FOSSIL FISH. 



The remains of Fossil Fish are found in the strata anterior to 

 the chalk, in that substance, and in strata which are more 

 recent. These remains consist of bones, of spines, and scales. 

 Sometimes they are converted into a substance either calca- 

 reous, siliceous, or pyritous ; but for the most part they have 

 not changed their nature. 



These fossil remains have belonged to distinct genera, some 

 of whichare new. Our limits will not permit us to enter very 

 largely into their enumeration. 



It is not necessary, nor perhaps altogether possible, to ex- 

 plain how these different species of fossils have been formed, 

 in localities of different degrees of antiquity, from the oldest 

 zootic strata, to those which are being formed daily under our 

 actual inspection ; but it is not difficult to conceive why the 

 fish have left a greater quantity of those buried remains than 

 any other class of vertebrated animals. It is sufficient for this 

 purpose, to recollect that the fish, constantly living in the 

 water, and often in the muddy bottom, can, when they die, be 

 deposited without coming in contact with the air, and, in con- 

 sequence of their form, which is most frequently extremely 

 flatted, in such a position as is very favourable to their con- 

 servation. Their carcasses, carried along by the currents, are 

 deposited in some still water, where the liquid element easily 

 abandons the calcareous molecules which it held in suspension, 

 and which then envelope either the skeleton or the entire fish. 

 Accordingly it is well known that, on the coasts of Iceland, 

 genuine ichthyolites are formed every day in a sort of bluish 

 mud, which hardens by exposure to the air. After this, it is 

 not astonishing to find fossil fish in every species of strata, at 

 whatever depth, or at whatever height, compact or loose, fresh- 

 water or marine ; but it is more especially in the schistose and 

 calcareous fossil depositions, that they are observed in the 

 greatest abundance, disposed, as it were, like plants in an her- 



