ; and wherefore the receptacles of water were shrunk and narrowed to their present size. The saline waters were thus collected into lakes, and pools, diversifying the interior regions of this continent with a remarkable mixture of land and water. It may be rationally concluded that the internal seas, now called lakes, were originally filled with salt wa- ter. Their present freshness is the consequence of the dilution they have gradually undergone, changing them from briny to fresh water. To understand this subject, let Ontario, Erie, Huron, Michigan, and their dependencies, with the upper lakes, be compared with the collections of salt water in the other parts of the world. The Caspian is naturally salt, and retains that quality because there is no outlet. The waters it receives by the rivers and rains are so nearly balanced by that which goes off by evaporation, that this grand reservoir has never burst its boundary. The like observation applies to the Dead Sea in Syria. The exhalation from its surface seems to be supplied from the influx of the Jordan ; and there has been no sufficient accumulation to force a passage out. THE NORTH AMERICAN LAKES. 329 The Mexican lakes present a case which strongly cor- roborates this doctrine. Of the two lakes which impart health and convenience to the city of Mexico, the upper one is fresh, the lowe r salt. This salt is not a muriate, but a carbonate of soda, like that in the nitrian ponds of Egypt. The two streams which feed the upper lake, have changed both the mass and character of the water. The salt has been washed out, and carried down to the lower lake. There it stagnates, until it escapes, by evaporation, or through the expensive aqueducts constructed by the go- vernment. The rise of the water in the lower basin fre- quently overflows an extensive surface of lowland, and sometimes inundates the contiguous part of the city. When it dries up and leaves bare the surface, an alkali is often left, which the inhabitants gather and sell to ma- nufacturers of soap. The Mediterranean has a communication with the At- lantic, and its saftness is supported by the great supplies it receives through the Herculean straits near Gibraltar, The same remark may be made concerning the Black Sea, or Euxine. It seems to be now understood, particu- larly since the publication of Mr. Ingigian's History of the Thracian Bosphorus, that the level of the Marmora and the Euxine is so nearly the same, that the current some* times runs through the canal of Constantinople, as some call it, northeastwardly to replenish the Euxine, and then again, southwestwardly to evacuate it. When, therefore, the supplies from the Danube, the Dnieper, the Dniester, the Don, the Kuban, the Phasis, and other streams, fail to raise the Euxine high enough to force into the Mar- mora and the .Egean, there is still water, both heights being the same. If the Black Sea heightens from new accessions of water, the outward current runs. But 42 330 ORIGINAL SALTNESS OP whenever the Mediterranean becomes more elevated, or the jEgean or Marmora seas are higher than the Euxine, the current proceeds the other way, and a flood of salt water pours into the Euxine, until 4he level is restored. This flux and reflux, this current and counter-current, explains a fact mentioned by the elaborate Le Sage, that the Euxine is not so saline as the ocean ; though, as Pro- fessor Clarke relates, briny enough at the Crimea, to ena- ble salt to be manufactured. Thus the Euxine receives salt water from the Mediterranean as occasion may re- quire. In theorizing upon its saltness, it may be con- sidered as. less saline than it originally was. It may be expected to grow fresher, by slow degrees, until, possibly, after a very long course of ages, the Black Sea may be- come as fresh as lake Superior. The inland seas of North America differ from all these cases, except that of the upper lake of Mexico. They are unlike the Caspian and the Judean seas, because these latter have no outlets. They vary from the Mediterranean and Euxine, inasmuch as the supplies of the latter are abun- dant ; and the outlets of the American lakes pass along such declivities, and are so rapid and precipitous, that the stream always sets one way, and a reflux is impossible. If the American lakes had originally been ink or alcohol, instead of brine, the respective fluids would have long ago, by incessant supplies of pure water, passed through all the stages of dilution, and have wholly lost their co- loured or spirituous qualities. Their original saltness may therefore be conceived as having been incessantly weakened by the copious and incessant supplies of fresh water ; and the freshened water which descended the ra- pids and the cataracts, fell to a depth whence it was im- possible for it to flow back. THE NORTH AMERICAN LAKES. 331 Under such circumstances, where the salt water was continually going forth, and the fresh water occupying its place, it must necessarily have happened that the for- mer would gradually be exhausted, and its place occupied by the latter. Thus it may be conceived that the primi- tive saltness of our lakes was lost. When, however, we survey the oceanic relicks on their shores, prodigiously diversified in number, quality and form, we cannot refuse full credit to the conclusion. And when we also reflect, that Erie and its continuous lakes, Huron and Michigan, abound with animals, which probably once inhabited salt water, we are led to consi- der the interesting process, whereby, during the freshen- ing of the water, they were weaned from their marine habits, and gradually converted to fresh water animals. The Cod of the Lakes, (gadus lacustris) forwarded tome from Massachusetts, by Henry A. S. Dearborn, Esq. of Boston ; and the Salmon without teeth (salmo clupeoides) brought to me from the falls of St. Mary, by Major Ro- berdeau, are creatures of this description. 332 THE INNER OR UPPER BARRIER The Barriers which probably restrained the Waters, in some parts of North America, after the Jlncient Ocean had re- tired. If we examine the face of the country, we shall pro- bably discover the remains of the old dams or barriers by which the waters were restrained, for a considerable time after the ocean had subsided. I. THE INNER OR UPPER BARRIER. One of these seems to have circumscribed to a certain degree the waters of the original lake Ontario. It is re- ported to be distinguishable on a mountainous ridge be- yond the river St. Lawrence, in Upper Canada, and si- tuated northeast of Kingston. Passing thence into the state of New-York, it may be traced as it divides the streams which empty into the present lake from those which discharge into the river St. Lawrence. It thus separates the Black Iliver from the Oswegatche. Passing along, it parts the head waters of the Hudson from the La Grasse, the Racket and St. Regis, which run in the op- posite direction, or northward. This elevation or mound appears to have been continued to the north end of lake George, and to have formed the mountainous ridge on the east side of that lake. It apparently travelled along, crossing the Hudson above Hadley Falls; and passing to the southward of Sacondago, crossed the Mohawk at the Little Falls. There can be no reasonable doubt that a more correct and minute survey will delineate the continuation of this mound, or of its ruins, toward the eastern sources of the Susquehannah, and particularly the branch called Char- WHICH RESTRAINED THE WATERS. 333 lotte river, dividing them from the Canajoharie and the Schoharie, two streams which fall into the Mohawk from its southern side. Geologists will follow it along as it parts the Cookwago and Papachton branches of the De- laware river, from the Plattekill, Esopuskill, and Ronde- outkill, which empty into the Hudson. I entertain no doubt the entire or broken chain will be found which made the junction with the Great Shawangunk, near the confines of Marbletown, Rochester, and Paltz, in the county of Ulster. Thence, or from the point where the Rondeout joins the Wallkill, the Shawangunk mountain raises and continues its immoveable mound in a south- westerly direction, through the northwestern part of New-Jersey. It crosses the Delaware river a little to the northward of Easton ; and leaving Nazareth and Bethlehem to the southeast, crosses the river Lehigh to the northward of Heidelburg, and the Schuylkiil to the northward of Hamburgh, in Pennsylvania. The dam of mountains is thence continued along to the north of Harrisburgh, over the Susquehannah, and so in a southwesterly direction, until it enters Maryland, and passes the Potomac into Virginia, at Harper's Ferry, immediately at the junction of the Shenandoah with that river. In Virginia it seems to be cofounded with the Alleg- hany mountain. As far as I can trace them, by map, and by verbal information, the two grand ridges approach and perhaps coalesce by some cross ridges. But in pursuing this mound which confined the waters, the Cumberland mountain presents itself, dividing the Tennessee river from the Cumberland river, and showing its abrupt termination at the Ohio, between the spaces 334 BREACHES I A THE INN where the two just-mentioned riyers unite with tho Ohio. From this point, the eye of the inquirer looks over a wide gap or long tract of prairie, towards the hills which skirt the Illinois river, and the mountains west of cape Girardeau, beyond the Mississippi, probably furnishing the only remaining vestiges of the ancient barrier. This grand rampart has, in the course of ages, been broken through in several places. I shall mention the principal breaches that have oorne to my knowledge. 1 . The breach at the northeastern extremity of lake Ontario. The thousand islands, and the whole of the scenery in their vicinity, bear witness of the mighty rush of waters which at some former period prostrated the opposing mound, and left them as scattered monuments of the ruin. This must have contributed to lower lake Ontario to the level of its outlet, or to its present bed. By this opera- tion the water must have subsided about one hundred and sixty feet from the height of the ridge road between the Niagara and Genesee rivers, so beautifully described by Dr. Clinton.* All the country on both the Cana- dian and Fredonian sides must have been drained and left bare on the occasion, exposing to view the water- worn pebbles, the works of marine animals, their solid parts buried in the soil, their relicks bedded in the rocks, and the whole exhibition of organic remains formed in the bottom of such a sea as that was. * Introductory Discourse before the New-York Literary and Philo sophical Society, note G. OR UPPER BARRIER. 335 Great masses of primitive rocks from the demolished mound or dam, and vast quantities of sand, mud and grave], were carried down the stream to form the curious mixture of primitive with alluvial materials in regions below. 2. The breach at the northern extremity of lake George. It may be presumed that the pressure of water conti- nued for ages, finally demolished the barrier near the outlet of lake George. The sea must have subsided to the level of the breach, and the lake been diminished to about its present size. A part of the geological configu- ration in that neighbourhood may be traced in all proba- bility to this source. 3. The breach made by the Hudson at Hadley Falls. On ascending the Hudson, the traveller finds the coun- try, as he approaches the cataracts of the Hudson, called Glen's and Hadley's Falls, composed of alluvial mate- rials, mingled with detached masses of primitive rocks removed from their stratified beds. The quantity of this loose matter is so great, as to cause the name of Sandy- Hill to be given to the place where It is most abundant. But on exploring the river a few miles above Sandy-Hill, the marks of violence and disruption present themselves. The beholder becomes satisfied whence the loose mate- rials came which he surveyed on his approach. They consist of the fragments of the broken barrier and of the sandy alluvion forced down the stream when the dam gave way. In this case tfre primitive fragments and the alluvial BREACHES IN THE INNER deposites are found contiguous to another formation of shistons trap and fetid limestone, full of marine shells and madrepores. 4. The breach at the upper falls of the Mohawk. I have several times visited this remarkable spot, and am convinced the rocks formed at some remote period a mound which opposed the progress of the water eastward. " As you approach the falls," says Governor Clinton, " the river becomes narrow and deep, and you pass through immense rocks, principally of granite, inter- spersed with limestone. In various places you observe profound excavations in the rocks, made by the agitation of pebbles in the fissures, and in some places the river is not more than twenty yards wide. As you approach the western extremity of the hills, you find them about half a mile distant from summit to summit, and at least three hundred feet high. The rocks are composed of granite, and many of them are thirty or forty feet thick ; and the whole mountain extends at least half a mile from east to west. You see them piled on each other like Ossa on Pelion; and in other places huge fragments scattered about, indicating evidently a violent rupture of the wa- ters through this place, as if they had been formerly dammed up and forced a passage; and in all directions you behold great rocks exhibiting rotundities, points and cavities, as if worn by the violence of the waves or hurled from their ancient positions."* As is the consequence in such cases, the upper country wears the face of a drained tract, and the lower country * Introductory Discourse before the New-York Literary and Philo- sophical Society, note Q, OR UPPER BARRIER. \ 337 exhibits the traces of rounded primitive rocks, inter* spersed with alluvial deposites. 5. The breach by the Delaware through the mountains above Easton. The Delaware river is turned out of its course by the continuation of the Shawangunk mountain, and travels along its northwestern side from Minissink to Knowlton ; there it has opened a way, and in doing so, drawn the water from the soil above, and covered the lands be- low with a medley of rocks, pebbles and sand. But before this opening was made, the mountain seems to have been disparted at another place, called the Wind- Gap, through which probably the water of the inland sea was partially and temporarily discharged. The vastness of this dismemberment impresses every traveller with a sense of its present grandeur, and of the prodigious force necessary to rend the mountain from its summit to its base. 6. The breach by the Lehigh through the mountains. To the northwest of Bethlehem, in Pennsylvania, the river Lehigh shows the opening it has made through the Blue Mountain, as it is there called ; a passage which, like those already mentioned, the physical geographer and geologist will contemplate with interest. An ope- ration which laid bare the region covered with water above, and overspread with alluvial wash and displaced and rounded nodules of rock the regions below, is worthy of particular notice. 43 338 BREACHES IN THE INNER 7. The breach made by the waters of the river Schuyl- kill. The two branches of the river Schtiylkill have effected a similar disruption through the same chain, there deno- minated the Albany mountains. It appears by the report of Cadwallader Evans, jun. President of >the Schuylkill Navigation Company, made in 1817, that the whole fall in the river from the coal mines above the Blue ridge to tide water near Philadel- phia, is about four hundred and eighty feet. Of this the ascent from tide water to Reading is ninety-eight feet ; and to the coal beds beyond the mountains three hundred and eighty-two feet. The specimens of coal, and the to- pography of the country, by Charles Snowden, Esq. are very characteristic and instructive. It is represented that the tipper stream of the Swetara has in like manner penetrated the barrier. 8. The breach made by the Susquehannah. Some distance to the southward of the junction of the Juniata river, the forceful Susquehannah, fraught with the rains not only of fehe midland district of Pennsylvania, but of a very extensive region in New- York, has tri- umphed over the mountain barrier, there termed the north mountain, which impeded its course to Chesapeake Bay. When geognostic researches shall be pushed as far as they deserve, the scientific world will be fully and circumstantially informed of the natural and physical appearances at this memorable spot. Water drained from the higher region, and comminuted o OR UPPER BARRIER. 339 sand with detached rocks carried to the lower, charac- terize as elsewhere this remarkable tract. 9. The breach by the Potomac through the Blue Ridge. Much might be written on this disruption of the Blue Ridge, or South Mountain, as it has sometimes been called. The great agent was probably the united current af the Potomac and Shenandoah. The mountains have every appearance of having formerly opposed a formida- ble barrier to the accumulated water. Obstructed, as it were by a dam, a pond or lake must have been formed beyond them. Their height is estimated at about twelve hundred feet, or not quite so much. Mr. Volney has incorrectly traced them along to the Catskill mountains of New- York ; whereas they really belong to the Sha- wangunk chain, which is quite distinct, both as to its si- tuation and composition, from the Catskili : the former being composed of quartzy rocks and amygdaloid, and the latter of sandstone. The sides and summits of the mountains near Harper's ferry are in summer clothed with green oaks. Chestnuts, maples, and planes are frequent before the eye. The lime tree, the tulip tree, the locust tree, awf the willow tree, overspread the surface with their veraure. While the persimmon, the passiflora, the calycjjtnthus, and the pa- paw, strike their roots through the sands of the shores and the crevices of the rocks. The predominating rocks and stones dispersed over the parts of Virginia and Maryland, which lie on both sides of the Potomac between the tide waters of Georgetown and the Blue Ridge at Harper's ferry, are quartzy. 340 BREACHES IN THE INNER Masses of this siliceous material, possessing different shades of whiteness, are very frequent along the road, as you pass through Loudon county on the south, and through Montgomery and Frederick on the north side of the river. Yet it must be observed, that the mixtures of quartz are various in this region. Where the Potomac pene- trates the strata of rocks at the Little Falls above George- town, they assume the forms of granite, granitine, and micaceous shist. In some instances, quartz and schoerl are associated. In others mica and garnet are blended. Frequently quartz is found by itself; and then again mica is aggregated into enormous masses, forming the high banks and much of the bed of the river. Several other mixtures of these materials are found hereabout. The micaceous shist containing small garnets may be seen advantageously at the Chain Bridge, three miles above Georgetown. The operations necessary for making a passage over the Potomac, have exposed the strata in a manner that favours examination. The great falls of this river, ten miles higher up the country, are formed chiefly of micaceous shistus. The quantities are exceedingly great, and compose the high perpendicular and overhanging sides of the stream, as well as its bed, and the rocky islands between its two banks. The interior locks of the canal made here by the Potomac Company for facilitating intercourse, are dug through strata of micaceous shist. But the opening through the Blue Ridge at Harper's ferry is of a still different character. The gap reaches from its summit to its base, and exposes to the observer its internal eonsitution. It is in such places that the pe- OR UPPER BARRIER. 