﻿ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. Ixix 



of him ; not duly conceding how much the chances of finding exam- 

 ples of terrestrial mammalia are on our side. "We throw with 

 loaded dice," to borrow an expression of Dr. Fleming's, in a contro- 

 versy respecting the evidences of a tropical climate at more ancient 

 periods. 



Of the tertiary mammalia, the oldest yet found, perhaps, are those 

 of the lower eocene, occurring in the London clay of Sheppey and 

 the sand of Kyson, near Woodbridge. Although the species are as 

 yet few in number, the quadrumana are represented by the Macacus 

 Eocetms, the marsupials by the Didelphys Colchesteri, the pachy- 

 derms by the Hyracotherium cuniculus; and these types alone 

 indicate as full a development of the mammalia as that exhibited by 

 the middle eocene strata of Hordwell cliff, the Isle of Wight, and the 

 gypsum of Montmartre, near Paris, where a more numerous assem- 

 blage of species has been found. As the mollusca of the upper and 

 lower eocene differ considerably, analogy leads us to expect that the 

 species of mammalia of these two periods (the lower and middle 

 eocene) will differ still more widely. On the other hand, the 

 fossil quadrupeds of the Limagne d'Auvergne, which I refer to an 

 upper eocene group (although some able geologists class them as 

 lower miocene), present another fauna ; and a fourth set of mam- 

 malia belong to the era of the Faluns of Touraine. Since the falu- 

 nian epoch the pliocene species came into existence, and a large part 

 of these also have in their turn become extinct, giving place to the 

 mammalia now co-existing with man. 



If we desire to satisfy ourselves of the superior facilities we enjoy 

 in studying the tertiary as compared to the secondary mammalia, we 

 have only to reflect on one advantage which a collector of newer 

 pliocene fossils enjoys over one who shall confine his investigations 

 to eocene or miocene remains. In Owen's table of the fossil 

 mammals of the British Isles, the longest list of species is that de- 

 rived from cavern deposits. All these he refers, and I believe cor- 

 rectly, to the newer pliocene period. We know nothing of the bones 

 which were enclosed in the stalagmite of caverns in the older pliocene 

 or miocene or eocene eras ; and the same remark holds good in all 

 those parts of France, Belgium, and Germany which I have visited, 

 and equally so, I believe, in regard to the caves of Brazil, Australia, 

 and New Zealand, from which the bones of extinct mammalia and 



