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Title: The Story of the Earth and Man
Author: J. W. Dawson
Release Date: May 20, 2013 [EBook #42741]
Language: English
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The Story of the Earth and Man.
By J. W. DAWSON
DIAGRAM OF THE EARTH'S HISTORY.
--------------------------------------------------------
ANIMALS ROCK FORMATIONS PLANTS
--------------------------------------------------------
Age N Modern Age
of E T Post-pliocene of
Man O i Pliocene Angiosperms
(Upper Z m Pliocene and
Strata) O e Miocene Plants
and I Eocene
Mammals C
--------------------------------------------------------
M
Age E Cretaceous Age
S T of
of O i Jurassic Cycads
Z m and
Reptiles O e Triassic Pines
I
C
--------------------------------------------------------
Permian Age of
Age of P
Amphibians A Carboniferous Acrogens
and Fishes L T
Æ i Erian or and
------ O m
Z e Devonian Gymnosperms
Age of O
Mollusks I Silurian ------
Corals C
and Siluro- Age
Crustaceans Cambrian
of
Cambrian
Algæ
Huronian?
------------------------------------------------------
Age of E Laurentian Plants
Protozoa O T
Z i not
O m
I e determinable
C
Harper & Brothers New York.
THE STORY
OF
THE EARTH AND MAN,
BY
J. W. DAWSON, LL.D., F.K.S., F.G.S.,
PRINCIPAL AND VICE-CHANCELLOR OF McGILL UNIVERSITY, MONTREAL, AUTHOR
OF "ARCHAIA," "ACADIAN GEOLOGY," ETC.
NEW YORK:
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,
FRANKLIN SQUARE
PREFACE
The science of the earth as illustrated by geological research, is one
of the noblest outgrowths of our modern intellectual life.
Constituting the sum of all the natural sciences in their application
to the history of our world, it affords a very wide and varied scope
for mental activity, and deals with some of the grandest problems of
space and time and of organic existence. It invites us to be present
at the origin of things, and to enter into the very workshop of the
Creator. It has, besides, most important and intimate connection with
the industrial arts and with the material resources at the disposal of
man. Its educational value, as a means of cultivating the powers of
observing and reasoning, and of accustoming the mind to deal with
large and intricate questions, can scarcely be overrated.
But fully to serve these high ends, the study of geology must be based
on a thorough knowledge of the subjects which constitute its
elementary data. It must be divested as far as possible of merely
local colouring, and of the prejudices of specialists. It must be
emancipated from the control of the bald metaphysical speculations so
rife in our time, and above all it must be delivered from that
materialistic infidelity, which, by robbing nature of the spiritual
element, and of its presiding Divinity, makes science dry, barren, and
repulsive, diminishes its educational value, and even renders it less
efficient for purposes of practical research.
That the want of these preliminary conditions mars much of the popular
science of our day is too evident; and I confess that the wish to
attempt something better, and thereby to revive the interest in
geological study, to attract attention to its educational value, and
to remove the misapprehensions which exist in some quarters respecting
it, were principal reasons which induced me to undertake the series of
papers for the _Leisure Hour_, which are reproduced, with some
amendments and extension, in the present work. How far I have
succeeded, I must leave to the intelligent and, I trust, indulgent
reader to decide. In any case I have presented this many-sided subject
in the aspect in which it appears to a geologist whose studies have
led him to compare with each other the two great continental areas
which are the classic ground of the science, and who retains his faith
in those unseen realities of which the history of the earth itself is
but one of the shadows projected on the field of time.
To geologists who may glance at the following pages, I would say
that, amidst much that is familiar, they will find here and there some
facts which may be new to them, as well as some original suggestions
and conclusions as to the relations of things, which though stated in
familiar terms, I have not advanced without due consideration of a
wide range of facts, To the general reader I have endeavoured to
present the more important results of geological investigation
divested of technical difficulties, yet with a careful regard to
accuracy of statement, and in such a manner as to invite to the
farther and more precise study of the subject in nature, and in works
which enter into technical details. I have endeavoured as far as
possible to mention the authors of important discoveries; but it is
impossible in a work of this kind to quote authority for every
statement, while the omission of much important matter relating to the
topics discussed is also unavoidable. Shortcomings in these respects
must be remedied by the reader himself, with the aid of systematic
text-books. Those who may desire any farther explanation of the
occasional allusions to the record of creation in Genesis, will find
this in my previously published volume entitled "Archaia."
J. W. D,
McGill College, Montreal,
_January, 1873_.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Chapter I.--The Genesis Of The Earth.
Uniformity and Progress.--Internal Heat.--Nebular
Theory.--Probable Condition of the Primitive World 1
Chapter II.--The Eozoic Ages.
The Laurentian Rocks.--Their Character and
Distribution.--The Conditions of their Deposition.--Their
Metamorphism.--Eozoon Canadense.--Laurentian Vegetation 17
Chapter III.--The Primordial or Cambrian Age.
Connection of the Laurentian and Primordial.--Animals
of the Primordial Seas.--Lingula, Trilobites, Oldhamia,
etc.--The terms Cambrian and Silurian.--Statistics of
Primordial Life 36
Chapter IV.--The Silurian Ages.
Geography of the Continental Plateaus.--Life of the
Silurian.--Reign of Invertebrates.--Corals, Crinoids,
Mollusks, Crustaceans.--The First Vertebrates.
Silurian Fishes.--Land Plants 56
Chapter V.--The Devonian or Erian Age.
Physical Character of the Age.--Difference of Deposits in
Marginal and Continental Areas.--Specialisation of
Physical Geography.--Corals, Crustaceans, Fishes,
Insects, Plants 81
Chapter VI.--The Carboniferous Age.
Perfection of Palæozoic Life.--Carboniferous
Geography.--Colours of Sediments.--Vegetation.--Origin
of Coal.--Land Life.--Reptiles, Land Snails, Millipedes,
etc.--Oceanic Life 109
Chapter VII.--The Permian Age.
Movements of the Land.--Plication of the Crust.--Chemical
Conditions of Dolomite, etc.--Geographical
Results of Permian Movements.--Life of the Period.
Summary of Palæozoic History 160
Chapter VIII.--The Mesozoic Ages.
Characters of the Trias.--Summary of Changes in the
Triassic and Cretaceous Periods.--Changes of the
Continental Plateaus.--Relative Duration of the
Palæozoic and Mesozoic.--Mesozoic Forests.--Land
Animals.--The reign of Reptiles.--Early Mammals
and Birds 188
Chapter IX.--The Mesozoic Ages (continued).
Animals of the Sea.--Great Sea Lizards, Fishes,
Cephalopods, etc.--Chalk and its History.--Tabular
View of the Mesozoic Ages 211
Chapter X.--The Neozoic Ages.
Physical Changes at the end of Mesozoic.--Subdivisions
of the Neozoic.--Great Eocene Seas.--Land Animals
and Plants. Life of the Miocene.--Reign of Mammals 235
Chapter XI.--The Neozoic Ages (_continued_).
Later Vegetation.--The Animals of the Pliocene Period.
Approach of the Glacial Period.--Character of the
Post-pliocene or Glacial 258
Chapter XII.--Close of the Post-pliocene, and Advent or Man.
Connection of Geological and Human History.--The Post-glacial
Period.--Its Relations to the Pre-Historic Human
Period.--Elevation of Post-Pliocene Land.--Introduction of
Man.--Subsidence and Re-elevation.--Calculations as to
Time.--Tabular View of the Neozoic Ages 282
Chapter XIII.--Advent Of Man (_continued_).
Relations of Post-pliocene and Modern Animals.--Cavern
Deposits.--Kent's Cave.--General Remarks. 299
Chapter XIV.--Primitive Man.
Theory of Evolution as applied to Man.--Its Demands.--Its
Deficiencies.--Fallacious Character of Arguments of
Derivationists. Hypothesis of Creation.--Its Demands
and Advantages 316
Chapter XV.--Primitive Man (_continued_).
Geological Conditions of Man's Introduction.--His Modern
Date.--His Isolated Position.--His Higher
Powers.--Pictures of Primitive Man according to Evolution
and Creation.--General Conclusion 350
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
Ideal Sections Illustrating the Genesis or the Earth 8
America In The Laurentian Period 18
Eozoon Canadense 24
Life in the Primordial Age 40
Organic Limestone of the Silurian 63
Life in the Silurian 66
Life in the Devonian 88
Vegetation of the Devonian 103
Carboniferous Plants 126
Oldest Land Snails 139
Carboniferous Reptiles 146
Foldings of the Crust in the Permian Period 162
Curves of Elevation and Depression 179
Culmination of Types of Palæozoic Animals 183
Land Animals of the Mesozoic 194
Aquatic Animals of the Mesozoic 219
Foraminiferal Rock-builders 243
Miocene Mammals 253
Britain in the Post-pliocene 301
THE STORY OF THE EARTH AND MAN.
CHAPTER I.
THE GENESIS OF THE EARTH.
The title of this work is intended to indicate precisely its nature.
It consists of rough, broad sketches of the aspects of successive
stages in the earth's history, as disclosed by geology, and as they
present themselves to observers at the present time. The last
qualification is absolutely necessary, when dealing with a science
whose goal to-day will be its starting point to-morrow, and in whose
view every geological picture must have its light and shaded portions,
its clear foreground and its dim distance, varying according to the
lights cast on them by the progress of investigation, and according to
the standpoint of the observer. In such pictures results only can be
given, not the processes by which they have been obtained; and with
all possible gradations of light and distance, it may be that the
artist will bring into too distinct outline facts still only dimly
perceived, or will give too little prominence to others which, should
appear in bold relief. He must in this judge for himself; and if the
writer's impressions do not precisely correspond with those of others,
he trusts that they will allow something for difference of vision and
point of view.
The difficulty above referred to perhaps rises to its maximum in the
present chapter. For how can any one paint chaos, or give form and
filling to the formless void? Perhaps no word-picture of this period
of the first phase of mundane history can ever equal the two negative
touches of the inspired penman--"without form and void"--a world
destitute of all its present order, and destitute of all that gives it
life and animation. This it was, and not a complete and finished
earth, that sprang at first from its Creator's hand; and we must
inquire in this first chapter what information science gives as to any
such condition of the earth.
In the first place, the geological history of the earth plainly
intimates a beginning, by utterly negativing the idea that "all things
continue as they were from the creation of the world." It traces back
to their origin not only the animals and plants which at present live,
but also their predecessors, through successive dynasties emerging in
long procession from the depths of a primitive antiquity. Not only so;
it assigns to their relative ages all the rocks of the earth's crust,
and all the plains and mountains built up of them. Thus, as we go back
in geological time, we leave behind us, one by one, all the things
with which we are familiar, and the inevitable conclusion gains on us
that we must be approaching a beginning, though this may be veiled
from us in clouds and thick darkness. How is it, then, that there are
"Uniformitarians" in geology, and that it has been said that our
science shows no traces of a beginning, no indications of an end? The
question deserves consideration; but the answer is not difficult. In
all the lapse of geological time there has been an absolute uniformity
of natural law. The same grand machinery of force and matter has been
in use throughout all the ages, working out the great plan. Yet the
plan has been progressive and advancing, nevertheless. The uniformity
has been in the methods, the results have presented a wondrous
diversity and development. Again, geology, in its oldest periods,
fails to reach the beginning of things. It shows us how course after
course of the building has been laid, and how it has grown to
completeness, but it contains as yet no record of the laying of the
foundation-stones, still less of the quarry whence they were dug.
Still the constant progress which we have seen points to a beginning
which we have not seen; and the very uniformity of the process by
which the edifice has been erected, implies a time when it had not
been begun, and when its stones were still reposing in their native
quarry.
What, then, is the oldest condition of the earth actually shown to us
by geology,--that which prevailed in the Eozoic or Laurentian period,
when the oldest rocks known, those constituting the foundation-stones
of our present continents, were formed and laid in their places? With
regard to physical conditions, it was a time when our existing
continents were yet in the bosom of the waters, when the ocean was
almost universal, yet when sediments were being deposited in it as at
present, while there were also volcanic foci, vomiting forth molten
matter from the earth's hidden interior. Then, as now, the great
physical agencies of water and fire were contending with one another
for the mastery, doing and undoing, building up and breaking down. But
is this all? Has the earth no earlier history? that it must have had,
we may infer from many indications; but as to the nature of these
earlier states, we can learn from conjecture and inference merely, and
must have recourse to other witnesses then those rocky monuments which
are the sure guides of the geologist.
One fact bearing on these questions which has long excited attention,
is the observed increase in temperature in descending into deep mines,
and in the water of deep artesian wells--an increase which may be
stated in round numbers at one degree of heat of the centigrade
thermometer for every 100 feet of depth from the surface. These
observations apply of course to a very inconsiderable depth, and we
have no certainty that this rate continues for any great distance
towards the centre of the earth. If, however, We regard it as
indicating the actual law of increase of temperature, it would result
that the whole crust of the earth is a mere shell covering a molten
mass of rocky matter. Thus a very slight step of imagination would
carry us back to a time when this slender crust had not yet formed,
and the earth rolled through space an incandescent globe, with all its
water and other vaporisable matters in a gaseous state. Astronomical
calculation has, however, shown that the earth, in its relation to the
other heavenly bodies, obeys the laws of a rigid ball, and not of a
fluid globe. Hence it has been inferred that its actual crust must be
very thick, perhaps not less then 2,500 miles, and that its fluid
portion must therefore be of smaller dimensions then has been inferred
from the observed increase of temperature. Further, it seems to have
been rendered probable, from the density of rocky matter in the solid
and liquid states, that a molten globe would solidify at the centre as
well as at the surface, and consequently that the earth must not only
have a solid crust of great thickness, but also a solid nucleus, and
that any liquid portions must be of the nature of a sheet or of
detached masses intervening between these. On the other hand, it has
recently been maintained that the calculations which are supposed to
have established the great thickness of the crust, on the ground that
the earth does not change its form in obedience to the attraction of
the sun and moon, are based on a misconception, and that a molten
globe with a thin crust would attain to such a state of equilibrium in
this respect as not to be distinguishable from a solid planet. This
view has been maintained by the French physicist, Delaunay, and for
some time it made geologists suppose that, after all, the earth's
crust may be very thin. Sir William Thomson, however, and Archdeacon
Pratt, have ably maintained the previous opinion, based on Hopkins'
calculations; and it is now believed that we may rest upon this as
representing the most probable condition of the interior of the earth
at present. Another fact bearing on this point is the form of the
earth, which is now actually a spheroid of rotation; that is, of such
a shape as would result from the action of gravity and centrifugal
force in the motion of a huge liquid drop rotating in the manner in
which the earth rotates. Of course it may be said that the earth may
have been made in that shape to fit it for its rotation; but science
prefers to suppose that the form is the result of the forces acting on
it. This consideration would of course corroborate the deductions from
that just mentioned. Again, if we examine a map showing the
distribution of volcanoes upon the earth, and trace these along the
volcanic belt of Western America and Eastern Asia, and in the Pacific
Islands, and in the isolated volcanic regions in other parts of the
world; and if we add to these the multitude of volcanoes now extinct,
we shall be convinced that the sources of internal heat, of which
these are the vents, must be present almost everywhere under the
earth's crust. Lastly, if we consider the elevations and depressions
which large portions of the crust of the earth have undergone in
geological time, and the actual crumpling and folding of the crust
visible in great mountain chains, we arrive at a similar conclusion,
and also become convinced that the crust has been not too thick to
admit of extensive fractures, flexures, and foldings. There are,
however, it must be admitted, theories of volcanic action, strongly
supported by the chemical nature of the materials ejected by modern
volcanoes, which would refer all their phenomena to the softening,
under the continued influence of heat and water, of materials within
the crust of the earth rather then under it.[A] Still, the phenomena
of volcanic action, and of elevation and subsidence, would, under any
explanation, suppose intense heat, and therefore probably an original
incandescent condition.
[A] Dr. T. Sterry Hunt, in Silliman'a Journal, 1870.
La Place long ago based a theory of the originally gaseous condition
of the solar system on the relation of the planets to each other, and
to the sun, on their planes of revolution, the direction of their
revolution, and that of their satellites. On these grounds he inferred
that the solar system had been formed out of a nebulous mass by the
mutual attraction of its parts. This view was further strengthened by
the discovery of nebulae, which it might be supposed were undergoing
the same processes by which the solar system was produced. This
nebular theory, as it was called, was long very popular. It was
subsequently supposed to be damaged by the fact that some of the
nebulæ which had been regarded as systems in progress of formation
were found by improved telescopes to be really clusters of stars, and
it was inferred that the others might be of like character. The
spectroscope has, however, more recently shown that some nebulæ are
actually gaseous; and it has even been attempted to demonstrate that
they are probably undergoing change fitting them to become systems.
This has served to revive the nebular hypothesis, which has been
further strengthened by the known fact that the sun is still an
incandescent globe surrounded by an immense luminous envelope of
vapours rising from its nucleus and condensing at its surface. On the
other hand, while the sun may be supposed, from its great magnitude,
to remain intensely heated, and while it will not be appreciably less
powerful for myriads of years, the moon seems to be a body which has
had time to complete the whole history of geological change, and to
become a dry, dead, and withered world, a type of what our earth would
in process of time actually become.
[Illustration: _Figs. 1 to 5._--_Ideal sections illustrating the
Genesis of the Earth._
Fig. 1. A vaporous world.
Fig. 2. A world with a central fluid nucleus (_b_) and a photosphere
(_a_).
Fig. 3. The photosphere darkened, and a solid crust (_c_) and solid
nucleus (_d_) formed.
Fig. 4. Water (_e_) deposited on the crust, forming a universal ocean.
Fig. 5. The crust crumpled by shrinkage, land elevated, and the water
occupying the intervening depressions.
The figures are all of uniform size; but the circle (A) shows th
diameter of the globe when in the state of fig. 1, and that marked (B)
its diameter when in the state of fig. 5. In all the figures (_a_)
represents vapour or air; (_b_) liquid rock; (_c_) solid rock as a
crust; (_d_) solid nucleus; (_e_) water.]
Such considerations lead to the conclusion that the former watery
condition of our planet was not its first state, and that we must
trace it back to a previous reign of fire. The reasons which can be
adduced in support of this are no doubt somewhat vague, and may in
their details be variously interpreted; but at present we have no
other interpretation to give of that chaos, formless and void, that
state in which "nor aught nor nought existed," which the sacred
writings and the traditions and poetry of ancient nations concur with
modern science in indicating as the primitive state of the earth.
Let our first picture, then, be that of a vaporous mass, representing
our now solid planet spread out over a space nearly two thousand times
greater in diameter then that which it now occupies, and whirling in
its annual round about the still vaporous centre of our system, in
which at an earlier period the earth had been but an exterior layer,
or ring of vapour. The atoms that now constitute the most solid rocks
are in this state as tenuous as air, kept apart by the expansive force
of heat, which prevents not only their mechanical union, but also
their chemical combination. But within the mass, slowly and silently,
the force of gravitation is compressing the particles in its giant
hand, and gathering the denser toward the centre, while heat is given
forth on all sides from the condensing mass into the voids of space
without. Little by little the denser and less volatile matters collect
in the centre as a fluid molten globe, the nucleus of the future
planet; and in this nucleus the elements, obeying their chemical
affinities hitherto latent, are arranging themselves in compounds
which are to constitute the future rocks. At the same time, in the
exterior of the vaporous envelope, matters cooled by radiation into
the space without, are combining with each other, and are being
precipitated in earthy rain or snow into the seething mass within,
where they are either again vaporised and sent to the surface or
absorbed in the increasing nucleus. As this process advances, a new
brilliancy is given to the faint shining of the nebulous matter by the
incandescence of these solid particles in the upper layers of its
atmosphere, a condition which at this moment, on a greater scale, is
that of the sun; in the case of the earth, so much smaller in volume,
and farther from the centre of the system, it came on earlier, and has
long since passed away. This was the glorious starlike condition of
our globe: in a physical point of view, its most perfect and beautiful
state, when, if there were astronomers with telescopes in the stars,
they might have seen our now dull earth flash forth--a brilliant white
star secondary to the sun.