341 eutiar composition of the strata can be examined to more advantage than under most other circumstances. The rocks may be referred by the modern geologist to the TRANSITION order. At the gap there is scarcely any mica to be seen ; but the quartz is abundant. The structure of the mountain may be comprehended under the following mineralogical disposition. First, quartzy rocks by them- selves, with very little admixture. Sometimes large and milk-white or snow-white masses make their appearance in other strata. Secondly, quartz blended with shist or slate. Both the materials are distinct, and they make coarse associations. The quartz is compact, granular, white, semi-transparent, cellular, ragged, and of various other qualities; but not often crystallized. The slate is of different hues, from pale to brown, greenish and black. Thirdly, quartz and hornblende. The material which I take to be hornblende, is of a brownish and fre- quently of a somewhat greenish hue, and mingled inti- mately throughout with the quartz. This composition appears to me to resemble, more nearly than any thing I recollect, the rocks at the upper falls of the Mohawk river. The hornblende is not known to be distinct, fibrous or crystalline. Fourthly, quartz and iron. Very commonly the quartz is coloured by a ferruginous tinge, and assumes therefrom a brown, reddish or rusty colour, and imparts the same to the other ingredients. Fifthly, quartz and feldspath ; though this mixture occurred so rarely, that it is but barely worth the mentioning. Sixthly, quartz filling the veins and seams of all the other rocks, and giving them stripes or bands of clear white, and sometimes marking them with fantastic flourishes. Such are the principal materials and their combinations at the Blue Ridge, where the waters penetrate it, on the territorial line of Maryland and Virginia. Put the mo- 342 BF- CACHES IN THE INNER ment you leave the mountains skirting the Potomac and the Shenandoah on their eastern or atlantic side, the minerals are of a different character. Immediately at their bases, and at the banks of these respective rivers, the strata becomes shistose. The streams pass by islands, and roll over beds of slate. The strata lie, where they have not been deranged, at angles of from thirty-three to forty-five degrees from the horizon ; and their dip or inclination, particularly in the channel of the Pbtomac, is from N. W. to S. E. Suddenly as you pass to the Vir- ginia side, the slate rises with a rough, craggy, and pic- turesque front. Between the margin of the water and the foot of this elevation, stand the shops where the muskets, pistols, and rifles are manufactured for the United States. At this commodious spot, the water for turning the wheels and giving force to the machinery is conducted through a canal or raceway about a mile in length. In several places, this passage has been dug through layers of slaty rock. A principal part of the stone-work consists of the same material ; for although it does not split into forms fit for covering houses, it may be separated into slabs and fiags fit for walls and floors. Here it is rare to be- hold any mixtures of quartz ; yet small parcels may be found. No other mineral abounds. Slate prevails every where. The heights from which the traveller surveys the sublime and picturesque scenery hereabout are slate. In short, whether wells are opened for water, founda- tions for buildings, or graves for the dead, parcels of shistus are raised with the spade. And from the lowly channel to the pinnacle where the powder magazine stands, the solid body of the mountain is brittle shist. In some places the layers appear to have been disturbed ; for some of them are cracked through perpendicularly: OR UPPER BARRIER. 343 some approach a horizontal direction, and others are jumbled into confused heaps. The removal of sand, gravel, and under-propping by rains, has in some in- stances left the rocks in odd shaped piles ; and as these shall be further deprived of support, they will quit their present abodes, and rush precipitous to the valleys. The road travelled by Braddock towards the fatal plains of Monongahela in 1755, and the ground occupied by the provisional army under Pinckney in 1800, are underlaid by foundations of slate. Yet, in less than two miles, as you proceed up the Po- tomac, limestone makes its appearance ; and you meet with the like in travelling a few miles up the Shenandoah. I am informed that shistus and quartz were heaped higk in alternate and distinct strata, about ten miles hence, on the banks of this latter river. Indeed it seems to me, as evident as the nature of the case admits, that in Virginia as in New-York, slate under- lays and supports the limestone. And it may be conceived as in the highest degree probable, that the same material which reaches to the foot of the Blue Mountains, on the Virginia side of the Potomac, and on the Winchester side of the Shenandoah, is continued beneath their elevated ridges, and bears them on its back, as it does the Catskill and the Newburgh mountains in New- York. Let the geologists, in these parts of America particularly, study the history of slate. The scenery about Harper's ferry is much and justly celebrated. Several artists have attempted to paint it. I recollect to have seen, several years ago, a picture of it, by some person whose name I do not now remember, in the Washington house at Mount Vernon. My atten- 344 BREACHES IN THE INNER tion was called to a striking view of it, at the principal inn near Ellicott's mills, on the Patapsco, in Maryland ; and I examined an excellent sketch of the same, in the possession of a gentleman at Baltimore. The best spot for observation is a romantic pile of shistic rocks, si- tuated between the summit and the Shenandoah. The prospect is eastward or down the stream. The two rivers unite at a point just beneath you, and pursue a roaring and foaming course through the dreadful breach they have made. The landscape consists of water finding its way toward the ocean amidst ledges and projections of rocks ; of vegetables endeavouring to cover with their verdure the sandy beach, and the ruinous terminations of the strata ; and of the ferries, roads, and buildings su- peradded by the industry of man. The whole is termi- nated by a distant perspective through the gap as far as the eye can distinguish, of woods, hills, farms, and other rural objects. The whole forms a rare and admirable display of the productions of art and of nature. 10. The breach made by James* river. The valley situated on the head waters of James' river has apparently undergone a similar evacuation, and the lower country extending to Manchester, Richmond, and beyond, has been subjected to a corresponding change by the gush and inundation. 11. The breach the widest of all, between the Cum- berland mountain and the hills at or near cape Girardeau, beyond the Missisippi. Over this wide tract, the barrier was either high enough to enclose the waters, or it has yielded to their impulse, over a broader space than IB any other. It PLATE I. Fossil HUMAN SKELETON, found at Guadaloupe. tr 1 5 w - JIT. hewing the' relative position the *. f OR CJPPER BARRIER. 345 be noticed in the sequel, that the summit of Michil- limakinac contains the shells of bivalve molluscas, and consequently must have been covered with water. The supposed dam confining the water in former ages, reached from the extremity of the Cumberland mountain to the Missouri hills. And by the flood which effected its de- molition, the vast tract behind it was drained, the lakes Erie, Huron and Michigan were formed, and the dry land appeared around; while the ruins of sand and soil were carried down the valley of the Mississippi, and de- posited on the alluvial bottom there. These imperfect traces may serve to give some con- ception of the former geography of North America, and of the changes by which that configuration has been changed to its present state. A List of some of the Organic Remains deposited by the Salt Water before it was drained off* A middle-sized oyster, entire, from the neighbourhood of Sackett's Harbour. The shells are in their proper si- tuation, cohering in such a manner as to exhibit a per- fectly natural appearance. The specimen brought by David B. Ogden, Esq. is in high preservation. From the county of Ontario, a petrified oyster, six inches long, and four broad, was lately brought to me by Mr. Isaac Adriance. The valves of the shell are a little disclosed, and the space between them filled with a black fetid limestone. Near the opening where the 44 346 ORGANIC BODIES OP THE ORIGINAL specimen was broke from the quarry, the stone exhibits a pecten and a terebratula, and an univalve shell resem- bling a turbo. The fountain of sulphuretted water at Clifton, about eleven miles northwest of Geneva, in the county of On- tario, rises from a rocky stratum filled with organic re- mains. These are mostly madrepores of singular and fantastic forms, differing from any at present found fresh and growing in the ocean. The limestone is of the fetid kind (lapis suillus), and abounds with sulphur and hy- drogen. These sometimes escape together, and are some- times extricated in their separate states. When they ac- company each other, they make sulphuretted hydrogenous gas. When there is no brimstone, the inflammable air rises without it, producing burning springs ; and when there is no hydrogen, the sulphur often oozes out and trickles down without it. Both are probably derived from the abundant animal matter with which the rock abounds. Shells and impressions of scallops in the calcarious rocks around Sacket's Harbour and in the country ad- jacent to the Black river. The slab of marble broiight by Major-General Brown, is one of the first-rate speci- mens of pectinite, wherein both the shells and the im- pressions are distinguished. The forms are plain and admirably traced. They differ from the species now found on our shores in a living condition, and, indeed, from every thing I have seen in the cabinets and the books. It is not improbable their race is extinct. Orthocerites of large size, so as to be reckoned by some to be the back bones and ribs of sturgeons, are fre- quent in the calcarious rocks around Sackett's Harbour. T<,1 SALT LAKES OF NORTH AMERICA. 347 Those forwarded by Dr. Francis Le Baron, are bedded in fetid limestone of a very dark colour. The spaces whence the shell had disappeared are sometimes filled with white ealcarious spar. The appearance of the pe- trifactions is thus very strikingly diversified* In other cases, the shell itself, though altered or petrified, re- mains. Madrepores, of various magnitudes and kinds, occupy places in the strata of this ealcarious carbonate. The central part of a very large one in my collection, exhibits a kind of radiations intersected by concentric circles. Some of the spaces or cells between them are yet empty, and others filled with a more newly formed cal carious substance. This probably belonged to a species now extinct. A neat topographical description of this region -was written in 1809, by Dr. Hugh Henderson. After having been read before the Central Medical Society at Albany, it was printed in the Medical Repository at New- York, (vol. xiv. p. 21 27.) He states expressly, " that there are such distinct traces of marine shells in all the stones he had yet seen, that he cannot resist the belief that either at the flood or some period since, this country has been inundated by the waters of the lake." This intelli- gent writer states in his memoir, the conjecture, that at the Thousand Islands, the attrition of the water had worn down the primitive rocks of granite, and reduced the stream to its present dimensions. My own observation has assured me that to the west- ward of the Little Falls on the Mohawk, remains of oceanic animals are found, sometimes in limestone, some- times iu argillaceous sbist, sometimes in very white sand- 348 RBLICKS OF ANIMALS FORMERLY INHABITING stone, through the whole distance to Upper Canada: Near Utica, encrinites and hippurites, as well as pecti- nites, are found in the shistic strata ; as are other regular though fantastic forms of bodies evidently organic. The white sandstone of Cayuga contains bivalve shells, which I take to be a species of fluted cardium or cockle. The rest of these petrifactions consist chiefly of marine shells and madrepores preserved in fetid limestone. The shells are mostly of the bivalve order, consisting of scallops, clams and cockles, with a few oysters, all consolidated into rock. The madrepores are various, some repre- senting the forms, as the people say, of buffaloes' horns ; others of honey-combs and hornets' nests; and others again of riddles and sieves ; and other odd comparisons, as of cow dung, &c. all petrified. These are so frequent and so numerous, that through the whole of this extensive region the rocks are studded with them. Near Oxford, in Chenango county, New- York, the mould of a very large and singular terebruin or screw shell was formed in a quarry of red sandstone, and for- warded to me by the Hon. Uri Tracy. Among the organic substances, those found near Wilkesbarre, in Pennsylvania, are not the least curious. In that vicinity there is an extensive formation of shining coal, of the kind that is somewhat difficult to burn, and which emits but a small flame. The strata that cover this coal are a sort of argillaceous slate, that contains nu- merous and plain impressions of ferns and other capillary plants, and of the bark of palm trees. I am indebted to Mr. John Bradbury for the specimens which are impressed with these remarkable characters. THE SALT LAKES OF NORTH AMERICA. 349 In relation to lake Ontario, the following statement concerning the appearances on its southern side were made by Dr. Clinton, in his address to the Historical Society : " From near the Genesee river to Lewiston, on the Niagara river, there is a remarkable ridge, or elevation of land, running almost the whole distance, which is seventy-eight miles, and in a direction from east to west. Its general altitude above the neighbouring land is thirty feet, and its width varies considerably ; in some places it is not more than forty yards. Its elevation above the level of lake Ontario is, perhaps, one hundred and sixty feet, to which it descends by a gradual slope, and its distance from that water is between six and ten miles. There is every reason to believe that this remarkable ridge was the ancient boundary of this great lake. The gravel with which it is covered was deposited there by the waters, and the stones everywhere indicate by their shape the abrasion and agitation produced by that ele- ment. All along the borders of the western rivers and lakes there are small mounds, and heaps of gravel, of a conical form, erected by the fish for the protection of their spawn: these fish banks are found at the foot of the ridge, on the side towards the lake; on the opposite side none have been discovered. All rivers and streams which enter the lake from the south have their mouths affected with sand in a peculiar way, from the prevalence and power of the northwesterly winds. The points of the creeks which pass through the ridge correspond ex- actly in appearance with the entrance of the streams into the lake. These facts evince, beyond a doubt, that lake Ontario has receded from this elevated ground ; and the cause of this retreat must be ascribed to its having en- larged its former outlet, or to its imprisoned waters 350 INHABITANTS OF THE ANCIENT LAKES?. '*> (aided, probably, by an earthquake) forcing a passage down the present bed of the St. Lawrence." That enterprising officer, Major Long, of the corps of engineers, forwarded to me a box of minerals and fossils from the Illinois river and its vicinity, and from the region adjacent to the junction of the Missouri and Mississippi. Organic remains of bivalve molluscas, and of some other beings, probably animal, to me unknown, are contained in the flinty masses along the Illinois its whole course, from Chicago, near lake Michigan, to the Mississippi ; and shells and madrepores abound in the limestone around St. Louis, and down the Mississippi to St. Genevieve and beyond. In the geological chapter of the Picture of Cincinnati ly Daniel Drake, M* D. (p. 6467), the strata through the extensive region of which that district is a part, are represented as a secondary form " a vast precipitate from a lake or sea of salt-water." It is a limestone of two kinds, one ancient and the other modern. The lat- ter, of a grayish-blue colour, surrounding Cincinnati, contains, according to this respectable writer, vestiges of the following species: Anomia terebratula. placenta. Belemnites. Ammonites. Entrochites, in flint. Corallines, in flint and limestone. Madrepores, , . always siliceous. Tubipores, $ With many other kinds, which Dr. Drake supposes a skilful naturalist could ascertain. ( 351 ) Changes wrought within these Limits subsequent to the burst- ing f tht Barrier, and in consequence thereof. After the subsidence and removal of the briny waters through so many passages, the streams fed by the rains and springs retiring to their channels, seem to have wrought other alterations, a few of which deserve to be mentioned. Travelling down the inclined plane from their several sources to the new level of the lakes, they have given a configuration of a more recent and modern date to the regions through which they pass. Among these are The falls and rapids in the Black river. The falls and rapid* in the Onondago river, a few miles above Oswego. The fall in Salmon river. The rapids in the Seneca river, near the outlet of the Seneca lake and at Jack's rift below. The cataract in the Genesee river. The grand cataract in Niagara river, which, from its just celebrity and grandeur, merits a more particular de- scription. There is reason to believe it deepened its channel through the rocks between Chippeway and Schlosser, and by that operation contributed further to lower the level of lakes Erie, Huron and Michigan. The cataract has employed so many pens and pencils, 352 ALTERATIONS MADE SINCE that I should not write any thing about it, did it not ap- pear to me that the great chasm which the water has form- ed in the rocks at that place, discloses much of the mine- ralogy of the region, and assists in forming correct opinions concerning the geology of this section of the globe. The delineation by Mr. Weld is reputable to him ; and his pages and illustrations instructive. The account by Mr. Volney is intelligent ; and his plans per- spicuous. The paintings and prints of Mr. Vanderlyn, are pieces which present to the eye, all that can be ex- pected from landscape. The description of Mr. M'Kin- nen, although it is almost as much a picture of his own emotions as of the scenes around him, is nevertheless in- genious and interesting. On exploring the strata laid bare by the cataract, their argillaceous, calcarious and siliceous character immedi- ately struck me. I was careful to bring away specimens of each; and these, at all times and distances, enable me to substantiate my own description of the grand falls. The lowest of the strata as yet reached, is the rock called by geologists old red sandstone. It is composed of quartzy particles, with a cement of clay and iron. The latter being in the form of reddish brown oxyd, im- parts its colour to the rock. Below the ridge which crosses the stream at Lewistown and Queenstown, the layers of this ancient sandstone make their appearance. It, in all probability, underlays the slate, limestone, and soil, to a great extent. The next layers of earthy matter at the falls are com- posed of slate, or shistus. This is very friable, and crack- ed into numberless pieces. It has so little cohesion that the fragments can be easily picked out by the fingers. THE UPPER BARRIER WAS BROKEN. 