372 



FAUNA ANTIQUA SIVALENSIS. 



III. — Abstract op an Extempore Discourse on the Co- 

 LOSSOCHELTS Atlas, DELIVERED before the British 

 Association at York, on Saturday, September 

 28th, 1844, AT 8 p.m.. The Dean op Ely, President, 

 in the Chair. ^ 



This evening the Association, as on Friday, assembled in 

 the Great Concert Hall of York to hear an extemporary 

 discourse by Dr. Falconer, on the Colossochelys Atlas or 

 Gigantic Fossil Tortoise, discovered along with numerous 

 other extinct animals, by Captain Cautley and Dr. Falconer 

 in the tertiary strata of the Sewalik hills, in the north of 

 India. The temporary screen in front of the orchestra 

 recess was sheeted over with a display of diagrams, maps, 

 and sections, in illustration of the discourse, among which 

 the most prominent was a very spirited and cleverly executed 

 restoration drawing of the Sewalik colossus, done by Mr. 

 Scharf, under the superintendence of Dr. Falconer, to the 

 natural size, measuring^ exclusive of curves, about 18|^ feet. 

 On stands beside the lecturer there was also a fine array of 



' This abstract was written by Dr. 

 Falconer himself, but was never pub- 

 lished. The following notice, however, 

 appeared in ' Chambers' Edinburgh 

 Journal' for Nov. 23, 18-i-i: — 'Another 

 evening was rendered still more agree- 

 able by an account of certain recent dis- 

 coveries in India. The demonstrator on 

 this last occasion was Dr. Falconer, a 

 young medical man recently returned 

 from India on leave. The members, on 

 entering this evening, were surprised by 

 the pietiu'e of a tortoise, displayed on 

 the green screen above the speaker's 

 head; exhibiting an animal the same in 

 form as ordinary land-tortoises, but 

 about twelve feet long. Strange as it 

 may seem, remains of this huge animal, 

 to which the name of Colossochelys Atlas 

 has been given, are found in the super- 

 ficial gravel upon the Sewalik hills ; 

 some of these were shown, particularly 

 one of the leg bones, the similarity of 

 which to the corresponding bone of the 

 modern diminutive species was easily 

 recognized. It appears that this and a 

 vast number of other animals, elsewhere 

 found in the tertiary strata, are, in that 

 part of the world discovered in the more 

 recent gravels, showing that the tertiary 

 species may have lived in certain dis- 

 tricts down to a time nearer to our own 

 era. And this idea Dr. Falconer con- 

 nected in a very interesting manner with 

 mythic traditions of India, descriptive of 



enormous tortoises, one of which M'as 

 fabled to support the elephant by which 

 the world was supported. It seemed 

 not unlikely that these legends referred 

 to animals which had been living in the 

 early ages of mankind, but which have 

 for many centimes been extinct. The 

 plain and perspicuous, yet arresting 

 address of Dr. Falconer, was universally 

 allowed a high place among the scientific 

 affairs of the week. He has made a 

 most important contribution to geology ; 

 and the ample specimens which he has 

 brought home enrich the museums to 

 which they have been presented. His 

 services are the more creditable to him- 

 self, that, placed in charge of the Botanic 

 Garden upon the Sewalik hills, he had 

 little means of cultivating the science in 

 any of the more ordinary methods, 

 when a canal excavation near the garden 

 exposed to him a rich treasury of fossil 

 bones, he had no means of studying in 

 order to ascertain what these were ; but 

 he took an original method. He went 

 off to the woods and wilderness and shot 

 animals, from which he might study 

 comparative anatomy, and by a reference 

 to these he was able to refer the fossils 

 to their proper species. What a crown- 

 ing to years of toil, thus to be able at 

 length to come before one of the most 

 intelligent audiences in Europe, and 

 enchain them with descriptions of such 

 novelties in human knowledge ! ' 