But in process of time this passes away. All the more solid and less
volatile substances are condensed and precipitated; and now the
atmosphere, still vast in bulk, and dark and misty in texture,
contains only the water, chlorine, carbonic acid, sulphuric acid, and
other more volatile substances; and as these gather in dense clouds at
the outer surface, and pour in fierce corrosive rains upon the heated
nucleus, combining with its materials, or flashing again into vapour,
darkness dense and gross settles upon the vaporous deep, and continues
for long ages, until the atmosphere is finally cleared of its acid
vapours and its superfluous waters.[B] In the meantime, radiation, and
the heat abstracted from the liquid nucleus by the showers of
condensing material from the atmosphere, have so far cooled its
surface that a crust of slag or cinder forms upon it. Broken again and
again by the heavings of the ocean of fire, it at length sets
permanently, and receives upon its bare and blistered surface the
ever-increasing aqueous and acid rain thrown down from the
atmosphere, at first sending it all hissing and steaming back, but at
length allowing it to remain a universal boiling ocean. Then began the
reign of the waters, and the dominion of fire was confined to the
abysses within the solid crust. Under the primeval ocean were formed
the first stratified rocks, from the substances precipitated from its
waters, which must have been loaded with solid matter. We must not
imagine this primeval ocean like our own blue sea, clear and
transparent, but filled with earthy and saline matters, thick and
turbid, until these were permitted to settle to the bottom and form
the first sediments. The several changes above referred to are
represented in diagrammatic form in figs. 1 to 4.
[B] Hunt, "Chemistry of the Primeval Earth," _Silliman's Journal_, 1858.
In the meantime all is not at rest in the interior of the new-formed
earth. Under the crust vast oceans of molten rock may still remain,
but a solid interior nucleus is being crystallised in the centre, and
the whole interior globe is gradually shrinking. At length this
process advances so far that the exterior crust, like a sheet of ice
from below which the water has subsided, is left unsupported; and with
terrible earthquake-throes it sinks downward, wrinkling up into huge
folds, between which are vast sunken areas into which the waters
subside, while from the intervening ridges the earth's pent-up fires
belch forth ashes and molten rocks. (Fig. 5.) So arose the first dry
land:--
"The mountains huge appear
Emergent, and their broad bare backs upheave
Into the clouds, their tops ascend the sky,
So high as heaved the tumid hills, so low
Down sunk a hollow bottom, broad and deep,
Capacious bed of waters."
The cloud was its garment, it was swathed in thick darkness, and
presented but a rugged pile of rocky precipices; yet well might the
"morning stars sing together, and all the sons of God shout with joy,"
when its foundations were settled and its corner-stone laid, for then
were inaugurated the changes which were to lead to the introduction of
life on the earth, and to all the future development of the
continents.
Physical geographers have taught us that the great continents, whether
we regard their coasts or their mountain chains, are built up on lines
which run north-east and south-west, and north-west and south-east;
and it is also observed that these lines are great circles of the
earth tangent to the polar circle. Further, we find, as a result of
geological investigation, that these lines determined the deposition
and the elevation of the oldest rocks known to us. Hence it is fair to
infer that these were the original directions of the first lines of
fracture and upheaval. Whether these lines were originally drawn by
the influence of of the seasons on the cooling globe, or by the
currents of its molten interior, or of the superficial ocean, they
bespeak a most uniform and equable texture for the crust, and a
definite law of fracture and upheaval; and they have modified all the
subsequent action of the ocean as a depositor of sediment, and of the
internal heat as a cause of alteration and movement of rocks. Against
these earliest belts of land the ocean first chafed and foamed. Along
their margins marine denudation first commenced, and the oceanic
currents first deposited banks of sediment; and along these first
lines have the volcanic orifices of all periods been most plentiful,
and elevatory movements most powerfully felt.
We must not suppose that the changes thus shortly sketched were rapid
and convulsive. They must have required periods of enormous duration,
all of which had elapsed before the beginning of geological time,
properly so called. From Sir William Thomson's calculations, it would
appear that the time which has elapsed from the first formation of a
solid crust on the earth to the modern period may have been from
seventy to one hundred millions of years, and the whole time from the
vaporous condition of the solar system to the present, must of course
have been still greater then even this enormous series of ages. Such a
lapse of time is truly almost inconceivable, but it is only a few days
to Him with whom one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years
as one day. How many and strange pictures does this series of
processes call up! First, the uniform vaporous nebula. Then the
formation of a liquid nucleus, and a brilliant photosphere without.
Then the congealing of a solid crust under dark atmospheric vapours,
and the raining down of acid and watery showers. Then the universal
ocean, its waves rolling unobstructed around the globe, and its
currents following without hindrance the leading of heat and of the
earth's rotation. Then the rupture of the crust and the emergence of
the nuclei of continents.
Some persons seem to think that by these long processes of creative
work we exclude the Creator, and would reduce the universe into a mere
fortuitous concourse of atoms. To put it in more modern phrase, "given
a quantity of detached fragments cast into space, then mutual
gravitation and the collision of the fragments would give us the
spangled heavens." But we have still to ask the old question, "Whence
the atoms?" and we have to ask it with all the added weight of our
modern chemistry, so marvellous in its revelations of the original
differences of matter and their varied powers of combination. We have
to ask, What is gravitation itself, unless a mode of action of
Almighty power? We have to ask for the origin of of thousands of
correlations, binding together the past and the future in that orderly
chain of causes and effects which constitutes the plan of the
creation. If it pleased God to create in the beginning an earth
"formless and void" and to elaborate from this all that has since
existed, who are we, to say that the plan was not the best? Nor would
it detract from our view of the creative wisdom and power if we were
to hold that in ages to come the sun may experience the same change
that has befallen the earth, and may become "black as sackcloth of
hair," preparatory perhaps, to changes which may make him also the
abode of life; or if the earth, cooling still further, should, like
our satellite the moon, absorb all its waters and gases into its
bosom, and become bare, dry, and parched, until there shall be "no
more sea" how do we know but that then there shall be no more need of
the sun, because a better light may be provided? Or that there may not
be a new baptism of fire in store for the earth, whereby, being melted
with fervent heat, it may renew its youth in the fresh and heavenly
loveliness of a new heaven and a new earth, free from all the evils
and imperfections of the present? God is not slack in these things, as
some men count slackness; but His ways are not like our ways. He has
eternity wherein to do His work, and takes His own time for each of
His operations. The Divine wisdom, personified by a sacred writer, may
well in this exalt his own office:--
"Jehovah possessed me in the beginning of His way,
Before His work of old.
I was set up from everlasting,
From the beginning, or ever the earth was.
When there were no deeps, T was brought forth;
When there were no fountains abounding in water.
Before the mountains were settled,
Before the hills, was I brought forth:
While as yet He had not made the earth,
Nor the plains, nor the higher part of the habitable world,
When He gave the sea His decree,
that her waters should not pass His limits;
When He determined the foundations of the earth."
CHAPTER II.
THE EOZOIC AGES.
The dominion of heat has passed away; the excess of water has been
precipitated from the atmosphere, and now covers the earth as a
universal ocean. The crust has folded itself into long ridges, the bed
of the waters has subsided into its place, and the sea for the first
time begins to rave against the shores of the newly elevated land,
while the rain, washing the bare surfaces of rocky ridges, carries its
contribution of the slowly wasting rocks back into the waters whence
they were raised, forming, with the material worn from the crust by
the surf, the first oceanic sediments. Do we know any of these
earliest aqueous beds, or are they all hidden from view beneath newer
deposits, or have they been themselves worn away and destroyed by
denuding agencies? Whether we know the earliest formed sediments is,
and may always remain, uncertain; but we do know certain very ancient
rocks which may be at least their immediate successors.
[Illustration: Fig. 6.--The Laurentian nucleus of the American
continent.]
Deepest and oldest of all the rocks we are acquainted with in the
crust of the earth, are certain beds much altered and metamorphosed,
baked by the joint action of heat and heated moisture--rocks once
called Azoic, as containing no traces of life, but for which I have
elsewhere proposed the name "Eozoic," or those that afford the traces
of the earliest known living beings. These rocks are the Laurentian
Series of Sir William Logan, so named from the Laurentide hills, north
of the River St. Lawrence, which are composed of these ancient beds,
and where they are more largely exposed then in any other region. It
may seem at first sight strange that any of these ancient rocks should
be found at the surface of the earth; but this is a necessary result
of the mode of formation of the continents. The oldest rocks, thrown
up in places into high ridges, have either not been again brought
under the waters, or have lost by denudation the sediments once
resting on them; and being of a hard and resisting nature, still
remain; and often rise into hills of considerable elevation, showing
as it were portions of the skeleton of the earth protruding through
its superficial covering. Such rocks stretch along the north side of
the St. Lawrence river from Labrador to Lake Superior, and thence
northwardly to an unknown distance, constituting a wild and rugged
district often rising into hills 4000 feet high, and in the deep gorge
of the Saguenay forming cliffs 1,500 feet in sheer height from the
water's edge. South of this great ridge, the isolated mass of the
Adirondack Mountains rises to the height of 6,000 feet, rivalling the
newer, though still very ancient, chain of the White Mountains. Along
the eastern coast of North America, a lower ridge of Laurentian rock,
only appearing here and there from under the overlying sediments, is
seen in Newfoundland, in New Brunswick, possibly in Nova Scotia, and
perhaps farther south in Massachusetts, and as far as Maryland. In the
old world, rocks of this age do not, so far as known, appear so
extensively. They have been recognised in Norway and Sweden, in the
Hebrides, and in Bavaria, and may, no doubt, be yet discerned in other
localities. Still, the grandest and most instructive development of
these rocks is in North America; and it is there that we may best
investigate their nature, and endeavour to restore the conditions in
which they were deposited. It has been already stated that the oldest
wrinkles of the crust of the globe take the direction of great circles
of the earth tangent to the polar circle, forming north-east and
south-west, and north-west and south-east lines. To such lines are the
great exposures of Laurentian rock conformed, as may be well seen from
the map of North America (fig. 6), taken from Dana, with some
additions. The great angular Laurentian belt is evidently the nucleus
of the continent, and consists of two broad bands or ridges meeting in
the region of the great lakes. The remaining exposures are parallel to
these, and appear to indicate a subordinate coast-line of
comparatively little elevation. It is known that these Laurentian
exposures constitute the oldest part of the continent, a part which
was land before any of the rocks of the shaded portion of the map were
deposited in the bed of the ocean--all this shaded portion being
composed of rocks of various geological ages resting on the older
Laurentian. It is further to be observed that the beds occurring in
the Laurentian bands are crumpled and folded in a most remarkable
manner, and that these folds were impressed upon them before the
deposition of the rocks next in geological age.
What then are these oldest rocks deposited by the sea--the first-born
of the reign of the waters? They are very different in their external
aspect from the silt and mud, the sand and gravel, and the shell and
coral rocks of the modern sea, or of the more recent geological
formations. Yet the difference is one in condition rather then
composition. The members of this ancient aristocracy of the rocks are
made of the same clay with their fellows, but have been subjected to a
refining and crystallizing process which has greatly changed their
condition. They have been, as geologists say, metamorphosed; and are
to ordinary rocks what a china vase is to the lump of clay from which
it has been made. Deeply buried in the earth under newer sediments,
they have been baked, until sandstones, gravels, and clays came out
bright and crystalline, as gneiss, mica-schist, hornblende-schist, and
quartzite--all hard crystalline rocks showing at first sight no
resemblance to their original material, except in the regularly
stratified or bedded arrangement which serves to distinguish them from
igneous or volcanic rocks. In like manner certain finer, calcareous
sediments have been changed into Labrador feldspar, sometimes gay with
a beautiful play of colour, and what were once common limestones
appear as crystalline marble. If the evidence of such metamorphoses is
asked for, this is twofold. In the first place, these rocks are
similar in structure to more modern beds which have been partially
metamorphosed, and in which the transition from the unaltered to the
altered state can be observed. Secondly, there are limited areas in
the Laurentian itself, in which the metamorphism has been so imperfect
as to permit traces of the original character of the rocks to remain.
It seems also quite certain, and this is a most important point for
our sketch, that the Laurentian ocean was not universal, but that
there were already elevated portions of the crust capable of yielding
sediment to the sea.
In North America these Laurentian rocks attain to an enormous
thickness. This has been estimated by Sir W. E. Logan at 30,000 feet,
so that the beds would, if piled on each other horizontally, be as
high as the highest mountains on earth. They appear to consist of two
great series, the Lower and Upper Laurentian. Even if we suppose that
in the earlier stages of the world's history erosion and deposition
were somewhat more rapid then at present, the formation of such
deposits, probably more widely spread then any that succeeded them,
must have required an enormous length of time.
Geologists long looked in vain for evidences of life in the Laurentian
period; but just as astronomers' have suspected the existence of
unknown planets from the perturbations due to their attraction,
geologists have guessed that there must have been some living things
on earth even at this early time. Dana and Sterry Hunt especially have
committed themselves to such speculations. The reasons for this belief
may be stated thus: (1.) In later formations limestone is usually an
organic rock, produced by the accumulation of shells, corals, and
similar calcareous organisms in the sea, and there are enormous
limestones in the Laurentian, constituting regular beds. (2.) In
later formations coaly matter is an organic substance, derived from
vegetables, and there are large quantities of Laurentian carbon in the
form of graphite. (3.) In later formations deposits of iron ores are
almost always connected with the deoxidising influence of organic
matters as an efficient cause of their accumulation, and the
Laurentian contains immense deposits of iron ore, occurring in layers
in the manner of later deposits of these minerals. (4.) The limestone,
carbon, and iron of the Laurentian exist in association with the other
beds in the same manner as in the later formations in which they are
known to be organic.
[Illustration: Fig. 7.--_Eozoon Canadense._ Dawson.
The oldest known animal. Portion of skeleton, two-thirds natural size,
(_a_) Tabulated cell-wall, magnified, (_b_) Portion of canal system,
magnified.]
In addition to this inferential evidence, however, one well-marked
animal fossil has at length been found in the Laurentian of Canada,
Eozoon Canadense, (fig. 7), a gigantic representative of one of the
lowest forms of animal life, which the writer had the honour of naming
and describing in 1865--its name of "Dawn-animal" having reference to
its great antiquity and possible connection with the dawn of life on
our planet. In the modern seas, among the multitude of low forms of
life with which they swarm, occur some in which the animal matter is a
mere jelly, almost without distinct parts or organs, yet
unquestionably endowed with life of an animal character. Some of these
creatures, the Foraminifera, have the power of secreting at the
surface of their bodies a calcareous shell, often divided into
numerous chambers, communicating with each other, and with the water
without, by pores or orifices through which, the animal can extend
soft and delicate prolongations of its gelatinous body, which, when
stretched out into the water, serve for arms and legs. In modern times
these creatures, though extremely abundant in the ocean, are usually
small, often microscopic; but in a fossil state there are others of
somewhat larger size, though few equaling the Eozoon, which seems to
been a sessile creature, resting on the bottom of the sea, and
covering its gelatinous body with a thin crust of carbonate of lime or
limestone, adding to this, as it grew in size, crust after crust,
attached to each other by numerous partitions, and perforated with
pores for the emission of gelatinous filaments. This continued growth
of gelatinous animal matter and carbonate of lime went on from age to
age, accumulating great beds of limestone, in some of which the entire
form and most minute structures of the creature are preserved, while
in other cases the organisms have been broken up, and the limestones
are a mere congeries of their fragments. It is a remarkable instance
of the permanence of fossils, that in these ancient organisms the
minutest pores through which the semi-fluid matter of these humble
animals passed, have been preserved in the most delicate perfection.
The existence of such creatures supposes that of other organisms,
probably microscopic plants, on which they could feed. No traces of
these have been observed, though the great quantity of carbon in the
beds probably implies the existence of larger sea-weeds. No other form
of animal has yet been distinctly recognized in the Laurentian
limestones, but there are fragments of calcareous matter which may
have belonged to organisms distinct from Eozoon. Of life on the
Laurentian land we know nothing, unless the great beds of iron ore
already referred to may be taken as a proof of land vegetation.[C]
[C] It is proper to state here that some geologists and naturalists
still doubt the organic nature of Eozoon. Their objections however, so
far as stated publicly, have been shown to depend on misapprehension
as to the structures observed and their state of preservation; and
specimens recently found in comparatively unaltered rocks have
indicated the true character of those more altered by metamorphism.
To an observer in the Laurentian period, the earth would have
presented an almost boundless ocean, its waters, perhaps, still warmed
with the internal heat, and sending up copious exhalations to be
condensed in thick clouds and precipitated in rain. Here and there
might be seen chains of rocky islands, many of them volcanic, or
ranges of bleak hills, perhaps clothed with vegetation the forms of
which are unknown to us. In the bottom of the sea, while sand and mud
and gravel were being deposited in successive layers in some portions
of the ocean floor, in others great reefs of Eozoon were growing up in
the manner of reefs of coral. If we can imagine the modern Pacific,
with its volcanic islands and reefs of coral, to be deprived of all
other forms of life, 'we should have a somewhat accurate picture of
the Eozoic time as it appears to us now. I say as it appears to us
now; for we do not know what new discoveries remain to be made. More
especially the immense deposits of carbon and iron in the Laurentian
would seem to bespeak a profusion of plant life in the sea or on the
land, or both, second to that of no other period that succeeded,
except that of the great coal formation. Perhaps no remnant of this
primitive vegetation exists retaining its form or structure; but we
may hope for better things, and cherish the expectation that some
fortunate discovery may still reveal to us the forms of the vegetation
of the Laurentian time.
It is remarkable that the humbly organized living things which built
up the Laurentian limestones have continued to exist unchanged, save
in dimensions, up to modern times; and here and there throughout the
geological series we find beds of Foraminiferous limestone, similar,
except in the species of Foraminifera composing them, to that of the
Laurentian. It is true that other kinds of creatures, the coral
animals more particularly, have been introduced, and have proved
equally efficient builders of limestones; but in the deeper parts of
the sea the Foraminifera continue to assert their pre-eminence in this
respect, and the dredge reveals in the depths of our modern oceans
beds of calcareous matter which may be regarded as identical in origin
with the limestones formed in the period which is to us the dawn of
organic life.
Many inquiries suggest themselves to the zoologist in connection with
the life of the Laurentian period. Was Eozoon the first creature in
which the wondrous forces of animal life were manifested, when, in
obedience to the Divine fiat, the waters first "swarmed with
swarmers," as the terse and expressive language of the Mosaic record
phrases it? If so, in contemplating this organism we are in the
presence of one of the greatest of natural wonders--brought nearer
then in any other case to the actual workshop of the Almighty Maker.
Still we cannot affirm that other creatures even more humble may not
have preceded Eozoon, since such humble organisms are known in the
present world. Attempts have often been made, and very recently have
been renewed with much affirmation of success, to prove that such low
forms of life may originate spontaneously from their materials in the
waters; but so far these attempts merely prove that the invisible
germs of the lower animals and plants exist everywhere, and that they
have marvellous powers of resisting extreme heat and other injurious
influences. We need not, therefore, be surprised if even lower forms
then Eozoon may have preceded that creature, or if some of these may
be found, like the organisms said to live in modern boiling springs,
to have had the power of existing even at a time when the ocean may
have been almost in a state of ebullition. Another problem is that of
means of subsistence for the Eozoic Foraminifera. A similar problem
exists in the case of the modern ocean, in whose depths live
multitudes of creatures, where, so far as we know, vegetable matter,
ordinarily the basis of life, cannot exist in a living condition. It
is probable, however, from the researches of Dr. Wyville Thompson,
that this is to be accounted for by the abundance of life at the
surface and in the shallower parts of the sea, and by the consequent
diffusion through the water of organic matter in an extremely tenuous
state, but yet sufficient to nourish these creatures. The same may
have been the case in the Eozoic sea, where, judging from the vast
amount of residual carbon, there must have been abundance of organic
matter, either growing at the bottom, or falling upon it from the
surface; and as the Eozoon limestones are usually free from such
material, we may assume that the animal life in them was sufficient to
consume the vegetable pabulum. On the other hand, as detached
specimens of Eozoon occur in graphitic limestones, we suppose that in
some cases the vegetable matter was in excess of the animal, and this
may have been either because of its too great exuberance, or because
the water was locally too shallow to permit Eozoon and similar
creatures to nourish. These details we must for the present fill up
conjecturally; bu the progress of discovery may give us further light
as to the precise conditions of the beginning of life in the "great
and wide sea wherein are moving things innumerable" and which is as
much a wonder now as in the days of the author of the "Hymn of
Creation"[D] in regard to the life that swarms in all its breadth and
depth, the vast variety of that life, and its low and simple types, of
which we can affirm little else then that they move.
[D] Psalm civ.
The enormous accumulations of sediment on the still thin crust of the
earth in the Laurentian period--accumulations probably arranged in
lines parallel to the directions of disturbance already
indicated--weighed down the surface, and caused great masses of the
sediment to come within the influence of the heated interior nucleus.