353 It is Constantly dropping off or wearing away. Its fallen portions constitute a part of the loose gravel through which the traveller labours, beneath. This substance yields to mechanical, and chemical agency more readily than the harder strata which it supports. It therefore un- dergoes excavation, while the superior and firmer strata of limestone project and overhang, until they break off by their own weight. Owing to this abrasion or decay of the brittle shistus, the calcarious rocks above, jut far beyond their present base, and threaten him who takes shelter below them. Masses of various sizes, from small stones to rocks of many tons weight, have fallen from the summit thus undermined, and now occupy the space at its foot. As the excavating or undermining process goes on, other pieces will be detached, and the chasm be propor- tionally enlarged. This foundation of slate is of vast ex- tent in these parts of North America. Shistus emerges from the strata of granite on the banks of the Hudson, at Newburgh and Fishkill, and underlays the limestone to the northward of both; as well as the sandstone of the Catskill mountains. Travelling north,' it shows itself again at the water-falls in the neighbourhood of Albany, and at the village of Waterford. The same kind of ar- gillaceous slate prevails beyond Stillwater to the falls of Fort Edward, and supports the limestone over which the Hudson at Glen's falls is precipitated. Turning west- ward, the s'histus, over which the Mohawk river falls at the Cohoez, is covered with granitical stones and rocks from Schenectady to Palatine ; and at the latter place, by a limestone that is replete with petrifactions. At the little falls where the lock-navigation has been opened, huge strata of a compact, striated, dusky and ferruginous quartz conceal it. At Utica a coarse, granulated, sili- ceous sandstone overspreads it. But at Oriscany the siate again makes its appearance, and continues until the 45 354 GEOLOGICAL APPEARANCES limestone incrusts it, west of the Oneida reservation, in the town of Sullivan. And it probably extends under the calcarious strata quite to Niagara river, and an un- known distance into Canada. At the former place, the impetuous action of the water has exposed its deep stra- tification. Shistic rock abounds in the region between the Hudson and the Mohawk ; for at Ballstown, some of the branches of the Kayaderossras have washed the strata bare. And the banks of the St. Lawrence from Quebec to Kingston on Lake Ontario, demonstrate the prevalence of the slate as the extensive substratum in all that tract of country. The rocks which press the layers of friable shistus at Niagara, are limestone. They are disposed horizontally, and are of the flat or tabular form. Their strength and compactness enables them to overhang the banks, after their foundation of brittle slate has been removed. One of the most prominent and durable of these strata is the table-rock. This is much frequented as a favourable spot for observing the magnificent scenery from above. While it lasts, it is worthy of being resorted to, for the advan- tages of the prospect it affords. And it may be regretted, that it will be spoiled whenever the slate beneath shall be so far worn away as to render the incumbent strata of calcarious matter incapable of supporting their own weight. The projecting portions will break off, and de- scend by their gravity to the subjacent mass of ruins* The fear of danger to a spectator standing upon such a ponderous shelf, and surveying his situation when above, is not surpassed by the solemn apprehension he expe- riences from its imminent and awful aspect when below. In these calcarious strata, the carbonate of lime pre- dominates. This, however, is not a mere mixture of AT THE FALLS OP NIAGARA. 355 fixed air with an earthy calx. The rock on being rub- bed or broken, emits a fetid or sulphureous odour; evincing that it is a swine-stone or lapis suillus. This disagreeable smell attends the limestone in this and the adjacent regions. I possess pieces of it charged with martial pyrites. And the sulphur, clay and iron of this association, are intimately blended with the calcarious carbonate. The existence of pyritical limestone ex- plains how, by the decomposition of the pyrites, sulphuric acid is produced, and gypsum formed. The calcarious nature of the upper rocks is evinced by the fact, that in the neighbourhood of the great cata- ract as well as at the whirlpool five miles down the river, and at Queenstown, two miles further, the inhabitants burn them into lime for economical purposes. But the material is not always indeterminate or shapeless. It assumes beautiful crystalline forms. Rhomboidal and cubical crystals are formed on its surface, and in its cavi- ties. The former are of a milkwhite colour, with ob- lique angles. The latter are less frequent, generally found in the same clusters with the others, of an almost rectangular figure, and of a semi-transparent complexion. Other crystals shoot along the vacuities of the limestone ; some of an imperfect hexangular shape, and others in clumps of acute six-sided crystals, both having a resem- blance to the dog's-tooth-spar. All these are probably modifications of the calcarious carbonate, by admixtures of magnesia, iron, silex, and perhaps some other ingre- dients. The layers of limestone are interspersed with small masses or lumps of gypsum. This is generally of a snowy whiteness, and indeterminate figure. But it is sometimes finely semi-pellucid and lamellar. It is mis- 356 GEOLOGICAL APPEARANCES taken by the people for the petrified froth of the river, It seems to be formed in consequence of a decomposi- tion of the pyrites imbedded in some parts of the rock. The sulphuric acid to which this process gives rise* ex- pels the carbonic acid, and unites with the limestone by Virtue of a more powerful attraction. Thus the com- mon limestone is converted into plaster of paris ; or in chemical language, the carbonate of lime is changed in- to a sulphate. The two compounds very commonly exist together, the limestone and gypsum cohering and making parts of one mineral mass. In some rills where the brimstone appears not to have been combined with oxygen, it oozes out with the water, and discolours the rocks. Thus native sulphur and calcarious sulphurets, may be enumerated among the natural products of Nia- gara. The siliceous ingredients in the rocks hereabout con- sist mostly of quartz and flint. The quartz is sometimes mingled with the calcarious carbonate in such quantity as to give sparks with steel ; forming a sort of siliceous limestone. In other cases it exists in veins or streaks al- most unmixed. And lastly it bespangles the surface with elegant crystals, hard enough to scratch glass. The flint at the falls is whitish ; but near the outlet of lake Erie it is blackish. In both places it is distinctly bedded in the limestone; and their quantity is relatively small, particu- larly at the former place. At the latter, the colour of the flint has concurred with that of the calcarious strata in which it is immerged, to obtain for the spot the name of Black rock. This stone breaks with the conca- vo-convex fracture ; and answers very well to furnish fire-stones for muskets. It does not seem to be chemi- cally incorporated with the limestone ; but to be laid in it as pebbles are scattered through breccias. It puts me AT THE FALLS OF NIAGARA. 357 in mind of the nodules of flint, contained in the chalk-pits of Kent and Surry, near London. The flint and lime- stone at Erie lie contiguous without mixture ; and may be broken out in their respective forms quite distinct. And this connexion of them continues eastwardly, far into the Seneca-prairies, or Buffalo Plains. Such is the constitution of the solid strata at Niagara, and in its vicinity. The uppermost are horizontal and tabular. When a stratum is discontinued, its termination is abrupt, forming a sudden descent. This descent, at any one place, is proportional to the thickness of the stra- tum. Several of these strata break off in this manner, about half way between Chippeway and the grand cata- ract. And they continue their interruptions to the even- ness of the channel, the whole distance beyond. At each termination the river treads lower, and skips and dances along to the next. It marches down this, and proceeds to the succeeding one. Then it runs from stage to stage, until, after a gradual and majestic progress of a mile, gathering force and velocity at every step, it leaps from the high and final precipice* The mighty and immeasurable torrent dashes upon a ledge of detached and enormous rocks, the fragments of the superior strata that have been broken off, and preci- pitated in the course of ages. All the pieces which the vehement and unceasing current can stir, are washed away. None remain but those that are too heavy for removal. These form a rough and broken bottom for the floods to rush upon. Their solidity and size cheek the impetuosity of the headlong river. Their crags convert a part of it into mist, which rises like an exhalation to an altitude sufficient to be seen for many miles, and which bedews the adjacent district with a moisture resembling 358 GEOLOGICAL APPEARANCES rain. On the Canada side, they are in a great degree concealed from sight by the foaming water, and the rising spray that invest them. But on the New-York side, where the height of the fall is greater and the quantity of water smaller, owing to a dip to the west or rather northwest, the inferior ledge o rocks can be better dis- cerned as they lie piled upon each other in all the rude- ness of accidental disposition ; these form a barrier to protect the basis of slate and sandstone from the assault of the water. By the intervention of these impassive heaps, the shistus, notwithstanding its shattered constitu- tion, maintains its ground remarkably, and yields but slowly. Yet, under the operation of such powerful causes, it gives way at last, though only inch by inch. In consequence of this moderate, but certain removal of the shistic foundation, the calcarious strata are at length deprived of their support, and yards and perches, as is believed, of their extremities have disappeared within the recollection of persons now alive. By this means the cataract seems to have moved its place, and not to have been stationary at any one point. Beyond a doubt, it is proceeding up the stream, and drawing nearer to Chippeway and Erie. And if in its early existence, it thundered where Q,ueenstown now is, it must have worn its way about seven miles in the lapse of centuries, to its present seat. Strange as this conjec- ture may appear, to many it really violates no probability. On the other hand, it is countenanced by several impor- tant considerations. A little above that village, the plain which reaches northwardly from the shores of Lake Erie, ceases. There is a rapid declivity to another plain which Extends to Ontario. The difference of these levels is rather more than the height of the falls. The beholder is impressed with the belief that the river once AT THE FALLS OF NIAGARA. 359 ran to this natural limit, and there descended to its lower bed. If this really was the fact, it could not have con- tinued to flow for ever there. The deep foundation is the same species of sandstone and shattered slate which sustains the strata where the falls now are. The incum- bent beds of rock are but continuations of those very calcarious layers ; with the addition of some siliceous sandstone between the top and bottom, along the decli- vity of Queenstown. What marvel then that the river should have opened for itself its present profound chan-- nei through rocks of such a stratification and so consti- tuted ? There cannot be a moment's hesitation in the mind of every examiner to admit the readiness with which the slaty strata, cracked through with innumerable flaws, would be dislodged by the force of such an agent. Their minute fragments of loosely cohering particles, would immediately be carried along by the tide. By attrition they would be worn away, and lay aside their shistic form on returning to argillaceous powder. Thus the strata of slate would naturally disappear and leave a passage for the waters. In the meanwhile the limestone, deprived of its support beneath, would separate piece- meal and tumble into the abyss. Every person of science knows that calcarious earth is soluble in water, and that it is liable also to alteration through the chemical and mechanical agencies to which it is subjected. The firm- est limestone will, after sufficient agitation and exposure, lose its coherence and be transformed to sand, or vanish in solution. In either case, whether the rocks are pul- verized or dissolved, the greater impediments are remov- ed and an opening made for the river. And really when it is considered what vast power water possesses as a menstruum, and how irresistibly it acts by impulse, there will be reason enough to conclude that the channel from Queenstown to Chippe way may have been worn between 360 CHANGES WROUGHT SINCE its rugged banks by that agent. It will be equally evi- dent that the work is by no means suspended ; but that the wear and tear is incessantly going on. B. F. Stickney, Esq. has written some valuable geo- logical observations on the middle lakes or seas of North America. He states that the elevation of the land be- tween Michigan and the Mississippi levels does not ex- ceed eighteen feet; and that boats pass, three or four months of the year, without difficulty. This ingenious inquirer asks, whether a dam, twenty or more feet high, across the strait of Niagara, would not raise the middle lakes high enough to discharge by the southwest toward the gulf of Mexico? It violates no probability to sup- pose it formerly was so. The falls of the Ohio near Louisville and the Rapids, and its numerous and tributary rivers and streams from Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio State, Kentucky, Illinois and Indiana, all hurrying down their slopes with increas- ed velocity and force, and producing constant changes by their alterations, torrents, and floods. And lastly, I enumerate in this place the falls of St. Anthony in the Mississippi, as situated within the limits circumscribed by the great dam or barrier already traced. Besides these traits of our country's character, by the evacuation of the great inland sea, by the formation of alluvions at the several openings and places of rupture, by the production of rivers within the region anciently occupied by that sea, and by the appearance in the un- covered rocks of marine productions in almost every part of the tract ; there is another class of phenomena* THE UPPER BARRIER WAS BROKEN. 361 relating to the organic remains of a later date. These embrace the remains of land animals, found in a fossil state, not imbedded in the rocks, but simply buried in the loose soil. Kentucky has been distinguished almost ever since its discovery by white men, for the extraordinary number and size of the bones found at different depths, from one foot to twenty feet, in the neighbourhood of the Licks, or places resorted to by wild animals to regale them- selves with the briny water that oozes out at those spots. The place most celebrated for these animal remains, and particularly for those of the Great Mastodon, or Ameri- can Mammoth, is generally distinguished by geographers as the Big-Bone-Lick. This spot was profoundly explored by Governor Clarke, in 1807, at the request of Mr. Jefferson, then president of the United States; a citizen who has already received the applause of the learned and the wise, by the exertions which he made, himself, to promote natural and physical inquiries, and by the employment of compe- tent persons in various instances to explore the unknown regions of North America. After the return of the for- mer gentleman from the expedition to the Pacific Ocean in 1806, he caused the soil of the Big-Bone-Licks to be dug up. Bones were found in great number and variety. They were carefully enclosed in boxes, and forwarded to Washington City, in the district of Columbia, by the way of New-Orleans. They arrived in safety about March, 1808. Being then a senator in congress, I had repeated opportunities of seeing the whole collec- tion displayed in the president's house, and of hearing Mr. Jefferson discourse upon them. I understood that Me made a triple division of them, sending one-third to 46 362 FOSSIL REMAINS WITHIN J^ . the American Philosophical Society, at Philadelphia, of which he was then the presiding officer ; forwarding one- third to the National Institute of France, of which he was one of the foreign associates ; and reserving the re- mainder for his own museum. This extraordinary assemblage of fossil bones, I ar? range under the following heads : 1. Many dozens of the smaller bones, apparently of the mastodon, which seemed to have belonged to the feet. 2. Bones of the legs, discovered partly in connexion with the former, and partly scattered as they were, through the soil. 3. Bones of the head and upper-jaw, which afforded expec- tation that more would have been learned from them than was before known, of the structure of these perish- able parts. 4. Two kinds of teeth, of very large size, and detached from the jaws ; some of these teeth evident- ly belonged to the mastodon, being distinguished by their elevated processes ; while others more nearly re- sembled the elephant's grinders. 5. Fragments of lower maxillary bones, containing the grinders fixed in their sockets. These jaws were mostly broken through the symphysis of the chin, and none of them were entire. 6. An enormous outer tooth or tusk, resembling that of the elephant. It consisted of ivory; but had laid so long in the ground, that it was decayed at both extremi- ties. The curve was a singular sort of spire. The ivory, on account of the decay it had undergone, flaked off, like layers of rotten wood. 7. Several small tusks, the smallest of which was about three feet long. They are of remarkable specific gravity, decayed and broken at the ends, and disposed to split and crumble to pieces by the exposure to the air. 8. Ribs, of the shape com- mon to the skeletons of mastodons. 9. Very large ver- tebras. 10. The skulls of buffaloes or bisons, with the THE LIMITS Off THE UPPER BARRIER. 363 bony cores of their horns. The horns were missing, but the bony enclosure very entire. Kentucky abounds with marine relicks. In my pos- session is an echinus of the family galerite. It was found fossil, and so charged with siliceous particles, as to be insoluble in acids. I received several of them from Dr. Samuel Brown, and Professor Woodhouse. They are detached, and about the size of a middling acorn. In Indiana, bones of the like huge creature were found July, 1817, in the east branch of the White river, a stream emptying into the Wabash, at a point distant forty-four miles in a right line from the mouth of the Wabash. This east branch unites with the west branch, at a point twenty-nine miles in a direct line from the mouth of the White river. The intelligence was communicated to me by- Josiah Meigs, Esq. commissioner of the general land office, in the treasury department of the United States, who received it from Mr. Spotts, living near the falls of East Branch. These consisted, it is stated, among others, of the upper jaw, whose width from out- side to outside, was 20 | inches ; length 25 inches ; length of the posterior grinder, (composed of 5 divisions in 3 rows) 7 inches ; breadth of the same across, 5 J. The accounts published of similar remains of mam- moths, found near Bedford, in Pennsylvania, belong to this place ; because they show that these animals inhabit- ed the land after the sea had retired, and it had become a fit abode for terrestrial quadrupeds. The celebrated tusk found at Chenanga, in New- York, near the point where the Susquehannah passes into Penn- sylvania, evidently belonged to an animal of the same 364 ANCIENT DAMS AND LAKES ON THE species ; a quadruped of the elephantine family, now probably extinct. Of this species appears to be the animal, whose remains were brought by Major Craig from the banks of the Ohio, in 1786. They consisted of a thigh-bone, part of a tusk, and a portion of the jaw with the grinders. They were figured by Colonel De Brahm, and published in the Columbian Magazine, at Philadelphia, vol. I. p. 103 lOf. Lakes and Dams, which formerly existed on the outside of the cordon or barrier already described. Though these supposed collections of water were si- tuated on the outside of the dam herein-before traced, as reaching from the Thousand Isles, in Canada, round to Cape Girardeau, in Missouri, yet they appear to have given to the country a character and configuration too important to be omitted in this memoir. 