ON GEOLOGIC HISTORY. 293 



all instauces peopled by colonization, i. e. by migration of spe- 

 cies from pre-existing, and in every case pre-Adamic, pro- 

 vinces. Among the terrestrial areas tbe British isles may 

 serve as an example ; among marine, the Baltic, Mediter- 

 ranean, and Black Seas. The British islands have been co- 

 lonized from various centres of creation in (now) continental 

 Europe ; the Baltic Sea from the Celtic region, although it 

 runs itself into the conditions of the Boreal one ; and the 

 Mediterranean, as it now appears, from the fauna and flora 

 of the more ancient Lusitanian province." Professor Forbes, 

 it is stated further, in the report of his paper to which I owe 

 these details, — a paper read at the Royal Institution in March 

 1 849, — " exhibited, in support of the same view, a map, show- 

 ing the relation which the centres of creation of the air- 

 breathing molluscs in Europe bear to the geological history 

 of the respective areas, and proving that the whole snail popu- 

 lation of its northern and central extent (the portion of the 

 Continent of newest and probably post-Adamic origin) had 

 been derived from foci of creation seated in pre-Adamic lands. 

 And these remarkable facts have induced the Professor," it 

 was added, " to maintain the improbability of post-Adamic 

 creations." 



With the introduction of man into the scene of existence, 

 creation, I repeat, seems to have ceased. What is it that 

 now takes its place, and performs its work? During the 

 previous dynasties, all elevation in the scale was an effect 

 simply of creation. Nature lay dead in a waste theatre of 

 rock, vapour, and sea, in which the insensate laws, chemical, 

 mechanical, and electric, carried on their blind, unintelli- 

 gent processes : the creative fiat went forth ; and, amid 

 waters that straightway teemed with life in its lower forms, 

 vegetable and animal, the dynasty of the fish was introduced. 

 Many ages passed, during which there took place no further 

 elevation ; on the contrary in not a few of the newly intro- 