Thus, extensive metamorphism took place, and at length the tension
becoming too great to be any longer maintained, a second great
collapse occurred, crumpling and disturbing the crust, and throwing up
vast masses of the Laurentian itself, probably into lofty
mountains--many of which still remain of considerable height, though
they have been subjected to erosion throughout all the extent of
subsequent geological time.
The Eozoic age, whose history we have thus shortly sketched, is
fertile in material of thought for the geologist and the naturalist.
Until the labours of Murchison, Sedgwick, Hall, and Barrande had
developed the vast thickness and organic richness of the Silurian and
Cambrian rocks, no geologist had any idea of the extent to which life
had reached backward in time. But when this new and primitive world of
Siluria was unveiled, men felt assured that they had now at last
reached to the beginnings of life. The argument on this side of the
Question was thus put by one of the most thoughtful of English
geologists, Professor Phillips: "It is ascertained that in passing
downwards through the lower Palæozoic strata, the forms of life grow
fewer and fewer, until in the lowest Cambrian rocks they vanish
entirely. In the thick series of these strata in the Longmynd, hardly
any traces of life occur, yet these strata are of such a kind as might
be expected to yield them.... The materials are fine-grained or
arenaceous, with or without mica, in laminae or beds quite distinct,
and of various thicknesses, by no means unlikely to retain
impressions of a delicate nature, such as those left by graptolites,
or mollusks, or annulose crawlers. Indeed, one or two such traces are
supposed to have been recognised, so that the almost total absence of
the traces of life in this enormous series is best understood by the
supposition that in these parts of the sea little or no life existed.
But the same remark of the excessive rarity of life in the lower
deposits is made in North America, in Norway, and in Bohemia,
countries well searched for this very purpose, so that all our
observations lead to the conviction that the lowest of all the strata
are quite deficient of organic remains. The absence is general--it
appears due to a general cause. Is it not probable that during these
very early periods the ocean and its sediments were nearly devoid of
plants and animals, and in the earliest time of all, which is
represented by sediments, quite deprived of such?" These words were
written ten years ago, and about the same time were published in
America those anticipations of the probability of life in the
Laurentian already referred to, and Lyell was protesting against the
name Primordial, on the ground that it implied that we had reached the
beginning of life, when this was not proved. Yet there were elements
of truth in both views. It is true now, as then, that the Primordial
seems to be a morning hour of life, having, as we shall see in our
next paper, unmistakable signs about it of that approach to the
beginning to which Phillips refers. It is also true that it is not so
early a morning hour as one who has not risen with the dawn might
suppose, since with its apparently small beginnings of life it is
almost as far removed from the Eozoon reefs of the early Laurentian on
the one hand, as it is from the modern period on the other. The dawn
of life seems to have been a very slow and protracted process, and it
may have required as long a time between the first appearance of
Eozoon and the first of those primordial Trilobites which the next
period will introduce to our notice, as between these and the advent
of Adam. Perhaps no lesson is more instructive then this as to the
length of the working days of the Almighty.
Another lesson lies ready for us in these same facts. Theoretically,
plants should have preceded animals; and this also is the assertion of
the first chapter of Genesis; but the oldest fossil certainly known to
us is an animal. What if there were still earlier plants, whose
remains are still to be discovered? For my own part, I can see no
reason to despair of the discovery of an _Eophytic_ period preceding
the Eozoic; perhaps preceding it through ages of duration to us almost
immeasurable, though still within the possible time of the existence
of the crust of the earth. It is even possible that in a warm and
humid condition of the atmosphere, before it had been caused "to rain
upon the earth" and when dense "mists ascended from the earth and
watered the whole surface of the ground,"[E] vegetation may have
attained to a profusion and grandeur unequalled in the periods whose
flora is known to us.
[E] Genesis ii. 5. For a description of this Eophytic period of
Genesis, see the Author's "Archaia," pp. 160 _et seq._
But while Eozoon thus preaches of progress and of development, it has
a tale to tell of unity and sameness Just as Eozoon lived in the
Laurentian sea, and was preserved for us by the infiltration of its
canals with siliceous mineral matters, so its successors and
representatives have gone on through all the ages accumulating
limestone in the sea bottom. To-day they are as active as they were
then, and are being fossilised in the same way. The English chalk and
the chalky modern mud of the Atlantic sea-bed, are precisely similar
in origin to the Eozoic limestones. There is also a strange
parallelism in the fact that in the modern seas Foraminifera can live
under conditions of deprivation of light and vital air, and of
enormous pressure, under which few organisms of greater complexity
could exist, and that in like manner Eozoon could live in seas which
were perhaps as yet unfit for most other forms of life.
It has been attempted to press the Eozoic Foraminifers into the
service of those theories of evolution which would deduce the animals
of one geological period by descent with modification from those of
another; but it must be confessed that Eozoon proves somewhat
intractable in this connection. In the first place, the creature is
the grandest of his class, both in form and structure; and if, on the
hypothesis of derivation, it has required the whole lapse of
geological time to disintegrate Eozoon into Orbulina, Globigerina,
and other comparatively simple Foraminifers of the modern seas, it may
have taken as long, probably much longer, to develop Eozoon from such
simple forms in antecedent periods. Time fails for such a process.
Again, the deep sea has been the abode of Foraminifers from the first.
In this deep sea they have continued to live without improvement, and
with little material change. How little likely is it that in less
congenial abodes they could have improved into higher grades of being;
especially since we know that the result in actual fact of any such
struggle for existence is merely the production of depauperated
Foraminifers? Further, there is no link of connection known to us
between Eozoon and any of the animals of the succeeding Primordial,
which are nearly all essentially new types, vastly more different from
Eozoon then it is from many modern creatures. Any such connection is
altogether imaginary and unsupported by proof. The laws of creation
actually illustrated by this primeval animal are only these: First,
that there has been a progress in creation from few, low, and
generalised types of life to more numerous, higher, and more
specialised types; and secondly, that every type, low or high, was
introduced at first in its best and highest form, and was, as a type,
subject to degeneracy, and to partial or total replacement by higher
types subsequently introduced. I do not mean that we could learn all
this from Eozoon alone; but that, rightly considered, it illustrates
these laws, which we gather from the subsequent progress of the
creative work. As to the mystery of the origin of living beings from
dead matter, or any changes which they may have undergone after their
creation, it is absolutely silent.
CHAPTER III.
THE PRIMORDIAL, OR CAMBRIAN AGE.
Between the time when _Eozoon Canadense_ flourished in the seas of the
Laurentian period, and the age which we have been in the habit of
calling Primordial, or Cambrian, a great gap evidently exists in our
knowledge of the succession of life on both of the continents,
representing a vast lapse of time, in which the beds of the Upper
Laurentian were deposited, and in which the Laurentian sediments were
altered, contorted, and upheaved, before another immense series of
beds, the Huronian, or Lower Cambrian, was formed in the bottom of the
sea. Eozoon and its companions occur in the Lower Laurentian. The
Upper Laurentian has afforded no evidence of life; and even those
conditions from which we could infer life are absent. The Lowest
Cambrian, as we shall see, presents only a few traces of living
beings. Still, the physical history of this interval must have been
most important. The wide level bottom of the Laurentian sea was broken
up and thrown into those bold ridges which were to constitute the
nuclei of the existing continents. Along the borders of these new-made
lands intense volcanic eruptions broke forth, producing great
quantities of lava and scoriæ and huge beds of conglomerate and
volcanic ash, which are characteristic features of the older Cambrian
in both hemispheres. Such conditions, undoubtedly not favourable to
life, seem to have prevailed, and extended their influence very
widely, so that the sediments of this period are among the most barren
in fossils of any in the crust of the earth. If any quiet undisturbed
spots existed in which the Lower Laurentian life could be continued
and extended in preparation for the next period, we have yet
discovered few of them. The experience of other geological periods
would, however, entitle us to look for such oases in the Lower
Cambrian desert, and to expect to find there some connecting links
between the life of the Eozoic and the very dissimilar fauna of the
Primordial.
The western hemisphere, where the Laurentian is so well represented,
is especially unproductive in fossils of the immediately succeeding
period. The only known exception is the occurrence of Eozoon and of
apparent casts of worm-burrows in rocks at Madoc in Canada, overlying
the Laurentian, and believed to be of Huronian age, and certain
obscure fossils of uncertain affinities, recently detected by Mr.
Billings, in rocks supposed to be of this age, in Newfoundland. Here,
however, the European series comes in to give us some small help.
Gümbel has described in Bavaria a great series of gneissic rocks
corresponding to the Laurentian, or at least to the lower part of it;
above these are what he calls the Hercynian mica-slate and primitive
clay-slate, in the latter of which he finds a peculiar species of
Eozoon, which he names _Eozoon Bavaricum_. In England also the
Longmynd groups of rocks in Shropshire and in Wales appears to be the
immediate successor to the Upper Laurentian; and it has afforded some
obscure "worm-burrows" or, perhaps, casts of sponges or fucoids, with
a small shell of the genus _Lingulella_, and also fragments of
crustaceans (_Palæeopyge_). The "Fucoid Sandstones" of Sweden,
believed to be of similar age, afford traces of marine plants and
burrows of worms, while the Harlech beds of Wales have afforded to Mr.
Hicks a considerable number of fossil animals, not very dissimilar
from those of the Upper Cambrian. If these rocks are really the next
in order to the Eozoic, they show a marked advance in life immediately
on the commencement of the Primordial period. In Ireland, the curious
Oldhamia, noticed below, appears to occur in rocks equally old. As we
ascend, however, into the Middle and Upper parts of the Cambrian, the
Menevian and Lingula flag-beds of Britain, and their equivalents in
Bohemia and Scandinavia, and the Acadian and Potsdam groups of
America, we find a rich and increasing abundance of animal remains,
constituting the first Primordial fauna of Barrande.
The rocks of the Primordial are principally sandy and argillaceous,
forming flags and slates, without thick limestones, and often through
great thicknesses, very destitute of organic remains, but presenting
some layers, especially in their upward extension, crowded with
fossils. These are no longer mere Protozoa, but include
representatives of all the great groups of animals which yet exist,
except the vertebrates. We shall not attempt any systematic
classification of these; but, casting our dredge and tow-net into the
Primordial sea, examine what we collect, rather in the order of
relative abundance then of classification.
Over great breadths of the sea bottom we find vast numbers of little
bivalve shells of the form and size of a finger-nail, fastened by
fleshy peduncles imbedded in the sand or mud; and thus anchored,
collecting their food by a pair of fringed arms from the minute
animals and plants which swarm in the surrounding waters. These are
the _Lingulæ_, from the abundance of which some of the Primordial beds
have received in England and Wales the name of Lingula flags. In
America, in like manner, in some beds near St. John, New Brunswick,
the valves of these shells are so abundant as to constitute at least
half of the material of the bed; and alike in Europe and America,
Lingula and allied forms are among the most abundant Primordial
fossils. The Lingulæ are usually reckoned to belong to the great
sub-kingdom of mollusks, which includes all the bivalve and univalve
shell-fish, and several other groups of creatures; but an able
American naturalist, Mr. Morse, has recently shown that they have many
points of resemblance to the worms; and thus, perhaps, constitute one
of those curious old-fashioned "comprehensive" types, as they have
been called, which present resemblances to groups of creatures, in
more modern times quite distinct from each other. He has also found
that the modern Lingulæ are very tenacious of life, and capable of
suiting themselves to different circumstances, a fact which, perhaps,
has some connection with their long persistence in geological time.
They are in any case members of the group of lamp-shells, creatures
specially numerous and important in the earlier geological ages.
[Illustration: Fig. 8.--LIFE IN THE PRIMORDIAL SEA.
On the bottom are seen, proceeding from left to right, _Oldhamia
antiqua_, _Lingulæ_, _Arenicolæ_, _Oldhamia radiata_, _Paradoxides_,
_Histioderma_, _Agnostus_, _Oldhamia radiata_, _Algæ_, and _Lingulæ_.
In the water are _Hymenocaris_, different species of _Trilobites_, and
_Pteropods_.]
The Lingulæ are especially interesting as examples of a type of beings
continued almost from the dawn of life until now; for their shells, as
they exist in the Primordial, are scarcely distinguishable from those
of members of the genus which still live. While other tribes of
animals have run through a great number of different forms, these
little creatures remain the same. Another interesting point is a most
curious chemical relation of the Lingula, with reference to the
material of its shell. The shells of mollusks generally, and even of
the ordinary lamp-shells, are hardened by common limestone or
carbonate of lime: the rarer substance, phosphate of lime, is in
general restricted to the formation of the bones of the higher
animals. In the case of the latter, this relation depends apparently
on the fact that the albuminous substances on which animals are
chiefly nourished require for their formation the presence of
phosphates in the plant. Hence the animal naturally obtains phosphate
of lime or bone-earth with its food, and its system is related to this
chemical fact in such wise that phosphate of lime is a most
appropriate and suitable material for its teeth and bones. Now, in the
case of the lower animals of the sea, their food, not being of the
nature of the richer land plants, but consisting mainly of minute algæ
and of animals which prey on these, furnishes, not phosphate of lime,
but carbonate. An exception to this occurs in the case of certain
animals of low grade, sponges, etc., which, feeding on minute plants
with siliceous cell-walls, assimilate the flinty matter and form a
siliceous skeleton. But this is an exception of downward tendency, in
which these animals approach to plants of low grade. The exception in
the case of Lingulæ is in the other direction. It gives to these
humble creatures the same material for their hard parts which is
usually restricted to animals of much higher rank. The purpose of this
arrangement, whether in relation to the cause of the deviation from
the ordinary rule or its utility to the animal itself, remains
unknown. It has, however, been ascertained by Dr. Hunt, who first
observed the fact in the case of the Primordial Lingulæ, that their
modern successors coincide with them, and differ from their
contemporaries among the mollusks in the same particular. This may
seem a trifling matter, but it shows in this early period the
origination of the difference still existing in the materials of which
animals construct their skeletons, and also the wonderful persistence
of the Lingulæ, through all the geological ages, in the material of
their shells. This is the more remarkable, in connection with our own
very slender acquaintance with the phenomenon, in relation either to
its efficient or final causes.
Before leaving the Lingulæ, I may mention that Mr. Morse informs me
that living specimens, when detached from their moorings, can creep
like worms, leaving long furrows on the sand, and that they can also
construct sand-tubes wherein to shelter themselves. This shows that
some of the abundant "worm burrows" of the Primordial may have been
the work of these curious little shell-fishes, as well as, perhaps,
some of the markings which have been described under the name of
_Eophyton_, and have been supposed, I think incorrectly, to be remains
of land plants.
In addition to Lingula we may obtain, though rarely, lamp-shells of
another type, that of the Orthids, These have the valves hinged along
a straight line, in the middle of which is a notch for the peduncle,
and the valves are often marked with ribs or striae. The Orthids were
content with limestone for their shells, and apparently lived in the
same circumstances with the Lingulæ; and in the period succeeding the
Primordial they became far more abundant. Yet they perished at an
early stage of the world's progress, and have no representatives in
the modern seas.
In many parts of the Primordial ocean the muddy bottom swarmed with
crustaceans, relatives of our shrimps and lobsters, but of a form
which differs so much from these modern shell-fishes that the
question of their affinities has long been an unsettled one with
zoologists. Hundreds of species are known, some almost microscopic in
size, others a foot in length. All are provided with a broad flat
horseshoe-shaped head-plate, which, judging from its form and a
comparison with the modern king-crabs or horseshoe-crabs, must have
been intended as a sort of mud-plough to enable them to excavate
burrows or hide themselves in the slimy ooze of the ocean bed. On the
sides of this buckler are placed the prominent eyes, furnished with
many separate lenses, on precisely the same plan with those of modern
crustaceans and insects, and testifying, as Buckland long ago pointed
out, to the identity of the action of light in the ancient and the
modern seas. The body was composed of numerous segments, each divided
transversely into three lobes, whence they have received the name of
_Trilobites_, and the whole articulated, so that the creature could
roll itself into a ball, like the modern slaters or wood-lice, which
are not very distant relatives of these old crustaceans.[F] The limbs
of Trilobites were long unknown, and it was even doubted whether they
had any; but recent discoveries have shown that they had a series of
flat limbs useful both for swimming and creeping. The Trilobites,
under many specific and generic forms, range from the Primordial to
the Carboniferous rocks, but are altogether wanting in the more recent
formations and in the modern seas. The Trilobites lived on muddy
bottoms, and their remains are extremely abundant in shaly and slaty
beds, though found also in limestone and sandstone. In the latter they
have left most curious traces of their presence in the trails which
they have produced. Some of the most ancient sandstones have their
surfaces covered with rows of punctured impressions (_Protichnites_,
first footprints), others have strange series of transverse grooves
with longitudinal ones at the side (_Climactichnites_, ladder
footprints); others are oval burrows, marked with transverse lines and
a ridge along the middle (_Rusichnites_, wrinkle footprints). All of
these so nearly resemble the trails and tracks of modern king-crabs
that there can be little doubt as to their origin. Many curious
striated grooves and bifid marks, found on the surfaces of Primordial
beds, and which have been described as plants, are probably only the
marks of the oral organs or feet of these and similar creatures, which
passed their lives in grubbing for food in the soft, slimy ooze,
though they could, no doubt, like the modern king-crabs, swim when
necessary. Some still more shrimp-like creatures, Hymenocaris, which
are found with them, certainly had this power.
[F] Woodward has recently suggested affinities of Trilobites with the
Isopods or equal-footed crustaceans, on the evidence of a remarkable
specimen with remains of feet described by Billings.
A lower type of annulose or ringed animal then that of the Trilobites,
is that of the worms. These creatures cannot be preserved in a fossil
state, except in the case of those which inhabit calcareous tubes:
but the marks which their jointed bodies and numerous side-bristles
leave on the sand and mud may, when buried under succeeding sediments,
remain; and extensive surfaces of very old rocks are marked in this
way, either with cylindrical burrows or curious trails with side
scratches looking like pinnate leaves. These constitute the genus
_Crusiana_, while others of more ordinary form belong to the genus
_Arenicolites_, so named from the common Arenicola, or lobworm, whose
burrows they are supposed to resemble. Markings referable to seaweed
also occur in the Primordial rocks, and also some grotesque and almost
inexplicable organisms known as _Oldhamia_, which have been chiefly
found in the Primordial of Ireland. One of the most common forms
consists of a series of apparently jointed threads disposed in
fan-like clusters on a central stem (_Oldhamia antiqua_). Another has
a wider and simpler fan-like arrangement of filaments. These have been
claimed by botanists as algæ, and have been regarded by zoologists as
minute Zoophytes, while some more sceptical have supposed that they
may be mere inorganic wrinklings of the beds. This last view does not,
however, seem tenable. They are, perhaps, the predecessors of the
curious _Graptolites_, which we shall have to represent in the
Silurian.
Singularly enough, Foraminifera, the characteristic fossils of the
Laurentian, have been little recognised in the Primordial, nor are
there any limestones known so massive as those of the former series.
There are, however, a number of remarkable organisms, which have
usually been described as sponges, but are more probably partly of the
nature of sponges and partly of that of Foraminifera. Of this kind are
some of the singular conical fossils described by Billings as
_Archæocyathus_, and found in the Primordial limestone of Labrador.
They are hollow within, with radiating pores and plates, calcareous in
some, and in others with siliceous spicules like those of modern
sponges. Some of them are several inches in diameter, and they must
have grown rooted in muddy bottoms, in the manner of some of the
deep-sea sponges of modern times. One species at least of these
creatures was a true Foraminifer, allied, though somewhat distantly,
to Eozoon. In some parts of the Primordial sandstones, curious
funnel-shaped casts in sand occur, sometimes marked with spiral lines.
The name _Histioderma_ has been given to some of these, and they have
been regarded as mouths of worm-burrows. Others of larger size have
been compared to inverted stumps of trees. If they were produced by
worms, some of these must have been of gigantic size, but Billings has
recently suggested that they may be casts of sponges that lived like
some modern species imbedded in the sand. In accordance with this view
I have represented these curious objects in the engraving, On the
whole, the life of these oldest Palæozoic rocks is not very abundant;
but there are probably representatives of three of the great
subdivisions of animals or, as some would reckon them, of four the
Protozoa, the Radiata (Coelenterata), the Mollusca, and the Annulosa.
And it is most interesting thus to find in these very old rocks the
modern subdivisions of animals already represented, and these by types
some of them nearly allied to existing inhabitants of the seas I have
endeavoured in the engraving to represent some of the leading forms of
marine life in this ancient period.
