EIGHTEENTH CENTURY EVOLUTIONISTS 165 



form. Thus he transforms into birds the flying 

 fishes :^ 



Driven out of the water by the ardor of the chase 

 or by pursuit, or carried by the wind, they [flying 

 fishes] might have fallen some distance from the 

 shore among plants, which, while supplying them 

 with food, prevented them from returning to the 

 water. Here, under the influence of the air, their an- 

 terior fins with their raised membranes transformed 

 into wings, barbules, and feathers, the skin became 

 covered with down, the ventral fins became limbs, the 

 body was remodelled, the neck and the beak became 

 elongated, and the fish discovered itself a bird. 



Huxley speaks as if scant justice had been 

 done to de Maillet, but we must infer that he has 

 not thoroughly examined the fantastic metamor- 

 phoses of which the above is a moderate example. 

 St. Hilaire more critically and justly says: 



Quant a De Maillet, qui fait naitre les oiseaux des 

 poissons volants, les reptiles des poissons rampants, 

 et les hommes des tritons, ses reveries, en partie 

 renouvelees d'Anaximandre, ont leur place marquee, 

 non da,ns I'histoire de la science, mais dans celle des 

 aberrations de I'esprit humain. 



His fantastic hypotheses of transformism were 

 expounded in 1749 and republished in 1755; the 



^Telliamedy 1755, vol. 2, pp. 166-7. 



