314 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



or most ancient being on the east. This is beautifully evidenced in the rocks 

 forming the basins of the great Canadian lakes. 



1C. That some of the groups, during and after deposition, were sub-atmos- 

 pheric, presenting the conditions of dry land and shallow waters for long 

 and varying periods : and that, together with the marine life they sup- 

 ported, they enjoyed the influences of the sun, and other meteorological 

 agencies. This is indicated by animal tracks, sun-cracks on ancient shores, 

 the short ripple-marks of a chopped sea, impressions of reeds waving in 

 limning water, and in presence of bog-iron ore. This is conformable with 

 what took place in the carboniferous, permian, triassic, liassic, oolite, wealden, 

 and later periods. Denudations also occurred to most of the groups to a 

 large extent. 



17. That in New York, as elsewhere, there is an intimate connection 

 between fossils and their sediment or habitat. The calcareocolous animals 

 are always found in limestone more or less pure, and the arenicolous in sand- 

 stone more or less pure, with exceptions, such as usually happen with lo- 

 comotive animals. The calcareocolous are everywhere the most numerous. 

 It is true that molluscs are the principal agents in the deposition of calcare- 

 ous sea bottoms ; but these latter greatly favor afterwards the multiplication 

 of individuals. 



18. That the iron ore which we so frequently see investing invertebrate 

 remains, had access to them after their death and sepulture. 



19. Every group, as established by the State Geologists of New York, is a 

 distinct centre of life a separate realm or community of animated beings, 

 which may be called epochal, so marked are the differences. 



The majority of these existences always perished at the end of the group 

 when certain deposits ceased, because the new sediment, with its new and 

 peculiar flora (and for other reasons), was only able to nourish a few, if any, 

 of the old molluscs. 



20. In New York the species of fucoids occupy and are typical of only one 

 group. 



21. All the individual existences are perfect at once, from the earliest 

 dawn of life, in their organization and social relations. 



22. It is a great thought, that throughout the incalculably long succession 

 of fossiliferous deposits, palaeozoic or more modern, all animal and vege- 

 table life was constructed upon the same idea of innervation, organs of 

 sense, supply and waste, fecundation, etc. 



23. There is another kind of life-centre the geographic, belonging to 

 one and the same group. This forms numerous separate provinces, linked 

 together by a few common fossils, and displaying extraordinary variety. 

 This principle or regulation is carried out abundantly everywhere. Bohe- 

 mia and Scandinavia have scarcely a Silurian fossil in common. One-half 

 of the Russian and Irish fossils, and two-thirds of those of New York, are 

 new and peculiar. Even the east and west sides of the small districts in 

 Wales and England, investigated by Prof. Philips, differ remarkably in 

 their population. We see this in the American Tertiaries, and in the recent 

 seas. 



21. Contrary to the opinion of Mr. D. Sharpe, the mollusc having the 

 greatest vertical range has the greatest horizontal extension, being found in 

 the most distant regions. 



25. There is no evidence of multiplication of species by transmutation. 



