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LETTER XXVIII. 
general remarks on the fossils already described. 
In the series of letters, composing the former volume, various facts 
were adduced, in proof of the solid part of this globe having, at some 
very distant period, been covered by water. An unexpected circum- 
stance was at the same time noticed ; — hardly any agreement could be 
found between the fossil vegetable remains and those vegetables with 
which the earth is at present clothed ; and, in the present volume, an 
equal want of agreement has been observed between the fossil remains 
and the actually existing animals of the order of zoophytes. 
That, m the stupendous changes which this planet has undergone, 
several species of beings, endued with vegetable or animal life, should 
have become extinct, is by no means inconsistent with the conclusions 
to which an unbiassed consideration of those grand events would lead. 
The discoveries, therefore, in the vestiges of a former world, of the re- 
mains of innumerable vegetables and animals, such as would consti- 
tute a prodigious number of species, and such as, according to the 
sti ict laws of arrangement, might be even disposed in new and distinct 
genera, although quite unexpected, is not in contradiction to what, 
on reflection, we should have admitted might, from the influ- 
ence of particular circumstances, have occurred. But a fact has been 