Perhaps one of the most interesting discoveries in these rocks is that
of rain-marks and shrinkage-cracks, in some of the very oldest
beds--those of the Longmynd in Shropshire. On the modern muddy beach
any ordinary observer is familiar with the cracks produced by the
action of the sun and air on the dried surfaces left by the tides.
Such cracks, covered by the waters of a succeeding tide, may be buried
in newer silt, and once preserved in this way are imperishable. In
like manner, the pits left by passing showers of rain on the mud
recently left bare by the tide may, when the mud has dried, become
sufficiently firm to be preserved. In this way we have rain-marks of
various geological ages; but the oldest known are those of the
Longmynd, where they are associated both with ripple-marks and
shrinkage-cracks. We thus have evidence of the action of tides, of
sun, and of rain, in these ancient periods just as in the present day.
Were there no land animals to prowl along the low tidal flats in
search of food? Were there no herbs or trees to drink in the rains and
flourish in the sunshine? If there were, no bone or footprint on the
shore, or drifted leaf or branch, has yet revealed their existence to
the eyes of geologists The beds of the Primordial age exist in
England, in Bohemia, in Sweden and Norway, and also in North America.
They appear to have been deposited along the shores of the old
Laurentian continent, and probably some of them indicate very deep
water. The Primordial rocks are in many parts of the world altered and
hardened. They have often assumed a slaty structure, and their
bedding, and the fossils which they contain, are both affected by
this. The usual view entertained as to what is called slaty structure
is, that it depends on pressure, acting on more or less compressible
material in some direction usually different from that of the bedding.
Such pressure has the effect of arranging all the flat particles as
scales of mica, etc. in planes parallel to the compressing surface.
Hence, if much material of this kind is present in the sediment, the
whole rock assumes a fissile character causing it to split readily
into thin plates. That such yielding to pressure has actually taken
place is seen very distinctly in microscopic sections of some slaty
rocks, which often show not only a laminated structure, but an actual
crumpling on a small scale, causing them to assume almost the aspect
of woody fibre. Such rocks often remind a casual observer of decaying
trunks of trees, and sections of them under the microscope show the
most minute and delicate crumpling. It is also proved by the condition
of the fossils the beds contain. These are often distorted, so that
some of them are lengthened and others shortened, and if specimens
were selected with, that view, it would be quite easy to suppose that
those lengthened by distortion are of different species from those
distorted so as to be shortened. Slaty cleavage and distortion are
not, however, confined to Primordial rocks, but occur in altered
sediments of various ages.
The Primordial sediments must have at one time been very widely
distributed, and must have filled up many of the inequalities produced
by the rending and contortion of the Laurentian beds. Their thicker
and more massive portions are, however, necessarily along the borders
of the Laurentian continents, and as they in their turn were raised up
into land, they became exposed to the denuding action first of the
sea, and afterwards of the rain and rivers, and were so extensively
wasted away that only in a few regions do large areas of them remain
visible. That of Bohemia has afforded to Barrande a great number of
most interesting fossils. The rocks of St. David's in Wales, those of
Shropshire in England, and those of Wicklow in Ireland are also of
great interest; and next to these in importance are, perhaps, the
Huronian and Acadian groups of North America, in which continent--as
for example in Nova Scotia and in some parts of New England--there are
extensive areas of old metamorphic rocks whose age has not been
determined by fossils, but which may belong to this period.
The question of division lines of formations is one much agitated in
the case of the Cambrian rocks. Whether certain beds are to be called
Cambrian or Silurian has been a point greatly controverted; and the
terms Primordial and Primordial Silurian have been used as means to
avoid the raising of this difficulty. Many of our division lines in
geology are arbitrary and conventional, and this may be the case with
that between the Primordial and Silurian, the one age graduating into
the other. There appears to be, however, the best reason to recognise
a distinct Cambrian period, preceding the two great periods, those of
the second and third faunas of Barrande, to which the term Silurian is
usually applied. On the other hand, in so far as our knowledge extends
at present, a strongly marked line of separation exists between the
Laurentian and Primordial, the latter resting on the edges of the
former, which seems then to have been as much altered as now. Still a
break of this kind may be, perhaps must be, merely local; and may vary
in amount. Thus, in some places we find rocks of Silurian and later
ages resting directly on the Laurentian, without the intervention of
the Primordial. In any case, where a line of coast is steadily
sinking, each succeeding deposit will overlap that which went before;
and this seems to have been the case with the Laurentian shore when
the Primordial and Silurian were being deposited. Hence over large
spaces the Primordial is absent, being probably buried up, except
where exposed by denudation at the margin of the two formations.
This occurs in several parts of Canada, while the Laurentian rocks
have evidently been subjected to metamorphism and long-continued
weathering before the Lower Silurian were deposited; and in some
cases the latter rest on weather-worn and pitted surfaces, and are
filled with angular bits of the underlying rock, as well as with
drift-shells which have been cast on these old Laurentian shores;
while in other cases the Silurian rests on smooth water-worn
Laurentian rocks, and is filled at the junction with well-rounded
pebbles and grains of sand which have evidently been subjected to a
more thorough attrition then those of the present beach. With respect
to the line of division between the Primordial and the next succeeding
rocks, it will be seen that important movements of the continents
occurred at the close of the Cambrian, and in some places the Cambrian
rocks have been much disturbed before the deposition of the Lower
Silurian.
Seated on some ancient promontory of the Laurentian, and looking over
the plain which, in the Primordial and Lower Silurian periods was the
sea, I have often wished for some shred of vegetable matter to tell
what lived on that land when the Primordial surf beat upon its shore,
and washed up the Trilobites and Brachiopods of those old seas; but no
rock has yet taken up its parable to reveal the secret, and the
Primordial is vocal only with the old story: "And God said, Let the
waters swarm with swarming living things, and it was so." So our
picture of the period may represent a sea-bottom swarming with animals
of low grade, some sessile, some locomotive; and we may merely suppose
a distant shore with vegetation dimly seen, and active volcanoes; but
a shore on which no foot of naturalist has yet trod to scan its
productions. Very different estimates have been formed of the amount
of life in this period, according to the position given to its latest
limit. Taking some of the more modern views of this subject, we might
have included among the Primordial animals many additional creatures,
which we prefer noticing in the Silurian, since it may at least be
affirmed that their head-quarters were in that age, even if they had a
beginning in the Primordial. It may be interesting here, however, to
note the actual amount of life known to us in this period, taken in
its largest scope. In doing this, I shall take advantage of an
interesting table given by Dr. Bigsby,[G] and representing the state
of knowledge in 1868, and shall group the species in such a manner as
to indicate the relative abundance of distinct types of structure. We
find then--
Plants (all, or nearly all, supposed to be
sea-weeds, and some, probably, mere tracks
or trails of animals) 22 species.
Sponges, and similar creatures 27 "
Corals and their allies 6 "
Starfishes and their allies 4 "
Worms 29 "
Trilobites and other crustaceans 442 "
Lamp-shells and other molluscoids 193 "
Common bivalve mollusks 12 "
Common univalve mollusks and their allies 172 "
Higher mollusks, nautili, cuttle-fishes, etc. 65 "
---
In all 972 "
[G] "Thesaurus Siluricus."
Now in this enumeration we observe, in the first place, a
representation of all the lower or invertebrate groups of the waters.
We have next the remarkable fact that the Radiata of Cuvier, the
lowest and most plant-like of the marine animals, are comparatively
slenderly represented, yet that there are examples of their higher as
well as of their lower forms. We have the further fact that the
crustaceans, the highest marine animals of the annulose type, are
predominant in the waters; and that in the mollusks the highest and
lowest groups are most plentiful, the middle less so. The whole number
of species is small, and this may arise either from our having here
reached an early period in the history of life, or from our
information being defective. Both are probably true. Still, of the
animals known, we cannot say that the proportions of the different
kinds depend on defective knowledge. There is no reason, for example,
why corals should not have been preserved as well as Trilobites, or
why Brachiopods should have been preserved rather then ordinary
bivalves. The proportions, therefore, it may be more safe to reason
from then the aggregate. In looking at these proportions, and
comparing them with those of modern seas, we are struck with the great
number of species representing some types either now extinct or
comparatively rare: the Trilobites and Brachiopods more particularly.
We are astonished at the enormous preponderance of these two groups,
and especially of the Trilobites. Further, we observe that while some
forms, like Lingula and Nautilus, have persisted down to modern
times, others, like the Trilobites and Orthids, perished very early.
In all this we can dimly perceive a fitness of living things to
physical conditions, a tendency to utilise each type to the limit of
its capacities for modification, and then to abandon it for something
higher; a tendency of low types to appear first, but to appear in
their highest perfection and variety; a sudden apparition of totally
diverse plans of structure subserving similar ends simultaneously with
each other, as for instance those of the Mollusk and the Crustacean;
the appearance of optical and mechanical contrivances, as for example
the compound eyes of the Trilobite and the swimming float of the
Orthoceras, in all their perfection at first, just as they continue to
this day in creatures of similar grade. That these and other similar
things point to a uniform and far-reaching plan, no rational mind can
doubt; and if the world had stopped short in the Primordial period,
and attained to no further development, this would have been
abundantly apparent; though it shines forth more and more
conspicuously in each succeeding page of the stony record. How far
such unity and diversity can be explained by the modern philosophy of
a necessary and material evolution out of mere death and physical
forces, and how far it requires the intervention of a Creative mind,
are questions which we may well leave with the thoughtful reader, till
we have traced this history somewhat further.
CHAPTER IV.
THE LOWER AND UPPER SILURIAN AGES.
By English geologists, the great series of formations which succeeds
to the Cambrian is usually included under the name Silurian System,
first proposed by Sir Roderick Murchison. It certainly, however,
consists of two distinct groups, holding the second and third faunas
of Barrande. The older of the two, usually called the Lower Silurian,
is the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick, and may properly be called the
_Siluro-Cambrian_. The newer is the true Silurian, or Silurian
proper--the Upper Silurian of Murchison. We shall in this chapter, for
convenience, consider both in connection, using occasionally the term
Lower Silurian as equivalent to Siluro-Cambrian. The Silurian presents
us with a definite physical geography, for the northern hemisphere at
least; and this physical geography is a key to the life conditions of
the time. The North American continent, from its great unbroken area,
affords, as usual, the best means of appreciating this. In this period
the northern currents, acting perhaps in harmony with old Laurentian
outcrops, had deposited in the sea two long submarine ridges, running
to the southward from the extreme ends of the Laurentian nucleus, and
constituting the foundations of the present ridges of the Rocky
Mountains and the Alleghanies. Between these the extensive triangular
area now constituting the greater part of North America, was a shallow
oceanic plateau, sheltered from the cold polar currents by the
Laurentian land on the north, and separated by the ridges already
mentioned from the Atlantic and Pacific. It was on this great plateau
of warm and sheltered ocean that what we call the Silurian fauna
lived; while of the creatures that inhabited the depths of the great
bounding oceans, whose abysses must have been far deeper and at a much
lower temperature, we know little. During the long Silurian periods,
it is true, the great American plateau underwent many revolutions,
sometimes being more deeply submerged, and having clear water tenanted
by vast numbers of corals and shell-fishes, at others rising so as to
become shallow and to receive deposits of sand and mud; but it was
always distinct from the oceanic area without. In Europe, in like
manner, there seems to have been a great internal plateau bounded by
the embryo hills of Western Europe on the west, and harbouring a very
similar assemblage of creatures to those existing in America.
Further, during these long periods there were great changes, from a
fauna of somewhat primordial type up to a new order of things in the
Upper Silurian, tending toward the novelties which were introduced in
the succeeding Devonian and Carboniferous. We may, in the first place,
sketch these changes as they occurred on the two great continental
plateaus, noting as we proceed such hints as can be obtained with
reference to the more extensive oceanic spaces.
Before the beginning of the age, both plateaus seem to have been
invaded by sandy and muddy sediments charged at some periods and
places with magnesian limestone; and these circumstances were not
favourable to the existence or preservation of organic remains. Such
are the Potsdam and Calciferous beds of America and the Tremadoc and
Llandeilo beds of England. The Potsdam and Tremadoc are by their
fossils included in the Cambrian, and may at least be regarded as
transition groups. It is further to be observed, in the case of these
beds, that if we begin at the west side of Europe and proceed
easterly, or at the east side of America and proceed westerly, they
become progressively thinner, the greater amount of material being
deposited at the edges of the future continents; just as on the sides
of a muddy tideway the flats are higher, and the more coarse sediment
deposited near the margin of the channel, and fine mud is deposited at
a greater distance and in thinner beds. The cause, however, on the
great scale of the Atlantic, was somewhat different, ancient ridges
determining the border of the channel. This statement holds good not
only of these older beds, but of the whole of the Silurian, and of the
succeeding Devonian and Carboniferous, all deposited on these same
plateaus. Thus, in the case of the Silurian in England and Wales, the
whole series is more then 20,000 feet thick, but in Russia, it is
less then 1,000 feet. In the eastern part of America the thickness is
estimated at quite as great an amount as in Europe, while in the
region of the Mississippi the Silurian rocks are scarcely thicker then
in Russia, and consist in great part of limestones and fine sediments,
the sandstones and conglomerates thinning out rapidly eastward of the
Appalachian Mountains.
In both plateaus the earlier period of coarse accumulations was
succeeded by one in which was clear water depositing little earthy
sediment, and this usually fine; and in which the sea swarmed with
animal life, from the _débris_ of which enormous beds of limestone
were formed the Trenton limestone of America and the Bala limestone of
Europe. The fossils of this part of the series open up to us the
head-quarters of Lower Silurian life, the second great fauna of
Barrande, that of the Upper Cambrian of Sedgwick; and in America more
especially, the Trenton and its associated limestones can be traced
over forty degrees of longitude; and throughout the whole of this
space its principal beds are composed entirely of comminuted corals,
shells, and crinoids, and studded with organisms of the same kinds
still retaining their forms. Out of these seas, in the European area,
arose in places volcanic islets, like those of the modern Pacific.
In the next succeeding era the clear waters became again invaded with
muddy and sandy sediments, in various alternations, and with
occasional bands of limestone, constituting the Caradoc beds of
Britain and the Utica and Hudson River groups of America. During the
deposition of these, the abounding life of the Siluro-Cambrian
plateaus died away, and a middle group of sandstones and shales, the
Oneida and Medina of America and the Mayhill of England, form the base
of the Upper Silurian.
But what was taking place meanwhile in the oceanic areas separating
our plateaus? These were identical with the basins of the Atlantic and
Pacific, which already existed in this period as depressions of the
earth's crust, perhaps not so deep as at present. As to the deposits
in their deeper portions we know nothing; but on the margin of the
Atlantic area are some rocks which give us at least a little
information.
In the later part of the Cambrian period the enormous thickness of the
Quebec group of North America appears to represent a broad stripe of
deep water parallel to the eastern edge of the American plateau, and
in which an immense thickness of beds of sand and mud was deposited
with very few fossils, except in particular beds, and these of a more
primordial aspect then those of the plateau itself. These rocks no
doubt represent the margin of a deep Atlantic area, over which cold
currents destructive of life were constantly passing, and in which
great quantities of sand and mud, swept from the icy regions of the
North, were continually being laid. The researches of Dr. Carpenter
and Dr. Wyville Thomson show us that there are at present cold areas
in the deeper parts of the Atlantic, on the European side, as we have
long known that they exist at less depths on the American side; and
these same researches, with the soundings on the American banks, show
that sand and gravel may be deposited not merely on shallows, but in
the depths of the ocean, provided that these depths are pervaded by
cold and heavy currents capable of eroding the bottom, and of moving
coarse material. The Quebec group in Canada and the United States, and
the metalliferous Lower Silurian rocks of Nova Scotia and
Newfoundland, destitute of great marine limestones and coral reefs,
evidently represent deep and cold-water areas on the border of the
Atlantic plateau.
At a later period, the beginning of the Upper Silurian, the richly
fossiliferous and exceptional deposits of the Island of Anticosti,
formed in the deep hollow of the Gulf of St. Laurence, show that when
the plateau had become shallowed up by deposition and elevation, and
converted into desolate sand-banks, the area of abundant life was
transferred to the still deep Atlantic basin and its bordering bays,
in which the forms of Lower Silurian life continued to exist until
they were mixed up with those of the Upper Silurian.
If we turn now to these latter rocks, and inquire as to their
conditions on our two great plateaus, we shall find a repetition of
changes similar to those which occurred in the times preceding. The
sandy shallows of the earlier part of this period give place to wide
oceanic areas similar to those of the Lower Silurian; In these we find
vast and thick coral and shell limestones, the Wenlock of England and
Niagara of America, as rich in life as the limestones of the Lower
Silurian, and with the generic and family forms similar, but the
species for the most part different. In America these limestones were
followed by a singularly shallow condition of the plateau, in which
the surface was so raised as at times to be converted into separate
salt lakes in which beds of salt were deposited. On both plateaus
there were alternations of oceanic and shallow conditions, under which
the Lower Helderberg and Ludlow beds, the closing members of the
Silurian, were laid down. Of the Atlantic beds of this period we know
little, except that the great limestones appear to be wanting, and to
be replaced by sandy and muddy deposits, in some parts at least of the
margins of the area. In some portions also of the plateaus and their
margins, extensive volcanic outbursts seem to have occurred; so that
the American plateau presented, at least in parts, the aspect of a
coral sea with archipelagos of volcanic islands, the ejections from
which became mixed with the aqueous deposits forming around them.
Having thus traced the interesting series of geographical conditions
indicated by the Silurian series, we may next take our station on one
of the submerged plateaus, and inquire as to the new forms of life now
introduced to our notice; and in doing so shall include the life of
both the Lower and Upper Silurian.
[Illustration: Fig. 9.--Fragment of Lower Silurian Limestone, sliced
and magnified ten diameters, showing the manner in which it is made up
of fragments of corals, crinoids, and shells. (From a paper oil the
Microscopic Structure of Canadian limestone, "Canadian Naturalist.")]
First, we may remark the vast abundance and variety of corals. The
polyps, close relatives of the common sea-anemone of our coasts, which
build up our modern coral reefs, were represented in the Silurian seas
by a great number of allied yet different forms, equally effectual in
the great work of secreting carbonate of lime in stony masses, and
therefore in the building-up of continents. Let us note some of the
differences. In the first place, whereas our modern coral-workers can
show us but the topmost pinnacles of their creations, peeping above
the surface of the sea in coral reefs and islands, the work of the
coral animals of the Silurian has been finished, by these limestones
being covered with masses of new sediment consolidated into hard rock,
and raised out of the sea to constitute a part of the dry land. In
the Silurian limestones we thus have, not merely the coral reefs, but
the wide beds of comminuted coral, mixed with the remains of other
animals, which are necessarily accumulated in the ocean bed around the
reefs and islands. Further, these beds, which we might find loose and
unconsolidated in the modern sea, have their fragments closely
cemented together in the old limestones. The nature of this difference
can be well seen by comparing a fragment of modern coral or shell
limestone from Bermuda, with a similar fragment of the Trenton
limestone, both being sliced for examination under the microscope. The
old limestone is black or greyish, the modern one is nearly white,
because in the former the organic matter in the animal fragments has
been carbonised or converted into coaly and bituminous matter. The old
limestone is much more dense and compact, partly because its materials
have been more closely compressed by superincumbent weight, but
chiefly because calcareous matter in solution in water has penetrated
all the interstices, and filled them up with a deposit of crystalline
limestone. In examining a slice, however, under the microscope, it
will be seen that the fragments of corals and other organisms are as
distinct and well preserved as in the crumbling modern rock, except
that they are perfectly imbedded in a paste of clear transparent
limestone, or rather calcareous spar, infiltrated between them. I have
examined great numbers of slices of these limestones, ever with new
wonder at the packing of the organic fragments which they present. The
hard marble-like limestones used for building in the Silurian
districts of Europe and America, are thus in most cases consolidated
masses of organic fragments.
In the next place, the animals themselves must have differed somewhat
from their modern successors. This we gather from the structure of
their stony cells, which present points of difference indicating
corresponding difference of detail in the soft parts. Zoologists thus
separate the rugose or wrinkled corals and the tabulate or floored
corals of the Silurian from those of the modern seas. The former must
have been more like the ordinary coral animals; the latter were very
peculiar, more especially in the close union of the cells, and in the
transverse floors which they were in the habit of building across
these cells as they grew in height. They presented, however, all the
forms of our modern corals. Some were rounded and massive in form,
others delicate and branching. Some were solitary or detached, others
aggregative in communities. Some had the individual animals large and
probably showy, others had them of microscopic size. Perhaps the most
remarkable of all is the American _Beatricea_,[H] which grew like a
great trunk of a tree twenty feet or more in height, its solitary
animal at the top like a pillar-saint, though no doubt more
appropriate and comfortable; and multitudes of delicate and encrusting
corals clinging like mosses or lichens to its sides. This creature
belongs to the very middle of the Silurian, and must have lived in
great depths, undisturbed by swell or breakers, and sheltering vast
multitudes of other creatures in its stony colonnades.
