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THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



fossil Btate, together with those of the deer and 

 bear, in diluvium, and on the Himalayan moun- 

 tains, at an elevation of 16,000 feet. 



In South America the bones of horses of a large 

 eize have been discovered by Mr. Charles Darwin, 

 naturalist to the Beagle, in company with the 

 remains of the megatherium, of immense bulk, a 

 huge mastodon, parts of rodents, and a llama fully 

 as large as the camel. 



<' With regard to North America," Cuviersays, 

 "the elephas primogenus has left thousands of its 

 carcasses from Spain to the shores of Siberia." 

 The fossil ox, in a like manner, he writes, is buried 

 ♦* dans toute la pariie boreale des deux continens, 

 puisque on en a d'Alleraagne, d'ltalie, de Prussie, 

 de la Siberia occidentale et orientale, et de 

 TAmerique." " I may here add," says Darwin, 

 " that horses' bones mingled with those of the mas- 

 todon, have several times been transmitted for sale 

 from North America to England ; but it has always 

 been imagined, from the simple fact of their being 

 horses' bones that they had been accidentally min- 

 gled with the fossils. Among the remains brought 

 home by Captain Beechey from the west coast of 

 the same continent, in the frozen region of 66° 

 north. Dr. Buckland has described the astragalus, 

 metacarpus, and metatarsus of the horse, which 

 were associated with the remains of the elephas 

 primogenus, and of the fossil ox. In Mr. Saull's 

 Geological Museum, Aldersgate Street, London, 

 there are three coffin bones, one os sacrum, and 

 one cannon bone, from Big Bone Lock, Kentucky. 

 In the same collection are one cervical vertebra, 

 Heme Bay, Kent ; several metatarsal, ditto, one 

 dentata, ditto, and portions of two ribs, from 

 Plumstead, Kent ; several teeth from Ban well 

 Cave, Somersetshire ; and two teeth, and several 

 astragalus, from Swansea, South Wales— all 

 of the horse. With respect to Great Britain, as I 

 before stated, there is no considerable district in 

 which some traces of the fossil horse do not occur, 

 ia company with either those of the elephant, the 

 rhinoceros, hippopotamus, tiger, ox, deer, or hyas- 

 na. At Oreston, near Plymouth, an immense 

 number of bones of the rhinoceros and horse were 

 found ; and in a cave at Paveland, in Glamorgan- 

 shire, those of the elephant, rhinoceros, horse, hog, 

 bear, and hysena, were found embedded together. 

 In the celebrated Kirkdale Cave, Yorkshire, the 

 contents of which have been so graphically de- 

 scribed by Dr. Buckland, were discovered fossil 

 bones of the tiger, bear, wolf, fox, weasel, ele- 

 phant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, horse, ox, and 

 deer, and an immense number of the bones of the 

 hysena. 



In the earlier ages, some of those colossal bones 

 were supposed to belong to gigantic races of man- 

 kind, and hence the traditions of giants, possessed 

 by every country in Europe ; but it is an authenti- 

 cated fact, acknowledged by all geologists, that no 

 traces of man or his works have ever been disco- 

 vered in any of the diluvium strata. Leibnitz, in 

 his " Protogea," mentions the fossil bones of a 

 unicorn, discovered at Quedlimbourg, in 1663. 

 They were found in a calcareous and gypseous 

 hill, and after being collected, a sketch was made 

 of the animal, such as it was pretended to be ; 

 but a single glance at the sketch is sufficient to 

 show that it was done by very ignorant hands, 

 and taken after parts most incongruously joined. 

 The bones of the horse seemed to have Ibrmed 



the principal part of the conformation, with a 

 considerable portion of the muzzle, a piece of the 

 humerus, a lower tooth, and an unsuinal phalanx 

 ofthe rhinoceros. It was supposed by Cuvier, but 

 now denied by most of our eminent geologists, that 

 the diluvium strata on which the animals we have 

 described have been Ibund embedded, was the con- 

 sequence of a sudden inundation of Water. It will 

 be necessary briefly to allude to a lew important 

 fiicts connected with this subject, that are acknow- 

 ledged by all parties : — First, that alter all the 

 strata which compose the crust of our globe had 

 been formed, a great poriion ofthe earth has been 

 covered with water. Secondly, that ihe period or 

 epoch which relates to this history was one of 

 immense time, and that ihe whole surliice was 

 densely peopled by various orders of living crea- 

 tures, some of them, as we have seen, not distin- 

 guishable from existing species. Thirdly, that 

 great and considerable changes must have taken 

 place since that epoch in the climate of different 

 pans of the world ; and confining our attention to _ 

 our own island lor an example of this, we find . 

 that there then flourished on its surface the luxu- 

 rious vegetation of a tropical clime. In ihe course 

 of time, however, the whole scene vanished, 

 with various orders of living creatures then rang- 

 ing the plain or swimming the lake, such as the 

 tiger, the elephant, the rhinoceros, and the hippo- 

 potamus ; while their contemporary congeners, 

 as the horse, deer, ox, &c. were left behind. 

 Shortly after this man appears oujits surliice. 



When we carry our minds back to this subter- 

 tiary period — which, geologically speaking, is so 

 recent that it may be considered as only just gone 

 by — we receive the accounts with surprise and 

 almost incredulity. It must be admitted, that 

 they at first seem much more like the dreams of 

 fiction and romance than the sober results of calm 

 and deliberate investigation ; but to those who 

 will examine the evidence ol' lacis, upon which 

 the conclusions rest, there can remain no more 

 reasonable doubt of the truth of what I have been 

 relating than is felt by the antiquary who, finding 

 the catacombs of Egypt stored with the mum- 

 mies of men, apes, and crocodiles, concludes them 

 to be the remains of mammalia and reptiles that 

 have formed part of an ancient population on the 

 banks of the Nile. 



Now, il it was a sudden catastrophe or deluge 

 which destroyed the hippopotamus, the tiger, and 

 the elei)hant, how did the ox, deer, and horse 

 continue to escape the flood of waters? Why 

 this partial selection of iis victims among the 

 ancient inhabitants of our country 7 But these 

 changes on our island are not moie wonderful 

 than the mutations that have occurred in other 

 parts of the world. It is almost impossible to 

 reflect, without the deepest astonishment, on the 

 changes that have taken place on the continent of 

 South America. Formerly it must have swarmed_ 

 with great monsters, like the southern parts of 

 Africa ; but we now find only the tapir, guanaco, 

 armadillo, and capybara— mere pigmies compared 

 to the antecedent races. The greatest number, if. 

 not all, lived at the epoch we have been describing, 

 and many of them were cotempurariet) of the ex- 

 isting mollusca. 



" In the Pampas," says Darwin, " the great se- 

 pulchre of such remains, there are no signs of vio- 

 lence, but on the contrary, of the most quiet and 



