2. 



66 The Natural Hijlory Part L 



entire, and firm. The whole crufta- 

 ceous kind, and the lighter ones of the 

 teftaceous, which together would be 

 a vaft number, fubfiding laft, fell up- 

 Pag. 19, on the Surface of the Earth; ^ whilft 

 SdpS heavier,which fettled down before, 

 cly;3^'^^' were entombed in the bowels of it. 

 Thofe therefore muft then lye every- 

 where ftrewed upon the ground 5 

 whereas now very few, if any, of them 

 jf.pag. appear ; i the Shells which we find at 

 and prelent upon the face of the Earth be- 

 mj.\\ principally of the heavier Ibrts, 



which were at firft lodged vvithin it, 

 and fince difclofed and turned out, by 

 g Part 5. what means we lliall fee hereafter || • 

 (^07if* 4- And indeed, 'tis not conceivable how 

 the generality of them could endure fb 

 many Hundreds of Years as have fince 

 pafb : how they could lye fb long expo- 

 fed to the Air, Weather, and other 

 Injuries, without vafl: numbers of 

 them, and efpecially the finer and ten- 

 derer Species, being, long eVe this, pe- 

 rifhM and rotten, fome of them quite 

 diffolved and vanifh'd, and the reft fb 

 damaged, many of them, and altered 

 by time, as not to appear the things 

 they then were, and lb create a doubt 

 amoogfl: Ibme of m whether they are 

 really Shells or not. This 



