THE SCIENCE OF PALAEONTOLOGY 9 



prior to August 1914, would be in no worse plight than 

 a Biologist who studied present faunas or floras without 

 taking into account those that preceded and generated 

 them. There yet remain biologists who dissipate their 

 energies in efforts to fabricate^ schemes of evolution in 

 defiance of palaeontological evidence ; they have still to 

 learn that the picturesque mists of hypothesis, however 

 valuable where direct observation is lacking, must yield 

 before the sunshine of truth as revealed by facts. 



The conception of Evolution has been the guiding 

 star of all recent biological study, however its interpreta- 

 tion may vary. It was not by accident that the two 

 protagonists in the introduction of that doctrine, 

 Lamarck and Darwin, were Palaeontologists of wide 

 experience. Evolution might well have arisen as a 

 theory among " pure " Biologists ; but to Palaeonto- 

 logists it is a manifest and proven principle. As to the 

 determinants and expressions of this all-pervading law 

 there is still ample scope for discussion and research. 

 Recent palaeontological work has not only contributed 

 much to the solution of these problems, but bids fair to 

 supply more evidence to that end. The Biologist can 

 suggest that certain methods of evolution might have 

 been employed, and that certain courses may have been 

 followed ; it rests with the Palaeontologist to show 

 whether or not such things have happened. When the 

 extent to which belief in Evolution pervades all phases 

 of human thought is realized, the value of the study of 

 fossils is apparent. Indirectly, but none the less surely, 

 it has enlarged the outlook of recent generations, while 

 yet in its infancy as a Science. If such results have 

 been achieved when the pioneering traverses are 

 hardly completed, what may be expected from detailed 

 survey of the territory comprised within the province of 

 Palaeontology ? 



