driven away from these by other species or genera.

"In regard to quadrupeds, on the contrary, every thing is precise. The appearance of their bones in strata, and still more

of their entire carcasses, clearly establishes that the bed in which they are found must have been previously laid dry, or at least that dry land must have existed in its immediate neighbourhood. Their disappearance as certainly announces that this stratum must have been inundated, or that the dry land had ceased to exist in that state. It is from them, therefore, that we learn with perfect certainty the important fact of the repeated irruptions of the sea upon the land, which the extraneous fossils and other productions of marine origin could not of themselves have proved; and, by a careful investigation of them, we may hope to ascertain the number and the epochs of those irruptions

of the sea.

"Secondly, the nature of the revolutions which have changed the surface of our earth, must have exerted a more powerful action upon terrestrial quadrupeds than upon marine animals. As these revolutions have consisted chiefly in changes of the bed of the sea, and as the waters must have destroy ed all the quadrupeds which they reached, if their irruption over the land was general, they must have destroyed the entire class, or, if confined only to certain continents at one time, they must have destroyed at least all the species inhabiting these continents, without having the same effect upon the marine animals. On the other hand, millions of aquatic animals may have been left quite dry, or buried in newly-formed strata, or thrown violently on the coasts, while their races may have been still preserved in more peaceful parts of the sea, whence they might again propagate and spread after the agitation of the water had ceased.

"Thirdly, this more complete action is also more easily ascertained and demonstrated; because, as the number of terrestrial quadrupeds is limited, and as most of their species, at least the large ones, are well kown, we can more easily determine whether fossil bones belong to a species which still exists, or to one that is now lost. As, on the other hand, we are still very far from being acquainted with all the testaceous animals and fishes belonging to the sea, and as we probably still remain ignorant of the greater part of those which live in the extensive deeps of the ocean, it is impossible to know, with any certainty, whether a species found in a fossil state may not still exist somewhere alive."

The doubt with which the above quotation concludes, whether any petrifactions of shells are of extinct animals, has also been suggested with respect to the fossil bones of quadrupeds. Nay, we have even been asked the question whether we believed in the reality of organic remains so VOL. III.-No. 1.

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frequently met with, belonging to extinct animals. This question as may well be supposed, was not asked by a naturalist, but, as all our readers may not have dip ped into this branch of science, it may be well to inform them that the fact is cer tain, and that it is as clearly and satisfactorily ascertained as any problem in Euclid. This certainty arises from a knowledge of the natural history of the animal creation; and the more perfect we become in this science, the greater is the conviction that there are organic remains which belong to extinct species. And when to this is added the information derived from comparative anatomy, nothing can be more clear. It has been supposed that there are many species of animals yet unknown to naturalists. This is no doubt true respecting the smaller ones, but of the larger animals, particularly quadrupeds, there is little or no probability of many new species to be found. This subject is investigated (sect. 25, p. 74) by an examination of the information which the ancients possessed, and of the voyages and travels of modern times; and also (p. 85) by an "Inquiry respecting the fabulous animals of the ancients;" from which, our author concludes, that none of the bones of the larger quadrupeds, found in a fossil state, belong to present existing species. Although there exists some difficulty in distinguishing the fossil bones of quadrupeds, yet comparative anatomy clearly demonstrates that there is a certain determinate correspondency between the various organs and the different bones of the skeleton of an animal; "Thus, if the viscera of an animal are so organized as only to be fitted for the digestion of recent flesh, it is also requisite that the jaws should be so constructed as to fit them for devouring prey; the claws must be constructed for seizing and tearing it to pieces; the teeth for cutting and dividing its flesh; the entire system of the limbs or organs of motion, for pursuing and overtaking it; and the organs of sense, for discovering it at a distance. Nature also must have endowed the brain of the animal with instincts sufficient for concealing itself, and for laying plans to catch its necessary victims."

