416 Symonds — British Fossil Mammals. 



whose remains are mingled with the relics of extinct reptiles, 

 plants, and shells. 



It appeals to me that the present school of geologists do not 

 lay sufficient stress upon the gradual elevation of land throughout 

 the northern hemisphere as connected with what I may term the 

 igneous, volcanic, and earthquake forces after the close of the 

 Secondary epoch ; and which elevatory forces were destined in the 

 course of unnumbered ages to elevate the sea-beds of the Secondary 

 and the earlier Tertiary epochs on the flanks and even to the summits 

 of the highest mountains in the world. The diminution of volcanic 

 intensity over the portion of the globe we inhabit from the period 

 of the New Eed Sandstone up to the close of the Chalk period has 

 not been sufficiently remarked upon : and it is most important to 

 note that it is to the renewal of this volcanic activity and of earth- 

 quake movements that so much of the present physical geography 

 of the northern hemisphere owes its origin. 



The Eocene Epoch. — Eocene is the term invented by Sir Charles 

 Lyell for the lowest and oldest of the Tertiary rocks which succeed 

 the Secondary rock-masses in stratigraphical position, and in which 

 the prototypes and progenitors of succeeding and existing Mammalia 

 are first known to geologists. Eocene means the shadowing forth or 

 the dawn of those animals whose modified successors in after Mio- 

 cene, Pliocene, and Post-pliocene times, lived in thousands for long 

 eras on ancient European lands. The points to which I would espe- 

 cially direct attention are the indications afforded by organic remains, 

 by the shells, plants, and animals, of the climate of this part of the 

 world during the Eocene epoch. Everywhere the evidence deriv- 

 able from the study of the organic remains furnished by the Lower 

 Tertiary Strata of the Continent and Great Britain, is in favour of the 

 existence of a much higher temperature during Eocene times, than 

 now attains in these temperate latitudes. The oldest known Tertiary 

 quadruped is the Arctocyon primcevus of the Lower Eocenes of 

 Paris, an animal related to the bear, and the Kinkajou or Honey 

 Bear of South America; while in the Lower Eocenes of Eng- 

 land there are found the remains of animals which lived hefore that 

 Middle Eocene period, when the great Nummulite formation of 

 marine strata was deposited over a wide sea bed, the strata of which 

 has since been elevated into the mountain chains of the Alps and 

 Pyrenees, the Cai^athians, and Himalayas. Many Lower Eocene 

 animals lived and died on the banks of the great river that floated 

 down the tropical fruits of the Isle of Sheppey, in Kent. Among 

 them was the CorypJiodon, a tapir-like animal, but twice the 

 size of the American tapir, and like it, probably inhabiting 

 densely wooded regions and the banks of rivers. Here also was 

 the Hyracotherium of Owen, an animal allied to the rhinoceros and 

 hippopotamus, and whose representatives still linger in the Hyrax 

 of the Cape, and the Syrian " coney." Here also are found 

 the bones of Lophioclon, an animal which was allied to and was of 

 the size of the tapir, but which appears from its remarkable 

 comparative anatomy to have had affinities connected with its 