1. The lakes, breaches and alluvions of Connecticut river. Some persons suppose that a dam existed in former days at Bellas' falls. If so, there must have been a lake above them. When that lake was exhausted or run out, dry land was brought to view, and a wash of move- able matters carried to the region below. If we can suppose that there was once, at one or more places in Massachusetts and Connecticut, higher up than Hartford, dams and lakes, then it will be evi- dent that the breaking or disrupture of such dams would inundate the lower country, and cover it with a OUTSIDE OP THE UPPER BARRIER, 36*5 mixture of alluvial matter mingled with detached masses of primitive rocks. It is agreed by all our geologists, that the region situated on both sides of Connecticut river, and extend- ing from the northern line of Massachusetts to Long- Island Sound, is secondary or alluvial. They may inquire further whether there is any connexion between such ancient bursting of dams, and the deposition of earthy and rocky materials in the spaces below them* Should the secondary formation thereabout be not refer- able to this cause, there will be no difficulty in ascribing to it, a part of the alluvial character of the tract. Here I may mention the impressions or forms of fossil fish, found in the town of Glastonbury. They are con- tained in a black bituminous shist interspersed with fine particles of mica. Though in the specimens I possess, the tail, scales, and fins, are perfectly distinguishable, the specimens are too much broken to enable me to decide upon the genus and species. My exertions to procure an entire ichthyolite from that place have not as yet been successful. 2. The falls, breaches, and derelictions of the Hudson. About fifty miles north of Albany, near Kingsbury, is a very picturesque and magnificent scene. The whole waters of the Hudson fall down a considerable steep. ThB country from about two or three miles above the falls, called Glens' falls, to some distance below them, abounds with calcarious rocks, and with a sort of black trap. They are at that place the upper strata, and rest upon the shistus or slate, which forms here, as at other parts of New-York state, the solid mass of earthy mate- 366 FALLS, BREACHES, AND rials below. A thick and massy bed of this rock crosses the river a little above the place where it descends. The rock there divides itself into so many distinct masses, that when the water is low or scanty, it runs through four different chasms between the walls. When the river is swelled with rains, all these fissures and interposing mounds are covered up, and the distinction of current is in some measure lost for about half the distance of their irregular descent. The streams then assume a new mo- dification, and arrive at the bottom by three principal channels. The rocks which directs the courses of the waters, and separate their currents, are almost as horizon- tal as if they had been laid by a level. In several places they are very abrupt, and terminate with the per- pendicularity of a wall. Between them are the profound openings through which the torrents force their way. These strata abound in shells and madrepores. In the lowest they are least conspicuous. In the mid- dle layers they are plainer; aad most distinguishable above. The collection of fossil specimens made by Mr. Miibert and Trecot, now in my possession, afford beauti- ful illustrations of this distribution of organic relicks through the rocks. Other features of this region are equally remarkable* The surrounding scenery is a medley of detached granite and gneiss, with sand, and other loose allu- vial materials. These evidently were washed down from Hadley, when the enclosed waters removed their barrier, and bore every thing before them to this lower country. At Fort Edward Falls, the bed of the Hudson is slate. This shistic bottom is visible all the distance, wherever DERELICTIONS OF THE HUDSON. 367 the sand and gravel have been washed off, to Troy, and the great falls of the Mohawk. The fine scenery along the Hudson at Glen's and Hadley's falls, has been so ele- gantly sketched by Mr. Milbert, that his paintings give interest to geology. The descent of the river toward tide-water at Troy, is interrupted by several smaller falls and rapids running over layers of slaty rock. This con- tinues until the Mohawk joins it from the west. Their united current passes along without any memorable im- pediment until it arrives at the Highlands, a range of mountains crossing it a little to the southward of New- burgh and Fishkill. They are composed chiefly of gra- nite and gneiss, abounding in loose nodules and .solid veins of magnetical iron ore. The width of the chain may be rated at about sixteen miles. The height of the most elevated peaks have been ascertained barometrically by Captain Alden Patridge, of the corps of artillerists and engineers. According to his observations, Butter- Hill, on the west side of the river, is 1529 feet above tide-water, and the new Beaco.n 1565 feet. This thick and solid barrier seems in ancient days to have impeded the course of the water, and to have raised a lake high enough to cover all the country to Quaker- Hill and the Taconick mountains on the east, and to the Shawangunk and the Catskill mountains on the west. This lake may be calculated to have extended to the Little Falls of the Mohawk, and to Hadley Falls on the Hudson. Geometrical surveys, and geological facts, countenance the belief, that a lake covered the whole space between the mountains on the east side of lake George and the Green Mountains in Vermont, and made a continued body of water to lake Champlain, as far above Montreal, as the foot of the aneient barrier already de- cribed as having existed anciently at the Thousand 368 THE LOWER OR OUTER BARRIER. Islands. The information given me by Colonel Garin, a skilful engineer, employed by the canal commissioners, in 1816, to explore the region between the Hudson and the lake Champlain, warrants this conclusion. Indeed, such an overflow of the country is the unavoidable con- sequence, that an obstruction of the water by the High- land mountains in New- York would produce. " Upon this supposition, what mound or dam would cir- cumscribe the lake or sea, on the northwest, north, north- east and east ? If our physical geographers are correct in their deli- neations, a barrier to the waters can easily be found. Such as, for example, the ridge that bounds the Seigneu- ries, and their augmentations of land N. W, of the river St. Lawrence, and separates them from the waste or un- granted territory of the British crown, all the distance from the Grand, or Ottowa river, in Upper Canada, to the sources of the rivers JaCques Cartier, and Charles, not very far from Quebec in the lower province. And such is the height of ground, elevated though broken, which extends through the rough country, beyond the river Chandiere, from the river St. Lawrence, to . the mountains of Maine and New-Hampshire. Some opinion may be formed of this disruption by the considerations of that sensible traveller, Joseph Sansom, Esq. describing the Plain of Abraham, near Quebec. He observes thus: turning round when you arrive at the summit, and looking down the river, between the two steeples of the Catholic and Protestant Cathedrals, you have what I thought the most interesting view of Que- bec, because it embraces in the same coup-cf otf, the prin- cipal objects in the vicinity. Overlooking the basin THE OUTER OR LOWER BARRIER. 369 which is six miles wide, you behold the Island of Orleans, stretched out before you, till it terminates in undistin- guishing haze, whilst on the left you have the north coast, rising gradually into distant mountains, from which the river Montmorency, precipitating itself into the St. Lawrence, is all but seen, through a grove of firs, and the view terminates abruptly in the perpendicular pro- montory of Cape Tourment, which is two thousand feet high, and therefore may be distinctly seen at the dis- tance of thirty miles. On the right you have the rocks of Point Levi, and behold the shipping in the harbour, at an immense depth below. Imagine the effect of this whole fairy scene, connected as it is by the broad sur- faces of the river, which is seen again upon the edge of the horizon, winding round the stupendous bluff above- mentioned, in its course toward the sea." This connexion being established, there is no difficul- ty in continuing it to the Green Mountains of Vermont, and their continuation through Massachusetts and New- York to the Highlands already mentioned, as passing the Hudson to the southward of Fishkill and Newburgh. V- On the west side of the Hudson, this barrier, called by the various names of the Highlands, the Fishkill, Skune- munk, and Haverstraw mountains, becomes the Sucka- sunny and Musconetcunk mountains, in New-Jersey. It passes the Delaware to the southward of the places where the Lehigh and the Musconetcunk rivers, fall into the Delaware. It then continues its course southwest- wardly, crossing the Schuylkill below Reading, the Sus- quehannah south of the Swetara, the Potomac above the Great Falls, and so on further than I have been able to trace it; being however associated with the Short Hills 47 370 RUPTURE NEAR NEW-YORK CfTY. in Virginia, and ultimately with the south mountain on the Atlantic side of the Shenandoah. Thus the second, or outer barrier, embraced a large extent of country, reaching from Canada to Virginia. The Breaches made about fifty miles north of New* York City. A geologist finds traces of three openings for the im- prisoned waters ; one through the eastern barrier, and discharging near the boundary of New-York and Con- necticut, into Long-Island sound ; another through the valley called the Clove, where the Ramapaugh river now runs ; and the third through the Highlands, where the Hudson to this day glides along. Through these several passages, the country from the Highlands to Glens' Falls and the Little Falls of the Mohawk, in length, and from the Shawangunk mountains to the Taconick, in breadth, may be supposed to-have been drained. Let the explorer of the scene behold the fossil and or- ganic remains which have thus been laid open to inspec- tion. At Palatine, near the place where the Canajoharie Creek joins the Mohawk, the limestone rocks abound with sea-shells> chiefly, if not altogether, of pectens, ano- mias, and other bivalve species. Here I mention the fossils of Cherry Valley, situated between lake Otsego and Canajoharie, south of the Mohawk. Cadwallader D. Colderi, Esquire, represents, on the authority of Mr. Morse, that petrifactions are very frequent. They consist of " marine shells, horns of ORGAMC REMAINS LAID BARE THEREBY. 371 land animals (probably ammonites or spirulas), and plants ; all in the same place. They are found on the deepest valleys and the highest hills. The valleys most- ly bedded with limestone ; and in the midst of large masses of this, the petrifactions are found. As you ascend to a certain height, the hills on each side of the valley, the limestone disappears, and the soil is totally different. Confused masses of the slate kind are found, some lying horizontal, others projecting from the ground at an angle of about forty-five degrees. In the midst of these masses of slate-rocks are found the same petrifactions." The whole ridge called the Helleberg, about twelve miles west of Albany city, is a sort of argillaceous lime- stone, made up as it were of pectens, terebratulas, spi- nilas, and oceanic relicks. It was here that the very large and highly remarkable spirula was discovered, which Simeon De Witt has circumstantially described. His narrative, with a figure, may be seen in the Medical Repository, vol. 10, p. 350. Within the limits of Coeyman's patent, about twenty miles south of Albany, there is a great body of Luraa- ehella marble, disposed in regular strata. Attempts have been made to work it ; but the quantity of siliceous mat- ter with which it abounds, renders it hard and difficult to polish. Its constitution is very curious. The slabs I received from Roger Strong, Esq. and which are now in the mineralogical cabinet of the New- York Institution, contain a variety of animal remains, and all of them oceanic. Among these are Belemnites. Anomlas. Encrinites. 372 MARINE EXUVLE EXPOSED BY Terebratulas. Pectinites. Ostreas. Cardiums. An Echinus, with its radiated prickles, or something resembling it. Near the village of Claverack, is a large mass of cal- carious rock, resembling a hill at a distance. It abounds with shells and their impressions. The foundation of the old court-house at Claverack, was built of the stone abounding in these petrifactions. The relicks here are mostly bivalve, being terebratulas, pectens, and some singular other forms. To Peter Wynkoop, Esq. I am indebted for the black marble, quarried from the strata westward of Kingston, and replete with marine shells. In Greene county, one hundred miles from the Atlantic coast, organic remains are found. Those brought by Mr. Frederic W. Porter, from the farm of Stephen Platt, Esq. at the village of Freehold, fifteen miles west from Hudson river, are the shells (not merely impressions) of pectens, terebratulas, and cardiums, bedded in a heavy and compact sort of siliceous clay, charged with brown oxyd of iron. The like are found imprinted in clay-grit, or a sort of silico-argillaceous lumps, scattered over the farms for several miles north and south of Poughkeepsie ; in many instances, the shells are wasted away, and the cavities they occupied, remain, together with their sizes and shapes. The whole region watered by the Wallkill is scattered THE BREACH AT THE HIGHLANDS. 373 over with organic remains ; they overspread the fields ; they appear in the stone fences ; they show themselves in the walls of houses. From Warwick to Paltz and Esopus, oceanic relicks imbedded in stones, are constant- ly before the traveller's eyes. They are mostly loose, and mingled with the other nodules with which the coun- try abounds ; at least I do not recollect to have observed any stratified rocks thereabout, that contained them. Among them are many pectinites and terebratulas, with sometimes an oyster. But peculiar madrepores, corallines, and fulciments of polypes are of frequent occurrence. If I am not greatly mistaken, a young lady, Miss Anicartha Miller, brought me a stone at New Hurley, which con- tained a maritime plant, of the family^ of valva, or fucus, not petrified, but in its proper form. I am in possession of the real scale of a sturgeon, broke out of a stone at Sha- wangunk, and brought to me by Dr. P. S. Townsend. The fossils of the Wallkill region, like those from Freehold and Poughkeepsie, are contained in a kind of wacke or killas, in which a mixture of fine clay and silex, is hardened by an impregnation of a brown or yellow- ish ochre of iron. I did not observe any of this class of relicks, lying unconnected, or in their naked state in the soil. But there is another sort of testaceous productions, which deserve notice here. These 'are the shells and re- lieks of fresh water molluscas. They have undoubtedly made their appearance since the salt water was drawn off, and thejf form an era in the geology of this region. These creatures inhabit certain pools or ponds of wa- ter, in the depressions or excavations which are frequent 374 FRESH WATER MOLLUSCAS THAT in the land's surface. Generally they are fed by springs, and there is an outlet for the superfluous water, after the cavity is filled up by boggy, or turfy matter, and the quag- mire overgrown by shrubs, trees and smaller plants. The learned world is greatly indebted to Silvanus Mil- ler, Esq. for an admirable topographical description of this district. The shells of these inhabitants of the fresh water had been collected as long ago as 1803, by Dr. Samuel Akerly, and placed with the other specimens which constitute the body of eonchology com- pleted by his industry. Great praise, notwithstanding, is due to Thomas Say, Esq. for the skill and science he has displayed in the classification of these and other mollus- cas of fresh water ; outstripping all his cotemporaries, and clearing the path for his followers. The shells found in the pools are small and delicate, and are of the following species : 1. A carinated planorbis* 2. A plain planorbis. 3. A lymniaea. 4. A spirorbis. 5. A tellina. Their remains, after death, dissolve to marl, or a white ealcarious carbonate like chalk, easily effervescing with vinegar, and exceedingly valuable as a manure. Until the fertilizing properties of gypsum were discovered, these marl-pits were mines of wealth to the proprietors. t But, as it has been believed by some naturalists, that those shells belonged to marine animals, I state it as a fact, that D'Jurco Knevels has seen all the species just HAVE SUCCEEDED THEM. MASTODONS. 375 enumerated, alive, in the fresh water brooks near Fish- kill. The vegetables growing in these little swamps, by their abundance and decay, furnished a great quantity of resi- due, which on drying is found to be inflammable ; being in reality a kind of peat. In some places this is twenty feet, or even more, in depth, making a miry bog, in which every heavy body, capable of breaking through the turfy Covering of roots and plants, immediately goes to the bottom. In many of them, a person who ventures on, may shake and agitate the tough surface for several rods around. The region watered by the Wallkill is peculiarly the land of the American mammoth. The history of their teeth, tusks and bones, as discovered from time to time by the citizens, has already been written by Silvanus Miller, Esq. and Dr. James G. Graham. Their respective essays are recorded in the 4th volume of the Medical Repo- sitory. Mr. Rembrant Peale has also published an inte- resting account of the expedition made by his venerable father, Charles Wilson Peale, Esq. to this district, to ob- tain the materials from which he has framed the skeleton which gives interest and grandeur to his rich museum in Philadelphia. To these several sources of information I refer ; observing, at the same time, that in this tract of country there have probably been discovered more fragments of mammoth remains, than in any other district of equal extent on the face of the globe. I refer to the writings of the late Professor Benjamin Smith Bar- ton, of the ex-President Thomas Jefferson, and of Go- vernor Dewitt Clinton, as great authorities on this sub- ject. 376 MASTODONS OF NEW-YORK. I visited the tract situated near the Wallkili in the spring of 1817 ; and it was ray fortune to assist in the dis- interment of a mammoth. On the 27th of May, I was at the house of Anthony Da- vis, Esq. in the village of Chester, near Goshen in Orange county, N. Y. Silvanus Miller, Esq. Peter S. Townsend, M. D. and Dr. Miller Wharry, had accompanied me there. We were met by Peter Townsend, Esq. of New- burgh, Dr. T. Seely, and by Messrs. William and Isaac Townsend, of Chester. During the evening the convex sation turned upon mammoth bones ; and Mr. Yelverton, who came in, said he knew where some of them lay, at the bottom of a ditch on his brother's farm, in the neighbour- hood, dug by himself, nine or ten years before. In the morning I encouraged him to conduct us to the spot, and in a few minutes after the arrival of our company on the ground, he discovered the bones with an exploring rod. The water of this small meadow had been drawn off by ditching. The soil had settled down ; the cedar trees had died ; the surface had been stubbed and smoothed ; and it had been converted into a neat field of meadow pasture. The grassy sward was underlaid by about six feet of black peat, or fine vege- table inflammable matter. The sward and turf were about four feet thick over the bones. Beneath them, and immediately around them, was a stratum of coarse vege- table stems and films resembling chopped straw, or rather drift-stuff of the sea ; for it seemed to be mixed with bro- ken films of conferva, like those of the Atlantic shore. It must be remarked also, notwithstanding the occur- rence of marl, in the holes or ponds, that the snails and other creatures from whose shells marl is formed, do not MASTODONS OF THE ^TAALKILL, 377 inhabit all of them. There are many in which there are none. Where the marl exists, it forms the lowest stratum, or lines the bottom of the pond. The peat and bog lay above it. Whether the elephantine quadrupeds of former times visited these miry places for the purpose of food or drink, or for any other cause, they seem very frequently to have died in them. When their bones sunk through the mud into the layer of marl, they were secured from putrifac- tion by its alkaline and antiseptic quality. But when the mammoth expired in a swamp where there was no marl, the bones passed more rapidly into decay. The mud and water conspired to disorganize and destroy them, from the time that they settled to the bottom. Those found by Mr. Peale had been preserved in a marl bottom, and were in sound condition. The skeleton disinterred in my presence lay in a peat- bog, without the presence of marl. The bones were con- sequently more disorganized and rotten. I mean by this that they were not entire and firm enough to be extract- ed whole, far less to be connected together after they were raised. The bones found were parts of the feet, legs, shoulder- blade, back-bone, rump, lower-jaw, and the upper-jaw, teeth and tusks. The teeth were in good preservation. More than half the lower-jaw was entire. The condyles and angle of the other half, crumbled to pieces by handling. Yet the portion containing the. teeth was taken up nearly whole. The exterior side was afterwards removed by 48 378 MASTODON FOUNB AT art to show the insertion of the grinders. Their appear- ance is represented in plate III. fig. 3. A view of the rest of the lower jaw, with its teeth, is given in fig. 2. It was found that the upper maxillary bone, with its teeth and tusks, were there in their natural connexion. The opportunity was very favourable for discovering their junction. The meadow had been freed from a great part of its water by ditching ; and a drought of long con- tinuance had contributed to lessen the fluid. Measures were adopted on the 29th to free the pit from all its mud and water, and to uncover these parts of the head in the most careful manner. For this purpose Dr. Townsend and Dr. Seely descended into the pit, and removed the soil with their own hands. They discovered that the pa- late bones and grinders were uppermost, as if the animal had died on his back. The former of these gentlemen made a faithful sketch of the appearances exactly as the bones lay. The figure and connexion of the several parts are delineated in plate II. fig. 2. The tusks were of different sizes, lengths and curva- tures; varying in all these respects like the unequal horns of some neat cattle. Their appearance, as they were supposed to look, when the creature was erect in^a standing attitude, is represented in fig. 3. The right tusk was the shorter, and its length was seven feet. It was thicker and blunter, in consequence, probably, of having been more used ; and such employment of it, may be considered as the cause of its greater curvature. The left tusk was nearly nine feet long, and of a more regular, taper, and pointed form.. CHESTER, MAY, 1817. 