CHAPTER V. 



PALEONTOLOGY. 



AFTER William Smith, Alexandra Brongniart, and Cuvier had 

 disclosed to geologists the significance that attached to fossils 

 as organic relics characteristic of successive geological epochs, 

 some of the most enlightened scientific men of the day shared 

 the increased interest in the study of fossils, and, greatly to the 

 advantage of this branch of research, directed their genius to 

 the examination, identification, and classification of fossils in 

 the light of comparison with the existing plant and animal 

 world. Blumenbach, Cuvier, Lamarck, Schlotheim, and others 

 applied the scientific methods of Zoology, Comparative Ana- 

 tomy, and Botany to the investigation of the remains of fossil 

 organisms. A knowledge of fossil remains was no longer 

 viewed as the hobby of a few dilettantes, but at the chief seats 

 of learning was elevated to the rank of an independent mental 

 discipline in the scientific curriculum. The new science was 

 given the name of " Palaeontology " almost simultaneously by 

 two eminent authors, Ducrotay de Blainville and Fischer von 

 Waldheim (1834), and the name was rapidly adopted in 

 France and England, although in Germany the older terms 

 " Petrefaktenkunde " and " Petrefaktologie " held their place 

 for many decades. 



Two directions were from the first apparent in palseontologi- 

 cal research a stratigraphical and a biological. Stratigraphers 

 wished from palaeontology mainly confirmation regarding the 

 true order or relative age of zones of rock deposits in the field. 

 Biologists had, theoretically at least, the more genuine interest 

 in fossil organisms as individual forms of life ; for the biologist 

 or student of existing life the supreme value of palaeontology 

 was the evidence it might bring towards the solution of the 

 problems of the genesis and evolution of living forms, deter- 

 mination of species and genera, variation of types in its rela- 

 tion to climatic conditions, distribution of types in respect of 



363 



