ADDRESS. lxiii 



appeared to have occupied definite and different parts of the depths of an- 

 cient time ; as now the tiger and the jaguar, the cayman and the gavial, live 

 on different parts of the terrestrial surface. Is the living elephant of Ceylon 

 the lineal descendant of that mammoth which roamed over Siberia and Eu- 

 rope and North America, or of one of those sub-Himalayan tribes which Dr. 

 Falconer has made known, or was it a species dwelling only in circumpolar 

 regions ? Can our domestic cattle, horses and dogs, our beasts of chace and 

 our beasts of prey, be traced back to their source in older types, contempo- 

 raries of the IJrus, Megaceros, and Hyena on the plains of Europe ? If so, 

 what range of variation in structure does it indicate ? if not so, by what 

 characters are the living races separated from those of earlier date ? 



Specific questions of this kind must be answered before the general pro- 

 position, that the forms of life are indefinitely variable with time and cir- 

 cumstance, can be even examined by the light of adequate evidence. That 

 such evidence will be gathered and rightly interpreted, I for one neither 

 doubt nor fear ; nor will any be too hasty in adopting extreme opinions or 

 too fearful of the final result, who remember how often that which is true 

 has been found very different from that which was plausible, and how often 

 out of the nettles of danger we have plucked the flowers of safety. At the 

 present moment the three propositions which were ever present to the mind 

 of Edward Forbes may be successfully maintained, as agreeing with many 

 observed phenomena ; and around them as a basis of classification may be 

 gathered most of the facts and most of the speculations which relate to the 

 history of life*. First, it may be admitted that plants and animals form 

 many natural groups, the members of which have several common characters, 

 and are parted from other groups by a real boundary line, or rather unoccu- 

 pied space. Next, that each of these groups has a limited distribution in 

 space, often restrained by high mountains or deep seas, or parallels of tem- 

 perature, within which it has been brought into being. Thirdly, that each 

 group has been submitted to, or is now undergoing, the pressure of a general 

 law, by which its duration is limited in geological time ; the same group 

 never reappearing after being removed from the series. 



How important, in the view of this and many other questions, is that 

 never-tiring spirit of geographical and maritime discovery, to which through 

 four hundred years Europe has sent her noblest sons and her most famous 

 expeditions ; sent them, alas ! too often to an early grave. Alas ! for 

 Franklin, who carried the magnetic flag into the Icy Sea from which he had 

 already brought trophies to Science ! Alas ! for Speke, who came home with 

 honour from the head waters of the Nile ! Forgotten they can never be, 

 whenever, on occasions like this, we mourn the absence of our bravest and 

 our best ; praise, never-ending praise be theirs, while men retain the generous 

 impulse which prompts them to enterprises worthy of their country and bene- 

 ficial to mankind ! 



'Aei <T0o5)' kXcos eooerai kclt ulav. 



If it be asked, what share in the discoveries and inventions of the last 

 thirty-three years is claimed for the British Association ; let us answer fear- 

 lessly — We had a part in all. In some of them we took the foremost place 

 by the frequency of our discussions, the urgency of our recommendations, 

 the employment of our influence, and the grant of our funds. For others we 

 gave all our strength, to support the Eoyal Society and other institutions in 



* See the remarkable Essay of E. Forbes on the distribution of the existing Fauna and 

 Flora of the British Isles, in Memoirs of Geol. Survey of Britain, vol. i. p. 336. 



