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firm mufcles and tendons that inveft the bones of land animals -, 

 when we call to mind in how very ftiort a time fuch of them 

 as die, or remain dead in their own element, do actually cor- 

 rupt, and run into fuch complete diffolution as to obliterate the 

 whole form, the bones only remaining, a fragile and imperfeft 

 indication of the fpecies to which they had belonged ; — and fur- 

 ther, when we find, in the cafes juft now mentioned, that fub- 

 ftances fo hard and durable as fhelis have not been able to with- 

 ftand the corroding influence of time, muft it not aftonifli us 

 to find, that in this inftance, nature has been able to effedl more 

 than perhaps the moft ftudied art could have accompliflied, and 

 will it not force us to have, recourfe to more than ordinary 

 eaufes to account for a phaenomenon fo extraordinary ? 



The very perfed prefervation of the living form which we 

 fee in thefe fpecimens, I confider as a certain proof that the 

 animals could Hot have been long dead before they were cn- 

 clofed in the matter that furrounds them ; from the fame cir- 

 cumftance it follows equally, that this matter muft have been 

 in a very fine and pulverulent ftate, fufpended in, or fubfiding 

 from the water in which the fifh fwam not long before. Here 

 then we have next to a demonftration, of two inferences of 

 moft important and fundamental fads, which are of material 

 confequence to our prefcnt enquiry : Firft, that thefe animals 

 were alive, and of courfe that the water in which they were 

 was clear and fit for the fupport of their life, at a very fhort 

 period before they were enveloped in the matter of their prefent 

 ftony enclofure ; and fecondly, that this matter muft have been 

 Tcry fuddenly difTufed through that water in a pulverulent ftate, 



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