Oil some Quadrupeds supposed to be extinct, 353 



those that still exist alive, are never found except in the latest 

 alluvial depositions, or in the fissures of caverns and rocks, in 

 places where they may have been overwhelmed by debris, or 

 even buried by man *." 



Thus it appears that a comparative view of the exact species 

 now living, with that of the fossil remains, is what we must 

 depend on to decide whether the fossil kinds may not be still in 

 existence. • M4ik -S»^ i^va; ' 



With respect to the very numerous theories of the earth, the 

 last, by Werner, has been confidently quoted in opposition to 

 the writer's historical proofs j. But Werner himself, before his 

 death (in 1817),, tacitly acknowledged that it is not a tenable 

 doctrine, and which is clearly indicated by the compilers of 

 Rees's Cyclopedia'^, although it is generally allowed to be the 

 best extant. This hypothesis was formed on a circumscribed 

 view of the strata in Saxony, but it is found to be quite inap- 

 plicable, in America for instance §. To account for fossil bones 

 of elephants, &c., being found high in the north, the American 

 author who discovered this defect in the geological doctrine, 

 conjectures that those large quadrupeds may have migrated, 

 like the buffalos, during the change of seasons. This notion, 

 however, would not apply to Asia, the native countries of those 

 animals being well supplied with leaves or other food the year 

 round. 



With these prefatory remarks some historical proofs are 

 offered, for the probability of the following animals found in a 

 fossil state, not being of extinct species, beginning with the 



Elephant. 



" On sinking the foundation for a mill, near the side of a 

 small brook in the Bishop of Kilmore^s lands, at Maghery, 



* Cuvier, Theory of the Earth. 



•!• In the American Quarterly Review, published at Philadelphia, 

 March, 1827. Art. •* Fossil Remains." 



% Titles, *• Werner," " Fletz," •« Transition." 



§ See two dissertations on the Geology of the U. S. of N. America, 

 by W. M'Clure, Esq., in the Transactions of the Amer. Phil. Soc, new 

 series, vol. i., Philadelphia, 1818. This gentleman had entertained a 

 different view in the previous volume ; but after eight years' experience, 

 in Europe and America, he had the philosophical justice, boldly to 

 amend his former opinions. 



