Principles of Geology Part 75

Prevost, published Ann. des Sci. Nat. Avril, 1825. The fossil is a lower jaw, adhering by its inner side to the slab of oolite, in which it is sunk. The form of the condyle, or posterior process of the jaw, is convex, agreeing with the mammiferous type, and is distinctly seen, an impression of it being left on the stone, although in this specimen the bone is wanting. The anterior part of the jaw has been partially broken away, so that the double fangs of the molar teeth are seen fixed in their sockets, the form of the fangs being characteristic of the mammalia. Ten molars are preserved, and the place of an eleventh is believed to be apparent. The enamel of some of the teeth is well preserved.

[219] A colored figure of this small and elegant quadruped is given in the Trans. Zool. Soc. vol. ii. pl. 28. It is insectivorous, and was taken in a hollow tree, in a country abounding in ant-hills, ninety miles to the southeast of the mouth of Swan River in Australia.--It is the first living marsupial species known to have nine molar teeth in the lower jaw, and some of the teeth are widely separated from others, one of the peculiarities in the thylacotherium of Stonesfield, which at first induced M. Blainville to refer that creature to the cla.s.s of reptiles.

[220] This figure (No. 10) was taken from the original, formerly in Mr. Broderip's collection, and now in the British Museum. It consists of the right half of a lower jaw, of which the inner side is seen. The jaw contains seven molar teeth, one canine, and three incisors; but the end of the jaw is fractured, and traces of the alveolus of a fourth incisor are seen. With this addition, the number of teeth would agree exactly with those of a lower jaw of a didelphis. The fossil is well preserved in a slab of oolitic structure containing sh.e.l.ls of trigoniae and other marine remains. Two or three other similar jaws, besides those above represented, have been procured from the quarries of Stonesfield.--See Broderip, Zool.

Journ. vol. ii. p. 408. Owen, Proceedings Geol. Soc., November, 1838.

[221] Darwin's Journal, chap. 19. Lyell's Manual of Geol. chap.

21, p. 279.

[222] Taylor's Annals of Nat. Hist. Nov. 1839.

[223] See notice by the Author, and Professor Owen, Taylor's Annals of Nat. Hist. Nov. 1839.

[224] See Principles of Geology, 1st ed. 1830, vol. i p. 152.

[225] The first quadrumanous fossils discovered in India were observed in 1836 in the Sewalik Hills, a lower range of the Himalayan Mountains, by Lieutenants Baker and Durond, by whom their osteological characters were determined (Journ. of Asiat.

Soc. of Bengal, vol. v. p. 739), and in the year following, other fossils of the same cla.s.s were brought to light and described by Capt. Cantley and Dr. Falconer. These were imbedded, like the former, in tertiary strata of conglomerate, sand, marl, and clay, in the Sub-Himalayan Mountains. (Ibid. vol. v. p. 379. Nov. 1836; and vol. vi. p. 354. May, 1837.)

The Brazilian quadrumane was found, with a great many other extinct species of animals, by a Danish naturalist, Dr. Lund, between the rivers Francisco and Velhas, in 1837.

The gibbon of the South of France was found by M. Lartet in the beginning of 1837, and determined by M. de Blainville. It occurred near Auch, in the department of Gers, about forty miles west of Toulouse, in freshwater marl, limestone, and sand. They were accompanied by the remains of the mastodon, dinotherium, palaeotherium, rhinoceros, gigantic sloth, and other extinct quadrupeds. (Bulletin de la Soc. Geol. de France, tom. viii. p.

92.)

The British quadrumane was discovered in 1839, by Messrs. William Colchester and Searles Wood, at Kyson, near Woodbridge, in Suffolk, and was referred by Professor Owen to the genus Macacus.

(Mag. of Nat. Hist. Sept. 1839. Taylor, Annals of Nat. Hist. No.

xxiii. Nov. 1839.)

[226] Owen's Introduction to British Fossil Mammals, p. 46.

[227] Proceedings of Acad. Nat. Sci. Philad. Dec. 9, 1851.

[228] See ch. 48.

[229] Ibid.

[230] Ibid.

[231] Phys. Hist. of Mankind, vol. ii. p. 594.

[232] Virgil, Eclog. iv. For an account of these doctrines, see Dugald Stewart's Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind, vol. ii. chap. ii. sect. 4, and Prichard's Egypt. Mythol. p. 177.

[233] See ch. 41.

