MAMMIFEROUS ANIMALS. 



conjectured, will in a few years cease to be 

 formidable. 



If we look back to the Antidiluvian state of 

 the globe, Geology informs us, that the face of it 

 must have been over run with a much greater 

 number of wild animals, and many of a still more 

 ferocious character, than those which have inhabi- 

 ted it since the era of the deluge ; as not only 

 vast col lections of the remains of the offensive and 

 other animals of Tropical and Polar Latitudes 

 (as the Tiger, the Hysena, the Bear, the Crocodile, 

 the Elephant, the Rhinoceros, the Hippopotamus, 

 and many of a smaller species,) have been found 

 in various caves of the temperate portions of 

 Europe, and in this country in particular, as so 

 ably illustrated by professor Buckland ; but fos- 

 sil specimens of immense Carnivorous animals 

 intermixed with those of the ruminating order, 

 have been discovered in the various strata of the 

 different portions of Europe, and America, of 

 which we have no living specimens at the present 

 day. 



This would lead us to conjecture, that the de- 

 luge, like other great visitations, has been pro- 

 ductive to the subsequent race of mankind, 

 of some very permanent good; not only by limit- 

 ing the numbers of the more ferocious animals, 

 but probably also, by rendering the vegetable 

 and mineral kingdoms, more accessible and suit- 

 able to Man, under that progressive state 



