328 0. C. Marsh—History and Methods of 
by a “lapidifying juice.” Falloppio, the eminent professor 
of anatomy at Padua, believed that fossil shells were generated 
by fermentation where they were found ; and that the tusks of 
elephants, dug up near Apulia, were merely earthy concretions. 
Mercati, in 1574, published figures of the fossil shells preserved 
in the Museum of the Vatican, but expressed the opinion that 
they were only stones, that owed their peculiar shapes to the 
heavenly bodies. Olivi, of Cremona, described the fossils in 
the Museum at Verona, and considered them all “sports of | 
nature.” 
Palissy, a French anthor, in 1580, opposed these views, and 
is said to have been the first to assert in Paris that fossil shells 
and fishes had once belonged to marine animals. Fabio Colonna 
appears to have first pointed out that some of the fossil shells 
found in Italy were marine, and some terrestrial. 
Another peculiar theory discussed in the sixteenth century 
deserves mention. This was the vegetation theory, especially 
advocated by Tournefort and Camerarius, both eminent as 
bot ese writers believed that the seeds of .mine 
moulds?” The stalactites which formed in caverns in various 
parts of the world were also supposed to be proofs of this 
vegetative growth. os 
Still another theory has been held at various times, and 18 
not entirely forgotten, namely: that the Creator made 
fossil animals and plants just as they are found in the rocks, 
theory has never prevailed among those f. h scientific 
facts, and hence needs here o further consideratio: 
An ‘inter arose in England later than 0” 
opinions as to their origin were not less ra vo 
oe FOLOrreds 
Plot, in his “N atural History of Oxf 4 published in 
a F 
