Professor Pictet on the Insects found in Amber, 395 



authors have concluded, from these deposits, that it was of 

 more modern origin than the tertiary epoch. Sometimes am- 

 ber has been found even mingled with the remains of human 

 industry. Thus Steinbeck says, that a small metal bell was 

 discovered, near Brandenburg, under a bed, containing amber ; 

 and instances are mentioned of nails, wire, &c., having been 

 found in veins of amber. All these facts cannot be explained 

 but by admitting, as we have said, that fragments of amber 

 have been, at different periods, displaced by the sea, as hap- 

 pens in the present day, and deposited in formations poste- 

 rior to the tertiary period. We cannot, therefore, deduce 

 from them any argument for bringing the period when this 

 resin was formed nearer to our own day. 



Other more important facts shew that the origin of amber 

 goes back to the tertiary epoch, and that it is to be assigned to 

 a resin which flowed from the trunk of certain trees belonging 

 to that era. The following are the proofs in favour of this view i, 

 1st, We find amber in beds of tertiary lignites, in the form of 

 numerous fragments lying between the trunks of amber trees. 

 It is true that this substance has never been found adhering 

 directly to any of the trunks ; but the position of the frag- 

 ments seems to admit of no doubt. 2d, The analogy between 

 copal and amber evidently indicates a similar origin. Their 

 consistency, their colour, their nature, and the fact that they 

 both inclose organic remains, prove this resemblance, and 

 concur in shewing that amber, like copal, and many modern 

 resins and gums, has flowed from the trunk and branches of 

 a vegetable. It is probable that the large and irregular 

 masses are the produce of the trunk, that the smaller ones 

 have come from the branches, and that those which have a 

 slaty structure have been formed by a series of layers. The 

 roots probably produced none. The great quantity thrown 

 up by the Baltic Sea, is probably owing to the existence of a 

 considerable bed, situate in the south-west quarter of the pre- 

 sent basin of that sea, towards 55° north latitude, whence the 

 winds convey it by diverging to the different points of the 

 coasts of Prussia. This must have been the principal place 

 where Baltic amber was formed, and the site of the forest 



