INTRODUCTION. 7 
the latter. Thus the teeth and limbs have a certain definite 
relation to each other, or, in other words, are correlated. Again, 
horned quadrupeds are all herbivorous (or graminivorous), and 
have hoofs to their feet. The following amusing anecdote serves 
to illustrate Cuvier’s law. One of his students thought he would 
try and frighten his master, and, having dressed up as a wild 
beast, entered Cuvier’s bedroom by night, and, presenting himself 
by his bedside, said in hollow tones, ‘‘ Cuvier, Cuvier, I’ve come 
to eat you!” ‘The great naturalist, who on waking up was able 
to discern something with horns and hoofs, simply remarked, 
** What! horns, hoofs—graminivorous—you can’t!” What better 
lesson could the master have given the pupil to help him to 
remember his ‘‘ Law of Correlation” ? 
Cuvier’s great work, entitled Ossemens Fossiles, will long remain 
an imperishable monument of the genius and industry of the 
greatest pioneer in this region of investigation. This work 
proved beyond a doubt to his astonished contemporaries the 
great antiquity of the tribes of animals now living on the surface 
of the earth. It proved more than that, however; for it showed 
the existence of a great philosophy in Nature which linked the 
past with the present in a scheme that pointed to a continuity of 
life during untold previous ages. All this was directly at variance 
with the prevalent ideas of his time, and consequently his views 
were regarded by many with alarm, and he received a good deal 
of abuse—a fate which many other original thinkers before him 
have shared. 
» It is somewhat difficult for people living now, and accustomed 
to modern teaching, to realise how novel were the conclusions 
announced by Cuvier. In his Descourse on the Revolutions of the 
Surface of the Globe, translated into most European languages 
under the title Zheory of the Earth, he lays down, among 
others, the two following propositions :— 
1. That all organised existences were not created at the same 
time; but at different times, probably very remote from each 
