"^98 Of the Changes which Life has experienced on the Globe. 



after man and the orang-outang, might lead to the inference of 

 a proportional developement of the intellectual faculties ; but, 

 with reference to this subject, we have only the relations'of fish- 

 ermen, who affirm, that the dolphin, like the whales, loves to 

 live in society, that it performs great migrations, has a great at- 

 tachment to its young, and defends them courageously when 

 they are pursued. 



The figures of the plate accompanying this memoir represent 

 the brain of the dolphin : \st, by its upper surface ; 9^dly^ by its 

 base ; Qdly, the cerebellum and tubercula quadrigemina ; 4^/i/y, 

 the vertical section of the cerebellum made in the middle ; 5thly, 

 the brain, without the upper part of the hemispheres, which are 

 removed to the level of the centrum ovale of Vieussens, and of 

 the lateral ventricles. 



Of the Changes which Life has experienced on the Globe. 



X: ossiL remains of the animals which preceded man upon the 

 earth are every day discovered on both continents ; and every day 

 are the documents regarding the history and successive changes 

 of the various races that existed before the present, increased by 

 new facts. This is equally the case with the vegetation which 

 embellished the earth at that remote period, and with which 

 those primitive animals were necessarily in close connection. 

 New animals and vegetables have assumed the place of those 

 that have been destroyed, and whose ancient existence is only 

 revealed to us by their fossil remains. Thus, in the course of 

 the ages that preceded the appearance of man upon the eai'th, 

 its surface has successively changed its aspect, its verdure and 

 its inhabitants ; the seas have nourished other beings, the air has 

 been peopled with other birds. 



The remains of these various successions of animals and ve- 

 getables attest that they were at first much more uniform. The 

 vegetables of the coal formation, for example, scarcely present 

 any difference, whatever may be the latitude, the longitude, or 

 the elevation at which they are found. Europe, Asia, and the 

 two Americas, alike produced elephants, rhinoceroses, masto- 

 dons, &c. The differences which vegetables and animals exhi- 



