214 ANIMAL REMAINS. 



itself; and there is not a portion of any of the three 

 alpine rocks above-named found native within twenty 

 miles of it ; and the nearest is separated by the deep 

 beds of two or three rivers. Though nothing to the 

 pedestal of Peter's statue, this is rather a large stone, 

 weighing at least six tons, and it is so poised upon a 

 ridge of the green-stone, that it vibrates to the slightest 

 touch of the little finger. Art has had something to do 

 in producing this easy vibration, as the one end of the 

 stone has been chipped, and as these " rocking stones," 

 as they are called, were used as ordeals in the times of 

 superstition ; but art had nothing to do with the bringing 

 of it, or of the hundreds of others in the same district, 

 to the places where they are now found. Thus there 

 must at one time have been a power in operation, at a 

 higher level than the present surface of the ocean, 

 which could move masses of many tons in weight to 

 considerable distances; and the only power adequate 

 to effect that purpose, with which we are acquainted, 

 is the ocean. 



The remains of animals, even of marine ones, are 

 usually found in soft deposits, where they may have 

 been covered by the return of successive floods, in the 

 rivers now existing. The bones and teeth of the north- 

 ern elephant, the latter of which, as ivory, form an 

 article of export from Siberia ; the accumulated animals 

 in the caves of Germany, England, and other places ; 

 the vast mass of fishes in the hill of Bolca, near 

 Verona with the whales and other animals that have 

 been found in the flat lands near the mouth of the 

 great rivers such as in the clay at Brentford, and in 

 various clay formations in Scotland, may all be ac- 