[234] See ch. 35.

[235] See ch. 37, 38, 39, 41.

[236] See also Manual of Geology, ch. 11, 12.

[237] It has been suspected ever since the middle of the last century, that the Caspian was lower than the ocean, it being known that in Astrakhan the mercury in the barometer generally stands above thirty inches. In 1811, MM. Engelhardt and Parrot attempted to determine the exact amount of difference by a series of levellings and barometrical measurements across the isthmus at two different places near the foot of Mount Caucasus. The result of their operations led them to the opinion that the Caspian was more than 300 feet below the Black Sea. But the correctness of the observations having afterwards been called in question, M.

Parrot revisited the ground in 1829 and 1830, and inferred from new levellings, that the mouth of the Don was between three and four feet lower than that of the Wolga; in other words, that the sea of Azof, which communicates with the Black Sea, was actually lower than the Caspian! Other statements, no less contradictory, having been made by other observers, the Russian government at length directed the Academy of St. Petersburg to send an expedition, in 1836, to decide the point by a trigonometrical survey, from which it appeared that the Caspian is 101 Russian, or 108 English, feet lower than the Black Sea. (For authorities, see Journ. Roy. Geograph. Soc. vol. viii. p. 135). Sir R.

Murchison, however, concludes, in 1845, from the best Russian authorities, that the depression of the Caspian is only 83 feet 6 inches.

The measurements of Major Anthony Symonds, since confirmed by French authorities, make the Dead Sea to be 1200 feet below the Mediterranean.

[238] See Lyell's Travels in N. America, ch. 2 and 25.

[239] See Manual of Geology, chap. 29 to 33, inclusive.

[240] See ch. 26, _infra._

[241] See ch. 27, _infra._

[242] Ann. des Sci. Nat., Septembre, Novembre, et Decembre, 1829.

Revue Francaise, No. 15, May, 1830. Bulletin de la Societe Geol.

de France, p. 864, May, 1847. The latest edition of M. de Beaumont's theory will be found in the 12th vol. of the Dictionnaire Universel d'Hist. Nat. 1852, art. "Systemes des Montagues;" also the same printed separately.

[243] Systeme de Mont. p. 762.

[244] Ibid. pp. 761 and 773.

[245] Phil. Mag. and Annals, No. 58. New Series, p. 242.

[246] Systeme de Montagnes, 1852, p. 429.

[247] Phil. Mag. and Annals, No. 58. New series, p. 243.

[248] Systeme de Montagnes, 1852, p. 429.

[249] For page, see Index, "Hopkins."

[250] Art. Systeme de Montagnes, p. 775.

[251] M. E de Beaumont in his later inquiries (Comptes rendus, Sept. 1850, and Systemes des Montagnes) has come to the conclusion, that the princ.i.p.al mountain ranges, if prolonged, would intersect each other at certain angles, so as to produce a regular geometric arrangement, which he calls "a pentagonal network." This theory has been ably discussed and controverted by Mr. Hopkins, in his Anniversary Address as President of the Geol.

Soc., Feb. 1853.

[252] Darwin's Geology of South America, p. 248. London, 1846.

[253] Systeme de Montagnes, p. 748.

[254] See Lyell's Manual of Elementary Geology, ch. 5.

[255] See the Author's Anniversary Address, Quart. Journ. Geol.

Soc. 1850, vol. vi. p. 46, from which some of the above pa.s.sages are extracted.

[256] See Lyell's Manual of Elementary Geology.

[257] Reports to Brit. a.s.soc. 1842, 1843, and Introd. to Brit.

Foss. Mamm. p. 31. The conchological evidence respecting the British Miocene, Pliocene, and Pleistocene fossils, examined by Mr. Forbes, in the paper before cited, p. 88, note, bear out some of the most important conclusions of M. Deshayes, quoted by me in the first edition of the Principles, 1831, and the recent observations of Philippi in regard to the pa.s.sage of species from one formation to another. I refer to these authorities more especially because this doctrine of a gradual transition has been opposed by some living naturalists of high distinction, among whom I may mention M.A. d'Orbigny and M. Aga.s.siz. I have long been convinced that we must abandon many of the identifications formerly made of Eocene with recent sh.e.l.ls; but some errors of this kind do not affect the general reasoning on the subject. See a discussion on this question, Quarterly Journ. of Geog. Soc., No. 5, p. 47 Feb. 1846.