BARON CUVIER. 49 



iem with those which now live on the surface of the 

 lobe." 



To this task did M. Cuvier devote a large portion of his 

 ife, and his first care was, to determine the living and fos- 

 il species of elephants, which form the subject of the first 

 /olume. The plan he adopted was, to describe the osteo- 

 ogy of the best known species ; to point out the countries 

 they inhabit ; to ascertain how many species have been found ; 

 and, then, to compare them with those bones which are in a 

 fossil state. He himself visited many of the spots whence 

 these remains had been taken ; such as England, Holland, 

 Germany, and Italy; and others were brought to him, in a 

 order that he might be the eye-witness of every thing which 

 he endeavoured to prove. These researches entirely set at 

 rest the question concerning the existence, or, rather, the 

 finding of human fossils. Such relics have never, as yet, 

 been discovered; and the Gaudaloupe skeletons, which 

 have been so much talked of, had probably been deposited 

 in that place after shipwreck ; the soil by which they were 

 enveloped being of too recent a formation to admit of any 

 idea that they were true fossils, and the positions in which 

 they laid, not allowing of the supposition that they had 

 been purposely interred there. Also, the pretended histo- 

 ries of giants, are, in this volume, entirely refuted ; and 

 amusing accounts are there given of the ignorance and cre- 

 dulity which caused them to be so generally circulated; but 

 on this occasion, as, in fact, all others, M. Cuvier's own words 

 are the best, and he writes as follows :-" The bonesof elephants 

 having more resemblance to those of man than they have to 

 those of other animals, even skilful anatomists have been often 

 tempted to take them for human remains and this probably 

 occasioned the pretended discoveries of the tombs of giants, 

 mentioned by ancient authors, and those of the middle ages." 

 This example was unfailingly followed by more modern 

 writers, for the marvellous is delicious food to the minds of 

 most people. The great propagator of the on dits of na- 

 tural history, Pliny, was not, of course wanting on this oc- 

 casion ; and he speaks of the supposed body of Orestes as 

 being thirteen feet three inches long. Few countries 

 have been without these fables, and (to continue M. Cu- 

 vier's account) " one of the most celebrated was that of 



E 



