266 RELICS OF PRIMEVAL LIFE 



Thus stated, the conclusion is scarcely correct. We 

 do not live in the chalk period, but the conditions 

 of the chalk period still exist in the deep sea. We 

 may say more than this. To some extent the 

 conditions of the Laurentian period still exist in 

 the sea, except in so far as they have been removed 

 by the action of the Foraminifera and other lime- 

 stone builders. To those who can realize the enor- 

 mous lapse of time involved in the geological history 

 of the earth, this conveys an impression almost of 

 eternity in the existence of this oldest of all the 

 families of the animal kingdom. 



We are still more deeply impressed with this 

 when we bring into view the great physical changes 

 which have occurred since the dawn of life. When 

 we consider that the skeletons of Eozoon contribute 

 to form the oldest hills of our continents ; that they 

 have been sealed up in solid marble, and that they 

 are associated with hard crystalline rocks contorted 

 in the most fantastic manner ; that these rocks have, 

 almost from the beginning of geological time, been 

 undergoing waste to supply the material of new 

 formations ; that they have witnessed innumerable 

 subsidences and elevations of the continents ; and 

 that the greatest mountain chains of the earth have 



