90 Eaton's Geology. 



he had found a petrified roll of butter with the maker's name upon 

 it, in a formation of that period, as a snake of any kind. Not 

 convinced, he ventured, in a subsequent number of Silliman's 

 Journal, to publish a lithographic plate of it, when it turned out 

 to be one of the commonest fossil coal plants. 



Gen. Van Renselaer having supposed Dr. Buckland to speak in 

 an approving manner of Mr. Eaton's labours, it may not be amiss, 

 by way of answer, to quote the following bombastic passage from 

 page 14 of the " Geological Text Book." 



" Since that time, Buckland, aided by the veteran Cuvier, has 

 commanded the whole geological phalanx to leave, for a while, 

 the deep abode of rocks, and to examine 'the open caverns and 

 the furrowed earth.' He has led out before us, from the cave of 

 Kirkdale, the antediluvial mastodon^ chased and gnawed by hun- 

 dreds of hyenas. He has shown us the torrid abodes of the river 

 horse and the elephant, to have been in the latitudes of Caledo- 

 nia and Scythia, &c. &c." 



The opening of the cave of Kirkdale, when discovered, was 

 about two feet wide in a solid rock. The adult mastodons were 

 from ten to twelve feet high, so that it was impossible for any 

 animal of that genus, young or old, ever to get in, or get out of 

 such a cave, which was a mere den where hyenas brought the 

 bones of dead animals. But Dr. Buckland never found even any 

 fragment of a bone of the mastodon in that cave. It is evident, Mr. 

 Eaton never read Dr. Buckland's book, or he would not have 

 made an assertion so easily exposed. Are we to suppose that Dr. 

 Buckland, one of the first minds in Europe, has lost his judgment, 

 and can approve of such stuff? 



But Gen. Van Renselaer says, " I am perfectly satisfied with 

 Professor Eaton's labours." 



And Mr. Silliman coming forward in his editorial capacity, to 

 the defence of Mr. Eaton, says, " it is less an act of courtesy than 

 of justice" on his part. If these gentlemen are satisfied to take 

 such trash for Geology, it is very certain that the world at large 

 will not be so. This is an intelligent age, and will stand by any 

 writer who fearlessly speaks the truth, and diligently labours to 

 prevent quackery and pretension from degrading the minds of 

 the rising generation.'* 