"To enable the claws of a carnivorous animal to seize its prey, a considerable degree of mobility is necessary in their paws and toes, and a considerable strength in the stances, there necessarily result certain determinate forms in all the bones of their paws, and in the distribution of the muscles and tendons by which they are moved. The fore-arm must possess a certain facility of

claws themselves. From these circum

moving in various directions, and consequently requires certain determinate forms in the bones of which it is composed. As the bones of the fore-arm are articulated with the arm-bone or humerus, no change can take place in the form and structure of the former without occasioning correspondent changes in the form of the latter. The shoulder blade also, or scapula, requires a correspondent degree of strength in all animals destined for catching prey, by which it likewise must necessarily have an appropriate form. The play and action of all these parts require certain proportions in the muscles which set them in motion, and the impressions formed by these muscles, must still farther determine the forms of all these bones. "After these observations, it will be easily seen that similar conclusions may be drawn with respect to the hinder limbs of carnivorous animals, which require particular con. formations to fit them for rapidity of motion in general; and that similar considerations must influence the forms and connexions of the vertebræ and other bones constituting the trunk of the body, to fit them for flexibility and readiness of motion in all directions. The bones also of the nose, of the orbit, and of the ears, require certain forms and structures to fit them for giving perfection to the senses of smell, sight, and hearing, so necessary to animals of prey. In short, the shape and structure of the teeth regulate the forms of the condyle, of the shoulder-blade, and of the claws, in the same manner as the equation of a curve regulates all its other properties; and, as in regard to any particular curve, all its properties may be ascertained by assuming each separate property as the foundation of a particular equation; in the same manner, a claw, a shoulder-blade, a condyle, a leg or arm bone, or any other bone separately considered, enables us to consider the description of teeth to which they have belonged; and so also reciprocally we may determine the forms of the other bones from the teeth. Thus, commencing our investigation by a careful survey of any one bone by itself, a person who is sufficiently master of the laws of organic structure, may, as it were, reconstruct the whole animal to which that bone had belonged.

"This principle is sufficiently evident, in its general acceptation, not to require any more minute demonstration; but when it comes to be applied in practice, there is a great number of cases in which our theoretical knowledge of these relations of forms is not sufficient to guide us, unless assisted by observation and experience.

"For example, we are well aware that all hoofed animals must necessarily be herbivorous, because they are possessed of no means of seizing upon prey. It is also evident, having no other use for their fore-legs than to support their bodies, that they have no occasion for a shoulder so vigorously organized as that of carnivorous animals; owing to which, they have no clavicles or accromion pro

cesses, and their shoulder-blades are proportionally narrow. Having also no occasion to turn their fore-arms, their radius is joined by ossification to the ulna, or is at least articulated by gynglymus with the humerus. Their food, being entirely herbaceous, requires teeth with flat surfaces, on purpose to bruise the seeds and plants on which they feed. For this purpose also, these surfaces require to be unequal, and are consequently composed of alternate perpendicular layers of hard enamel and softer bone. Teeth of this structure necessarily require horizontal motions, to enable them to triturate or grind down the herbaceous food; and, accordingly, the condyles of the jaw could not be formed into such confined joints as in the carnivorous animals, but must have a flattened form, correspondent to sockets in the temporal bones, which also are more or less flat for their reception. The hollows likewise of the temporal bones, having smaller muscles to contain, are narrower, and not so deep, &c. All these circumstances are deducible from each other, according to their greater or less generality, and in such manner that some are essentially and exclusively appropriated to hoofed quadrupeds, while other circumstances, though equally necessary to that description of animals, are not exclusively so, but may be found in animals of other descriptions, where other conditions permit or require their existence.

"When we proceed to consider the dif ferent orders or subdivisions of the class of hoofed animals, and examine the modifications to which the general conditions are liable, or rather the particular conditions which are conjoined, according to the respective characters of the several subdivisions, the reasons upon which these particular conditions or rules of conformation are founded become less evident. We can easily conceive, in general, the necessity of a more complicated system of digestive organs in those species which have less perfect masticatory systems; and hence we may presume that these latter animals require especially to be ruminant, which are in want of such or such kinds of teeth; and may also deduce, from the same considerations, the necessity of a certain conformation of the esophagus, and of corresponding forms in the vertebra of the neck, &c. But I doubt whether it would have been discovered, independently of actual observation, that ruminant animals should all have cloven hoofs, and that they should be the only animals having that particular conformation; that the ruminant animals only should be provided with horns on their foreheads; that those among them which have sharp tusks, or canine teeth, should want horns, &c.