379 Finding it impossible to elevate the parts, by reason of their decayed and crumbling condition, Dr. Townsend took great pains to remove the soil and examine every part of the upper-jaw and head. His delineations of the form and structure of these parts of the skeleton, as cor- rectly as he could ascertain them, by laying them bare and exploring every part, are given in fig. 1 and fig. 2. The flatness of the cranium, the connexion of the tusks with the head by exsertion, and not by gomphosis, and the insertion of the grinders in them at their origin, will not fail to attract the attention of zoologists. My own situation on the bank, only a few feet from the uncovered relicks, enables me to state my opinion of the fidelity and correctness of the drawings my friend has made. After having then taken a summary survey of the fossils brought within our reach by the subsidence of the lake north of the Highlands, in consequence of the breaches in the dam which confined the waters, it is proper to inquire what were the effects produced in the districts be- low, or between that barrier and the ocean. From the facts which I collected and published in the American Mineralogical Journal, in 1811 and 1813, it appears, that the whole of Long-Island is underlaid at a depth, varying from thirty to fifty feet, from its present surface, with a stratum of marine sand and gravel. In many places the well-diggers have found fragments of clam-shells and oyster- shells. The periwinkle or murex has also been discovered in New-Utrecht at the depth of 380 ALLUVIAL CHARACTER OF sixty-seven feet. Within the same strata which contain the shells, are often found boughs and trunks of trees, bark and damaged wood. For a large and conclusive body of facts upon this subject, I refer to the valuable work just mentioned, p. 129 133, and 261 263. In addition to that mass of evidence, I now mention two more occurrences daring the year 1817. My brother, Judge Singleton Mitchill, apprized me in a letter received from him a few days ago (October) that in digging a well in his neighbourhood, on Cow Neck, at North Hempstead, and not more than a mile and a half from the light-house at Sands's Point, shells of clams and oysters were discovered at the depth of forty-five feet. On the same occasion a piece of wood was dug out, pene- trated through and through by the teredo or pipe- worm. The facts are well known to the workmen and neighbours ; and have since been confirmed to me in conversation. Our graduate, Dr. Bering, brought, a few weeks ago, to the Lyceum of Natural History the fragments of clam- shells (venus), found in digging a well in Shelter-Island, thirty-five feet below the surface. Shelter-Island is situ- ated between Gardiner's bay and Southold bay, within the north prong of the fork of Long-Island on one side and the southern on the other. It is nearly a hundred miles east of New-York city. Since this marine alluvion has been hove up, a memo- rable change appears to have been wrought upon the north side of Long-Island. Vast, numbers of loose rocks have been superinduced. They all appear to have been LONG ISLAND FROM MARINE CAUSES. 381 detached from solid strata, and to have been rolled and worn since. They consist mostly of granite and gneiss. There are some huge masses of actinolite or radiated as- bestos, and many of ponderous black shoerl among them. Stones of many kinds, consisting of quartz, shist, ferrugi- nous oxyd, breccias, and pebbles formed of the granite and gneiss, abound every where among the rocks. . These loose and rolled rocks are most abundant in the towns of North-Hempstead and Flushing, particularly the former. Their great weight and bulk must have re- quired extraordinary power to detach them from their primitive beds, and to have placed them \vhere they now lie. Along the shores and over the fields, stones have been found now and then, in which prganic remains of shells could be distinguished. There is a ridge of hills upon Long-Island, separating it into two sections, the north and the south side. They extend from New-Utretcht in the west, to the neighbour- hood of Southold in the east. They are highest in North- Hempstead, and gradually slope away on both directions until they disappear in King's county, near the Narrows, and in Suffolk, as they approach River-Head. Their greatest elevation at the Harbour Hill, as found by Capt. Partridge, accompanied by Mr. Haines, Mr. Griffith, Professor EJUcott, Judge Mitchill, and myself, in the summer of 1816, is three hundred and nineteen feet. My letter to Mr. Dallas, then Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, (of October 16, 1816) contains the particulars of that expedition and experiment. The north side of the Long-Island ridge of hills is so Different from the south side, that a traveller naturally 382 CONSEQUENCES OF THE INLAND FLOOD UPON THE asks whence came the rounded rocks and stones which occupy the north side, while there is not a pebble as large as an egg, on the south ? A geologist may probably answer the query, by deriving them from the barrier, which the lake has not, in this instance, been able to force through and through. The mountains of Fishkill, con- tinued northeastward to Quaker Hill, seemed to have re- sisted the pressure. But it also seems that a partial breach was made by the Ten-Mile river, a branch of the Housatonick, in v the town of Amenia, Dutchess County, New-York, contiguous to Lichfield county, Con- necticut. The water issuing this way reaches Long- Island Sound at Stratford. Another partial breach was made by the Croton river, which rises near the Connecti- cut line, and empties into the Hudson at the Tappan Sea. But the lake above might have overflowed the dam, which it was unable to break, until the channels of the Ten-Mile and the Croton were worn. The rugged as- pect of the mountains in North Salem almost lead one to suppose the flood of the lake pouring over Joe's Hills, rushed down their southern side, and carried along the loose and detached materials, as far as its force could con- vey them. Sand and stones as usual were urged to the greatest distance ; moderately weighty rocks not quite so far ; and the heaviest ones loitered in the rear,, or con- cealed themselves under the water of the sound, where they annoy navigators. It may be conjectured, that among these slow but steady operations, the strata of granite at Hellegate were broken down and torn up from their foundations, and the Archi- pelago of islands produced which so strongly impress the mind of the traveller as he approaches that memorable strait from the east. Some of these islands, such as Hur- tleberry Island, Pea Island, the Brothers, and a number NORTH SIDE OF L. ISLAND AND STATEN ISLAND. 383 more, have a basis of stratified rocks; while Hart Island, Miniford's Island, Hiker's Island, and several others, are modern and alluvial. The tide, and storms from the N. E., have done much of this work. I next proceed to trace the consequences of the breach through the Clove, where the Ramapough river now runs. That part of the imprisoned water escaped through this passage, is so plain an inference from the ap- pearances, that every traveller through the pass readily and involuntarily draws it. Such a burst of rocks, stones, sand and water appears to have been driven over the region, situated along the Hackinsack, Saddle, and Pas- saick rivers. After sweeping along the valley lying be- tween Bergen and Newark, it seems to have rolled up a huge pile of materials on the north side of Staten Island, and to have imparted to it a portion of its altitude, rough- ness and character. Another mass of these dislodged materials appears beyond the Rariton, in the form of the Neversink Hills, carried thither by the impetuosity of the flood. The south side of Staten Island resembles Long Island. Carbonated wood, pyritical coal, and other organic re- mains, have frequently been discovered by digging wells. At the Narrows, where the fortifications and beacons are, several pieces of native copper were found by the labour- ers on the works. Has this any connexion with the copper mines near Belleville, above ? Over other parts, iron ore is scattered. Has this any relation to the iron mines along the Ramapough in the Clove ? The basis of the Neversink Hills is oceanic. Up- on this has been accumulated the mass of sand and stones, from the interior district. Near their summits are. 384 MARINE AND INLAND ALLUVION detached pieces of sandstone, and some of them many feet in length, and of considerable thickness. None of it however is stratified. Has this broken sandstone any connexion with the same material at Belleville and the other adjacent quarries ? Their height as found, barometrically, by the gentlemen already mentioned as associated with me on an expedition thither for the pur- pose, in 1816, is only two hundred and eighty-one feet above the tide-water. For the particulars I once more refer to my letter of information to the Treasury depart- ment, and to Mr. Blunt's excellent work, The North Ame- rican Coast Pilot. Near the foundation of the Neversink Hills, is a stra- tum of marine exuviae, that give to Monmouth County a peculiar importance. It is a sort of calcarious powder tinctured, as is supposed, with pyrifical or vitriolic mat- ter, and containing the remains of several animals, Among them are, A Belemiiite. A Gryphaea. A peculiar Oyster. A tooth and part of the jaw of a lizard monster, or Saurian animal, resembling the famous fossil reptile of Maestricht. There have been also discovered in the neighbouring region extending to Shrewsbury and Middletown, A Baculite. A thigh bone, probably of a rhinoceros. A tooth of an elephant (see plate I. % 2), and in a OF SANDY HOOK AND THE NEVERSINK HILLS. 385 district so full of fossil remains, it may be expected that many more articles will be found. That the reader may rightly comprehend the form of the monitor relick, it is figured in plate III. figure 4. ' . . . . ^ ~ ** -. ' For some curious and instructive remarks on the geo- logical constitution of New-Jersey, especially of the space between the Raritan and Delaware, I own my ob- ligations to the Hon. John Rutherford. The report of this gentleman and his colleagues to the legislature at Trenton, on the feasibility of a canal communication be- tween the two rivers, contains many excellent facts and observations. The one, that the Millstone river pene- trates and passes the primitive ridge from the south, in a direction diametrically opposite to the course of all the other rivers on the continent, is very singular. I come now to the enumeration of some of the proba- ble consequences of the Hudson's breach through the Highlands in the channel where it now continues to run. Upon the supposition that this was the fact, a great mass of materials must have been impelled, in a dismem- bered and confused condition to the lower district situat- ed nearer the ocean. The island of Manhattan, upon the southwestern extre- mity of which the city of New- York stands, has a basis of granite and gneiss, regularly stratified. The strata in many places are nearly vertical ; that is, they decline but a few degrees from- the perpendicular. Sometimes the rock of this formation breaks up with sufficient regulari- 49 386 INLAND ALLUVION SUPERINDUCED OVER ty to be laid in courses, for the construction of walls* The battery near the southwest castle is underlaid by such stratified rock ; though now almost entirely covered up by art in the progress of improvement. In thousands of spots over the island, their naked backs rise above the Surface. Great labour and expense have been necessary for opening the streets and avenues through them. At Hellegate and Bloomingdaie these rocks appear in their proper and geognostic forms; making a spectacle highly worthy the notice of all persons of taste as well as of science. Upon this foundation of ancient stratified rock, a very different and modern deposite has been made. This is more considerable towards the middle and southwest, south, and southeast side, th'an at the other extremity near Kingsbridge and Haerlera. In its passage by the island, the Hudson's direction is considerably to the westward of south. The inundation from the lake beyond the mountains has left some strong marks of its action. To the eye of the geologist, it looks as if a portion of the overwhelming torrent, repelled by the Trap-wall at Fort Lee, changed its direction, and opened the channel of Haerlem river, filling its former estuary with the allu^ vial matter that at this day constitutes Haerlem flats. Like Long Island, Staten Island, and the Neversink re- gion near Sandy Hook,.there is evidence, a little south of Bellevue, of an oceanic stratum of sand with the broken shells of clams and oysters scattered throughout it. This marine stratum, as well as the granite on which it PRIMITIVE ROCK AT THE CITY OF NEW-YORK. 387 has been overspread by the more recent alluvion now under consideration. The alterations perpetually making by public authori- ty, afford lessons to the naturalist, as instructive as if they had been made for his special use. While streets are opening, and hills digging down, there are the fairest opportunities of examining how the strata lay and of what they were composed. These alluvial materials are disposed horizontally, waving in some places,and dipping a little; but convincing the beholder that they were so arranged by the action of water. The constitution of these strata, upon which the city of NeW-York actually stands, is sand, gravel, rounded stones fit for paving, and loose rocks, some of them of enormous magnitude. There is a scarcity of clay in the soil ; that is to say, it is not stiff enough to form bricks. At most it is but a sandy loam. Nodules of stony matter, disclosing by their fracture petrified shells and their impressions, have been often found. During this season of 1817, such organic relicks were brought to me from Corlear's Hook, the Battery, and a place situated between the Bowery and Broadway. Broken pieces of compact shistus, alone, and associated quartz, have frequently been found. The rounded rocks are sometimes six feet in diame- ter. In the progress of alterations made by public authority, they are daily disappearing from view. .Part of them are buried in the ground ; but the 388 'PRIMITIVE BASIS OF NEW-YORK CITY. greater part rent to fragments by gunpowder, and dragged away. In a few years much of the scenery I am describing will vanish, and the bustling cit will hear with wonder, or rather refuse to hear, the curious geolo- gy of the street in which he resides. They consist of rolled or rounded masses of ". . .:> - '..: '^i., Schoerl rocks. Rocks of quartz and schoerl. Rocks of stellated asbestos. Granite rocks, in which the ingredients are variously associated and modified. Gneiss rocks, whose constituent parts are also differ- ently mixed and combined. Now, it is apparent, that there is a strong and close re- semblance between these alluvial substances in New- York city, and those beyond the Highlands, and at New- burgh and Fishkill. For example, the sand, gravel, and stones are of the same quality with those near Newburgh, and are disposed in similar loose strata. The shistose fragments occurring in New-York, exactly resemble those in the region north of the mountains. The primitive rocks, of the kinds already enumerated, can only be considered as fragments from their parent mountains. Who can view them in any other light, than that of members torn by violence from the body to which they were once attached ? In short, they may be con- ceived as the materials which before their disintegration and removal formed the barrier of the mountains where the Hudson now flows. ORGANIC REMAINS IN THE ALLUVION OF N. Y. CITY. 389 But, above all, the fossil remains in the loose and de- tached masses,, scattered over the city of New- York, (and rapidly disappearing from sight, as houses and other buildings are erected,) resemble in every particular the Ibssii relicks along the Wallkill. The specimens brought to the New-York Institution by the Rev. Mr. Schaeffer, pastor of the Lutheran church, by John Macomb, Esq. Street Commissioner, and by Mr. D. Bruce, are docu- ments of the most instructive and important nature on this subject. Had they not been found in the city of New- York, a mineralogist, on examining them, would pronounce them to be productions of the .county of Orange, or of Dutchess. As parcels of this copious deposite, on the break- ing of the mountain barrier, may be reckoned the islands, with their shoals, in the bay. Governor's Island, Oyster Island, and Bedlow's Island, with Sandy Hook, and the spits and bars in its vicinity, ought all to be con-* sidered in connexion with that grand catastrophe. Some of the minerals and fossils seem to have been left by the way. A superb specimen brought by James Smith, .Esq. from Mount Pleasant, or Singsing, in Westchester county, presents marine shells of the same character and species with those already described. To the same gentleman I am indebted for the very sin- gular fact, that the sandstone at Nyack, in the county of Rockland, scarcely more than thirty miles north of the city, overlays a stratum of loose loam containing the bones of mammiferous quadrupeds, or land animals. Mr. Smith's polite disposition and zeal for science induced him, in 1815, to accompany me to the quarry of Mr. William Palmer, where, on breaking up the sandstone, FOSSIL BONES AND TEETH OP ROCKLAND. the bones had been disinterred. The proprietor declared his knowledge of the fact. To convince ourselves, we, and our attending friends, went into the quarry and dug out bones of land-animals with our own hands. They were in fragments ; but the articulation and points of mus- cular insertion are evident in several of them. The spe- cimens I brought away are now in my collection. / These relicks were not petrified; but lay scattered through a loamy bed, upon which were a stratum of sand- stone, eight feet thick^ and another of arable soil, four feet thick. The place where we found them is but a few rods from the right bank of the Hudson. Rockland county has afforded another fossil phenome- non. Eleven miles west of the spot where bones of quadrupeds lie buried under strata of sandstone, and only thirty-two north of this city, the remains of a mastodon were found in July, 1817. Mr. Edward Suffern, jun. has obligingly put the set of grinders, all that remained of the skeleton, at my disposal. Figures of one of these are given in plate II. fig. 1 and 2. They were acci- dentally discovered by a ditcher, who was opening a trench on his father's farm at New Antrim, in the town of Hempstead. They lay in mud, only three feet below the surface. They were large, and the enamel remarka- bly white and glossy. The roots were much decay- ed. The generous donor informed me the cavities of these teeth contained a fatty substance. None of this, however, remained when they were brought to me. 3. The breach in the vicinity of Quebec, by the rive* St. Lawrence. BREACH OF ST. LAWRENCE NEAR QUEBEC. 