FOSSIL REPTILES. 173 



The raammifera were the last, as they evidently are the 

 most perfect productions of the Creative power. Their or- 

 ganization is in all points more complicated and complete, 

 fitting them for the performance of a greater variety of 

 functions, and placing them altogether in a more extended 

 range of existence. There is among them a more decided 

 separation of all the organs which concur to the purposes of 

 life, and nature appears to have employed more art, and less 

 economy, in the process of their conformation. 



The reptiles commenced their existence long before the 

 mammalia. Their debris are found in formations of greater 

 antiquity, and the naturalist is compelled to seek for their 

 remains in the deeper strata of our globe. 



We have already seen, in the brief review of fossil mammi- 

 fera, which we have presented to our readers, that the greatest 

 number, beyond all comparison, of viviparous quadrupeds, 

 have left their bones in the latest diluvial strata, in caverns, or 

 in the clefts and crevices of rocks. The sea which passed 

 over them had scarcely sufficient time to deposit many traces 

 of its transitory inundation : at all events, it has not covered 

 them with compact, solid, regular strata. Some local for- 

 mations alone, and which appear to be of a more ancient 

 date, inclose principally the remains of non-existing genera, 

 and are covered in certain places by marine depositions. But 

 in the coarse limestone, the calcaire grossier of the French, in 

 the limestone with cerithiaf none but marine mammifera have 

 been found, such as phocae, lamantins, and cetacea. In one 

 instance alone, which may, after all, be attributable to some 

 mistake, has an exception to this law been found. We 

 allude to the molasse, the lignites contained therein, and 

 certain contemporary lignites, in which incontestable bones of 

 mammifera have been observed, and where the Baron found 

 his antracotheria, and palseotheria, accompanied, as in the 

 Parisian gypsum, with trionyces and crocodiles, and where 

 he also met with some bones and teeth of mastodon, and a 



