FOSSIL ANIMALS. 



a thousand-fold, when we look to the infinite variety of adapta- 

 tions by which similar instruments have been modified, through 

 endless genera and species, from the long-lost Trilobites of the 

 transition strata, through the extinct Crustaceans, and the count- 

 less hosts of living insects. It appears impossible to resist the 

 conclusions as to unity of design in a common Author, which are 

 thus attested by such cumulative evidences of Creative Intelligence 

 and Power ; both as infinitely surpassing the most exalted faculties 

 of the human mind, as the mechanisms of the natural world, 

 when magnified by the highest microscopes, are found to transcend 

 the most perfect productions of human art." 



64. In like manner the lias, which is the earliest deposit of the 

 Oolitic period, is characterised by various organic remains, as well 

 of reptiles as of mollusca and the lower divisions. Among the 

 latter may be mentioned a particular species of Ammonites, called 

 the Ammonites Bucklandi, and among the former the ichthyosaurus, 



Fig. 7. The Ichthyosaurus. 



or fish-lizard, is an example of an extinct animal of this tribe, which 

 has the muzzle and general aspect of a porpoise, the head of a lizard, 

 the teeth of a crocodile, the vertebra) of a fish, the sternum or 

 breast-bone of an ornithorhynchus, and the fins of a whale. The 

 enormous magnitude of the eyeballs was one of the peculiarities 

 of this genus. The cavities in which they were lodged, in one of 

 the species, measured not less than fifteen inches in diameter. A 

 ring of bony plates surrounded the socket, which apparently 

 seemed to protrude more or less the globe of the eye, and vary the 

 convexity of the cornea, so as to adapt the organ for near or dis- 

 tant vision. This, combined with the great power of the fins or 

 propellers, must have conferred upon the reptile great promptitude 

 in perceiving and seizing its prey. 



These reptiles were essentially aquatic, and the form of their 

 teeth proves them to have been carnivorous. Their coprolites, 

 or fossilised, excrements, show that their intestine was spirally 

 arranged, like that of certain fishes. 



65. The Wealden strata, lying near the upper part of the oolitie 

 and the lower part of the cretaceous, is characterised by remains 

 of the Monocotyledonous * division of plants, by ferns, by various 



* Having only one seed-lobe. 



61 



