74 ORIGIN OF THE 



any specimens remain, they have dwindled to 

 the mere pigmies of their race,) lived, and dwelt, 

 and died in them. Huge fishes, of which his- 

 tory furnishes no trace, (unless we except the 

 leviathan of the deep,) of immense length and 

 size, as indicated by the fossil remains which 

 have since been discovered, inhabited the waters. 

 Reptiles, too, of the saurian or lizard tribe, of 

 enormous length, crept or waded over the soft- 

 ened earth. Here, too, the mammoth, ninety 

 feet in height, with tusks to uproot, and trunk to 

 pull down, the immense trees of the forest, 

 (this trunk having served as a duct for the con- 

 veyance of air to the embryo, as it was partially 

 matured beneath the waters,) roamed on the 

 land, or swam in the seas, devouring the herbage 

 either under or above them. This species is 

 now only represented, in miniature, by the ele- 

 phant of tropical climes. The hippopotamus, or 

 river-horse ; the huge rhinoceros, whose love for 

 the soft and miry earth, as then exhibited, and 



