526 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
allotted to man has revolved in its orbit through a period of time so vasi, that 
the mind, in the cndeavom- to realize it, is strained by an effort like that by 
which it strives to conceive the space dividing the solar system from the most 
distant nebulae. 
" Paleontology has shown that, from the inconceivably remote period of the 
deposition of the Cambrian rocks, the earth has been vivified by the sun's light 
and heat, has been fertihzed by refi^eshing showers, and washed by tidal waves ; 
that the ocean not only moved in orderly oscillations regulated, as now, by sun 
and moon, but was rippled and agitated by winds and storms ; that the atmos- 
phere, besides these movements, was healthily influenced by clouds and vapours, 
rising, condensing, and falling in ceaseless circulation. With such conditions of 
life, palseontology demonstrates that life has been enjoyed during the same count- 
less thousands of j-ears ; and that with life, from the beginning, there has been 
death. The earliest testimony of the living tiling, whether coral, crustacean, or 
shell, in the oldest fossiliferous rock, is at the same time proof that it died. At no 
period does it appear that the gift of life has been monopolized by contemporary 
individuals through a stagnant sameness of untold time, but it has been handed 
down from generation to generation, and successively enjoyed by the countless 
thousands that constitute the species. Palseontology further teaches, that not 
only the individual, but the species perishes ; that as death is balanced by gene- 
ration, so extinction has been concomitant with the creative power which has 
produced a succession of species ; and fui-thermore, that, in tins succession, there 
has been ' an advance and progress in the main.' Thus we learn that the 
creative force has not deserted the earth during any of the epochs of geological 
time that have succeeded to the first manifestation of such force ; and that, in 
resioect to no one class of animals, has the operation of creative force been 
limited to one geological epoch ; and perhaps the most important and significant 
result of palaeontological research has been the establishment of the axiom of 
the continuous operation of the ordained becoming of the species of living thmgs." 
(" Palasontology," 2nd edition, p. 2.) 
In a diagram illustrating the above geuerahzations, the genetic succession of 
animal Hfe is summed up. It appears from this corrected statement of the latest 
discoveries in palgeontology, that the class of fishes makes its first appearance in 
the Upper Silurian strata, and Prof Owen draws the conclusion that " those spe« 
cies Avhich are most useful to man have immediately preceded him in the order of 
creation," and that they " have superseded species which, to judge by the bony 
garpikes (Lepidosteus) were much less fitted to afford mankind a sapid and whole- 
some food." 
The eai-Hest known reptile is found, not, as generally supposed, in the Devo- 
nian age, but in the Coal measm-es, and all the earliest created forms belong to 
the lowest or Ganocephalous group, analogous to the Lcpidosircns, or mud*fishes, 
which attracted so much attention at the Crystal Palace some time ago. It is 
not until tlie Tertiary times that the reptiles approach in organization to those 
of the ijrescnt day. 
The class birds is represented by footprints in the Upper Trias, in which 
stratum, however, no evidence has yet been found of actual bones, which moro 
conclusive proof is not found below the Lower Chalk. All the earliest created 
birds exhibit the characters of the order Cnrsores, " characters of the embryo or 
immature indi^^duals of tlie " higher m-ders of birds, and are consequently placed 
at the lowest step of the scale of ornithic organization. 
In the higher class mammalia it is most interesting to find again that the 
gi-eatest part of the earliest created mammalia belong to the lowest orders of the 
class. "We find marsupials in the Upper Trias (Microlestcs) , and in the Oohtic beds. 
We find a solitary small vegetable feeding pachyderm Stcrcognoihus in the Oolite, 
and a doubtful cetacean in the Greensand. But it is not till the Eocene division 
of tertiary time that we find the class reach its culminant development. The 
earliest created mammals were the nearest to the ideal archetype. The fossil 
Anoplotheres and Folcsotlicrcs resembled each other in their dentition moi'e than 
the existing musk-deer and tapii-s. The former extinct animals, however, gave 