"As all these relative conformations are constant and regular, we may be assured that they depend upon some sufficient cause; and, since we are not acquainted with that cause, we must here supply the defect of theory by observation, and in this way lay down empirical rules on the subject, which

By a strict adherence to these rules Cuvier has ascertained and classified the fossil remains of 78 different quadrupeds, forty-nine of which are species heretofore entirely unknown to naturalists. They are not found among living animals, and consequently belong to extinct species. For proofs of these we must refer to Cuvier's great work on fossil organic remains, or to the second part of the publication before us wherein professor Jameson gives an account of Cuvier's geological discoveries. Among the representations of these extinct animals the present essay contains two entire skeletons, one of the megatherium (plate 3) dug out of alluvial soil near Buenos-Ayres, in South America, an animal apparently allied to the sloths, and the ornithocephalus, found near Aichstedt, in Germany,-a quadruped of the bat kind, with the head of a bird. If further proofs were wanting, the American mammoth, or great mastodon, may be added, the skeleton of which was disinterred in this state and is to be seen in the museum of Philadelphia.

The relation which the species of fossil bones bear to the strata in which they are found, is treated of in the 29th section, p. 111. Here it is stated, that shells alone are found in the oldest floetz, or secondary formations. The next in order are oviparous quadrupeds, as alligators, crocodiles, tortoises, &c. and among them no mammiferous land quadrupeds are to be found. In the basin, around Paris, a formation of chalk, without organic remains, lies above these. But land quadrupeds in abundance succeed in the strata above the chalk. In the upper strata, or allu vial deposites, are the remains of the elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and mastodon. The bones of existing animals are only found in the latest alluvial depositions. Among the great number and variety of organic remains hitherto discovered, no

more or less considerable collections of rocks, or earthly materials by which they are covered." All these changes which have taken place on the surface of the globe, must have been anterior to the formation of human beings, and consequently the establishment of our existing societies could not have been very ancient, being less than five thousand years. For proofs of this our readers must consult the 324 section of our author, containing the traditionary accounts of a great catastrophe and subsequent renewal of human society.

"I am of opinion, then," says Cuvier in conclusion, "with M. Deluc and M. Dothoroughly established in geology, it is, that lomieu, That, if there is any circumstance the crust of our globe has been subjected to a great and sudden revolution, the epoch of which cannot be dated much farther back than five or six thousand years ago; that this revolution had buried all the countries which were before inhabited by men and by the other animals that are now best known; that the same revolution had laid dry the bed of the last ocean, which now that the small number of individuals of men forms all the countries at present inhabited; and other animals that escaped from the effects of that great revolution, have since propagated and spread over the lands then newly laid dry; and consequently, that the human race has only resumed a progressive state of improvement since that epoch, by forming established societies, raising monuments, collecting natural facts, and constructing systems of science and of learning.

"Yet farther, That the countries which by this last revolution, had been formerly are now inhabited, and which were laid dry inhabited at a more remote era, if not by man, at least by land animals; that, consequently, at least one previous revolution had submerged them under the waters; and that, judging from the different orders of ani mals of which we discover the remains in a fossil state, they had probably experienced two or three irruptions of the sea.

"These alternate revolutions form, in my opinion, the problem in geology that is most important to be solved, or rather to be accu rately defined and circumscribed; for, in order to solve it satisfactorily and entirely, it were requisite that we should discover the cause of these events,-an enterprise invol ving difficulties of a very different nature."

We have thus endeavoured to give an analysis of Cuvier's Theory of the Earth, but any further observation on this, or the remaining parts of the present publication must be deferred to our next number.

(To be continued.