[H] First described by Mr. Billings. It has been regarded as a plant,
and as a cephalopod shell; but I believe it was a coral allied to
_Cystiphyllum_.
[Illustration: Fig. 10.--LIFE IN THE SILURIAN AGE.
On the bottom are seen, proceeding from left to right, Corals
(_Stenopora_ and _Beatricea_) and a Gasteropod; _Orthoceras_; Coral
(_Patria_); Crinoids, _Lingulæ_, and Cystideans; a _Trilobite_ and
_Cyrtolites_. In the water is a large _Pterygotus_, and under it a
_Trinucleus_. Further on, are Cephalopods, a Heteropod, and Fishes.
At the surface, _Phyllograptus_, _Graptolithus_, and _Bellerophon_.
On the Land, _Lepidodendron_, _Psilophyton_, and _Prototaxites_.]
Lastly, the Silurian corals nourished in latitudes more boreal then
their modern representatives. In both hemispheres as far north as
Silurian limestones have been traced, well-developed corals have been
found. On the great plateaus sheltered by Laurentian ridges to the
north, and exposed to the sun and to the warmer currents of the
equatorial regions, they nourished most grandly and luxuriantly: but
they lived also north of the Laurentian bands in the Arctic Sea
basins, though probably in the shallower and more sheltered parts.
Undoubtedly the geographical arrangements of the Silurian period
contributed to this. We have already seen how peculiarly adapted to an
exuberant marine life were the submerged continents of the period; and
there was probably little Arctic land producing icebergs to chill the
seas. The great Arctic currents, which then as now flowed powerfully
toward the equator, must have clung to the deeper parts of the ocean
basins, while the return waters from the equator would spread
themselves widely over the surface; so that wherever the Arctic Seas
presented areas a little elevated out of the cold water bottom, there
might be suitable abodes for coral animals. It has been supposed that
in the Silurian period the sea might have derived some appreciable
heat from the crust of the earth below, and astronomical conditions
have been suggested as tending to produce changes of climate; but it
is evident that whatever weight may be due to these causes, the
observed geographical conditions are sufficient to account for the
facts of the case. It is also to be observed, that we cannot safely
infer the requirements as to temperature of Silurian coral animals
from those of the tenants of the modern ocean. In the modern seas many
forms of life thrive best and grow to the greatest size in the colder
seas; and in the later tertiary period there were elephants and
rhinoceroses sufficiently hardy to endure the rigours of an Arctic
climate. So there may have been in the Silurian seas corals of much
less delicate constitution then those now living.
Next to the corals we may place the crinoids, or
stone-lilies--creatures abounding throughout the Silurian seas, and
realizing a new creative idea, to be expanded in subsequent geological
time into all the multifarious types of star-fishes and sea-urchins. A
typical crinoid, such as the _Glyptocrinus_ of the Lower Silurian,
consists of a flexible jointed stem, sometimes several feet in length,
composed of short cylindrical discs, curiously articulated together, a
box-like body on top made up of polygonal pieces attached to each
other at the edges, and five radiating jointed arms furnished with
branches and branchlets, or fringes, all articulated and capable of
being flexed in any direction. Such a creature has more the aspect of
a flower then of an animal; yet it is really an animal, and subsists
by collecting with its arms and drifting into its mouth minute
creatures floating in the water. Another group, less typical, but
abundantly represented in the Silurian seas, is that of the
Cystideans, in which the body is sack-like, and the arms few and
sometimes attached to the body. They resemble the young or larvæ of
crinoids. In the modern seas the crinoids are extremely few, though
dredging in very deep water has recently added to the number of known
species; but in the Silurian period they had their birth, and attained
to a number and perfection not afterwards surpassed. Perhaps the
stone-lilies of the Upper Silurian rocks of Dudley, in England, are
the most beautiful of Palæozoic animals. Judging from the immense
quantities of their remains in some limestones, wide areas of the sea
bottom must have been crowded with their long stalks and flower-like
bodies, presenting vast submarine fields of these stony water-lilies.
Passing over many tribes of mollusks, continued or extended from the
Primordial--and merely remarking that the lamp-shells and the ordinary
bivalve and univalve shell-fishes are all represented largely, more
especially the former group, in the Silurian--we come to the highest
of the Mollusca, represented in our seas by the cuttle-fishes and
nautili, creatures which, like the crinoids, may be said to have had
their birth in the Silurian, and to have there attained to some of
their grandest forms. The modern pearly nautilus shell, well known in
every museum, is beautifully coiled in a disc-like form, and when
sliced longitudinally shows a series of partitions dividing it into
chambers, air-tight, and serving as a float to render the body of the
creature independent of the force of gravity. As the animal grows it
retracts its body toward the front of the shell, and forms new
partitions, so that the buoyancy of the float always corresponds with
the weight of the animal; while by the expansion and contraction of
the body and removal of water from a tube or syphon which traverses
the chambers, or the injection of additional water, slight differences
can be effected, rendering the creature a very little lighter or
heavier then the medium in which it swims. Thus practically delivered
from the encumbrance of weight, and furnished with long flexible arms
provided with suckers, with great eyes and a horny beak, the nautilus
becomes one of the tyrants of the deep, creeping on the bottom or
swimming on the surface at will, and everywhere preying on whatever
animals it can master. Fortunately for us, as well as for the more
feeble inhabitants of the sea, the nautili are not of great size,
though some of their allies, the cuttle-fishes, which, however,
want the floating apparatus, are sufficiently powerful to be
formidable to man. In the Silurian period, however, there were
not only nautili like ours, but a peculiar kind of straight
nautilus--the _Orthoceratites_--which sometimes attained to gigantic
size. The shells of these creatures may be compared to those of nautili
straightened out, the chambers being placed in a direct line in front
of each other. A great number of species have been discovered, many
quite insignificant in size, but others as much as twelve feet in
length and a foot in diameter at the larger end. Indeed, accounts have
been given of individuals of much larger growth. These large
_Orthoceratites_ were the most powerful marine animals known to us in
the Silurian, and must have been in those days the tyrants of the
seas.[I]
[I] Zoologists will observe that I have, in the illustrations given
the Orthoceras the arms rather of a cuttle-fish then of a nautilus.
The form of the outer chamber of the shell, I think, warrants this
view of the structure of the animal, which must have been formed on a
very comprehensive type.
Among the crustaceans, or soft shell-fishes of the Silurian, we meet
with the _Trilobites_, continued from the Primordial in great and
increasing force, and represented by many and beautiful species; while
an allied group of shell-fishes of low organization but gigantic size,
the _Eurypterids_, characteristic of the Upper Silurian, were provided
with powerful limbs, long flexible bodies, and great eyes in the front
of the head, and were sometimes several feet in length. Instead of
being mud grovellers, like the Trilobites and modern king-crabs, these
_Eurypterids_ must have been swimmers, careering rapidly through the
water, and probably active and predaceous. There were also great
multitudes of those little crustaceans which are inclosed in two horny
or shelly valves like a bivalve shell-fish, and the remains of which
sometimes fill certain beds of Silurian shale and limestone.
No remains found in the Silurian rocks have been more fertile sources
of discussion then the so-called _Graptolites_, or written stones--a
name given long ago by Linnæus, in allusion to the resemblance of some
species having rows of cells on one side, to minute lines of writing.
These little bodies usually appear as black coaly stains on the
surface of the rock, showing a slender stem or stalk, with a row of
little projecting cells at one side, or two rows, one on each side.
The more perfect specimens show that, in many of the species at least,
these fragments were branches of a complex organism spreading from a
centre; and at this centre there is sometimes perceived a sort of
membrane connecting the bases of the branches, and for which various
uses have been conjectured. The branches themselves vary much in
different species. They may be simple or divided, narrow, or broad and
leaf-like, with one row of cells, or two rows of cells. Hence arise
generic distinctions into single and double graptolites, leaf and tree
graptolites, net graptolites, and so on. But while it is easy to
recognise these organisms, and to classify them in species and genera,
it is not so easy to say what their affinities are with modern things.
They are exclusively Silurian, disappearing altogether at the close of
this period, and, so far as we know, not succeeded by any similar
creatures serving to connect them with modern forms. Hence the most
various conjectures as to their nature. They have been supposed to be
plants, and have been successively referred to most of the great
divisions of the lower animals. Most recently they have been regarded
by Hall, Nicholson,[J] and others, who have studied them most
attentively, as zoophytes or hydroids allied to the Sertularise, or
tooth-corallines and sea-fir-corallines of our coasts, to the
cell-bearing branches of which their fragments bear a very close
resemblance. In this case, each of the little cells or teeth at the
sides of the fibres must have been the abode of a little polyp,
stretching out its tentacles into the water, and enjoying a common
support and nutrition with the other polyps ranged with it. Still the
mode of life of the community of branching stems is uncertain. In some
species there is a little radicle or spike at the base of the main
stem, which may have been a means of attachment. In others the hollow
central disk has been conjectured to have served as a float. Occurring
as the specimens do usually in shales and slates, which must have been
muddy beds, they could not have been attached to stones or rocks, and
they must have lived in clear water, either seated on the surface of
the mud, attached to sea-weeds, or floating freely by means of hollow
disks filled with air. After much thought on their structure and mode
of occurrence, I am inclined to believe that in their younger stages
they were attached, but by a very slender thread; that at a more
advanced stage they became free, and acquiring a central membranous
disk filled with air, floated by means of this at the surface, their
long branches trailing in the waters below. They would thus be, with
reference to their mode of life, though not to the details of their
structure, prototypes of the modern Portuguese man-of-war, which now
drifts so gaily over the surface of the warmer seas. I have
represented them in this attitude; but in case I should be mistaken,
the reader may imagine it possible that they may be adhering to the
lower surface of floating tangle. The head-quarters of the Graptolites
seem to be in the upper part of the Cambrian, and in the
Siluro-Cambrian, and they are widely distributed in Europe, in
America, and in Australia. This very wide distribution of the species
is probably connected with their floating and oceanic habits.
[J] See also an able paper by Carruthers, in the _Geological
Magazine_, vol. v., p. 64.
Lastly, just as the Silurian period was passing away, we find a new
thing in the earth--vertebrate animals, represented by several species
of shark-like fishes, which came in here as forerunners of the dynasty
of the vertebrates, which from that day to this have been the masters
of the world. These earliest vertebrates are especially interesting as
the first known examples of a plan of structure which culminates only
in man himself. They appear to have had cartilaginous skeletons; and
in this and their shagreen-like skin, strong bony spines, and
trenchant teeth, to have much resembled our modern sharks, or rather
the dog-fishes, for they were of small size. One genus (_Pteraspis_),
apparently the oldest of the whole, belongs, however, to a tribe of
mailed fishes allied to some of those of the old red sandstone. In
both cases the groups of fishes representing the first known
appearance of the vertebrates were allied to tribes of somewhat high
organization in that class; and they asserted their claims to
dominancy by being predaceous and carnivorous creatures, which must
have rendered themselves formidable to their invertebrate
contemporaries. Coprolites, or fossil masses of excrement, which are
found with them, indicate that they chased and devoured orthoceratites
and sea-snails of various kinds, and snapped Lingulæ and crinoids from
their stalks; and we can well imagine that these creatures, when once
introduced, found themselves in rich pasture and increased
accordingly. Space prevents us from following further our pictures of
the animal life of the great Silurian era, the monuments of which were
first discovered by two of England's greatest geologists, Murchison
and Sedgwick. How imperfect such a notice must be, may be learned from
the fact that Dr. Bigsby, in his "Thesaurus Siluricus" in 1868,
catalogues 8,897 Silurian species, of which only 972 are known in the
Primordial.
Our illustration, carefully studied, may do more to present to the
reader the teeming swarms of the Silurian seas then our word-picture,
and it includes many animal forms not mentioned above, more especially
the curved and nautilus-like cuttle-fishes, those singular molluscous
swimmers by fin or float known to zoologists as violet-snails,
winged-snails or pteropods, and carinarias; and which, under various
forms, have existed from the Silurian to the present time. The old
_Lingulæ_ are also there as well as in the Primordial, while the fishes
and the land vegetation belong, as far as we yet know, exclusively to
the Upper Silurian, and point forward to the succeeding Devonian. We
know as yet no Silurian animal that lived on the land or breathed air.
But our knowledge of land plants, though very meagre, is important.
Without regarding such obscure and uncertain forms as the _Eophyton_
of Sweden, Hooker, Page, and Barrande have noticed, in the Upper
Silurian, plants allied to the Lycopods or club-mosses. I have found
in the same deposits another group of plants allied to Lycopods and
pill-worts (Psilophyton), and fragments of wood representing the
curious and primitive type of pine-like trees known as _Prototaxites_.
These are probably only a small instalment of Silurian land plants,
such as a voyager might find floating in the sea on his approach to
some unknown shore, which had not yet risen above his horizon. Time
and careful search will, no doubt, add largely to our knowledge.
In the Silurian, as in the Cambrian, the head-quarters of animal life
were in the sea. Perhaps there was no animal life on the land; but
here our knowledge may be at fault. It is, however, interesting to
observe the continued operation of the creative fiat, "Let the waters
swarm with swarmers" which, beginning to be obeyed in the Eozoic age,
passes down through all the periods of geological time to the "moving
things innumerable" of the modern ocean. Can we infer anything further
as to the laws of creation from these Silurian multitudes of living
things? One thing we can see plainly, that the life of the Silurian is
closely related to that of the Cambrian. The same generic and ordinal
forms are continued. Even some species may be identical. Does this
indicate direct genetic connection, or only like conditions in the
external world correlated with likeness in the organic world? It
indicates both. First, it is in the highest degree probable that many
of the animals of the Lower Silurian are descendants of those of the
Cambrian. Sometimes these descendants may be absolutely unchanged.
Sometimes they may appear as distinct varieties. Sometimes they may
have been regarded as distinct though allied species. The continuance
in this manner of allied forms of life is necessarily related to the
continuance of somewhat similar conditions of existence, while changes
in type imply changed external conditions. But is this all? I think
not; for there are forms of life in the Silurian which cannot be
traced to the Cambrian, and which relate to new and even prospective
conditions, which the unaided powers of the animals of the earlier
period could not have provided for. These new forms require the
intervention of a higher power, capable of correlating the physical
and organic conditions of one period with those of succeeding periods.
Whatever powers may be attributed to natural selection or to any other
conceivable cause of merely genetic evolution, surely prophetic gifts
cannot be claimed for it; and the life of all these geological periods
is full of mute prophecies to be read only in the light of subsequent
fulfilments.
The fishes of the Upper Silurian are such a prophecy. They can claim
no parentage in the older rocks, and they appear at once as kings of
their class. With reference to the Silurian itself, they are of little
consequence; and in the midst of its gigantic forms of invertebrate
life they seem almost misplaced. But they predict the coming Devonian,
and that long and varied reign of vertebrate life which culminates in
man himself. No such prophetic ideas are represented by the giant
crustaceans and cuttle-fishes and swarming graptolites. They had
already attained their maximum, and were destined to a speedy and
final grave in the Silurian, or to be perpetuated only in decaying
families whose poverty is rendered more conspicuous by the contrast
with the better days gone by. The law of creation provided for new
types, and at once for the elevation and degradation of them when
introduced; and all this with reference to the physical conditions not
of the present only but of the future. Such facts, which cannot be
ignored save by the wilfully blind, are beyond the reach of any merely
material philosophy.
The little that we know of Silurian plants is as eloquent of plan and
creation as that which we can learn of animals. I saw not long ago a
series of genealogies in geological time reduced to tabular form by
that ingenious but imaginative physiologist, Haeckel. In one of these
appeared the imaginary derivation of the higher plants from Algæ or
sea-weeds. Nothing could more curiously contradict actual facts. Algæ
were apparently in the Silurian neither more nor less elevated then in
the modern seas, and those forms of vegetable life which may seem to
bridge over the space between them and the land plants in the modern
period, are wanting in the older geological periods, while land plants
seem to start at once into being in the guise of club-mosses, a group
by no means of low standing. Our oldest land plants thus represent one
of the highest types of that cryptogamous series to which they belong,
and moreover are better developed examples of that type then those now
existing. We may say, if we please, that all the connecting links have
been lost; but this is begging the whole question, since no thing 'but
the existence of such links could render the hypothesis of derivation
possible. Further, the occurrence of any number of successive yet
distinct species would not be the kind of chain required, or rather
would not be a chain at all.
Yet in some respects development is obvious in creation. Old forms of
life are often embryonic, or resemble the young of modern animals, but
enlarged and exaggerated, as if they had overgrown themselves and had
prematurely become adult. Old forms are often generalized, or less
specific in their adaptations then those of modern times. There is
less division of labour among them. Old forms sometimes not only rise
to the higher places in their groups, but usurp attributes which in
later times are restricted to their betters. Old forms are often
gigantic in size in comparison with their modern successors, which, if
they could look back on their predecessors, might say, "There were
giants in those days." Some old forms have gone onward in successive
stages of elevation by a regular and constant gradation. Others have
remained as they were through all the ages, Some have no equals in
their groups in modern days. All these things speak of order, but of
order along with development, and this development not evolution;
unless by this term we understand the emergence into material facts of
the plans of the creative mind. These plans we may hope in some degree
to understand, though we may not be able to comprehend the mode of
action of creative power any more then the mode in which our own
thought and will act upon the machinery of our own nerves. Still, the
power is not the less real, that we are ignorant of its mode of
operation. The wind bloweth whither it listeth, and we feel its
strength, though we may not be able to calculate the wind of to-morrow
or the winds of last year. So is the Spirit of God when it breathes
into animals the breath of life, or the Almighty word when it says,
"Let the waters bring forth."
CHAPTER V.
THE DEVONIAN AGE.
Paradoxical as it may appear, this period of geological history has
been held as of little account, and has even been by some geologists
regarded as scarcely a distinct age, just because it was one of the
most striking and important of the whole. The Devonian was an age of
change and transition, in both physical and organic existence; and an
age which introduced, in the Northern hemisphere at least, more varied
conditions of land and water and climate then had previously existed.
Hence, over large areas of our continents, its deposits are irregular
and locally diverse; and the duration and importance of the period are
to be measured rather by the changes and alterations of previous
formations, and the ejection of masses of molten rock from beneath,
then by a series of fossiliferous deposits. Nevertheless, in some
regions in North America and Eastern Europe, the formations of this
era are of vast extent and volume, those of North America being
estimated at the enormous thickness of 15,000 feet, while they are
spread over areas of almost continental breadth.
At the close of the Upper Silurian, the vast continental plateaus of
the northern hemisphere were almost wholly submerged. No previous
marine limestone spreads more widely then that of the Upper Silurian,
and in no previous period have we much less evidence of the existence
of dry land; yet before the end of the period we observe, in a few
fragments of land plants scattered here and there in the marine
limestones--evidence that islands rose amid the waste of waters. As it
is said that the sailors of Columbus saw the first indications of the
still unseen Western Continent in drift canes, and fragments of trees
floating in mid ocean, so the voyager through the Silurian seas finds
his approach to the verdant shores of the Devonian presaged by a few
drift plants borne from shores yet below the horizon. The small
remains of land in the Upper Silurian were apparently limited to
certain clusters of islands in the north-eastern part of America and
north-western part of Europe, with perhaps some in the intervening
Atlantic On these limited surfaces grew the first land plants
certainly known to us--herbs and trees allied to the modern
club-mosses, and perhaps forests of trees allied to the pines, though
of humbler type; and this wide Upper Silurian sea, with archipelagos
of wooded islands, may have continued for a long time. But with the
beginning of the Devonian, indications of an unstable condition of the
earth's crust began to develop themselves. New lands were upheaved;
great shallow, muddy, and sandy flats were deposited around them the
domains of corals and sea-weeds were contracted and on banks, and in
shallows and estuaries, there swarmed shoals of fishes of many
species, and some of them of most remarkable organization. On the
margins of these waters stretched vast swamps, covered with a rank
vegetation.
