118 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Yol. 



VI. 



valleys covered with forests grander than any of the present day^ 

 or wide expanses of rich savannah over which roamed countless 

 herds of animals, many of gigantic size, of which our present 

 meagre fauna retains but a few dwarfed representatives. Noble 

 rivers flowed through plains and valleys, and sea-like lakes broader 

 and more numerous than those the continent now bears diversified 

 the scenery. Through unnumbered ages the seasons ran their 

 ceaseless course, the sun rose and set, moons waxed and waned over 

 this fair land, but no human eye was there to mark its beauty, or 

 human intellect to control and use its exuberant fertility. Flowers 

 opened their many colored petals on meadow and hill-side, and 

 filled the air with their fragrance, but only for the delectation of 

 the wandering bee. Fruits ripened in the sun, but there was no 

 hand there to pluck, nor any speaking tongue to taste. Birds 

 sang in the trees, but for no ears but their own. The surface of 

 lake or river was whitened by no sail, nor furrowed by any prow 

 but the breast of the water-fowl ; and the far reaching shores 

 echoed no sound but the dash of the waves, and the lowing of the 

 herds that slaked their thirst in the crystal waters. 



Life and beauty were everywhere; and man, the great 

 destroyer, had not yet come, but not all was peace and harmony in 

 this Arcadia. The forces of nature are always at war, and 

 redundant life compels abundant death. The innumerable species 

 of animals and plants had each its hereditary enemy, and the 

 struggle of life was so sharp and bitter that in the lapse of ages 

 many genera and species were blotted out forever. 



The herds of herbivores — which included nearly all the genera 

 now living on the earth's surface, with many strange forms long 

 since extinct — formed the prey of carnivores commensurate to 

 these in power and numbers. The coo of the dove and the 

 whistle of the quail were answered by the scream of the eagle ; 

 and the lowing of herds and the bbating of flocks come to the ear 

 of the imagination, mingled with the roar of the lion, the howl of 

 the wolf, and the despairing cry of the victim. Yielding to the 

 slow-acting but irresistible forces of nature, each in succession of 

 these various animal forms has disappeared till all have passed 

 away or been changed to their modern representatives, while the 

 country they inhabited, by the upheaval of its mountains, the 

 deepening of its valleys, the filling and draining of its great lakes, 

 has become what it is. 



:^ :ii 5H * * * * 