K

Supplement to DR. MITCHILL'S "Observations on the Geology of North-America," just published by Messrs. Kirk & Mercein, in the Description of a Fossil Elephant, discovered in Wythe County, southwest of the River Ihanhawa, in Virginia, written by Dr. John Stranger, to lieut. Wm. L. Brownlow, of the U. S. Marine Corps, stationed at N. York, dated Wythe County, March 10, 1818. DEAR SIR,

Your letter has been received some weeks ago, after my return from NorthCarolina, which should have been answered before this time, had I not been at a loss to know, what particular information Dr. Mitchill wishes with regard to the teeth and bones found on Mr. Kinsa's land. However, that you may not think your friendly application to me disregarded, I will now comply with your request, as well as I can. The place where the discovery was made, is a small marshy piece of ground, not more than 40 feet square, in a field which has been for more than 20 years in cultivation, and has previous to that time, as I am informed, been used as a lick by horses and cattle, a small spring of mineral taste oozes from the spot. The owner of the field observed repeatedly in the summer season, in dry weather, after a refreshing shower, that the place was covered with a white substance like salt. Under this impression he began to dig in search of salt water. The ground being opened a few feet in depth, he found a few uncommon teeth and small round bones, about 4 inches long and about 1 1-2 inches in diameter, solid and somewhat larger in circumference at each end, like joints of a tail, or toe. The news of this discovery induced several persons to visit the spot: I also went, and being desirous to make a farther search, I obtained permission to make a larger opening, say 12 feet square, and found a number of still larger teeth and bones, belonging, in my opinion, to two different species of animals, larger than any we now have within our states. The bones were so much decayed, that they would generally fall to pieces, when exposed to the air; the teeth I preserved, and some time afterwards put them in the possession of Dr. John Floyd, (a member from Virginia in the present congress) residing in Montgomery county, who probably, sent them to some Museum. The soil was so strongly impregnated with the mineral, that it tasted like copperas itself. The

position in which the teeth and bones were found, was somewhat remarkable. The large teeth, two of which weighed 161b. each, and several more of less weight and size, were deposited in a manner by themselves, and deeper in the ground, according to their gravity: round about those, some little distance off, were the teeth and bones of the lesser animals, placed in a semicircle; of the latter I found several jawbones with their teeth sticking fast; and in one upper-jaw I found besides a tusk, about 20 inches long, shaped like a cow's horn, round, crooked, tapering off to a point, hollow at the base, and pointing forward towards the nose, also a couple of ribs and shoulder blades. The smaller animals I judged to have been of the carnivorous, from the shape of their teeth, which had a double row of high conic processes, three to each row, between 3 and 4 inches from the bottom of the root to the top of the tooth, and each was about 3 inches long. All the teeth of the large animal (I found no bones of this animal) were flat, and ribbed transversely. This remarkable position of the different bones and teeth, made me suppose, that the large animal had died in a conflict with the smaller ones. Or why should I have found several sets of teeth and bones of the one kind, and all in that semicircle, and but one set of teeth of the large animal opposite to them. None of these teeth were deeper than about 6 feet in the ground, when a flat limestone rock commenced, which rock must have been once nearer to the surface, for I found pine-knots, and pieces of rotten wood within two feet above it. This, sir, is all the information I can think of, should Dr. Mitchill be desirous to know any other circumstance relative to this affair, I will cheerfully give it, if in my power.

I am, Sir, respectfully,
Your humble servant,
JOHN STRANGER.

To the Editors of the American Monthly Magazine.

THE salivating qualities which our pastures seem to possess for these last ten or fifteen years, so distressing to horses and neat-cattle, I have long wished to see philosophically investigated and publicly announced. The farmer, however, is still left to his own vague conjectures, and there is not a species of grass or herb which will grow in pasture land, but has

been accused of producing this deleterious effect. Now, permit me to suggest, (which I can do with much confidence,) that it ought not to be attributed to any vegetable whatever, but to that species of spider which, weaving a thick horizontal web near the surface of the ground, covers, in some pastures, one-tenth of the surface during the greater part of the

GENTLEMEN,

summer months. Should this suggestion induce the curious to an investigation of the properties and rapid progress of this insect, and a plain publication of the same, with the best method of counteracting its baneful effects, its object will have been attained, and the suggestor highly gratified. D. D.

Marcellus, April 2, 1818.

P. H.