Of the Conitnuitij of the An'tniul Kingdom, i^lf. 155 



in particular, which the study of monstrosity presents, be at- 

 tended to, and there will appear nothing surprising in the mo- 

 difications produced in the animal species, by the succession of 

 ages, any more than in modifications induced in the agents un- 

 der the influence of which animals are developed. 



To determine the power of external causes in modifying the 

 developement of living beings, was the real object of the experi- 

 ments made by the author in the establishment of Anteuii, 

 where chickens are reared that have been hatched under the in- 

 fluence of artificial heat. 



The philosophical object of these inquiries the author now 

 avows for the first time ; he was obliged to conceal them at a 

 period when science was under persecution. The experiments 

 here alluded to are conclusive. M. Geoffroy St Hilaire, by 

 varying the phenomena of heat, dryness, and motion, not only 

 produced monstrosities at pleasure, but even produced a given 

 species of monstrosity by means of a particular precaution. 

 And let it not be objected that the monstrous species thus pro- 

 duced in an artificial manner, were incapable of being reproduced 

 and perpetuated. Nature, aided by time, which he had not 

 at his disposal, acting by more numerous and gentler modifica- 

 tions, could have done what will always be impossible in the 

 most judiciously conducted experiments. 



M. Geoffroy also spoke of the long debated question of the 

 pre-existence of germs, and opposed to that theory the whole of 

 our knowledge respecting monstrosities, and in particular the 

 experiments above alluded to, in which he made the organiza- 

 tion deviate at pleasure, and in a determinate direction from its 

 natural course. 



On a nezc Species of Tapir, discovered in the Andes, with Re- 

 marks on Antediluvian Animals. 



M. G. CuviEK lately made a report to the Academy of Sciences 

 of France, on the memoir of Dr Roulin, having for its object 

 the natural histori/ of the Taint, and particnlarhj that of a new 

 species of that genus which the author has discovered in the high 

 regions of the Cordillera of the Andes. 



The reporter commenced with giving ii long analysis of M. 



