744 



GEOLOGY. 



have long been quarried in the hill of Montmartre. They consist of land and river 

 shells, fragments of dicotyledonous wood, bones of fresh-water fish and crocodiles, with 

 other land and river reptiles, and the skeletons of mammalia. Cuvier, who first developed 

 these fossil quadrupeds, has an interesting passage respecting his course of discovery: 



" When," says he, " the sight of some bones of the bear and 

 elephant, twelve years ago, inspired me with the idea of 

 applying the general laws of comparative anatomy to the 

 re-construction of fossil species ; when I began to perceive 

 that these species were not perfectly represented by those 

 of our day which resembled them the most ; I did not 

 suspect that I was every day treading upon a soil filled with 

 remains more extraordinary than any that I had yet seen ; 

 nor that I was destined to bring to light whole genera of 

 animals unknown to the present world, and buried for in- 

 calculable ages at vast depths under the earth." He pro- 

 ceeds to describe his first acquaintance with the ossiferous 

 gypsum quarries at Montmartre: " I was in the situa- 

 tion of a man who had given to him the mutilated and 

 incomplete fragments of a hundred skeletons, belonging to 

 twenty sorts of animals, and it was required that each bone 

 should be joined to that which it belonged to. It was a 

 resurrection in miniature ; but the immutable laws pre- 

 scribed to living beings were my directors. At the voice 

 of comparative anatomy each bone, each fragment, regained 

 its place. I have no expression to describe the pleasure 

 experienced in perceiving that, as I discovered one cha- 

 racter, all the consequences, more or less foreseen, of this 

 character, were successively developed. The feet were con- 

 formable to what the teeth had announced, and the teeth 

 to the feet ; the bones of the legs and the thighs, and every 

 thing that ought to reunite these two extreme parts, were 

 conformable to each other. In one word, each of the species 

 sprung up from one of its own elements. Those who will 

 have the patience to follow me in these memoirs may form 

 some idea of the sensations which I experienced in thus 

 restoring by degrees these ancient monuments of mighty 

 revolutions." Among the remains found in the ossiferous 

 gypsum are those of 



Pachydermata. Palagotherium and anoplotherium of 

 many species, all extinct, and all belonging to that division 



Cerithium giganteum. of ^ order which is now represented by only four living 



species, namely, by three tapirs and the daman of the Cape. 



Carnivora. Several species allied to the fox and gennet. 



Rodentia. Dormouse, two species ; squirrel. 



Marsupialia. Opossum. 



Birds Nine or ten species, all extinct, but referable to the following genera; 

 buzzard ; owl ; quail ; woodcock ; sea lark ; curlew ; pelican. 



Reptiles Crocodiles and tortoises of extinct species. 



Fishes Seven extinct species of extinct genera. 



The annexed view represents the restored outline of some of these ancient inhabitants 



