Paleontology: Extinction of Species. 37 



does all science admit that great convulsions took 

 place over the globe, great cataclysms which 

 changed abruptly all the features of localities and 

 of whole countries ? Or, let us with great liberality 

 suppose that the whole number of species now ex- 

 tinct, among which man lived then, amounted to 

 almost a hundred; and that they chose to die out 

 gracefully, one at a time; and that the species were 

 content with half a century each for its obsequies; 

 how many years would that require ? Less than 

 five thousand; not so far back as some chronologi- 

 cal tables put the birth of Noe. As to their being 

 found petrified and preserved in soils, and rocks, 

 that does not prove the lapse of tens of thousands 

 of years. It proves a little chemistry paying them 

 a tribute, which is due to their remains, no doubt, 

 but is not at all relevant to the question of their 

 antiquity. Besides, scientists point out species that 

 die out, right under our eyes, and that too rapidly 

 enough; as the didus and dinornis of the islands 

 Bourbon and Mauritius. 



35. The animals with which men lived have 

 served some observers as a guide to distinguish pre- 

 historic times into three epochs. First, 

 that of the great cave-bear; secondly, J^e aS" 

 that of the mammoth; thirdly, that of 

 the reindeer. This succession, however, being 

 ill-substantiated, gave way to an archaeological 

 classification, taken from the stations in which in- 

 dustrial remains were found. Four periods have 



