Oct. 21, 1886] 
described by Kentmann, and in 1664 the existence of leaf- 
impressions in true rock was for the first time published 
by Major. In 1699, Lhywd, a Londoner, figured and 
described a number of ferns from the Coal-Measures, 
which can even now be recognised. These he was in- 
clined to consider due to the swccus fetrificus, a petrifying 
juice whose action was controlled by the wis dapidifica, 
both petrifying forces having been invented by Kircher 
in 1655, when he propounded his theory of sewznaria de 
corpuscula salina as the true faith regarding petrifactions. 
Sperling believed in a special stone-making spirit, and 
Camerarius (1712) held that in the beginning God had 
supplied the earth’s interior with these varied forms, just 
as he had placed grass and herbage on its surface. Still 
others were content to regard fossils as mere freaks of 
Nature. Such-like ideas held the field, and only began 
to give way during the early years of the eighteenth cen- 
tury, for we find that, as late as 1733, infinitesimal par- 
ticles were believed by a Dr. Arnold to have been brought 
together at the Creation to form dead outlines or images 
of all the living creatures upon or within the world. 
During all these dark ages, however, there were not 
wanting writers who held more rational views as to the 
nature of fossils, and even combated the supernatural 
explanations of the dominant schools. It was due to 
fossil vegetables, according to Brongniart, that these 
crude ideas came to be abandoned. All these theories 
were Swept away by the “ Flood theory,” the first germ 
of which is apparently to be found in Luther’s comment- 
ary on Genesis, where he expresses the belief that surviv- 
ing indications of the Deluge would be found in the form 
of wood hardened into stone around the mines and 
smelting-mills. Several writers between Luther’s time 
and the close of the sixteenth century held the same 
view, but the Flood theory was for a time drowned in 
the more fantastic speculations then in vogue, not to come 
to the surface again until another century had passed. In 
1695 Woodward published a work on fossils, in which he 
maintained that all the solid parts of the earth’s crust 
were loosened by the Flood and mingled promiscuously 
in its waters, and that at its close everything sank back 
to the surface according to its specific gravity, the re- 
mains of animals and plants assuming the positions in 
which they are found petrified. The chiefest expounder 
of this hypothesis, however, was Scheuchzer, whose great 
work on fossils, in 1709, laid the foundations of palzo- 
botany, though he subsequently rendered himself even 
more notorious by describing a large fossil Salamander 
as Homo diluvii testis. His work, however, aroused so 
deep an interest that for many years collectors and 
writers were busy searching for and describing fresh evi- 
dences in support of the Diluvial theory. It had indeed 
for some time no serious rival, and remained all but uni- 
versally accepted down to the second half of the eight- 
eenth century, when dissentients first ventured to make 
themselves heard. The last two decades of the eighteenth 
century were destined to witness a collapse of the Dilu- 
vial theory as rapid as its rise inthe first decade, though 
Hugh Miller even found supporters of it in our own 
time. 
During the seventeenth century the occasional pro- 
tests of the rational minority, among whom we find 
Steno, made few disciples; but during the eighteenth 
their arguments were felt with increasing force. The 
Deluge hypothesis, faulty as it was, was a great actual 
advance, for it at least recognised the real nature of the 
objects, and turned discussion towards the means through 
which fossils came to be embedded. ‘Though several 
authors wrote in a truly scientific spirit during this 
century, it was Blumenbach who first taught with 
authority that the beings to whose former existence these 
fossil forms were due were not only antediluvian, but 
pre-Adamitic, and that, moreover, there had been a series 
of faunas and floras inhabiting the earth before the age 
NABER E 
599 
ofman. The change in opinion, however, had long been 
preparing, and prominent among the questions that led 
up to it were: Are these the remains of the same kind of 
plants that are now found growing upon the earth? and, 
When did the originals live that have been preserved by 
changing into stone? Only two generations since the 
answers would have been universally that they were 
plants that grew but a few thousand years ago, and that 
they either grew where found, or had been brought from 
other countries by some such agency as the Flood, or else 
had been destroyed by these agencies and become 
extinct. Scheuchzer regarded them as plants which 
could still be found living, citing a number of genera as 
examples. Among many others who embraced this view 
was Lehmann (1756), who laboured hard to prove that 
the impressions of Axnularia sphenophylloides were 
flowers of Aster montanus, caught in full bloom, and 
petrified 272 sz/w. The exotic theory, as it may be called, 
first appears in a note of Leibnitz, 1706, on the occurrence 
of impressions of Indian plants in Germany ; and in 
1718 Antoine de Jussieu discussed the resemblances of 
the coal plants of St. Chaumont to ferns of the tropics, 
Parsons (1757) stated that the Sheppey fruits were abso- 
lutely exotic, and Dulac soon after compared the coal 
plants of St. Etienne to American species. These 
instances are only a few among many, for similar views 
became commonly held. Volkmann (1720) and others 
held what may be described as a degeneration theory, 
believing that antediluvian vegetation was of a higher 
order, and free from thorns, thistles, and other scourges, 
while comprising many fruit-bearing trees of which our 
modern ones are the degenerate representatives. The 
same authors held at the same time mixed views, think- 
ing that many of the petrified plants might have become 
extinct during the Deluge or other physical changes, and 
it was probably this idea that led to the more critical 
investigation of the stratified rocks, and brought the 
question as to when the originals lived within the region 
of practical science. 
THE RECENT EARTHQUAKES AND 
VOLCANIC ERUPTIONS 
ERRIBLE as has been the tale of destruction to life 
and property during the last six years owing to the 
exceptional activity of the subterranean forces in nearly 
every part of the globe, we cannot avoid the reflection 
that scientific men in the future will feel that there have 
been at least some compensating advantages for these 
sad losses. Never before, perhaps, have greater oppor- 
tunities been afforded to us for collecting the real facts, 
and for testing, verifying, or correcting hypotheses con- 
cerning these interesting phenomena; and never, certainly, 
have such organised efforts been made to deal adequately 
with the great opportunities which have been afforded 
to us. 
After the earthquakes at Agram, a Commission ap- 
pointed by the Hungarian Government was sent to 
examine the district, and the result was a Report of great 
value and interest, in which the exact details of the actual 
phenomena observed were carefully sifted from the mass 
of vague rumours and gross exaggerations with which 
they had become involved. Admirable monographs on 
the terrible earthquakes of Ischia in 1881 and 1853 have 
been prepared by Prof. Mercalli, of Monza, and by our 
own countryman, Dr. Johnston-Lavis. The tremendous 
catastrophe which occurred in the Sunda Straits three 
years ago has already given rise to a vast mass of litera- 
ture bearing on the subject. Commissions, including 
very competent observers, were sent to the district by the 
Dutch and the French Governments, and the former of 
these has already completed and published its very valu- 
able Report. We may be certain, too, that the more 