But the period was one of powerful igneous activity. Volcanoes poured
out their molten rocks over sea and land, and injected huge dykes of
trap into the newly-formed beds. The land was shaken with earthquake
throes, and was subject to many upheavals and subsidences. Violent
waves desolated the coasts, throwing sand and gravel over the flats,
and tearing up newly-deposited beds; and poisonous exhalations, or
sudden changes of level, often proved fatal to immense shoals of
fishes. This was the time of the Lower Devonian, and it is marked,
both in the old world and the new, by extensive deposits of sandstones
and conglomerates.
But the changes going on at the surface were only symptomatic of those
occurring beneath. The immense accumulations of Silurian sediment had
by this time so overweighted certain portions of the crust, that great
quantities of aqueous sediment had been pressed downward into the
heated bowels of the earth, and were undergoing, under an enormous
weight of superincumbent material, a process of baking and
semi-fusion. This process was of course extremely active along the
margins of the old Silurian plateaus, and led to great elevation of
land, while in the more central parts of the plateaus the oceanic
conditions still continued; and in the Middle Devonian, in America at
least, one of the most remarkable and interesting coral limestones in
the world--the corniferous limestone--was deposited. In process of
time, however, these clear waters became shallow, and were invaded by
muddy sediments; and in the Upper Devonian the swampy flats and muddy
shallows return in full force, and in some degree anticipate the still
greater areas of this kind which existed in the succeeding Coal
formation.
Such is a brief sketch of the Devonian, or, as it may be better called
in America, from the vast development of its beds on the south side of
Lake Erie, the _Erian_ formation. In America the marine beds of the
Devonian were deposited on the same great continental plateau which
supported the seas of the Upper and Lower Silurian, and the beds were
thicker towards the east and thinned towards the west, as in the case
of the older series. But in the Devonian there was much, land in the
north-east of America; and on the eastern margin of this land, as in
Gaspé and New Brunswick, the deposits throughout the whole period were
sandstones and shales, without the great coral limestones of the
central plateau. Something of the same kind occurred in Europe, where,
however, the area of Devonian sea was smaller. There the fossiliferous
limestones of the Middle Devonian in Devon, in the Eifel district, in
France and in Russia, represent the great corniferous limestone of
America; while the sandstones of South Wales, of Ireland, and of
Scotland, resemble the local conditions of Gaspé and New Brunswick,
and belonged to a similar area in the north-west of Europe, in which
shallow water and land conditions prevailed during the whole of the
Devonian, and which was perhaps connected with the corresponding
region in Eastern America by a North Atlantic archipelago, now
submerged. This whole subject is so important to the knowledge of the
Devonian, and of geology in general, that I may be pardoned for
introducing it here in a tabular form, taking the European series from
Etheridge's excellent and exhaustive paper in the "Journal of the
Geological Society."
DEVONIAN OF ERIAN.
DIVISIONS. CENTRAL AREAS.
Devon. Rhen. Prussia. New York.
{Pilton group:-- Clymenia, Cypridina, Chemung and Portage.
{ Brown calcareous etc. Shales, Sandstones
Upper { shales, brown and limestones, and and shales.
{ yellow sandstone. sandstones. Plants and marine
{ Land plants and Plants and marine shells.
{ marine shells. shells.
{Ilfracombe group:-- Eifel limestone, Hamilton shales,
{ Grey and red Calceola shales, and Corniferous
Middle { sandstones and etc. or cherty
{ flags, calcareous Corals, shells, limestone.
{ slates and etc. Many corals and
{ limestones, with shells, also
{ corals, etc. plants.
{Lynton group:-- Coblentz and Schoharie and
{ Bed and purple Wissenbach shales, Caudagalli grits.
Lower { sandstones. Marine Rhenish greywacke, Oriskany
{ shells, etc. Spinier sandstones.
{ sandstone. Marine shells.
{ Marine shells.
DIVISIONS. MARGINAL AREAS.
Scotland. Ireland. Gaspé and New Brunswick.
{Yellow and red Yellow and red Red and grey
{ sandstones. sandstones, etc. sandstones, grits
Upper {Fishes and plants. Plants, fishes, and shales, and
{ etc. conglomerates of
{ Gaspé and Mispeck.
{ Plants.
{Red shales and Grits and Grey and Red
{ sandstones, and sandstones of sandstones, and
Middle { conglomerates. Dingle. grey and dark
{Caithness flags. shales. Gaspé
{Fishes and plants. and St. John.
{ Many plants and
{ fishes.
{Flagstones, shales Glengariff grits, Sandstone and
{ and conglomerates. etc. conglomerate.
Lower {Fishes and plants. Gaspé and St.
{ John.
{ Plants and fishes.
A glance at this table suffices to show that when we read Hugh
Miller's graphic descriptions of the Old Red Sandstone of Scotland,
with its numerous and wonderful fishes, we have before us a formation
altogether distinct from that of Devonshire or the Eifel. But the one
represents the shallow, and the other the deeper seas of the same
period. We learn this by careful tracing of the beds to their junction
with, corresponding series, and by the occasional occurrence of the
characteristic fishes of the Scottish strata in the English and German
beds. In like manner a geologist who explores the Gaspé sandstones or
the New Brunswick shales has under his consideration a group of beds
very dissimilar from that which he would have to study on the shores
of Lake Erie. But here again identity of relations to the Silurian
below and the carboniferous above, shows the contemporaneousness of
the beds, and this is confirmed by the occurrence in both series of
some of the same plants and shells and fishes.
It will further be observed that it is in the middle that the greatest
difference occurs. Sand and mud and pebble-banks were almost universal
over our two great continental plateaus in the Older and Newer
Devonian. But in the Middle there were in some places deeper waters
with coral reefs, in others shallow flats and swamps rich in
vegetation. Herein we see the greater variety and richness of the
Devonian. Had we lived in that age, we should not have seen great
continents like those that now exist, but we could have roamed over
lovely islands with breezy hills and dense lowland jungles, and we
could have sailed over blue coral seas, glowing below with all the
fanciful forms and brilliant colours of polyp life, and filled with
active and beautiful fishes. Especially did all these conditions
culminate in the Middle Devonian, when what are now the continental
areas of the northern hemisphere must have much resembled the present
insular and oceanic regions of the South Pacific.
Out of the rich and varied life of the Devonian I may select for
illustration its corals, its crustaceans, its fishes, its plants, and
its insects.
[Illustration: Fig. 11.--CORALS, FISHES, AND CRUSTACEANS OF THE
DEVONIAN
In the foreground are Corals of the genera _Favosites_, _Michelina_,
_Phillipsatrea_, _Zaphrentis_, _Blothrophyllum_, and _Syringopora_,
and the seaweed Spirephyton; also Fishes of the genera _Cephalaspis_
and _Pterichthys_. Above are _Pterygotus_ and _Dinichtys_, with Fishes
of the genera _Diplacanthus_, _Osteolepis_, _Holoptychius_,
_Pteraspis_, _Coccosteus_, etc. The distant land had _Lepidodendra_,
Pines and Tree-ferns.]
The central limestones of the Devonian may be regarded as the
head-quarters of the peculiar types of coral characteristic of the
Palæozoic age. Here they were not only vastly numerous, but present
some of their grandest and also their most peculiar forms. Edwards and
Haime, in their "Monograph of British Fossil Corals" in 1854,
enumerate one hundred and fifty well-ascertained species, and the
number has since been largely increased; I have no doubt that my
friend Dr. Bigsby, in his forth-coming "Thesaurus Devonicus," will
more then double it. In the Devonian limestones of England, as for
instance at Torquay, the specimens, though abundant and well preserved
as to their internal structure, are too firmly imbedded in the rock to
show their external forms. In the Devonian of the continent of Europe
much finer specimens occur; but, perhaps, in no part of the world is
there so clear an exhibition of them as in the Devonian limestones of
the United States and Canada. Sir Charles Lyell thus expresses his
admiration of the exposure of these corals, which he saw at the falls
of the Ohio, near Louisville. He says, "Although the water was not at
its lowest, I saw a grand display of what may be termed an ancient
coral-reef, formed by zoophytes which flourished in a sea of earlier
date then the Carboniferous period. The ledges of horizontal
limestone, over which the water flows, belong to the Devonian group,
and the softer parts of the stone have decomposed and wasted away, so
that the harder calcareous corals stand out in relief. Many branches
of these zoophytes project from their erect stems precisely as if they
were living. Among other species I observed large masses, not less
then five feet in diameter, of _Favosites Gothlandica_, with its
beautiful honeycomb structure well displayed. There was also the
cup-shaped _Cyathophyllum_, and the delicate network of _Fenestella_,
and that elegant and well-known European species of fossil, the chain
coral, _Catenipora escharoides_, with a profusion of others which it
would be tedious to all but the geologist to enumerate. Although
hundreds of fine specimens have been detached from these rocks to
enrich the museums of Europe and America, another crop is constantly
working its way out under the action of the stream, and of the sun and
rain in the warm season when the channel is laid dry."[K] These
limestones have been estimated to extend, as an almost continuous
coral reef, over the enormous area of five hundred thousand square
miles of the now dry and inland surface of the great American
continental plateau. The limestones described by Sir Charles are known
in the Western States as the "Cliff limestone." In the State of New
York and in Western Canada the "Corniferous limestone," so called from
the masses of hornstone, like the flint of the English chalk,
contained in it, presents still more remarkable features. The corals
which it contains have been replaced by the siliceous or flinty
matter in such a manner that, when the surrounding limestone weathers
away, they remain projecting in relief in all the beauty of their
original forms. Not only so, but on the surface of the country they
remain as hard siliceous stones, and may be found in ploughing the
soil and in stone fences and roadside heaps, so that tons of them
could often be collected over a very limited space. When only partly
disengaged from the matrix, the process may be completed by immersing
them in a dilute acid. The beauty of these specimens when thus
prepared is very great not at all inferior to that of modern corals,
which they often much resemble in general form, though differing in
details of structure. One of the most common forms is that of the
_Favosites_, or honeycomb coral, presenting regular hexagonal cells
with transverse floors or tabulæ. Of these there are several species,
usually flat or massive in form; but one species, _F. polymorpha_,
branches out like the modern stag-horn corals. Another curious form,
_Michelina_, looks exactly like a mass of the papery cells of the
great American hornet in a petrified state, and the convex floors
simulate the covers of the cells, so that it is quite common to find
them called fossil wasps' nests. Some of the largest belong to the
genus _Phillipsastrea_ or _Smithia_, which Hugh Miller has
immortalized by comparing its crowded stars, with confluent rays, to
the once-popular calico pattern known as "Lane's net"--a singular
instance of the accidental concurrence of a natural and artificial
design. Another very common type is that of the conical _Zaphrentis_,
with a deep cut at top to lodge the body of the animal, whose
radiating chambers are faithfully represented by it's delicate
lamellæ. Perhaps the most delicate of the whole is the _Syringopora_,
with its cylindrical worm-like pipes bound together by transverse
processes, and which sometimes can be dissolved out in all its fragile
perfection by the action of an acid on a mass of Corniferous limestone
filled with these corals in a silicified state.
[K] "Travels in North America." second series.
These Devonian corals, like those of the Silurian, belong to the great
extinct groups of Tabulate and Rugose corals; groups which present, on
the one hand, points of resemblance to the ordinary coral animals of
the modern seas, and, on the other, to those somewhat exceptional
corals, the Millepores, which are produced by another kind of polyp,
the Hydroids. Some of them obviously combine properties belonging to
both, as, for example, the radiating partitions with the arrangement
of the parts in multiples of four, the horizontal floors, and the
external solid wall; and this fact countenances the conclusion that in
these old corals we have a group of high and complex organization,
combining properties now divided between two great groups of animals,
neither of them probably, either in their stony skeletons or the soft
parts of the animal, of as high organization as their Paleozoic
predecessors. This sort of disintegration of composite types, or
dissolution of old partnerships, seems to have been no unusual
occurrence in the history of life.[L]
[L] Verril has suggested that the Tabulata may be divided into two
groups, one referable to Actinoids, the other to Hydroids.
If the Devonian witnessed the culmination of the Palæozoic corals, its
later stages saw the final decadence of the great dynasty of the
Trilobites. Of these creatures there are in the Devonian some large
and ornate species, remarkable for their spines and tubercles; as if
in this, the latter day of their dominion, they had fallen into habits
of luxurious decoration unknown to their sterner predecessors, and at
the same time had found it necessary to surround their now disputed
privileges with new safeguards of defensive armour. Not improbably the
decadence of the Trilobites may have been connected with the
introduction of the numerous and formidable fishes of the period.
But while the venerable race of the Trilobites was preparing to fight
its last and unsuccessful battle, another and scarcely less ancient
tribe of crustaceans, the Eurypterids, already strong in the Silurian,
was armed with new and formidable powers. The _Pterygotus anglicus_,
which should have been named _scoticus_, since its head-quarters are
in Scotland, was in point of size the greatest of known crustaceans,
recent or fossil. According to Mr. Henry Woodward, who has published
an admirable description and figures of the creature in the
Palæontographical Society's Memoirs, it must have been six feet in
length, and nearly two feet in breadth. Its antennæ were, unlike the
harmless feelers of modern Crustacea, armed with powerful claws. Two
great eyes stood in the front of the head, and two smaller ones on the
top. It had four pairs of great serrated jaws, the largest as wide as
a man's hand. At the sides were a pair of powerful paddles, capable of
urging it swiftly through the water as it pursued its prey; and when
attacked by any predaceous fish, it could strike the water with its
broad tail, terminated by a great flat "telson," and retreat backward
with the rapidity of an arrow. Woodward says it must have been the
"shark of the Devonian seas;" rather, it was the great champion of the
more ancient family of the lobsters, set to arrest, if possible, the
encroachments of the coming sharks.
The Trilobites and Eurypterids constitute a hard case for the
derivationists. Unlike those Melchisedeks, the fishes of the Silurian,
which are without father or mother, the Devonian crustaceans may boast
of their descent, but they have no descendants. No distinct link
connects them with any modern crustaceans except the Limuli, or
horse-shoe crabs; and here the connection is most puzzling, for while
there seems some intelligible resemblance between the adult
Eurypterids and the horse-shoe, or king-crabs, the latter, in their
younger state, rather resemble Trilobites, as Dr. Packard has recently
shown. Thus the two great tribes of Eurypterids and Trilobites have
united in the small modern group of king-crabs, while on the other
hand, there are points of resemblance, as already stated, between
Trilobites and Isopods, and the king-crabs had already begun to exist,
since one species is now known in the Upper Silurian. So puzzling are
these various relationships, that one naturalist of the derivationist
school has recently attempted to solve the difficulty by suggesting
that the Trilobites are allied to the spiders! Thus nature sports with
our theories, showing us in some cases, as in the corals and fishes,
partnerships split up into individuals, and in others distinct lines
of being converging and becoming lost in one slender thread. Barrande,
the great palæontologist of Bohemia, has recently, in an elaborate
memoir on the Trilobites, traced these and other points through all
their structures and their whole succession in geological time thereby
elaborating a most powerful inductive argument against the theory of
evolution, and concluding that, so far from the history of these
creatures favouring such a theory, it seems as if expressly contrived
to exclude its possibility.
But, while the gigantic Eurypterids and ornate Trilobites of the
Devonian were rapidly approaching their end, a few despised little
crustaceans,--represented by the _Amphipeltis_ of New Brunswick and
_Kampecaris_ of Scotland,--were obscurely laying the foundation of a
new line of beings, that of the Stomapods, destined to culminate in
the Squillas and their allies, which, however different in structure,
are practically the Eurypterids of the modern ocean. So change the
dynasties of men and animals.
"Thou takest away their breath, they die,
They return to their dust;
Thou sendest forth Thy Spirit,
They are created;
Thou renewest the form of the earth."
The reign of fishes began in the Upper Silurian, for in the rocks of
this age, more especially in England, several species have been found.
They occur, however, only in the newer beds of this formation, and are
not of large size, nor very abundant. It is to be observed that, in so
far as the fragments discovered can be interpreted, they indicate the
existence already of two distinct types of fishes, the Ganoids, or
gar-fishes, protected with bony plates and scales, and the Placoids,
or shark-like fishes; and that in the existing world these fishes are
regarded as occupying a high place in their class. Further, these two
groups of fishes are those which throughout a large portion of
geological time continue to prevail to the exclusion of other types,
the ordinary bony fishes having been introduced only in comparatively
recent periods. With the Devonian, however, there comes a vast
increase to the finny armies; and so characteristic are these that the
Devonian has been called the age of fishes _par excellence_, and we
must try, with the help of our illustration, to paint these old
inhabitants of the waters as distinctly as we can. Among the most
ancient and curious of these fishes are those singular forms covered
with broad plates, of which the _Pteraspis_ of the Upper Silurian is
the herald, and which are represented in the Lower Devonian by several
distinct genera. Of these, one of the most curious is the
_Cephalaspis_, or buckler-head, distinguished by its broad flat head,
rounded in front and prolonged at the sides into two great spines,
which project far beyond the sides of the comparatively slender body.
This fish, it may be mentioned, is the type of a family highly
characteristic of the Lower Devonian, as well as of the Upper
Silurian, and all of which are provided with large plate-like cephalic
coverings, sometimes with a long snout in front, and, in so far as is
known, a comparatively weak body and tail. They were all probably
ground-living creatures, feeding on worms and shell-fishes, and
"rooting" for these in the mud, or burrowing therein for their safety.
In these respects they have a most curious analogy to the Trilobites,
which in habits they must have greatly resembled, though belonging by
their structure to an entirely different and much higher class. So
close is this resemblance, that their head-shields used to be mistaken
for those of Trilobites. The case is one of those curious analogies
which often occur in nature, and which must always be distinguished
from the true affinities which rest on structural resemblances.
Another group of small fishes, likewise cuirassed in bony armour of
plates, may be represented by the _Pterichthys_, with its two strong
bony fins at the sides, which may have served for swimming, but
probably also for defence, and for creeping on or shovelling up the
mud at the bottom of the sea. But, besides the Ganoids which were
armed in plated cuirasses, there were others, active and voracious,
clad in shining enamelled scales, like the bony pikes of the American
rivers and the _Polypterus_ of the Nile. Some of these, like the
_Diplacanthus_, or "double-spine" were of small size, and chiefly
remarkable for their sharp defensive bony spines. Others, like
_Holoptychius_ (wrinkled-scale) and _Osteolepis_ (bone-scale), were
strongly built, and sometimes of great size. One Russian species of
_Asterolepis_ (star-scale) is supposed to have been twenty feet in
length, and furnished with strong and trenchant teeth in two rows.
These great fishes afford a good reason for the spines and
armour-plates of the contemporary trilobites and smaller fishes. Just
as man has been endeavouring to invent armour impenetrable to shot,
for soldiers and for ships, and, on the other hand, shot and shells
that can penetrate any armoury so nature has always presented the
spectacle of the most perfect defensive apparatus matched with the
most perfect weapons for destruction. In the class of fishes, no age
of the world is more eminent in these respects then the Devonian.[M]
In addition to these fishes, there were others, represented
principally by their strong bony spines, which must have been allied
to some of the families of modern sharks, most of them, however,
probably to that comparatively harmless tribe which, furnished with
flat teeth, prey upon shell-fishes. There are other fishes difficult
to place in our systems of classification; and among these an eminent
example is the huge _Dinichthys_ of Newberry, from the Hamilton group
of Ohio. The head of this creature is more then three feet long and
eighteen inches broad, with the bones extraordinarily strong and
massive. In the upper jaw, in addition to strong teeth, there were in
front two huge sabre-shaped tusks or incisors, each nearly a foot
long; and corresponding to these in the massive lower jaw were two
closely joined conical tusks, fitting between those of the upper jaw.
No other fish presents so frightful an apparatus for destruction; and
if, as is probable, this was attached to a powerful body, perhaps
thirty feet in length, and capable of rapid motion through the water,
we cannot imagine any creature so strong or so well armed as to cope
with the mighty _Dinichthys_.
[M] Many of these were discovered and successfully displayed and
described by Hugh Miller, and are graphically portrayed in his
celebrated work on the "Old Red Sandstone," published in 1841.
