118 THE GENEALOGY OF ANIMALS IV 
rarely goes further back than the “ Ante-period,” 
ee eee 
which precedes that in which the remains of 
animals belonging to that group are found. Thus, — 
as fossil remains of the majority of the groups of | 
Reptilia are first found in the Trias, they are 
assumed to have originated in the “Antetriassic” 
period, or between the Permian and Triassic 
epochs. 
I confess this is wholly incredible to me, The — 
Permian and the Triassic deposits pass completely 
into one another ; there is no sort of discontinuity 
answering to an unrecorded “ Antetrias”; and, - 
what is more, we have evidence of immensely | 
extensive dry land during the formation of these — 
deposits. We know that the dry land of the Trias 
absolutely teemed with reptiles of all groups 
except Pterodactyles, Snakes, and perhaps Tor-— 
toises ; there is every probability that true Birds ~ 
existed, and Mammalia certainly did. Of the in- 
habitants of the Permian dry land, on the contrary, 
all that have left a record are a few lizards. Is it 
conceivable that these last should really represent 
the whole terrestrial population of that time, and 
that the development of Mammals, of Birds, and 
of the highest forms of Reptiles, should have been 
crowded into the time during which the Permian 
conditions quietly passed away, and the Triassic 
conditions began? Does not any such supposition 
become in the highest degree improbable, when, 
in the terrestrial or fresh-water Labyrinthodonts, 
OO 
ed ed 