391 When this opening was made by the force of the in- cluded water, the land was laid bare on both sides of that river, as far up as St. Regis, including the islands of Montreal and Jesus ; and by the same operation, the land on both sides of lake Champlain would be drained as far as Ticonderoga and Whitehall. The following fossil relicks countenance this supposition. The specimens of pectinites and other marine animals brought to me from the lime-quarries of Montreal, by Professor Andrew Eliicot, of the United States' Military Academy, at West-Point. Specimens of a like character, filled with marine ex- uviae, from the strata of calcarious carbonate at St. Re- gis, sent to me by the same gentleman. Ammonites from the vicinity of Plattsburgh r brought by his excellency Governor Tompkins, incased and pre- served limestone. Pectinites, Ammonites, Corals, and shells of various kinds, observed by Bishop Kalm at Crown Point, and other places along Lake Champlain. 4 and 5. The breaches made by the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers through the lower barrier. The alluvion at and near Philadelphia, ought to be very considerable, since two rivers have concurred to bring it down to its present location. In this respect, the site of that beautiful city deserves to be compared with that of New- York. Both stand upon an allu- vial base; which rests upon a primitive bottom. Mr a 392 ORGANIC REMAINS IN AND AROUND PHILADELPHIA. Maclure, the best authority extant, informs the public, in the new edition of the Geology of the United States of America, &c. just published by Abraham Small, (p. 33), that the " city of Philadelphia stands upon primitive rock, though, at the Centre-Square, thirty or forty feet of sand and gravel must be penetrated before the gneiss rock, which ascertains the formation, is found." Dr. Amos Gregg has stated that the land where Bristol stands, is made ground, and that within no great period of time. As a confirmation of the opinion, about twenty- five feet below the surface, the earth is found to be the same with that of the adjacent marsh, to wit, a black mud. Both are nearly upon a level. At that depth, in several places, have been found large sticks or rather logs of wood, sound and uninjured by the waste of time, except about a quarter of an inch on the surface. He thought they were of pine. At this place the geological appearances are so pecu- liar, that Mr. William Bartram was led to conclude, the low marsh, meadows, and ponds, situated N. W. of the borough, were once the bed or channel of the Delaware, and that the present bed of that river was a low isthmus which connected it with the firm land of New-Jersey. The following extract from the Picture of Philadelphia. published by James Mease, M. D. shows the topographi- cal character of the bottom upon which the city stands, (p. 15, 16.) The " immediate substratum of Philadel- phia is a clay of various hues and degrees of tenacity mixed with more or less sand, or sand and gravel. Un- derneath, at various depths, from twenty to nearly forty feet, and also on the opposite shore of New-Jersey, are found a variety of vegetable Remains, which evidently ORGANIC REMAINS AT PHILADELPHIA. 393 appear to have been left there by the retiring waters. Hickory-nuts were found a few years since, in digging a well upwards of thirty feet below the surface ; and the trunk of a sycamore (button-wood or platanus) was dis- covered in Seventh-street, near Mulberry-street, about forty feet below, imbedded in black mud, abounding with leaves and acorns ; about sixty feet distant from that place, a bone was found ; the stratum above was a tough potter's clay. In various other parts of the city, and even at the distance of several miles in the country, si- milar discoveries have been made. Shark's teeth are occasionally dug up many feet below the surface near Mount Holly." The following fact is told of a fossil found in Mary- land. Some men in working an iron-mine, at Bush-creek, near the head of Chesapeake Bay, found the trunk of an oak tree, thirty feet underground, fixed by its roots in its natural erect position. The wood was penetrated by the ore. The specimen of this curious transformation was exhibited in Philadelphia. (Col. Mag. v. 1. p. 268). Alluvion of the Susquehannah. I cannot suppress the persuasion that great deposites have been made by the impetuous stream of the Susque- hannah. Spesutia island, Poole's island, and the adjacent shores, bear witness of these circumstances. Near the end of October, 18 IT, charcoal and ashes were found, fifty feet below the surface, near Elkton, at the head of Chesapeake bay. The proprietor, Mr. Thomas Moore, an inhabitant of Elktow-neck, and residing four miles from the shore, was digging a well when he discovered these articles. The quantity of charred coal 50 394 ORGANIC REMAINS tfEAR and ashes raised, *was six cartloads. There was also a parcel of burned' brands, or pieces of wood, charred at one end, found at the same depth. These were birch and beech, and -though soft, sufficiently entire to be ascertained and distinguished. On many of the pieces there were marks of edged tools, and of their having been split by human hands. These pieces of burned wood filled a corn basket, of the capacity of two bushels. In penetrating* to this depth they passed common soil, yellow gravel alid stiff clay; and they found water at the very place where the charcoal, ashes and wood lay. The soil above was overgrown with ancient trees of hickory and oak. I remember, that petrified bones, apparently of a whale, were brought from the shore of Chesapeake bay, near the place where the river Patuxent enters it, to the City of Washington, by Mr. O'Neale. In the geographical description of the country around Baltimore, by Dr. Horace H. Hayden, there is a fact con- cerning organic remains. In digging a well in that part of the city east of Jones's falls, called Old-Town, a log and a nut of the black-walnut-tree, were found twenty- one feet below the present surface, in a good state of preservation. The grinder of an elephant was dug out of the ground by the side of Mmarsh, in Queen Ann's county, on the eastern shore of Maryland, while opening a ditch. It differs, as Dr. Hayden observes, in some respects from the African as well as from the Asiatic elephant's grinder. The depth of this tooth is nine inches ; the length of the grinding surface nine ; breadth four and a half. It ha? THE HEAD OP CHESAPEAKE BAY. 395 twenty-one ovoidai processes, or what Mr. Blake calls conical processes. It is considerably convex on one side, which leads to a belief that it is a grinder of the upper jaw ; the convex side corresponding with the arch of the zygoma and alveolar circle. Its weight, after the loss of its roots and gelatinous matter, is more than ten pounds. At upper Marlborough, on the Patuxent river, there is a stratum of rock of a gray shore-sand, filled with shells of an univalve mollusca, which seems to be a buc- cinum. The specimens I possess are very beautiful. I possess also the moulds, in indurated clay, of that spiral shell which resembles a cork screw. In these the covering has perished, and the earthy core alone remains. Some of them have been flattened and distort- ed by compression. The fossil remains in this region, bordering on the quehannah and the Chesapeake, afford proofs like those already stated of a deposite from inland floods since the oceanic strata were formed. There is an extensive field for further research, which the sons of science in Mary- land will hasten to explore. The effects of the breach by the Potomac river, upon the land below the Falls. The region with which I am more particularly ac- quainted, is the District of Columbia. Washington, the seat of the general government, is situated in lat. 38 53' N. seventeen miles below the Great Falls of the Poto- mac, where the locks have been constructed, and about 396 ORGANIC REMAINS ALONG THE five or six miles lower than the Little Falls above Georgetown. It is just at the head of tide-water, which rises and falls between four and five feet in the Eastern branch. Along the shore from the mouth of Rock creek to the Tiber, the land adjoining the Potomac is of considerable elevation. From the latter place to the point at which the junction takes place with the Eastern branch, the shore is more flat and low. From this plain on the south, and from the bank of the Tiber on the west, rises the Capitol Hill. The height of this hill is more than eighty feet above tide- water, and between sixty and seventy above the ad- jacent low ground. Digging has shown that all the strata are horizontal ; and the pebbles and stones mingled with the sand are rounded as if worn by water. This ap- pearance is universal along the banks of the rivers and the streets. Under this mass of alluvial materials organic remains exist. They lie in a stratum of muddy clay. Trunks and branches of trees are found in abundance at the depth of fifty-four feet under the surface of Capitol Hill. Frequently the wood is blackened so as to resemble coal, and is mingled with pyrites. Forty-five feet below the surface of the lower ground, near the Eastern branch, a bough of sound and seasoned black-walnut was found on digging a well. A bone, apparently a rib of some very large, or elephantine ani- mal, was dug out of the bank of the Potomac, and exhi- bited for a show. Shark's teeth, or glosso-petrae, are often raised on digging wells, further down the river, as at Diggas's point, for example. POTOMAC AND JAMES S RIVERS. 397 This will show that there is a marine alluvion ; and that a fresh-water or inland alluvion has been super- induced. The AUuvion brought down by James's River. In the neighbourhood of this stream there is an abun- dance of organic remains. They are partly derelictions of the ocean, and partly accretions by the floods. On the authority of William Wirt, Esq. it is stated, that as far west as the Blue Ridge, marine shells and other exuviae of the ocean have been found, showing that the region was once emerged in the deep. Mr. Chevallie brought me, from Richmond, entire tri- angular teeth, apparently of sharks, and pieces of bones, probably of whales, dug from the depth of between sixty and one hundred feet, in the city of Richmond. Above these, in penetrating the earth, were found bark and wood, and the thigh bone of a small quadruped, probably a squirrel. All these are now in my cellection, at the College. It has been repeatedly affirmed, and on the examina- tion of the distinguished gentleman quoted in the para- graph before the last, that' in the neighbourhood of Wil- liamsburgb, in 1802, a considerable portion of a whale's skeleton was discovered. It was about four or five feet under ground ; two miles distant from the shore of James's river, and fifty from the Atlantic ocean. Among other parts were fragments of the ribs, and all the vertebrae regularly arranged, and very little impaired as to its figure. 398 REMARKABLE FOSSIL RELICKS So, on the bank of York river, the same observer, while walking on the sand beach, noticed, in the high cliff or bank above him, strata of sea shells not yet decomposed, of the same kind as those which lay on the beach under his feet, interposed with strata ofea^rth, showing at once the comparatively recent retreat of the water, and the subsequent action of the inland floods, and of the winds, to accumulate soil in that place. Benjamin Henry Latrobe, Esq. has surveyed 4he ma- ritime parts of Virginia, from Aquia creek to Cape Hen- ry, with the eye and the mind of a geologist. His pub- lication on the sand hills and sand quarries in that re- gion, abound with interesting fact and argument. He found carbonated wood with loose stone to underlay the strata of Potomac-sandstone. The wood mixed with the stone near James's river, appeared to him less carbo- nated than on the Potomac and Rappahannock. In the vicinity of the latter river, at Mansfield below Frede- ricksburg, the largest mass of timber he had seen, lies be- low the freestone. The Virginia sandstone does not merely rest upon vegetable relicks. It is penetrated by them. To the component parts of the stone, such as sand, clay, pebbles, pyrites, nodules of iron-ore, oxyd of iron and native alum, are added organic remains. Wood of all sizes, from the trunks and branches of trees to small twigs, ra- mifies throughout the strata. Sometimes it is entirely carboned ; or the wood is carbonated and the bark in a fibrous state, so as to have a net-like appearance, with a considerable degree of tenacity; or the bark is fibrous, and the wood in a state quite friable; or the wood re- placed by a pyrites which undergoes decomposition by exposure to the atmosphere ; and some other forms. IN VIRGINIA. 399 While treating of the maritime borders of Virginia, let me not forget to mention the remains of a mammoth found on the bank of York river, in 1811, about six miles east of Williamsburgh. When discovered, they lay on a marsh-mud, or a few feet within it, surrounded by roots of cypress trees penetrating the earth where the bones were found. Those roots were evidently the remains of such as had been shot forth by trees growing in the ground, now removed by water. The difference be- tween the present level, where the bones and roots are, and the top of the adjacent bank, is more than twenty feet. I received these facts from that reverend prelate, bishop James Madison, then president of William and Mary College. He visited the place, and examined into every thing relative to the discovery, with his accustom- ed accuracy. (See further particulars in Med. Reposi- tory, vol. xv. p. 388, 390.) It will be there found, that the parts of the skeleton raised, were the ossa innomi- nata; a femur or thigh bone; two vertebrae or joints of the back; two ribs almost entire; two tusks in tolerable preservation ; seven teeth, all of them grinders, and four of them fixed in their sockets, which seemed to be part of the lower jaw. The weight of the largest tooth was 7 l-4ib. ; of the smaller, from 3 to 41b. Other Fossil Remains in the United States* Rhode Island. Rhode Island contains a stratum of coal. It burns with little or no flame, and is somewhat difficult to kin- dle ; but makes an intensely hot fire. It is associated frequently with quartz, and sometimes with asbestos crystallized. ,It does not emit any kind of offensive 400 VEGETABLE AND ANIMAL KELICKS IN vapour; and is therefore as good for brewers and malt- sters as Kilkenny coal. Over this coal lies a stratum of thick coarse slate, containing ferns of a very large size. They appear to have been petrified, inasmuch as their substance seems to have been there. They cross each other, throughout the several laminae, in all directions. Dr. Case's publications afford much information con- cerning the inflammable materials covered by this roof of capillary plants. The specimens I possess are very distinct. North Carolina. At a place called Fishing creek, 150 miles from the sea coast, and almost four from Tarborough, in digging some little depth, they found a part of the skeleton of a whale, wjth sea shells in abundance. In the same place, in digging a well, at the depth of almost thirty-five feet, they found a cypress stump, with chips about and upon it, and an iron hatchet or wedge sticking into it. The skeleton of another whale, together with a petrified por- tion of a shark's jaw with teeth, has been found at a place called Williamstown, more than 100 miles from the sea coast. About a year ago, the skeleton of a huge animal was found on the bank of the Meherrin river, near Mur- freesborough. It was dug out of a hill, distant sixty miles from the ocean. Capt. Neville and Dr. Fowler, who visited the spot, gathered the scattered vertebrae which the negroes had thrown out, and laid them in a row thirty-six feet in length. If to this the head and tail be added, the creature must have been perhaps fifty feet or more in length. The former of these gentlemen enriched my collection with two of the teeth and a FOSSIL REMAINS IN N. AND S. CAROLINA. 401 joint of the back bone that he brought away. The teeth weigh sixteen ounces each. They are covered with an ash-coloured enamel, except at the roots where they were fastened in the jaws. Their figure is trian- gular, the sides towards the apex measuring six inches each, and the base four inches and a half across. The joint of the back is not cartilaginous, but actually bony. It is in some degree petrified, and weighs twelve pounds and a half. It, in all likelihood, belonged to a shark or a sea-serpent. The Rev. James Hall, a missionary from the general assembly of the presbyterian church and the synod of the Carolinas, to the Mississippi territory, published at Salsbury, in North Carolina, a short account of the more memorable observations he made during his journey. He affirms, that abed of clam and oyster-shells, as fair as ever lay on the shore of the Atlantic, is to be seen in an old field in the Ghicasaw country (p. 58). In the Mississippi territory he saw freestone, and a yellow cal- carious earth, which is apparently a concretion of shells. He observes, that it burns into good lime, and that the land is destitute of stones. South Carolina. Very remarkable organic remains have been disco* vered in South Carolina. I refer with pleasure to Go- vernor John Drayton's View of that State as respects her natural and civil concerns, for the full description illus- trated by an engraving of the teeth and bones of elephan- tine animals, dug out of Biggin swamp, in 1T94, by Colo- nel Senf, near the head of the West Branch of Cooper river, about eight or nine feet under ground ; as also for the distinct account he has given of the stratum of enor- 51 402 FOSSIL REMAINS IN GEORGIA, mous oyster-shells, extending from Nelson's ferry on the Santee, southwest to the Three Runs on the Savannah river. Georgia. From the information of General David Meriweather ? I learn valuable particulars concerning a remarkable body of sea shells, now existing in the internal parts of Georgia. Of a number of them I possess specimens. " The shell banks, as they are termed, make their first appearance on the south bank of Savannah river, near the place called White Bluff, about a hundred miles on a straight line from the sea shore, and run about southwest. They are not one entire ridge, but the ground is higher for about six or eight miles in width than it is above or below. On this ridge the shells make their appearance, in many places near the surface, and in others deeper. Not only the oyster-shell is found, but clam shells and a scalloped shell nearly similar to the clam shell. Some of them are large, and appear to be entire; others are cemented together. I think I have seen some of them large enough to contain the foot of a common man. I have seen the shells in different parts of the ridge, for the space of forty miles. They are made use of for lime, but are not supposed to afford a product so good as the common shell lime. I have been informed, that further to the southwest, and a little above the direct course, they get a congeries of shells which is in a rocky form, and affords a better cement. "And what is more extraordinary, at some distance above that, there are several quarries of a kind of sile- cious stone, which has a number of all kinds of shell? FLORIDA, AND LOUISIANA. 