The difference between the fishes of the Devonian and those of the
modern seas is well marked by the fact that, while the ordinary bony
fishes now amount to probably 9,000 species, and the ganoid fishes to
less then thirty, the finny tribes of the Devonian are predominantly
ganoids, and none of the ordinary type are known. To what is this
related, with reference to conditions of existence? Two explanations,
different yet mutually connected, may be suggested. One is that armour
was especially useful in the Devonian as a means of defence from the
larger predaceous species, and the gigantic crustaceans of the period.
that this was the case may be inferred from the conditions of
existence of some modern ganoids. The common bony pike of Canada
(_Lepidosteus_), frequenting shallow and stagnant waters, seems to be
especially exposed to injury from its enemies. Consequently, while it
is rare to find an ordinary fish showing any traces of wounds, a large
proportion of the specimens of the bony pike which I have examined
have scars on their scales, indicating injuries which they have
experienced, and which possibly, to fishes not so well armed, might
have proved fatal. Again, in the modern Amia, or mud-fish, in the bony
pike and _Polypterus_, there is an extremely large air-bladder, amply
supplied with blood-vessels, and even divided into cells or chambers,
and communicating with the mouth by an "air-duct." This organ is
unquestionably in function a lung, and enables the animal to dispense
in some degree with the use of its gills, which of course depend for
their supply of vital air on the small quantity of oxygen dissolved in
the water. Hence, by the power of partially breathing air, these
fishes can live in stagnant and badly aerated waters, where other
fishes would perish. In the case of the _Amia_, the grunting noises
which it utters, its habit of frequenting the muddy creeks of swamps,
and its possession of gill-cleaners, correspond with this view. It is
possible that the Devonian fishes possessed this semi-reptilian
respiration; and if so, they would be better adapted then other fishes
to live in water contaminated with organic matter in a state of decay,
or in waters rich in carbonic acid or deficient in oxygen. Possibly
the palæozoic waters, as well as the palæozoic atmosphere, were less
rich in pure oxygen then those of the present world; and it is certain
that, in many of the beds in which the smaller Devonian fishes abound,
there was so much decaying vegetable matter as to make it probable
that the water was unfit for the ordinary fishes. Thus, though at
first sight the possession of external armour and means to respire
air, in the case of these peculiar fishes, may seem to have no direct
connection with each other, their obvious correlation in some modern
ganoids may have had its parallel on a more extensive scale among
their ancient relatives. Just as the modern gar-fish, by virtue of its
lungs, can live in stagnant shallows and hunt frogs, but on that
account needs strong armour to defend it against the foes that assail
it in such places; so in the Devonian the capacity to inhabit
unaërated water and defensive plates and scales may have been alike
necessary, especially to the feebler tribes of fishes. We shall find
that in the succeeding carboniferous period there is equally good
evidence of this.
We have reserved little space for the Devonian plants and insects; but
we may notice both in a walk through a Devonian forest, in which we
may include the vegetation of the several subordinate periods into
which this great era was divisible. The Devonian woods were probably,
like those of the succeeding carboniferous period, dense and dark,
composed of but few species of plants, and these somewhat monotonous
in appearance, and spreading out into broad swampy jungles,
encroaching on the shallow bays and estuaries. Landing on one of these
flats, we may first cast our eyes over a wide expanse, covered with
what at a distance we might regard as reeds or rushes. But on a near
approach they appear very different; rising in slender, graceful
stems, they fork again and again, and their thin branches are sparsely
covered with minute needle-like leaves, while the young shoots curl
over in graceful tresses, and the older are covered with little oval
fruits, or spore-cases; for these plants are cryptogamous, or
flowerless. This singular vegetation stretches for miles along the
muddy flats, and rises to a height of two or three feet from a knotted
mass of cylindrical roots or root-stocks, twining like snakes through
and over the soil. This plant may, according as we are influenced by
its fruit or structure, be regarded as allied to the modern
club-mosses or the modern pill-worts. It is _Psilophyton_, in every
country one of the most characteristic plants of the period, though,
when imperfectly preserved, often relegated by careless and unskilled
observers to the all-engulfing group of fucoids. A little further
inland we see a grove of graceful trees, forking like _Psilophyton_,
but of grander dimensions, and with the branches covered with linear
leaves, and sometimes terminated by cones. These are _Lepidodendra_,
gigantic club-mosses, which were developed to still greater
dimensions in the coal period. Near these we may see a still more
curious tree, more erect in its growth, with rounded and somewhat
rigid leaves and cones of different form, and with huge cable-like
roots, penetrating the mud, and pitted with the marks of long
rootlets. This is _Cyclostigma_, a plant near to the _Lepidodendron_,
but distinct, and peculiar to the Devonian. Some of its species attain
to the dimensions of considerable trees; others are small and shrubby.
Another small tree, somewhat like the others, but with very long
shaggy leaves, and its bark curiously marked with regular
diamond-shaped scars, is the _Leptophleum_. All these plants are
probably allied to our modern club-mosses, which are, however, also
represented by some low and creeping species cleaving to the ground. A
little further, and we reach a dense clump of _Sigillariæ_, with tall
sparsely forking stems, and ribbed with ridges holding rows of
leaf-scars a group of plants which we shall have further occasion to
notice in the coal formation; and here is an extensive jungle of
_Calamites_, gigantic and overgrown mares'-tails, allies of the modern
equisetums.
[Illustration: Fig. 12.--VEGETATION OF THE DEVONIAN.
To the left are _Calamites_; next to these, _Leptophleum_; in the
centre are _Lepidodendron_, _Sigillaria_, and a Pine. Below are
_Psilophyton_, _Cordaites_, Ferns, and _Asterophyllites_.]
Amidst these trees, every open glade is filled with delicate ferns of
marvellous grace and beauty; and here and there a tree-fern rears its
head, crowned with its spreading and graceful leaves, and its trunk
clad with a shaggy mass of aërial roots--an old botanical device, used
in these ancient times, as well as now, to strengthen and protect the
stems of trees not fitted for lateral expansion. Beyond this mass of
vegetation, and rising on the slopes of the distant hills, we see
great trees that look like pines. We cannot approach them more nearly;
but here on the margin of a creek we see some drift-trunks, that have
doubtless been carried down by a land flood. One of them is certainly
a pine, in form and structure of its wood very like those now living
in the southern hemisphere; it is a _Dadoxylon_. Another is different,
its sides rough and gnarled, and marked with huge irregular ridges;
its wood loose, porous, and stringy, more like the bark of modern
pines, yet having rings of growth and a true bark of its own, and
sending forth large branches and roots. It is the strange and
mysterious _Prototaxites_, one of the wonders of the Devonian land,
and whose leaves and fruits would be worth their weight in gold in our
museums, could we only procure them. A solitary fragment further
indicates that in the yet unpenetrated solitudes of the Devonian
forests there may be other trees more like our ordinary familiar
friends of the modern woods; but of these we know as yet but little.
What inhabitants have these forests? All that we yet know are a few
large insects, relatives of our modern May-flies, flitting with broad
veined wings over the stagnant waters in which their worm-like larvæ
dwell, and one species at least assuming one of the properties of the
grasshopper tribe, and enlivening the otherwise silent groves with a
cricket-like chirp, the oldest music of living things that geology as
yet reveals to us; and this, not by the hearing of the sound itself,
but by the poor remains of the instrument attached to a remnant of a
wing from the Devonian shales of New Brunswick.
A remarkable illustration of the abundance of certain plants in the
Devonian, and also of the slow and gradual accumulation of some of its
beds, is furnished by layers of fossil spore-cases, or the minute sacs
which contain the microscopic germs of club-mosses and similar plants.
In the American forests, in spring, the yellow pollen-grains of
spruces and pines sometimes drift away in such quantities in the
breeze that they fall in dense showers, popularly called showers of
sulphur; and this vegetable sulphur, falling in lakes and ponds, is
drifted to the shore in great sheets and swathes. The same thing
appears to have occurred in the Devonian, not with the pollen of
flowering plants, but with the similar light spores and spore-cases of
species of Lepidodendron and allied trees. In a bed of shale, at
Kettle Point, Lake Huron, from 12 to 14 feet thick, not only are the
surfaces of the beds dotted over with minute round spore-cases, but,
on making a section for the microscope, the substance of each layer is
seen to be filled with them; and still more minute bodies, probably
the escaped spores, are seen to fill up their interstices. The
quantity of these minute bodies is so great that the shale is
combustible, and burns with much flame. A bed of this nature must have
been formed in shallow and still water, on the margin of an extensive
jungle or forest; and as the spore-cases are similar to those of the
Lepidodendra of the coal-measures, the trees were probably of this
kind. Year after year, as the spores became ripe, they were wafted
away, and fell in vast quantities into the water, to be mixed with the
fine mud there accumulating. When we come to the coal period, we shall
see that such beds of spore-cases occur there also, and that they have
even been supposed to be mainly instrumental in the accumulation of
certain beds of coal. Their importance in this respect may have been
exaggerated, but the fact of their occurrence in immense quantities in
certain coals and shales is indisputable.
This is but a slender sketch of the Devonian forests: but we shall
find many of the same forms of plants in the carboniferous period
which succeeds. With one thought we may close. We are prone to ask for
reasons and uses for things, but sometimes we cannot be satisfied. Of
what use were the Devonian forests? They did not, like those of the
coal formation, accumulate rich beds of coal for the use of man.
Except possibly a few insects, we know no animals that subsisted on
their produce, nor was there any rational being to admire their
beauty. Their use, except as helping us in these last days to complete
the order of the vegetable kingdom as it has existed in geological
time, is a mystery. We can but fall back on that ascription of praise
to Him "who liveth for ever and ever," on the part of the heavenly
elders who cast down their crowns before the throne and say, "Thou art
worthy, Lord, to receive the glory, and the honour, and the might;
because Thou didst create all things, and by reason of _Thy will_ they
are and were created."
CHAPTER VI.
THE CARBONIFEROUS AGE.
That age of the world's history which, from its richness in
accumulations of vegetable matter destined to be converted into coal,
has been named the Carboniferous, is in relation to living beings the
most complete and noble of the Palæozoic periods. In it those varied
arrangements of land and water which had been increasing in perfection
in the previous periods, attained to their highest development. In it
the forms of animal and plant life that had been becoming more
numerous and varied from the Eozoic onward, culminated. The Permian
which succeeded was but the decadence of the Carboniferous,
preparatory to the introduction of a new order of things. Thus the
Carboniferous was to the previous periods what the Modern is to the
preceding Tertiary and Mesozoic ages the summation and completion of
them all, and the embodiment of their highest excellence. If the
world's history had closed with the Carboniferous, a naturalist,
knowing nothing further, would have been obliged to admit that it had
already fulfilled all the promise of its earlier years. It is
important to remember this, since we shall find ourselves entering on
an entirely new scene in the Mesozoic period, and since this
character of the Carboniferous, as well as its varied conditions and
products, may excuse us for dwelling on it a little longer then on the
others, On the other hand, the immense economic importance of the coal
formation, and the interesting points connected with it, have made the
Carboniferous more familiar to general readers then most other
geological periods, so that we may select points less common and
well-known for illustration. Popular expositions of geology are,
however, generally so one-sided and so distorted by the prevalent
straining after effect, that the true aspect of this age is perhaps
not much better known then that of others less frequently described.
Let us first consider the Carboniferous geography of the northern
hemisphere; and in doing so we may begin with a fact concerning the
preceding age. One of the most remarkable features of the Newer
Devonian is the immense quantity of red rocks, particularly red
sandstones, contained in it. Red sandstones, it is true, occur in
older formations, but comparatively rarely; their great head-quarters,
both in Europe and America, in so far as the Palæozoic is concerned,
are in the Upper Devonian. Now red sandstone is an infallible mark of
rapid deposition, and therefore of active physical change. If we
examine the grains of sand in a red sandstone, we shall find that they
are stained or coated, externally, with the peroxide of iron, or iron
rust; and that this coating, with perhaps a portion of the same
substance in the intervening cement, is the cause of the colour. In
finer sandstones and red clays the same condition exists, though less
distinctly perceptible. Consequently, if red sands and clays are long
abraded or scoured in water, or are subjected to any chemical agent
capable of dissolving the iron, they cease to be red, and resume their
natural grey or white colour. Now in nature, in addition to mechanical
abrasion, there is a chemical cause most potent in bleaching red
rocks, namely, the presence of vegetable or animal matter in a state
of decay. Without entering into chemical details, we may content
ourselves with the fact that organic matter decaying in contact with
peroxide of iron tends to take oxygen from it, and then to dissolve it
in the state of protoxide, while the oxygen set free aids the decay.
Carrying this fact with us, we may next affirm that iron is so
plentiful in the crust of the earth that nearly all sands and clays
when first produced from the weathering of rocks are stained with it,
and that when this weathering takes place in the air, the iron is
always in the state of peroxide. More especially does this apply to
the greater number of igneous or volcanic rocks, which nearly always
weather brown or red. Now premising that the original condition of
sediment is that of being reddened with iron, and that it may lose
this by abrasion, or by the action of organic matter, it follows that
when sand has been produced by decay of rocks in the air, and when it
is rapidly washed into the sea and deposited there, red beds will
result. For instance, in the Bay of Fundy, whose rapid tides cut away
the red rocks of its shores and deposit their materials quickly, red
mud and sand constitute the modern deposit. On the other hand, when
the red Band and mud are long washed about, their red matter may
disappear; and when the deposition is slow and accompanied with the
presence of organic matter, the red colour is not only removed, but is
replaced by the dark tints due to carbon. Thus, in the Gulf of St.
Lawrence, where red rocks similar to those of the Bay of Fundy are
being more slowly wasted, and deposited in the presence of sea-weeds
and other vegetable substances, the resulting sands and clays are
white and grey or blackened in colour. An intermediate condition is
sometimes observed, in which red beds are stained with grey spots and
lines, where sea-weeds or land-plants have rested on them. I have
specimens of Devonian red shale with the forms of fern leaves, the
substance of which has entirely perished, traced most delicately upon
them in greenish marks.
It follows from these facts that extensive and thick deposits of red
beds evidence sub-aërial decay of rocks, followed by comparatively
rapid deposition in water, and that such red rocks will usually
contain few fossils, not only because of their rapid deposition, but
because the few organic fragments deposited with them will probably
have been destroyed by the chemical action of the superabundant oxide
of iron, which, so to speak, "iron-moulds" them, just as stains of
iron eat holes out of linen. Now when Sir Roderick Murchison tells us
of 10,000 feet in thickness of red iron-stained rocks in the old red
sandstone of England, we can see in this the evidence of rapid aqueous
deposition, going on for a very long time, and baring vast areas of
former land surface. Consequently we have proof of changes of level
and immense and rapid denudation--a conclusion further confirmed by
the apparent unconformity of different members of the series to each
other in some parts of the British Islands, the lower beds having been
tilted up before the newer were deposited. Such was the state of
affairs very generally at the close of the Devonian, and it appears to
have been accompanied with some degree of subsidence of the land,
succeeded by re-elevation at the beginning of the Carboniferous, when
many and perhaps large islands and chains of islands were raised out
of the sea, along whose margins there were extensive volcanic
eruptions, evidenced by the dykes of trap traversing the Devonian, and
the beds of old lava interstratified in the lower part of the
Carboniferous, where also the occurrence of thick beds of conglomerate
or pebble-rock indicates the tempestuous action of the sea.
But a careful study of the Lower Carboniferous beds, where their
margins rest upon the islands of older rocks, shows great varieties in
these old shores. In some places there were shingly beaches; in
others, extensive sand-banks; in others, swampy flats clothed with
vegetation, and sometimes bearing peaty beds, still preserved as small
seams of coal. The bays and creeks swarmed with, fishes. A few
sluggish reptiles crept along the muddy or sandy shores, and out
sea-ward were great banks and reefs of coral and shells in the clear
blue sea. The whole aspect of nature, taken in a general view, in the
Older Carboniferous period, must have much resembled that at present
seen among the islands of the southern hemisphere. And the plants and
animals, though different, were more like those of the modern South
Pacific then any others now living.
As the age wore on, the continents were slowly lifted out of the
water, and the great continental plateaus were changed from coral seas
into swampy flats or low uplands, studded in many places with shallow
lakes, and penetrated with numerous creeks and sluggish streams. In
the eastern continent these land surfaces prevailed extensively, more
especially in the west; and in America they spread both eastward and
westward from the Appalachian ridge, until only a long north and south
Mediterranean, running parallel to the Rocky Mountains, remained of
the former wide internal ocean. On this new and low land, comparable
with the "Sylvas" of the South American continent, flourished the
wondrous vegetation of the Coal period, and were introduced the new
land animals, whose presence distinguishes the close of the Palæozoic.
After a vast lapse of time, in which only slow and gradual subsidence
occurred, a more rapid settlement of the continental areas brought the
greater part of the once fertile plains of the coal formation again
under the waters; and shifting sand-banks and muddy tides engulfed and
buried the remains of the old forests, and heaped on them a mass of
sediment, which, like the weights of a botanical press, flattened and
compressed the vegetable _débris_ preserved in the leaves of the coal
formation strata. Then came on that strange and terrible Permian
period, which, like the more modern boulder-formation, marked the
death of one age and the birth of another.
The succession just sketched is the normal one; but the terms in which
it has been described show that it cannot be universal. There are many
places in which the whole thickness of the Carboniferous is filled
with fossils of the land, and of estuaries and creeks. There are
places, on the other hand, where the deep sea appears to have
continued during the whole period. In America this is seen on the
grandest scale in the absence of the marine members along the western
slopes of the Appalachians, and the almost exclusive prevalence of
marine beds in the far west, where the great Carboniferous
Mediterranean of America spread itself, and continued uninterruptedly
into the succeeding Permian period.
In our survey of the Carboniferous age, though there are peculiarities
in the life of its older, middle, and newer divisions, we may take the
great coal measures of the middle portion as the type of the land life
of the period, and the great limestones of the lower portion as that
of the marine life; and as the former is in this period by far the
most important, we may begin with it. Before doing so, however, to
prevent misapprehension, it is necessary to remind the reader that the
Flora of the Middle Coal Period is but one of a succession of related
floras that reach from the Upper Silurian to the Permian. The meagre
flora of club-mosses and their allies in the Upper Silurian and Lower
Devonian was succeeded by a comparatively rich and varied assemblage
of plants in the Middle Devonian. The Upper Devonian was a period of
decadence, and in the Lower Carboniferous we have another feeble
beginning, presenting features somewhat different from those of the
Upper Devonian. This was the time of the Culm of Germany, the Tweedian
formation of the North of England and South of Scotland, and the Lower
Coal formation of Nova Scotia. It was a period eminently rich in
Lepidodendra. It was followed by the magnificent flora of the Middle
Coal formation, and then there was a time of decadence in the Upper
Coal formation and only a slight revival in the Permian.
In the present condition of our civilization, coal is the most
important product which the bowels of the earth afford to man. And
though there are productive beds of coal in most of the later
geological formations, down to the peats of the modern period, which
are only unconsolidated coals, yet the coal of the Carboniferous age
is the earliest valuable coal in point of time, and by far the most
important in point of quantity. Mineral coal may be defined to be
vegetable matter which has been buried in the strata of the earth's
crust, and there subjected to certain chemical and mechanical changes.
The proof of its vegetable origin will grow upon us as we proceed. The
chemical changes which it has undergone are not very material. Wood or
bark, taken as an example of ordinary vegetable matter, consists of
carbon or charcoal, with the gases hydrogen and oxygen. Coal has
merely parted with a portion of these ingredients in the course of a
slow and imperfect putrefaction, so that it comes to have much less
oxygen and considerably less hydrogen then wood, and it has been
blackened by the disengagement of a quantity of free carbon. The more
bituminous flaming coals have a larger amount of residual hydrogen. In
the anthracite coals the process of carbonisation has proceeded
further, and little remains but charcoal in a dense and compact form.
In cannel coals, and in certain bituminous shales, on the contrary,
the process seems to have taken place entirely under water, by which
putrefaction has been modified, so that a larger proportion then usual
of hydrogen has been retained. The mechanical change which the coal
has experienced consists in the flattening and hardening effect of the
immense pressure of thousands of feet of superincumbent rock, which
has crashed together the cell-walls of the vegetable matter, and
reduced what was originally a pulpy mass of cellular tissue to the
condition of a hard laminated rock. To understand this, perhaps the
simplest way is to compare under the microscope a transverse section
of recent pine-wood with a similar section of a pine trunk compressed
into brown coal or jet. In the one the tissue appears as a series of
meshes with thin woody walls and comparatively wide cavities for the
transmission of the sap. In the other the walls of the cells have been
forced into direct contact, and in some cases have altogether lost
their separate forms, and have been consolidated into a perfectly
compact structureless mass.
With regard to its mode of occurrence, coal is found in beds ranging
in vertical thickness from less then an inch to more then thirty feet,
and of wide horizontal extent. Many such beds usually occur in the
thickness of the coal formation, or "coal measures," as the miners
call it, separated from each other by beds of sandstone and compressed
clay or shale. Very often the coal occurs in groups of several beds,
somewhat close to each other and separated from other groups by
"barren measures" of considerable thickness. In examining a bed of
coal, where it is exposed in a cutting or shore cliff, we nearly
always find that the bed below it, or the "underclay," as it is termed
by miners, is a sort of fossil soil, filled with roots and rootlets.
