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EXPLANATIONS 



fossiliferous formation ; grounding the statement upon 

 Sir Henry de la Beche's Manual, published about eleven 

 years ago, and contrasting with it, in a foot-note, my re- 

 mark, "Neither fishes nor any higher vertebrata as yet 

 roamed through the marine wilds." The fact is, that this 

 last critic — understood to be a very eminent philosophical 

 writer, was not aware that, since the publication of De 

 la Beche's Manual, the lower fossiliferous rocks had been 

 divided into several distinct formations, in the lowest of 

 which, it is fully admitted, there are no vertebrata. 

 More than this still : a body called the Literary and Philo- 

 sophical Society of Liverpool had brought before them 

 (January, 1845) a set of letters which one of their mem- 

 bers had drawn with reference to my book from several 

 of the chief geologists of the day. We there find Mr. 

 Lyell stating upon hearsay that I represented fish begin- 

 ning in the coal, and Mr. Murchison speaking of me as 

 beginning with zoophytes and polypiaria alone ; statements, 

 [ need hardly say, conveying the most erroneous impres- 

 sions regarding the book. This, however, is not the im- 

 mediate point. The two gentlemen here named will be 

 allowed to stand in the very first rank as geologists. They 

 are able men, of marvellous industry, and unimpeached 

 zeal for science. These men, nevertheless, in the corre- 

 spondence to which I am pointing, give entirely opposite 

 views of the first fossiliferous formation. Mr. Murchison 

 says, " No trace of a vertebrated animal has been found 

 in the lower Silurian rocks." Mr. Lyell says, " The fact 

 that, with the earliest type of organization, we meet with 

 vertebrated animals, true fish, so far from being explained 

 away since I affirmed it in my book, is confirmed and ex- 

 tended by fresh evidence." The very latest affirmation 

 we have on this point from Mr. Murchison — an affirma- 

 tion made after examining Silurian rocks in Russia, where 

 they are presented in vast extent — contains these words : 

 ** The absence of even the lowest of the vertebrata in the 

 inferior Silurian rocks — an absence which is totals so far 

 as can be inferred from the researches of geologists in all 

 parts of the world — gives them a true Protozoic charac- 

 ter."* These extracts speak for themselves. The only 

 thing calling for further remark is the surprising circum- 

 stance of this correspondence having been brought before 



- 1 Abstract of a paper by Mr. Murchison, Report of British As 



sociation of 1844, page 54. 