403 intermingled and dispersed throughout it. These are petrified and as hard as flint." These are wrought into millstones, and are considered as a good substitute for French burhs. In a spring near the high shoals of Apalachy, are found many echenites of a flat form, rather larger than a Spa- nish dollar. On the upper side are five radial bars of four rays each. The upper side is rather convex, and the lower, concave. They are converted to flint, and are a species of the scutella family. Florida. Ellicot's Journal of the occurrences during the expe- dition for determining the boundary of the United States and his most Catholic Majesty, between the years 1796 and 1800, contains valuable information on the fossils of the Apalachy, Chatahouche, and Flint Rivers. Vast strata of limestone abound. It seems to be the prevailing basis of the soil, and almost the sole ingredient of the rocks, islands, and keys quite round Cape Florida. It is com- posed in many places of broken shells, and filled with petrifactions. Louisiana. The following extract of a Letter received from William Darby, Esq. author of the valuable Map and Description of Loui- siana) contains the information collected by that intelligent gentleman of a Fossil Elephant found on the right bank of the lower Mississippi. In the month of October, 1804, I first visited the southwest part of the now state of Louisiana, Ope- 404 ORGANIC KEL1CKS IIS lousas, and when in that country, learned the following- facts : About the year 1797, Mr. Martin Durald, command- ant of Atacapas, addressed a letter to the late Wil- liam Dunbar, of Natchez, to the following effect:- That when the French first came into the country j now Atacapas and Opelousas, they found a watercourse, to which the native savages gave a name, that in their language was equivalent to " Carion Cro" in French. Mr. Durald demanded of the Indians, for what reason they gave the name of Carion Cro to that bayou ; they replied, that in the days of their fathers, a large animal came there and died, and that so many carion crows as- sembled to devour the carcass, that ever afterwards the creek (bayou) received the name of Carion Cro. Mr. Durald further states, that he, after his establishment in Atacapas, instituted an inquiry, and found that part of the bones of the large animal spoken of by the Indians had been recently discovered, and were to be seen on bayou Carion Cro. Mr. Durald's communication on the fossil bones at Opelousas, west of the Mississippi, is printed in the Philo- sophical Transactions of Philadelphia, vol. vi. p. 55. In digging wells there, various bones have been found, such as a human skull, thirty -five feet deep ; pottery of the na- tives ; oyster shells, twenty-two feet deep ; a goat's horn ; enormous bones, supposed to be those of the elephant ; teeth and jaw bones of the same. There was a cart load or more of these huge remains in one place, on the farm of Mr. Nerat, as Mr. Dunbar relates. I myself visited Opelousas in October, 1804, and while there, learned from Dr. Raphael Smith, of that place, LOUISIANA AND MISSISSIPPI. 405 who resided within two miles of Carion Cro, that within a few days before my arrival, some very large bones had been disinterred. I went with Dr. Smith to the spot, ana assisted in digging out of the earth a jaw bone, an- swering exactly to your Plate VIII. Fig. 2. I measured the tooth, and found it four inches over the enamel, and about one foot in depth. It contained transverse lines, as represented in your Fig. 2. Plate VI. The fragments of this tooth were sent to Dr. Garret E. Pendergrast, of Natchez, who remitted them to Dr. Wistar, of Philadelphia, in whose possession they now remain. It is a curious and interesting fact, that the spot where the savages reported from tradition that the large ani- mal died, was within one mile of the very place where Dr. Smith and myself found the fossil tooth. The surface of the ground was a loose loam, which had been formed by accretion of soil in the lapse of ages. The tooth had been opened to-day by a drain from the Prairie. The enamel was perfectly entire, but the other parts had beea changed to a carbonate of lime. Mississippi. The earthquakes which shook North America during the years 1811, 12 and 13, were accompanied, among other occurrences, with an ejection of warm water, sand, and coal in the region adjoining New Madrid, near the Mis- sissippi. Some of this volcanic coal was brought to me at Washington City, and in May, 1812, I made some ex- periments upon it, which led me to a belief of its vege- table origin. I found it very inflammable. It consumed with a bright and vivid blaze. A copious smoke was ^06 FOSSIL REMAINS IN emitted, whose smell was not at all sulphureous, but bi- tuminous in a high degree. Taken out of the fire in its ignited and burning state, it did not go out, but conti- nued to burn until it was consumed. When blowed upon, instead of being deadened by the blast, it became brighter, and the ashes turned vegetable blue to green, showing its alkaline quality. Alabama. The fossil specimens sent me by Mr. Magoflin from the neighbourhood of St. Stephen's, on the Tombigbee river, are highly interesting. They consist of the shells of bivalve molluscas, and of sea-urchins and radiary animals. Some of these are distinct and in their proper forms ; others compacted into limestone, with many of their lineaments remaining ; and others changing and changed to chalk. Fifteen or twenty feet below the surface is a stratum where wood is found, of different kinds, partially de- cayed. Beneath this and a concomitant body of clay and soft limestone, is a substance resembling the grass on the margin of the ocean, accompanied by numberless marine shells. The water from this, on first being taken up, smells like bilge-water. i Missouri. What shall we think of the genus and species of that petrified skeleton of a very large fish, seen in the Sioux country, up the Missouri, by Patrick Gass ? In his Jour- nal to the Pacific ocean with Messrs. Lewis and Clark, in 1804 6, he relates that it was forty-five feet long, and lay on the top of a high cliff. He mentions also a petri- ALABAMA AND MISSOURI. 407 lied log of wood, out of which whetstones and hones, could be made, in the Mandane region. This outline of North American geology is, I am sen- sible, very imperfect. Further observations will be re- quire4 to fill up the picture and finish it by proper co- louring. These, as they occur, may be arranged in their places, and contribute to the excellence and beauty of the piece. With the acquisition of facts from a wider field, the composition may be enlarged. Things which lie beyond the limits of my survey will be introduced. In process of time, it may be expected, that the whole scenery be- tween the Caribbean and the Frozen seas, and between the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans, will be introduced. When this object shall be accomplished, our contri- bution to the geology of the globe will be respectable. It may be added to the intelligence concerning South America, laid before the learned world by Baron Hum- fooldt and others. Conclusion. I have forborne to refer any of these great changes to epochs in time. Chronological dates and historical re- cords do not reach far enough back to answer all the purpose. Viewing the face of the earth as I do, some conception may nevertheless be entertained of the syn- chronism and succession of the respective formations. Let us take them in the inverse order from that which was stated in the introduction to this Essay. 408 THE THREE CLASSES OF DEPOSITES 1. Modern depositions from the briny ocean. These* as they consist of wearing away some places and adding to others, are in daily operation. There can be no doubt that such changes have always been going on since our planet received its present configuration. Many of them are subsequent to the commencement of animal and vegetable life. 2. Depositions from fresh water are also constantly making. The showers of rain, the currents of rivers, the trickling of springs, and the bursting of lakes, are all instrumental in producing alterations of this kind. From the nature of these productions they are deeply connected with beings that have enjoyed life, as we know from the vast number and variety of their fossil remains. I consider these formations as subsequent to the preceding in their origin and commencement, but coetaneous ever since. 3. Proceeding further back, the inland seas of salt water present themselves. In North America they have lost their briny quality, and become fresh lakes ; while, in Asia, there are numerous instances of inland salt seas to this day. The subsidence of the North Ame- rican lakes in the first instance, and their conversion from saltness to freshness in the second, are occurrences of the most interesting nature. They have given a pe- culiarity and distinctness of character to our geology, which naturalists among us will learn to appreciate. 4. After exploring the extensive formations of this kind in North America, we are carried to the most an- cient foundation, beyond which our inquiries are inca- pable of penetrating. These materials probably consti- tute the solid body or nucleus of the globe, according ON THE PRIMITIVE FOUNDATION. 409 to the original arrangement, when the confusion of chaos was reduced to order, and at the command of their Creator, the waters under the heaven were gathered to- gether into one place, and the dry land appeared. That water was the principal agent in all these opera- tions, there can be no doubt, But there was unquestionably another agent, of a most powerful character, and that was fire. This is the cause that produces volcanoes, or burning mountains, with their explosions, eructations and convulsions. I have not, however, dwelt upon them, because there are none of them within the limits of my survey. Thus, water and fire acting separately, by what is called the moist way and the dry way, have wrought and are yet working memorable effects on the superficial crust or external covering of our earth. Jointly, or acting in connexion, their operation is tremendous. Difficulties have been raised concerning the subsidence of the primitive ocean. I have published, nine years ago, my opinion that it must necessarily have diminished very considerably, for several reasons: 1. A great draught must have been made upon it to form the at- mosphere. , 2. Another, and a very great portion of it, entered into the constitution of crystals, where it is so- lidified and embodied, 3. The bodies of vegetables ab- sorb and confine a portion of it. 4. The bodies of ani- mals consolidate or contain much more. Geologists have, nevertheless, called in the aid of other causes. f r-#/; /": :..'**'"-:..; ^ -v. 410 SEVERAL HYPOTHESES TO AID IN The approach or the stroke of a comet has been sup- posed, by Count Buffon, capable of overturning the order of things, and of introducing into the system full as much confusion as the strata, and their organic re mains exhibit to us. Whether this was the fact or not, is impossible for its to know. Mr. Kir wan has given weighty reasons for his belief, that the globe's surface has been, at some remote period, most violently assailed by a mighty flood from the southeast. Tearing up and bearing away the looser materials of the southern hemisphere, it has brought a great body of them to the northern, and impressed upon the Capes of Good-Hope, of Horn, of Van Diemen's Land, and other promontories, the marks of its over- whelming force. This opinion corresponds very well with the geolo- gical features of the United States. What agent so ca- pable or so likely to wash up the sand and other materials into such ridges as our mountains present? The impulse of an ocean upturned from its bed, rolling impetuously over the land, and carrying every thing before it, may be supposed competent to the accomplishment of such a work. -^'^*; yVj, . ;: /.|, '''$Hy* !: ; 'V Attempts have been made to explain this rush of wa- ters, and concomitant events, by supposing that our planet has changed its axis. This hypothesis has some- thing plausible to the geologist, and seems to help him out of many difficulties. It places the poles and the equator of ancient days in situations very different from those they occupy at present. Regions then cold are now warm, and districts heretofore bound by frost, are at this day cheered or parched by heat. i '< ;/ * EXPLAINING GEOLOGICAL FACTS. 411 I was desirous to know how such a projection of the sphere would appear. At my request Mr. Darby exe- cuted a map whose equator and axis are removed forty- five degrees from the present equinoctial line and poles. By fixing one pole to the northwest of the Sandwich Islands, and the other to the southward of St. Helena, the equator crossing the isthmus of Darien, and touching the east end of Cuba*, runs over the Atlantic ocean to the eastward of Bermuda, and all the United States lie between it and the tropic. The continuation of the equator passes through Ireland, England, Holland, Ger- many, Poland, touches the northern shore of the Black Sea, and brings all Europe between the tropics. From that track the equator may be supposed to have been moved to the place it now occupies, producing a corresponding action in the physical character of the globe, and on the life of its plants and animals. This notion may be said by critics to be unfounded and visionary. The reader will remember it is not of- fered as a fact, but as a speculation. Visions, when they are known to be such, are frequently amusing, and never mischievous. It is only when they are mistaken for realities that they mislead the understanding. APPENDIX. LEIBNITZ'S PROTOG^A. JjrJLY learned correspondent, Fr, Adr. Vanderkemp a of Oldenbamerald, New-York, has favoured me with a communication too important to be withheld from the public eye. c< I send you enclosed the outlines of Leibnitz's Pro- togaea, published in 1749, with a Preliminary Disserta* tion of C. L. Scheidius. Gottingen. 1749. Inserted in Leibnitz's Works, the splendid edition of Lud. Dutens, in vi. vols. 4to. Geneva. 1768. By de Tournes, torn* ii. pag. 181. The Preliminary Dissertation of Scheidius is continued till page 199; the Protogaea from page 199 241. 1. Introitus. 2. Globus terras regulari primum forma fuit, et ex li* quido indtiruit, motrix caussa lux sive ignis. 3. Distinctior de globi terrei creatione sententia, et de basi illius. 4. Origo aquae .marinas et fluviaticas; lapidum item et diversorum terrae stratorum. $ 5. Plurimas globi nostri mutationes post primam crea- tionem ex variis caussis. 414 CONTENTS OF THE GREAT WORK OF J 6. Unde fuerit aqua, quae terrain obtegit, et quo de- venerit? nee non de variis diluvii caussis. $ 7. De Bructero monte, et fontium origine. 5 8. Metallorum in terra situs, venarumque descriptio et explicatio. 9. Mineralium generationem Chemia illustrat. 10. Recensentur productiones laboratoriis et fodinis communes. 11. Gemmarum generatio et naturalis et artificialis est. 12. Sublimationes naturales. Ammoniaci prasparatio. 13. Argentum et aurum aliaque metalla, quae statim sua sunt, vi ignis prodiere in venis. 14. Formas quasdam accipiunt a motu aquarum, ut rotunda inter lapides et metalla. 15. Qugedam in aquis concrescunt. 16. Tophaceus lapis a guttis cadentibus. De Stalactite antri Baumaniani, de cavitatibus ingemmatis saxo- rum, et de cavernis. 17. Quasdam a caloris et aquas conjunctione oriuntur. 18. Piscium variorum formas in ardesia unde provene- rint ? 19. Ignem inesse globo nostro motus terras, Vulcani, pumices, bitumen, et alia ostendunt. 20. Pisces in ardesia ex veris expresses lusus naturae non esse ostenditur. J 21. De variis terras stratis, eorum situ, et de origine salium, aquarumque salsarum. | 22. Montium et collium origo partim ex aquas materiem molliorem secum abripientis defluxu, partim ex ven- torum vi et terras motibus. v, 23. Conchylia marina in nostra regione et alibi passim inveniuntur. 24. Varia conchyliorum genera mire permista, in saxo et glarea non esse nata, et forma non mutata et situs ipse ostendit. LEIBNITZ ON THE PRIMITIVE EARTH. 415 | 25. Conchylia et ossa animalium marinorum, quae effo- diuntur, examinanari et resolvi possunt aeque ac ve- rorum animalium partes. 26. Antiquissimis temporibus maria vicina habuerunt aniinalia et conchylia, quos jam ibi non inveniuntur. 27. GlossopetraS) baculi S. Pauli et serpentes Melitenses, lapides Judaici, Asteriae, Trochitae et Entrochi, &c. sunt dentes, testae, exuviae et ossicula animalium ma- rinorum, non vero lusus natures. 28. Hue tamen non pertinent polygonorum figurae in Crystalliis aliisque rebus ; nee ea, qu33 in saxis prae- occupata imaginatio solummodo videt. \ 29. Exploditur ignava quorundam solertia, quag ludicra imaginationis vi quicquid vult in lapidibus figuratis deprehendit, aliaque a veritate aliena comminiscitur. 30. Ubi Giossopetroe Luneburgenses inveniantur? 31. Glossopetrae sunt dentes Carchariarum. \ 32. Usus Gtessopetrarum medicus illustratur. 5 33. De Belemnitis, Osteocolla, Corallio, Strombitis, Conchytis, Trochitis, Entrochis, Ebore fossili. \ 34. De ossibus, maxillis, craniis et dentibus minoribus et majoribus, quae in antro Baumanniano, et alibi etiam apud nos inveniuntur. 35. De cornu Monocerotis, et ingenti animali Qued- linburgi eflbsso. 36. Descriptio antri Scharzfeldensis et ossium in eo re- pertorum. 37. Descriptio antri Baumanniani et in eo contentorum. 38. De Succini natura, et quod etiam in nostris terris reperiatur. 39. De mutationibus terrarum per flumina, et de ruina- rum ingentium apud nos vestigiis. 40. Tisurgis prope Mindam montes perrupisse videtur. Ad hanc usque urbem olim paludes ab Oceano irri- gui pertigisse dicuntur. 416 THE PROTOG^A OF LEIBNITZ, 41. Ubi nunc Venetiarum et Principum Estensium re- giones, ibi antiquissimis temporibus mare et paludes fuere. 42. Fontium Mutinensium rairaculum exponitur. 43. Caussa horum fontium proditu-r. 44. Descriptio stratorum terrse soli Rostorpiensis prope Goettingam, Mutinensi aliquo modo similis. 45. De obrutis terra arboribns, et fossili ligno. 46. De Torfa ej usque origine. 4T. Singularis de arboribus terra obrutis observatio. 48. Enumeratio stratorum terra?, Amstelodami in putei fossione observatorum." This learned and curious memoir is embellished by many figures, contained in twelve plates. Leibnitz confesses himself a believer in the extensive ._ operation of fire upon this globe. " I believe," he writes in his fifth letter to Mr. Bourguet, torn. vi. epist. 5. p. 213, "that our globe has been one day in a state like that of a burning mountain ; and it was then that the minerals which are discovered in these times, and that are capable of being imitated in our furnaces, were formed." " Ilocks, which may be called the bones of the earth, are the sconce, or vitrification of this ancient fusion; sand is only the glass of this fusion, pulverized by motion; sea water is but an oleum per deliquium,' produced by cooling, after the calcination. Thus the three most extensive materials on the globe's surface (the sea, rocks and sand) are naturally explained by fire, while it is not easy to explain them by any other hypothesis." APPENDIX. 