486 



THE WONDERS OF GEOLOGY. Lect. V. 



mation. The flora consisted chiefly of coniferous trees, 

 ferns, cycadeous plants, cypresses, and a few unknown, 

 but apparently related forms. In fact, the islands and 

 continents of the Wealden and Cretaceous epochs, appear 

 to have possessed the same zoological and botanical cha- 

 racters. Here then we have the first glimpse of extensive 

 regions almost exclusively inhabited by enormous reptiles : 

 for though the leaves and fruits of delicate plants, and the 

 fragile bones of birds and flying reptiles, and brittle shells 

 with their ligaments and epidermis remaining, are found 

 imbedded in the sediments of the rivers and seas, not 

 the slightest traces of any mammiferous animal have been 

 discovered ! I forbear to comment in this place on this 

 extraordinary fact, of which our examination of the tertiary 

 formations afforded no intimation. We have now ap- 

 proached the Age of Reptiles; — that geological epoch, in 

 which the earth swarmed with enormous oviparous qua- 

 drupeds, and the air and the waters alike teemed with rep- 

 tilian forms. 



3. Site op the country of the Iguanodon. — Before 

 we pass to the investigation of the older secondary for- 

 mations, I would briefly reconsider the question as to the 

 geographical position of the principal tracts of country 

 during the deposition of the Wealden and cretaceous strata; 

 —whether England was then dry land, and enjoyed a 

 tropical climate ; and whether turtles, crocodiles, and 

 gigantic lizards, here flourished amid groves of tree-ferns, 

 and other productions of intertropical climes ; or, on the 

 contrary, whether the country of the Iguanodon was 

 situated far distant from the area now covered by its 

 spoils ? 



The unequivocal marks of transport which, as we have 

 seen, the fossils so generally exhibit, seem to demonstrate 

 that the reptiles and terrestrial plants could not have 

 lived and died in the regions where their relics are in:- 



