OF CREATION. 225 



of species of land animals preserved in the Wealden 

 beds is exceedingly small, and the vegetable re- 

 mains, though numerous, are nowhere abundant or 

 greatly varied. They are, however, sufficient to 

 prove that very little change had taken place since 

 the commencement of the secondary epoch. 



With regard to the animals, we still find reptiles 

 greatly preponderate, and almost all the principal 

 forms still continue. The great marine saurians, the 

 carnivorous land species, and those adapted for flying, 

 and the true crocodiles and animals allied to them, are 

 chiefly abundant ; but there have not yet been found 

 any remains of quadrupeds, or any that can with 

 certainty be referred to birds. Turtles and fishes of 

 various kinds seem to have been very abundant, and 

 besides these we have two new reptiles adapted for 

 land, one of them, at least, being a true vegetable 

 feeder. 



The atmosphere in the low flat district on this 

 border of a continent, and near the issue of some 

 considerable river, may possibly have been loaded 

 with carbonic acid gas, the result of the rapid and 

 constant decomposition of decaying organic matter in 

 a damp swampy tract, and in this respect the con- 

 dition may have resembled that now observable in 

 the Sunderbunds, on the delta of the Ganges. 



Surrounded thus with a constantly renewed ve- 

 getation, in an atmosphere and with climatal con- 

 ditions probably admirably adapted to its habits, 

 there existed another monstrous animal, more un- 

 wieldy even than the megalosaur, and treading down 

 whole forests in its advance, organized so as to 

 clear away a portion, at least, of the results of a 



L 5 



