X. 



GEOLOGICAL CONTEMPORANEITY AND 

 PERSISTENT TYPES OF LIFE. 



Merchants occasionally go through a wholesome, though 

 troublesome and not always satisfactory, process which 

 they term "taking stock." After all the excitement of 

 speculation, the pleasure of gain, and the pain of loss, 

 the trader makes up his mind to face facts and to 

 learn the exact quantity and quality of his solid and 

 reliable possessions. 



The man of science does well sometimes to imitate 

 this procedure ; and, forgetting for the time the import- 

 ance of his own small winnings, to re-examine the 

 common stock in trade, so that he may make sure how 

 far the stock of bullion in the cellar — on the faith of 

 whose existence so much paper has been circulating — 

 is really the solid gold of truth. 



The Anniversary Meeting of the Geological Society 

 seems to be an occasion well suited for an undertaking 

 of this kind — for an inquiry, in fact, into the nature and 

 value of the present results of palosontological investi- 

 gation ; and the more so, as all those who have paid 

 close attention to the late multitudinous discussions 

 in which palaeontology is implicated, must have felt 

 the urgent necessity of some such scrutiny. 



