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We have Cuvier and the mummies; M. Roulin and the domesticated animals of America; the difficulties presented by hybridism and by Palaeontology; Darwinism a 'rifacciamento' of De Maillet and Lamarck; Darwinism a system without a commencement, and its author bound to believe in M. Pouchet, etc. etc. How one knows it all by heart, and with what relief one reads at p. 65 "Je laisse M. Darwin!"
Lytton indited not a little bombast, Dickens had his incurable mannerisms, and Thackeray his conventional cynicisms. There are passages in George Eliot's romances which read like sticky bits from a lecture on comparative palaeontology; and Disraeli, who for fifty years threw off most readable tales in the intervals of politics, seems always to be laughing at the public behind his mask.
Now, here is Woodstock for you, and tell me if this be not your Cidaris. Oh, and we have found out the name of your funny spiked shell. Ten minutes of palaeontology ensued; and she was leading the way back to the drawing-room, when he exclaimed, 'Have you heard about the match, Miss May? 'Match? Oh, the cricket match? 'Stoneborough against All England, on St.
We have Cuvier and the mummies; M. Roulin and the domesticated animals of America; the difficulties presented by hybridism and by Palaeontology; Darwinism a rifacciamento of De Maillet and Lamarck; Darwinism a system without a commencement, and its author bound to believe in M. Pouchet, &c. &c. How one knows it all by heart, and with what relief one reads at p. 65 "Je laisse M. Darwin!"
It is desirable to speak of these excellent books, and of their distinguished authors, with the utmost respect, and in a tone as far as possible removed from carping criticism; indeed, if they are specially cited in this place, it is merely in justification of the assertion that the following propositions, which may be found implicitly, or explicitly, in the works in question, are regarded by the mass of palaeontologists and geologists, not only on the Continent but in this country, as expressing some of the best- established results of palaeontology.
On the evidence of palaeontology, the evolution of many existing forms of animal life from their predecessors is no longer an hypothesis, but an historical fact; it is only the nature of the physiological factors to which that evolution is due which is still open to discussion.
I shall therefore content myself with pointing out that it is not simply new formations which are brought to light from year to year, reminding us of the elementary state of our knowledge of palaeontology, but new types also of structure are discovered in rocks whose fossil contents were supposed to be peculiarly well known.
Viewed in this light the facts of palaeontology receive a meaning upon any other hypothesis I am unable to see, in the slightest degree, what knowledge or signification we are to draw out of them.
Lindley's terms, as most familiar in this country; but as those of M. A. Brongniart are much cited, it may be useful to geologists to give a table explaining the corresponding names of groups so much spoken of in palaeontology. Cryptogamous amphigens, or cellular cryptogamic: Thallogens: Lichens, sea- weeds, fungi.
And I accept this limitation the more willingly as the no less important topic of the bearing of geology and of palaeontology upon distribution has been luminously treated in the address of the President of the Geographical Section.