Dr Hibbert on the Discovery of the Fossil Elk. 15 



At other times, it bears an exact resemblance to an ancient al- 

 tar, the fire of which seems to burn with great intensity. At 

 some distance beyond the tower, there is seen the chimney-top 

 of a house for boiling pitch, or other purposes connected with 

 the docks. When smoke issues from that chimney, the ap- 

 pearance represented in Fig. 14 was produced. The black 

 waved lines under the smoke had a rapid vibratory motion, 

 while the motion of that which represents the fire of the altar, 

 was exactly similar (excepting in colour) to the flame of a 

 strong fire. * 



The accompanying outlines will render the above descrip- 

 tion sufficiently intelligible. Some hygrometrical and thermo- 

 metrical observations, connected with this subject, may be 

 brought forward on a future occasion. 



Akt. III. — Account of the Circumstances connected with the 

 Discovery of the Fossil Elk in the Isle of Man, which prove 

 that this Animal is not Antediluvian, as many Naturalists 

 and Antiquaries have supposed. By Samuel Hibbert, 

 M. D. F. R. S. E. and M. G. S. Secretary to the Society 

 of Scottish Antiquaries. 



1 here are few subjects in Natural History more interesting 

 than the circumstances connected with the discovery of those 

 Fossil Animals, the several races of which are either foreign 

 to the country and climate in which they are at present found, 

 or have become wholly extinct. In reference to this curi- 

 ous investigation, the Irish Elk attracts no small share of atten- 

 tion. The zoologist inquires, whether animals of the same 

 kind are still to be found on the surface of the globe, or have 

 completely disappeared : — if the latter supposition be enter- 

 tained, the antiquary proposes a question, at what era races of 

 them might have existed ? while the geologist contents him- 

 self with a solution of the great difficulty, whether their ex- 



• A full detail of the principles, on which the phenomena of Vertical 

 and Lateral Mirage depend, will be found in the Edinburgh Encyclopae- 

 dia, Article Optics, vol. xv. p- 617. 



