6 ON THE GEOGRAPHY OF ANIMALS. 
that the fossil remains of animals, every where dis- 
coverable, chiefly belong to races different from those 
which now exist ; these were probably exterminated in 
the great catastrophe. Mankind escaped by the means 
recorded in the sacred, and in many profane, histories ; 
and with them were saved the stock of animals peculiar 
to the region in which, before the flood, they had their 
dwelling, and of which they, and most of the early do- 
mesticated animals, are in al! probability the native 
inhabitants. After the deluge, when new regions 
emerged from the ocean, it is probable they were sup- 
plied with organised inhabitants suited to the soil and 
climate of each district. Among these new races, man, 
and the tribes which had survived with him, and which 
were his companions, spread themselves in a later time. 
The scripture history may thus be reconciled with the 
facts established by zoological research.’’ Some per- 
sons will object to this hypothesis that it assumes po- 
sitions not laid down in the sacred narrative, such as a 
partial creation subsequent to the deluge. This must 
be granted, and the proof of such position must be 
sought, not in the scriptural history, but in external 
phenomena. The silence of the Scriptures, in respect 
to such facts, seems to be of little consequence. It is 
not to be presumed that these sacred books contain a 
narrative of all that it has pleased Divine Providence to 
effect in the physical creation, but only of His dis- 
pensations to mankind, and of the facts with which man 
is concerned: and it was of no importance for man to 
be informed at what era Australia began to contain 
kangaroos, or the woods of Paraguay ant-eaters and 
armadilloes. 
(7.) Other writers, by circumscribing their views to 
the local distribution of a few native animals, have so 
far lost sight of the original question, as to suppose 
that “ the geographic distribution of each species may be 
represented by a circle, towards the centre of which 
existence may be comfortably maintained ; but, as we 
approach the circumference, restraints multiply, and 
