OF ARTS AND SCIENCES. 251 



This was not done without opposition, the centre of which was in 

 England, where no one accejjted it, — Sedgwiclc no more than IVIurchi- 

 son and the Geological Suivcy. Barrande, in his fine and courteous 

 way, called the " Primordial fauna " Mademoiselle de Trop (Miss of 

 Too-much). In truth, it was too much for Murcliison, who thought he 

 had included the whole in his " Silurian System," and it was also veiy 

 mat a propos for Sedgwick, who had caused McCoy to describe all 

 the fossils found in his " Cambrian," and who was right in regarding 

 them as the most ancient forms, the base of organic types. 



Lastly, the Geological Survey, with its numerous staff of assistants 

 and collectors of fossils, and the extreme care with which it studied 

 Wales and the Malvern Hills, did not like to admit that a stranger, 

 in a short stay in London, and during a rapid visit to other points of 

 the country in the winter of 1850-51, had been able to find an entirely 

 new fauna which had completely escaped them. 



No one has shown greater elevation of mind, or carried to a higher 

 point the moral distinctions in his geological and palajontologicid 

 discoveries and researches, than Barrande. He had consecrated the 

 greater part of his time and resources for fifteen years to " the crea- 

 tion of the primordial fauna," to follow the expression of D'Omalins 

 d'Halloy, and when in 18G0 he received from Dr. Emmons and Bil- 

 lings the documents published on the " Taconic System," he did not 

 hesitate a moment in recognizing and proclaiming the right of priority 

 for Emmons and the " Taconic System." He says : — 



"At its origin, that is to say from 1838 to 1844, this Taconic 

 System was presented as founded on peti-ogi-aphic and stratigraji^liic 

 observations, and constituted simply the sediirientary base, accordujg 

 to the American expression. It was still without any characteristic 

 fauna. But in 1844, Dr. Emmons having discovei-ed in this forma- 

 tion fossils before unknown, his Taconic System for him represented 

 the palceozoic base. 



" This expression, used on the other side of the Atlantic, is evidently 

 equivalent to that of ' Primoi'dial fauna,' which I have applied to the 

 trilol)ilic group, the oldest of Bohemia, defined for the first time in 

 my Notice preliminaire, in 1846. It is known that the Lingidce which 

 characterize the corresponding horizon of Lingula flags in Wales, 

 that is, in the Cambrian region of England, were only discovered by 

 Mr. Davis in 1845. (Siluria, 2d ed., p. 43, 1859.) 



"In comparing these dates it is clear that Dr. Emmons had first 

 announced the existence of a fauna anterior to that wln'ch had been 

 established in the ' Silurian system ' as cliaracterizing the ' Lower 



