202 SKETCHES OF CREATION. 



advanced. Of the thousands of species that had their be- 

 ing during the Paleozoic and Mesozoic Ages, not one has 

 survived to the present. The specific types are all extinct. 

 Now, on the contrary, in the dawn of the Cenozoic Ages, 

 a fauna was created, of which a few representatives have 

 survived to modern times. The survivors, however, are 

 all marine. Another feature of the fauna of this era, indi- 

 cating the approach of the human period, was the advent 

 of multitudes of mammals, a class of which man is the 

 head. Some of the lowest terrestrial mammals seem, it is 

 true, to have made their appearance a long time previous- 

 ly in the Jurassic Age, and perhaps even in the Triassic, 

 but nothing more is seen of the class till the beginning of 

 the Tertiary. Like the Devonian reptiles, they seem to 

 have run far in advance of their class, and to have totally 

 perished for their temerity. The full numerical develop- 

 ment and ascendency of mammalian quadrupeds are the 

 characteristics of the Tertiary Age. 



The immortal George Cuvier was the first to bring to 

 light abundant relics of these masters of a former world. 

 The vicinity of Paris seems to have been an ancient bury- 

 ing-place of extinct quadrupeds while it was yet the bed 

 of the sea. The bones were undoubtedly transported 

 thither from the adjacent land. One of the most remark- 

 able of these animals was the Paleotherium, a three-hoofed 

 quadruped resembling a tapir, and attaining the size of a 

 horse. Other quadrupeds, which grazed upon the same 

 grounds with the Paleothere, were variously allied to the 

 deer, the peccary, and the tapir. Monkeys, mastodons, and 

 elephants existed in Europe a little later, and these were 

 associated with a huge anomalous quadruped named Di- 

 notherium, which united characteristics of the elephant, 

 hippopotamus, tapir, and dugong. The sloth and opossum 

 tribes also, which are now confined to other continents, 



