278 Dr Fleming on the insufficiency of the Evidence Jbr 



analogous to the productions of tropical forests. The conclusion 

 seemed to be warranted, by an extended induction, that our re- 

 gion once enjoyed a tropical climate, at which time our rivers 

 were swarming with alligators, our lakes with tortoises, and our 

 seas with corals ; when our caves were the haunts of bears and 

 hyaenas, and our forests the resort of the elephant and tiger. 

 Nay, that in those northern regions, now suffering, during so 

 great a part of the year, all the rigours of an iron winter, the cli- 

 mate was once so mild as to permit the residence of the rhinoce- 

 ros and the elephant. 



Imposing as these conclusions certainly appear, their validity 

 might, with propriety, have been called in question, when natu- 

 ralists, ceasing to rely on general appearances, examined more 

 narrowly specific characters, and announced, as a result of their 

 labours, that the extinct animals, though genericaily related to 

 the tropical kinds, were yet to be viewed as distinct species. 

 The argument in favour of a change of climate^ which these fos- 

 sil remains formerly seemed to furnish, now unsupported by ob- 

 servation, was found to rest entirely on analogy. Yet, in spite 

 of this change of character, it is still relied on with confidence, 

 as yielding support to hypothetical views ; and few geologists of 

 eminence could be mentioned, in whose writings it has ceased to 

 occupy a prominent place. Some anxiously seek for proofs of a 

 change of climate, on the supposition that our planet was once 

 fluid by heat, and is still in the act of cooling ; while others, 

 guided by their notions of magnetism or electricity, are equally 

 sanguine in their expectations of perceiving proofs of change *. 



If it be admitted that the extinct animals are different in spe- 

 cies from the existing kinds, and here, we presume, there is no 

 difference of opinion, we shall be able to bring the subject into 

 that form in which accurate conclusions may be obtained, or the 

 value of those previously announced brought to a suitable test. 

 Indeed, the whole argument in favour of a change of climate 

 seems to depend on the value of analogy., as an instrument of 

 research. Supposing ourselves acquainted with the habits ^d 

 Af^ flF. '\*> 



• Professor Link in his Urwelt, or Antediluvian World ; Kruger in his 

 History of the Antediluvian World ; and other modern writers on geology, 

 oppose tUe opinion of Cuvier, and advocate the view discussed by Dr Fleming 

 in this Memoir. — Edit. 