417 CONFIGURATION OF THE COUNTRY LYING SOUTH OF LAKE ERIE. I own my obligation to Professor Chester Dewey, df Williams' College, Massachusetts, for the following in- telligence on the natural formation of the region situated to the southward of lake Erie* Almost all the distance from Buffalo to the head of lake Erie, there is a regular swell of land, generally about five miles from the shore, everywhere presenting to the observing traveller, sufficient evidence of its hav- ing formerly been the south boundary of the lake. The land south of this ridge is generally lower for many miles in some places it is nearly forty miles a dead-level, except when it is interrupted by the channels or beds of creeks, which are generally deep, with almost perpendi- cular banks* The land on the north side of the ridge gradually descends to the north about one mile generally, where is a second, or what we call the north, ridge. This is not so high nor so interrupted by mounds of sand as the south ridge. The distance from this to the lake is about four mile's, and the land a little descending towards the lake. Though the present lake-store appears to have been fixed for centuries, probably the southern ridge was once the shore ; and for the following reasons : * The south ridge is composed of the same materials as the pre- sent shore. I have carefully viewed it from Coneaut creek to Grand river, a distance of about 45 miles. This day I have been viewing a newly dug well in the town of Wrightsburgh. From the top of the ground, the first three feet is a sandy loam ; then a coarse gravel ; and then a layer of small stones of the same kind which we find on the present lake-shore. These three layers 53 418 APPENDIX. make about five feet. Beneath these are successive stra-* ta of the same kind to the bottom of the well, which is about twenty feet from the surface. At the bottom of the well, in the coarse gravel, and in a spring or rather sub- terranean brook, there was found a piece of (apparently) bass wood, between two and three feet long, and two OF three inches in diameter. It was evidently a limb of a trunk which is now buried in the gravel and pebbles be- low its direction was perpendicular, and its texture so little impaired, that it was with difficulty broken off. Lobster-shells, cockle-shells, and clam-shells, of the same appearance are found this depth from the surface, as are now found on the lake-shore. My informant describes the remains of a well-built fort, with its trench and mound, which has never been examined, but which can be given you at another time if it be of any importance to you : as also the huge human bones, which have been discovered, with some articles of stone, lead, and sometimes brass, buried with them. In support of the above, it is added, that all these monuments are found either on or always south of the south ridge. This is sufficient proof that these forti- fications were all built before the recession of the wa- ters of the lake ta the north. All these bones are found only on or south of the ridge. The land is higher on the south ridge than for a considerable distance to the south of it. The waters once inundated the land for many miles , to the south; but probably by the constant breaking of the surf of the lake in the shallow waters, this south ridge was formed. When the surface of the lake Avas lowered, (which probably was occasioned by the breaking away of the earth at Niagara 3 ) the creeks broke through the mound of sand or gravel, and thus be- gan their present beds. The north ridge does not seem to APPENDIX. 419 have been the boundary of thfi lake for any length of time ; and it really seems, from many accounts, that the water ef the Niagara once run off to the southward. CLASSIFICATION OF MARINE RELICKS. I insert, on account of its peculiar importance, the fol- lowing classification of the fossil shells of the United States, by my friend John G. Bogert, Esq. Pectinite, #rca, Glycemeris, Jinomla Vitrea> Ostrcea Fascinata^ Terebratulites. These specimens I chiseled out of the summit of a high limestone hill, in the County of Columbia, about 300 feet above the surface of the Hudson river, and dis- tant four miles from the river, and 130 from New-York. The limestone in this neighbourhood, at that distance above the level of the river, abounds with specimens of this description, and extends along the edge of the sum- mit several miles, and not more than about five feet in breadth on the southeasterly side ; none appearing on the northwest side near the Hudson. That part of the hill from which I procured these spe- cimens, presents a perpendicular of about 80 feet from its base ; although from the base of the perpendicular to the stream or river below, there appears to be a descent of at least 70 feet. If we take a view of this tract of country, extending from within four miles of the Hudson to Hillsdale on the Taconick mountains, in the State of Massachusetts, where I found similar specimens; a geological mipd cannot be 420 APPENDIX. otherwise impressed, than that this region has, at some very remote period, been covered with water, as the country generally is alluvial. Upon examination of a great part of this country, I found the course of the wa- ter, directed towards the Hudson, falling in many places over high precipices, and the rocks very much water worn. On the easterly side of this range of mountains? which divides the state of Massachusetts from New- York, the water empties into the Sound or East river. A Terebratulite. Gaultieri, in his book, has made a particular genus for the Terebratulites, and calls them Terebratula. Lin^ naeus calls them Anomia. Davila ranks them as a genus of his first family of Ostrea. The break on the top of the under valve is perfo* rated, and rises curved upon the upper valve ; the hinge is inarticulate. The second species of this family is multarticulate ; the hinge lying on a long straight line, and set with teeth like the arc shell. The specimens I have, are from the Ohio falls, Black river, Jefferson, Ontario, Oneida, Columbia, Rockland, and Orange Counties, State of New-York. These remains are rarely found recent, and differ much in their external figure ; some are globular, and others elongated. Area Noe and Area Tortuosa. These specimens I procured from the Wallkill, Orange County, State of New- York ; they are imbedded in in- APPENDIX. 421 durated clay, and are not petrified, having the shells complete, and in some instances the impressions only re- main, the shell having been decomposed. ^ The arc shell is found in the Mediterranean and the West-Indies, and not on our coast. I have compared them with the recent shells in my cabinet from the Me- diterranean, and they correspond in external figure. It is worthy of remark, that almost all shells imbedded in clay, are not petrified ; but indurated ; having the ap^ pearance of having been submitted to the action of fire, or calcined ; and are properly denominated Conservata. Pectinlte, A variety called by Linnaeus Nodosa, very large, 5 to 6 inches in diameter, with the Tintinnabuhim attached in considerable number to the surface, of about an inch in length ; these are converted into sandstone, and found in James's river, State of Virginia ; these are generally equivalve; the hinge lies on a straight line, like the Es- callop, but set with several parallel and straight ridges, and furrows, I have specimens also from the Counties of Columbia, Rockland, West Chester, and New- York. Those from Columbia and West Chester are imbedded in carbonate of lime ; those from Rockland and New- York, in clay. The mass of Pectinites I found on a mountain in Rock- land, are much water-worn externally. Those found on the island of New-York, were discovered near the State Prison in digging down a hill. I have also a singular aggregated mass of shells, com- 422 APPENDIX. pletely converted into silex, known by the name of horse-foot, found on lot No. 69, Cayuga reservation, and presented me by D. Clinton, Esq. This specimen has never been described by any writer to my knowledge. Serpulite. A fragment of a Serpula, if extended upon a straight line, woald measure about 10 inches; this is a carbonate of lime, and was found in Coeyman's patent, near Al- bany. Orthocerite. First Species. From seven to eight inches in length, and one and a quarter inch to two in diameter at the base; straight, and not turbinated; tapering from the broad end to a sharp pointed top, like a straight horn, (from whence its name.) They are chambered from bot- tom to top, and have a Siphunculus or pipe of Cottcam- meration from chamber to chamber pipe central. These specimens I obtained from Sullivan County, New- York. In your valuable collection you have seve- ral very distinct and well marked, which I believe are from Jefferson animal extinct. Linnaeus ranks them in his system as Nautilus Ortho- cera. They are generally casts of stone or replacements of sparry matter; sometimes fragments of shells may be seen on them. Second Species. Lituus. This exactly resembles a bishop's crozier in shape, has a long stem, cylindrical one end whereof has a.spiral turn ; this shell is soft and easily fractured. APPENDIX. 423 Third Species* Turbo Polythalamus five concame- rations. This shell has never been found, except fossil, and in that state only one species has been known to me. It is turbinated or spiral, of a lengthened shape, like a buccinum, is concamerated, and the diaphragenus are jogged like the Ammonite. J3 elemnite. Those in my cabinet are from James's river, Virginia, and Monmouth County, New-Jersey. From Monmouth County, they are found in marl pitts, near Sandy-Hook, and measure from three to five inches in length, having a base of half an inch, lengthened to a sharp point, con- eamerated. Linnaeus classes them with Nautuli. Gryphite. I have some specimens from New- Jersey and Virginia; there are several varieties ; some are grooved, and others have a plain surface ; some are flattened, and others al- most globular, having the apex conflected. Found in marl. This animal is extinct in this country, as also in Europe. In addition to the above described specimens, I have also Corallites, Encrinites, Entrochites, Echinites, Cha- mites, Cardites, &c. principally found in the State of New- York. In addition to the list or catalogue of organic remains, of which I have endeavoured to give some account, per- mit me to make one or two remarks. As there is a va- riety of opinions^ainong geologists on the subject of the formation of Obsidian (although not exactly belonging to your book on the geology of North America), I beg leave to mention, that Dr. Barton, of Philadelphia, pre- 424 APPENDIX. vious to his departure for Europe, showed me tiful specimen of obsidian, belonging to his Mineralogi- cal cabinet, with a complete Echinite imbedded in it; this specimen is in a state of conservata, and not calcin- ed. This is a curious fact, as it offers an objection to a generally received opinion, that obsidian is of volcanic origin ; and if it was so, the calcarious matter must have been decomposed. I would also make another observation with respect to an opinion of Cuvier. He says that crystallized mar- bles never cover shelly strata. Perhaps this may be the case in that part of Europe which has been examined by him ; but I have discovered granular foliated lime- stone, perfectly crystallized, in the County of Columbia, in the neighbourhood of Hudson, containing pectinites, anomites, terebratulites, &c. specimens of which I have. There have been some inquiries made with respect to the rocks catled the Pallisadoes, opposite Mount Pleasant, on the Hudson river. On examination, I found the lower stratum running under the river, composed of a beauti- ful red granite, and the superincumbent matter consisting of a species of basalt, of the trap family. This mass of rock takes a westerly and northwesterly direction towards the falls of Passaick, and there becomes the trap of the se- condary formation; in which I found several pieces of agate, imbedded in a similar manner to some specimens I have received from Leo. M'Nally, Esq. of Dublin, which ke obtained near the Giant's Causeway. CONTENTS. 1. INTRODUCTORY Observations 321 2. The Original Saltness of the North American Lakes 327 3. The Barriers which probably restrained the waters, in some parts of North America, after the ancient ocean had retired 332 I. THE INNER OR UPPER BARRIER, ib. Breaches of this Barrier 334 1. At the northeast extremity of Lake Ontario ib. 2. Northern extremity of Lake George 335 3. By the Hudson River, at Hadley ib. 4. Mohawk River, at the Upper Falls 336 5. Delaware, above Easton 337 6. Lehigh, above Bethlehem ib. 7. Schuylkill, through the Blue Ridge 338 8. Susquehannah, through the same ib. 9. Potomac and Shenandoah 339 10. By James's River ,.... 344 11. By the Ohio and Mississippi .,... ib. Enumeration of certain Organic Remains found within the li- mits herein delineated. A. MARINE PRODUCTIONS ,.... 345 Oysters ,.- ib. Scallops 346 PectinitCB,. ,,,,,,. ",..,,, ,,,,,,,,,..,,,,,,,,, ,,,,,.,. ib. 54 126 CONTENT^. PAtfE Orthocerites . 346 Madrepores 347 Terebrums 348 Clams ib. Cockles . ib. Fish Banks, south of Lake Ontario.-. 349 Fossils along the Illinois 350 Fossils in the state of Ohio ib. LAND PRODUCTIONS. Ferns ib. Palms ib. CHANGES WROUGHT BY THE BREACHES OF THE INNER BARRIER. The Falls in Black River.... 351 Onondago River ib. Salmon River * ib. Seneca River... ib. Genesee River ib. Niagara River ib. Its Channel, as worn away above the cataract ...... 352 Its Channel, as torn away below 357 The Falls of Ohio 360 The Falls of Mississippi ib. B. FRESH WATER PRODUCTIONS. Bones at the Licks in Kentucky 361 Of Mastodons 362 Elephants ib. Bisons ib. Mastodon in Indiana 363 Pennsylvania ib. Chemung, N. Y ib. Ohio., ,.,. 364 CONTENTS. 427 II. THE OUTER OR LOWER BARRIER. Breaches in this Barrier. 1. Connecticut River ...................... . ........ .... 364 Impressions of Fossil Fish .......................... 365 2. Hudson River ; by a branch of the Housatonick ; by the present channel ; by the Clove through which the Ramapaugh yet runs ............. ... ib. 3. St. Lawrence River, near Quebec ................ 390 4. Delaware River, below Easton ,. ................ 391 5+ Schuylkill, below Reading ......................... ib. 6. Susquehannah, below Swetara .................... 393 7- Potomac, below Harper's Ferry .................. 395 Salt water Fossils, left bare ....................... 396 Fresh water deposites ........................... . ib. 8. James's River Alluvion ............................ 397 C. Other Fossil Remains not comprehended within the fore- going limits and descriptions. Petrified Ferns and Capillary Plants in Rhode Island ....... 399 Teeth and Bone of (probably) a Sea-serpent, in North Ca- rolina ......................................................... 400 Oyster-shells and Elephantine Bones, in South Carolina.... 401 Marine shells and Echini, in Georgia ......................... 402 The like in Florida ....... ................. ,. ................... 403 Louisiana ...... . . . ....... . ...... . .................... 404 Mississippi ...... ... ........... . ...................... 405 Alabama and Missouri ................ . ........... 406 Imperfection of this sketch ................................... 407 Much information wanted within the limits of the Essay... ib. Much more for the region beyond them ..................... ib. Encouragement to Geologists to collect facts and complete the inquiry ................................................. . , .ib. Concluding Remarks, on the difficulty of referring the events stated, to epochs in chronology ,.,.,,,,.,,.,,, ? . . . jib, 428 CONTENTS!. PAGE INVERSE ORDER OF GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS. 1. By modern deposites of the great ocean 408 2. Deposites by fresh water ib. 3. Deposites from saline lakes ib. 4. The primitive foundation of the globe ib. My own opinion on the subsidence of the ancient and ori- ginal ocean ; as water was (a) turned to gas to form the atmosphere ; (b) converted to solids, by crystallization, to form minerals ; and (c) by nutrition to constitute plants and animals 409 OTHER AGENTS. The hypothesis of a stroke from a Comet 410 Of a vast Inundation from the southeast.... ib. Of a change in the Axis and Equator of the earth forty-five degrees 411 APPENDIX. Abstract of the Protogaea of Leibnitz 413 Description of the country south of Lake Erie 417 Classification of American Fossil Shells, &c. ,.,.,....,....,. 419 EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. PLATE I. Fig. 1. Bird's eye view of the front, or small upper grinder of the right side of an American Mastodon, dug up in the town of Hempstead, Rockland county, state of New- York, about 34 miles from the city of New- York. Length, 4 5-8 inches, breadth, 3 1-8 inches. Fig. 2. Bird's eye view of a tooth dug up in Middletown, Monmouth county, state of New-Jersey, about 26 miles from the city of New- York. Length, 9 8-8 inches breadth, 3 1-8 inches. It is supposed to be allied to the Asiatic Elephant. Fig. 3. Bird's eye view of a tooth found on the Eastern shore of Ma- ryland. (From Dr. Hayden.) Length, 8 l-a inches greatest breadth, 4 inches. It is supposed to be allied to the African Elephant. Fig. 4. Side view of Figure 1, with the roots broken. Fig. 5. Side view of Figure 2.- Showing the internal part of the tooth, the external lamina of bone having cracked off. The white substance exposed in this view, was of the same friable nature as that in the roots of Figure 1, and 4. Greatest depth, 8 1-2 inches. JFig. 6. Side view of Figure 3. Greatest depth, 9 &8 inches. 430 EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. PLATE II. Fig. 1. Exact view of the tusks of a large animal discovered by Drs. Mitchill and Townsend, at Chester, Orange county, state of New-York, in May, 1817. They were denuded lying in this horizontal position. The tusks were smooth, and of a yellow- ish brown and mottled appearance. This elegant surface was traceable all around and above the upper grinders, which were seated, as here represented, in the tusks themselves. The sharp edge of bone which seems to have surrounded the roof of the mouth, and which is seen to terminate behind, in condy- loid surfaces, for the reception of the cervical vertebrae, was afterwards exposed. The space within this circle of bone was so mutilated and crumbled, that an xact delineation could not be taken. The two triangular flat plates of bone, observed at the divergence of the tusks, were continuous into them, and not divided by sutures. It will be seen, however, that they are separated from each other their whole length, by a longitudi- nal fissure, until they are lost in the convergence of the tusks. The posture of the animal was supine, or on his back, and he had lain in this manner, probably undisturbed, since his death. The length of the left tusk, which was wholly exposed, is 9 feet along the curve. It made a bold curvature outward and a little upward. The right tusk was 7 feet along the curve, and had a direction in a plane, diverging very little from a perpendicu- lar. These bones lay about 6 feet below the surface. Diame- ter of each tusk at the divergence, 8 2-3 inches. Greatest breadth of the circular edge of bone, '25 inches. Distance from the condyloid surfaces to the upper grinders, 18 inches. l*'ig. 2. Side view of the lower jaw with the two grinders in siture. Length, from the condyle to the extreme point of the chin, 3G inches. Length along the base, 80 inches. Length of the front, or smaller grinder, 35-8 inches. Breadth, 2 7-8 inches. Length of the larger, 61-2 inches. Greatest breadth, 3 1-2 inches. Fig. 5- This thin flat plate of bone lay about ten feet deeper, and im- mediately under, and parallel to the circular edge of bone already described. It is separated by a longitudinal suture, and before its bifurcation is contracted in its breadth, and bent down to form a sinus on each side, apparently for the inception of temporal muscles* EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 431 Fig. 4. Relative direction and position of the tusks, with a conjectural view of the shape of the cranium, and the manner in which it was probably associated to the lower jaw. The dexter tusk was shorter, stouter, and more crooked than its fellow : The point had the appearance of having been worn and blunted by use. Its form afforded abundant evidence of the preference the living animal had given to the right side, PLATE III. Fig. 1 . Back or large upper grinder of the right side. Length 6 inches- Mean breadth, 3 inches- Fig. 2. Bird's eye view of half the lower jaw, displaying the angle of divergence. There was enough of the right side left to show its direction. Fig. 3. Perpendicular section -of the aveolar progress of the right branch of the lower jaw, giving a view of the large or back grinder, and direction and figure of the roots. They are hollow, and the external lamina of bone is seen peeling off. Fig. 4. Tooth and part of the jaw of a creature resembling the fossil animal of Maestricht. It was found at the base of the Never- sinck hills, in New-Jersey, among belemnites and oyster- shells. Fig. 5. A belemnite, from the same stratum. Fig. 6. Petrified echinus from Kentucky. They are said to be frequent in the Great Cavern, near the Green river. Fig. 7. Petrified echinus, from the upper country of Georgia. There were many more at the place whence these were taken. Fig. 8. Red oxyd of iron, containing encrinites and shells, from Oaei~ da county, New-York. FINIS. -, RETURN TO the circulation desk of any University of California Library or to the NORTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY Bldg. 400, Richmond Field Station University of California Richmond, CA 94804-4698 ALL BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAYS 2-month loans may be renewed by calling (415)642-6233 1-year loans may be recharged by bringing books to NRLF Renewals and recharges may be made 4 days prior to due date DUE AS STAMPED BELOW YC 21533