Hi INTRODUCTION. 



. rence of this feature by itself, or unassociated with its correla- 

 tives, in rocks of the same kind in widely separated regions ? the 

 occurrence of " chamber-casts " under the same circumstances ? 

 and the existence of typical eozoonal features in ophite, originally 

 an intrusive or igneous mass (Lizard, Cornwall)? 



Does not Dr. Dawson^s doctrine on one day joyfully accept a 

 thing as ' ' eozoon," and on the next day frown on it, because the 

 rocks containing it happen to be younger than the Archseans, and 

 therefore, as assumed of the latter, not "precipitated " under the 

 peculiar physical and chemical "activities" required by the 

 " novel doctrine "? How did it conduct itself in the presence of 

 the clearest evidence of " Eozoon" occurring in the Jurassic 

 ophite of the Isle of Skye ? Does it not deal in equivoques in 

 the case of specimens which contain in one part structures indis- 

 putably eozoonal, and in another part precisely the same 

 structures incontestably of mineral origin ? Or should any con- 

 ceivable doubt attach to either, are they not pronounced to be 

 <( imitative forms resembling Eozoon"! But there is no need to 

 repeat what has been already given in detail elsewhere. We 

 cannot, however, avoid declaring that Dr. Dawson's explanation 

 of eozoonal phenomena is inconsistently complicated, contradicts 

 itself, and eludes all scientific and logical treatment ! (e Quo 

 teneam vultus mutantem Protect nodo ? " 



1880. On the Organic Nature of Eozoon Canadense. Charles Moore. 



Brit. Assoc. Meeting, Swansea, pp. 582, 583. 

 ' ' Possessed of only two slices, and two small blocks weighing 

 but twelve ounces, both in their original condition," the 

 writer detected in " separated twenty grains " belonging thereto 

 "a clear siliceous-looking fibroid growth,' scarcely more sub- 

 stantial than the motes or fibres seen floating in the sunbeam ;" 

 while " a close examination occasionally revealed another form not 

 thicker than a spider's web, like mycelium growth of the present 

 day," also what he takes to be ({ ova or gemmules " and a 

 coloured filmy membrane, &c. We leave these evidences of 

 organic structure to be appreciated by Eozoonists. 



