ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. CXXXvii 



he considers the species closely allied to, if not identical Avitli Bh. 

 megarhinus of the Older Pliocene, or Ith. Schlciermacherl of tlie 

 Miocene, two species of the genus Sus, both INIiocene, a Tapirvs, an 

 Equus, a Mastodon, supposed to be M. amjustidens, a Dicranoceros 

 and a Megaceros, a Felis, a Canis, an Ursus, and Cetacea, Professor 

 Owen stating that the majority of the specimens are closely allied 

 to, if not identical with, Miocene species. 



The determination of a large Serpent, from Capt. Spratt's collec- 

 tion of Greek freshwater tertiaries, of the size of a large rattle- 

 snake, and probably venom.ous, was also interesting ; Professor Owen 

 remarking that, though the mythological history of the Greeks had 

 given creation to snakes of great magnitude, none such are known 

 in the existing fauna of Europe. 



Every one is now" aware that much difference of opinion has lately 

 arisen respecting the classification of the lower portion of the palaeo- 

 zoic rocks, some being disposed to allot the lower portion of the Silu- 

 rian series to the Cambrian formation, and others maintaining that 

 the fauna of the lower Silurian and the fauna of the upper Silurian 

 form one complete whole, being far too intimately connected with 

 each other to admit of separation. The advocates of the former 

 opinion appeal to the evidence of foreign countries, and endeavour 

 to prove that, taking into account their fossils, the difference becomes 

 too great for the maintenance of unity ; whilst their op})onents main- 

 tain that we must look at the British succession of strata by itself, 

 and, from the amount of analogy there observed between the upper 

 and lower Silurian, conclude that they form but one system ; and 

 then make similar comparisons for other countries ; or, in other 

 words, that we must expect to find co-existing and therefore repre- 

 sentative, not identical, faunae. This truth, for it is assuredly one, 

 I have before alluded to ; and, wdieri we consider the great difficulty 

 of determining the rate, extent, and direction of the expansion of 

 species from their first centres of creation, we may well admit that 

 there is a question before us worthy of patient and calm discussion. 

 Below the most ancient rocks known to be fossiliferous an immense 

 thickness of flaggy and slaty beds occur in AYales, which have hitherto 

 been considered unfossiliferons or azoic, but Mr. Salter has produced 

 proofs that even here organic life had commenced. In the nearly 

 unaltered sandstone-beds on the eastern side of the Longmvnd he dis- 

 covered traces of Annelides and fragments of a Trilobite, and in the 

 grits near Bangor a supposed Fucoid. The Annelides he refers to 

 Arenicola didyraa, and he has given the name oi Palceojujge Ramsaiji 

 to the Trilobite, which he considers allied to the Deikelocephalus of 

 D. Owen. He also deduces from the surface- or ripple-markings of the 

 flags, a proof that the conditions of sea and land at this remote epoch 

 were very analogous to those now observable, though in this case the 

 ancient shore-deposits have been thrown into a vertical position. For 

 correct specific determination the specimens are ])robably too imperfect, 

 but they may at least be received as curious indications of the actions 

 going on anterior to the Silurian deposits; whilst the presence of a Tri- 

 lobite appears to show what could not have been inferred from the 