On this rests the coal, which, when we examine it closely, is found to
consist of successive thin layers of hard coal of different qualities
as to lustre and purity, and with intervening laminae of a dusty
fibrous substance, like charcoal, called "mother coal" by miners, and
sometimes mineral charcoal. Thin partings of dark shale also occur,
and these usually present marks and impressions of the stems and
leaves of plants. Above the coal is its "roof" of hardened clay or
sandstone, and this generally holds great quantities of remains of
plants, and sometimes large stumps of trees with their bark converted
into coal, and the hollow once occupied with wood filled with
sandstone, while their roots spread over the surface of the coal. Such
fossil forests of erect stumps are also found at various levels in the
coal measures, resting directly on under-clays without any coals. A
bed of coal would thus appear to be a fossil bog or swamp.
This much being premised about the general nature of the sooty blocks
which fill our coal-scuttles, we may now transport ourselves into the
forests and bogs of the coal formation, and make acquaintance with
this old vegetation, while it still waved its foliage in the breeze
and drank in the sunshine and showers. We are in the midst of one of
those great low plains formed by the elevation of the former sea bed.
The sun pours down its fervent rays upon us, and the atmosphere, being
loaded with vapour, and probably more rich in carbonic acid then that
of the present world, the heat is as it were accumulated and kept near
the surface, producing a close and stifling atmosphere like that of a
tropical swamp. This damp and oppressive air is, however, most
favourable to the growth of the strange and grotesque trees which
tower over our heads, and to the millions of delicate ferns and
club-mosses, not unlike those of our modern woods, which carpet the
ground. Around us for hundreds of miles spreads a dense and monotonous
forest, with here and there open spaces occupied by ponds and sluggish
streams, whose edges are bordered with immense savannahs of reed-like
plants, springing from the wet and boggy soil. Everything bespeaks a
rank exuberance of vegetable growth; and if we were to dig downward
into the soil, we should find a thick bed of vegetable mould
evidencing the prevalence of such conditions for ages. But the time
will come when this immense flat will meet with the fate which in
modern times befell a large district at the mouth of the Indus.
Quietly, or with earthquake shocks, it will sink under the waters;
fishes and mollusks will swarm where trees grew, beds of sand and mud
will be deposited by the water, inclosing and preserving the remains
of the vegetation, and in some places surrounding and imbedding the
still erect trunks of trees. Many feet of such deposits may be formed,
and our forest surface, with its rich bed of vegetable mould, has been
covered up and is in process of transformation into coal; while in
course of time the shallow waters being filled up with deposit, or a
slight re-elevation occurring, a new forest exactly like the last will
flourish on the same spot. Such changes would be far beyond the
compass of the life even of a Methuselah; but had we lived in the Coal
period, we might have seen all stages of these processes
contemporaneously in different parts of either of the great
continents.
But let us consider the actual forms of vegetation presented to us in
the Coal period, as we can restore them from the fragments preserved
to us in the beds of sandstone and shale, and as we would have seen
them in our imaginary excursion through the Carboniferous forests. To
do this we must first glance slightly at the great subdivisions of
modern plants, which we may arrange in such a way as to give an easy
means for comparison of the aspects of the vegetable kingdom in
ancient and modern times. In doing this I shall avail myself of an
extract from a previous publication of my own on this subject.
"The modern flora of the earth admits of a grand twofold division into
the _Phænogamous_, or flowering and seed-bearing plants, and the
_Cryptogamous_, or flowerless and spore-bearing plants. In the former
series, we have, first, those higher plants which start in life with
two seed-leaves, and have stems with distinct bark, wood, and
pith--the _Exogens_; secondly, those similar plants which begin life
with one seed-leaf only, and have no distinction of bark, wood, and
pith, in the stem--the _Endogens_; and, thirdly, a peculiar group
starting with two or several seed-leaves, and having a stem with bark,
wood, and pith, but with very imperfect flowers, and wood of much
simpler structure then either of the others--the _Gymnosperms_. To the
first of these groups or classes belong most of the ordinary trees of
temperate climates. To the second belong the palms and allied trees
found in tropical climates. To the third belong the pines and cycads.
In the second or Cryptogamous series we have also three classes,--(1.)
The _Acrogens_, or ferns and club-mosses, with stems having true
vessels marked on the sides with cross-bars--the Scalariform vessels.
(2.) The _Anophytes_, or mosses and their allies, with stems and
leaves, but no vessels. (3.) The _Thallophytes_, or lichens, fungi,
sea-weeds, etc., without true stems and leaves.
"In the existing climates of the earth we find these classes of plants
variously distributed as to relative numbers. In some, pines
predominate. In others, palms and tree-ferns form a considerable part
of the forest vegetation. In others, the ordinary exogenous trees
predominate, almost to the exclusion of others. In some Arctic and
Alpine regions, mosses and lichens prevail. In the Coal period we have
found none of the higher Exogens, though one species is known in the
Devonian, and only a few obscure indications of the presence of
Endogens; but Gymnosperms abound, and are highly characteristic. On
the other hand, we have no mosses or lichens, and very few algæ, but a
great number of ferns and Lycopodiaceæ or club-mosses. Thus the coal
formation period is botanically a meeting-place of the lower
Phænogams and the higher Cryptogams, and presents many forms which,
when imperfectly known, have puzzled botanists in regard to their
position in one or other series. In the present world, the flora most
akin to that of the Coal period is that of moist and warm islands in
the southern hemisphere. It is not properly a tropical flora, nor is
it the flora of a cold region, but rather indicative of a moist and
equable climate. In accordance with this is the fact that the equable
but not warm climate of the southern hemisphere at present (which is
owing principally to its small extent of land) enables sub-tropical
plants to extend into high latitudes. In the Coal period this
uniformity was evidently still more marked, since we find similar
plants extending from regions within the Arctic circle to others near
to the tropics. Still we must bear in mind that we may often be
mistaken in reasoning as to the temperature required by extinct
species of plants differing from those now in existence. Further, we
must not assume that the climatal conditions of the northern
hemisphere were in the Coal period at all similar to those which now
prevail. As Sir Charles Lyell has argued, a less amount of land in the
higher latitudes would greatly modify climates, and there is every
reason to believe that in the Coal period there was less land then
now. It has been shown by Tyndall that a very small additional amount
of carbonic acid in the atmosphere would, by obstructing the radiation
of heat from the earth, produce almost the effect of a glass roof or
conservatory, extending over the whole world. There is much in the
structure of the leaves of the coal plants, as well as in the vast
amount of carbon which they accumulated in the form of coal, and the
characteristics of the animal life of the period, to indicate, on
independent grounds, that the Carboniferous atmosphere differed from
that of the present world in this way, or in the presence of more
carbonic acid--a substance now existing in the very minute proportion
of one-thousandth of the whole by weight, a quantity adapted to the
present requirements of vegetable and animal life, but probably not to
those of the Coal period."
Returning from this digression to the forests of the Coal period, we
may first notice that which is the most conspicuous and abundant tree
in the swampy levels--the Sigillaria or seal-tree, so called from the
stamp-like marks left by the fall of its leaves--a plant which has
caused much discussion as to its affinities. Some regard it as a
gymnosperm, others as a cryptogam. Most probably we have under this
name trees allied in part to both groups, and which, when better
known, may bridge over the interval between them. These trees present
tall pillar-like trunks, often ribbed vertically with raised bands,
and marked with rows of scars left by the fallen leaves. They are
sometimes branchless, or divide at top into a few thick limbs, covered
with long rigid grass-like foliage. On their branches they bear long
slender spikes of fruit, and we may conjecture that quantities of
nut-like seeds scattered over the ground around their trunks are
their produce. If we approach one of these trees closely, more
especially a young specimen not yet furrowed by age, we are amazed to
observe the accurate regularity and curious forms of the leaf-scars,
and the regular ribbing, so very different from that of our ordinary
forest trees. If we cut into its stem, we are still further astonished
at its singular structure. Externally it has a firm and hard rind.
Within this is a great thickness of soft cellular inner bark,
traversed by large bundles of tough fibres. In the centre is a core or
axis of woody matter very slender in proportion to the thickness of
the trunk, and still further reduced in strength by a large cellular
pith. Thus a great stem four or five feet in diameter is little else
then a mass of cellular tissue, altogether unfit to form a mast or
beam, but excellently adapted, when flattened and carbonised, to blaze
upon our winter hearth as a flake of coal. The roots of these trees
were perhaps more singular then their stems; spreading widely in the
soft soil by regular bifurcation, they ran out in long snake-like
cords, studded all over with thick cylindrical rootlets, which spread
from them in every direction. They resembled in form, and probably in
function, those cable-like root-stocks of the pond-lilies which run
through the slime of lakes, but the structure of the rootlets was
precisely that of those of some modern Cycads. It was long before
these singular roots were known to belong to a tree. They were
supposed to be the branches of some creeping aquatic plant, and
botanists objected to the idea of their being roots; but at length
their connection with Sigillaria was observed simultaneously by Mr.
Binney, in Lancashire, and by Mr. Richard Brown, in Cape Breton, and
it has been confirmed by many subsequently observed facts. This
connection, when once established, further explained the reason of the
almost universal occurrence of Stigmaria, as these roots were called,
under the coal beds; while trunks of the same plants were the most
abundant fossils of their partings and roofs. The growth of successive
generations of Sigillariæ was, in fact, found to be the principal
cause of the accumulation of a bed of coal. Two species form the
central figures in our illustration.
[Illustration: Fig. 13.--GROUP OF CARBONIFEROUS PLANTS, RESTORED FROM
ACTUAL SPECIMENS.
(_a_) Calamites (type of _C. Suckovii_). (_b_) Lepidofloios, or
Ulodendron. (_c_) Sigillaria (type of _S. reniformis_).
(_d_) (type of _S. elegans_). (_e_) Lepidodendron (type of
_L. corrugatum_). (_f_) Megaphyton (type of _M. magnificum_).
(_g_) Cordaites, or Pychnophyllum (type of _C. borassifolia_).]
Along with the trees last mentioned, we observe others of a more
graceful and branching form, the successors of those Lepidodendra
already noticed in the Devonian, and which still abound in the
Carboniferous, and attain to larger dimensions then their older
relations, though they are certainly more abundant and characteristic
in the lower portions of the carboniferous. Relatives, as already
stated, of our modern club-mosses, now represented only by
comparatively insignificant species, they constitute the culmination
of that type, which thus had attained its acme very long ago, though
it still continues to exist under depauperated forms. They all
branched by bifurcation, sometimes into the most graceful and delicate
sprays. They had narrow slender leaves, placed in close spirals on the
branches. They bore their spores in scaly cones. Their roots were
similar to Stigmaria in general appearance, though differing in
details. In the coal period there were several generic forms of these
plants, all attaining to the dimensions of trees. Like the Sigillariæ,
they contributed to the materials of the coal; and one mode of this
has recently attracted some attention. It is the accumulation of their
spores and spore-cases already referred to in speaking of the
Devonian, and which was in the Carboniferous so considerable as to
constitute an important feature locally in some beds of coal. A
similar modern accumulation of spore-cases of tree-ferns occurs in
Tasmania; but both in the Modern and the Carboniferous, such beds are
exceptional; though wherever spore-cases exist as a considerable
constituent of coal, from their composition they give to it a highly
bituminous character, an effect, however, which is equally produced by
the hard scales supporting the spores, and by the outer epidermal
tissues of plants when these predominate in the coal, more especially
by the thick corky outer bark of Sigillaria. In short, the corky
substance of bark and similar vegetable tissues, from its highly
carbonaceous character, its indestructibility, and its difficult
permeability by water carrying mineral matter in solution, is the best
of all materials for the production of coal; and the microscope shows
that of this the principal part of the coal is actually composed.
In the wide, open forest glades, tree-ferns almost precisely similar
to those of the modern tropics reared their leafy crowns. But among
them was one peculiar type, in which the fronds were borne in pairs
on opposite sides of the stem, leaving when they fell two rows of
large horseshoe-shaped scars marking the sides of the trunk.
Botanists, who have been puzzled with these plants almost as much as
with the Stigmaria, have supposed these scars to be marks of branches,
of cones, and even of aërial roots; but specimens in my collection
prove conclusively that the stem of this genus was a great caudex made
up of the bases of two rows of huge leaves cemented together probably
by intervening cellular tissue. As in the Devonian and in modern
times, the stems of the tree-ferns of the Carboniferous strengthened
themselves by immense bundles of cord-like aërial roots, which look
like enormous fossil brooms, and are known under the name Psaronius.
We have only time to glance at the vast brakes of tall Calamites which
fringe the Sigillaria woods, and stretch far sea-ward over tidal
flats. They were allied to modern Mares' Tails or Equisetums, but were
of gigantic size, and much more woody structure of stem. The Calamites
grew on wet mud and sand-flats, and also in swamps; and they appear to
have been especially adapted to take root in and clothe and mat
together soft sludgy material recently deposited or in process of
deposition. When the seed or spore of a Calamite had taken root, it
probably produced a little low whorl of leaves surrounding one small
joint, from which another and another, widening in size, arose,
producing a cylindrical stem, tapering to a point below. To
strengthen the unstable base, the lower joints, especially if the mud
had been accumulating around the plant, shot out long roots instead of
leaves, while secondary stems grew out of the sides at the surface of
the soil, and in time there was a stool of Calamites, with tufts of
long roots stretching downwards, like an immense brush, into the mud.
When Calamites thus grew on inundated flats, they would, by causing
the water to stagnate, promote the elevation of the surface by new
deposits, so that their stems gradually became buried; but this only
favoured their growth, for they continually pushed out new stems,
while the old buried ones shot out bundles of roots instead of regular
whorls of leaves.
The Calamites, growing in vast fields along the margins of the
Sigillaria forests, must have greatly protected these from the effects
of inundations, and by collecting the mud brought down by streams in
times of flood, must have done much to prevent the intrusion of earthy
deposits among the vegetable matter. Their chief office, therefore, as
coal-producers, seems to have been to form for the Sigillaria forests
those reedy fringes which, when inundations took place, would exclude
mud, and prevent that mixture of earthy matter in the coal which would
have rendered it too impure for use. Quantities of fragments of their
stems can, however, be detected by the microscope in most coals.
The modern Mares' Tails have thin-walled hollow stems, and some of the
gigantic calamites of the coal resembled them in this. But others, to
which the name _Calamodendron_, or Reed-tree, has been given, had
stems with thick woody walls of a remarkable structure, which, while
similar in plan to that of the Mares' Tails, was much more perfect in
its development. Professor Williamson has shown that there were forms
intervening between these extremes; and thus in the calamites and
calamodendrons we have another example of the exaltation in ancient
times of a type now of humble structure; or, in other words, of a
comprehensive type, low in the modern world, but in older periods
taking to itself by anticipation the properties afterward confined to
higher forms. The gigantic club-mosses of the Coal period constitute a
similar example, and it is very curious that both of these types have
been degraded in the modern world, though retaining precisely their
general aspect, while the tree-ferns contemporary with them in the
Palæozoic still survive in all their original grandeur.
Barely in the swampy flats, perhaps more frequently in the uplands,
grew great pines of several kinds; trees capable of doing as good
service for planks and beams as many of their modern successors, but
which lived before their time, and do not appear even to have aided
much in the formation of coal. These pines of the Coal-period seem to
have closely resembled some species still living in the southern
hemisphere; and, like the ferns, they present to us a vegetable type
which has endured through vast periods of time almost unchanged.
Indeed, in the Middle Devonian we have pines almost as closely
resembling those of the Modern world as do those of the Coal period.
It is in accordance with this long duration of the ferns and pines,
that they are plants now of world-wide distribution--suited to all
climates and stations. Capacity to exist under varied conditions is
near akin to capacity to survive cosmical changes. A botanist in the
strange and monstrous woods which we have tried to describe, would
probably have found many curious things among the smaller herbaceous
plants, and might have gathered several precursors of the modern
Exogens and Endogens which have not been preserved to us as fossils,
or are known only as obscure fragments. But incomplete though our
picture necessarily is, and obscured by the dust of time, it may serve
in some degree to render green to our eyes those truly primeval
forests which treasured up for our long winter nights the Palæozoic
sunshine, and established for us those storehouses of heat-giving
material which work our engines and propel our ships and carriages.
Truly they lived not in vain, both as realizing for us a type of
vegetation which otherwise we could not have imagined, and as
preparing the most important of all the substrata of our modern arts
and manufactures. In this last regard even the vegetable waste of the
old coal swamps was most precious to us, as the means of producing the
clay iron ores of the coal measures. I may close this notice of the
Carboniferous forests with a suggestive extract from a paper by
Professor Huxley in the _Contemporary Review_:--
"Nature is never in a hurry, and seems to have had always before her
eyes the adage, 'Keep a thing long enough, and you will find a use for
it.' She has kept her beds of coal for millions of years without being
able to find much use for them; she has sent them down beneath the
sea, and the sea-beasts could make nothing of them: she has raised
them up into dry land and laid the black veins bare, and still for
ages and ages there was no living thing on the face of the earth that
could see any sort of value in them; and it was only the other day, so
to speak, that she turned a new creature oat of her workshop, who by
degrees acquired sufficient wits to make a fire, and then to discover
that the black rock would burn.
"I suppose that nineteen hundred years ago, when Julius Cæsar was good
enough to deal with Britain as we have dealt with New Zealand, the
primeval Briton, blue with cold and woad, may have known that the
strange black stone, of which he found lumps here and there in his
wanderings, would burn, and so help to warm his body and cook his
food. Saxon, Dane, and Norman swarmed into the land. The English
people grew into a powerful nation, and Nature still waited for a
return for the capital she had invested in the ancient club-mosses.
The eighteenth century arrived, and with it James Watt. The brain of
that man was the spore out of which was developed the steam-engine,
and all the prodigious trees and branches of modern industry which
have grown out of this. But coal is as much an essential condition of
this growth and development as carbonic acid is for that of a
club-moss. Wanting the coal, we could not have smelted the iron needed
to make our engines, nor have worked our engines when we had got them.
But take away the engines, and the great towns of Yorkshire and
Lancashire vanish like a dream. Manufactures give place to agriculture
and pasture, and not ten men could live where now ten thousand are
amply supported.
"Thus all this abundant wealth of money and of vivid life is Nature's
investment in club-mosses and the like so long ago. But what becomes
of the coal which is burnt in yielding the interest? Heat comes out of
it, light comes out of it, and if we could gather together all that
goes up the chimney and all that remains in the grate of a
thoroughly-burnt coal fire, we should find ourselves in possession of
a quantity of carbonic acid, water, ammonia, and mineral matters,
exactly equal in weight to the coal. But these are the very matters
with which Nature supplied the club-moss which made the coal. She is
paid back principal and interest at the same time; and she straightway
invests the carbonic acid, the water, and the ammonia in new forms of
life, feeding with them the plants that now live. Thrifty Nature!
surely no prodigal, but most notable of housekeepers!"
All this is true and admirably put. Its one weak point is the poetical
personification of Nature as an efficient planner of the whole. Such
an imaginary goddess is a mere superstition, unknown alike to science
and theology. Surely it is more rational to hold that the mind which
can utilize the coal and understand the manner of its formation, is
itself made in the image and likeness of the Supreme Creative Spirit,
in whom we live and move and have our being, who knows the end from
the beginning, whose power is the origin of natural forces, whose
wisdom is the source of laws and correlations of laws, and whose great
plan is apparent alike in the order of nature of the Palæozoic world
and of the modern world, as well as in the relation of these to each
other.
In the Carboniferous, as in the Devonian age, insects existed, and in
greater numbers. The winged insects of the period, so far as known,
belong to three of the nine or ten orders into which modern insects
are usually divided. Conspicuous among them are representatives of our
well-known domestic pests the cockroaches, which thus belong
geologically to a very old family. The Carboniferous roaches had not
the advantage of haunting our larders, but they had abundance of
vegetable food in the rank forests of their time, and no doubt lived
much as the numerous wild out-of-door species of this family now do.
It is, however, a curious fact that a group of insects created so long
ago, should prove themselves capable of the kind of domestication to
which these creatures attain in our modern days; and that, had we
lived even so far back as the coal period, we might have been liable
to the attacks of this particular kind of pest. Another group,
represented by many species in the coal forests, was that of the
May-flies and shad-flies, or ephemeras, which spend their earlier days
under water, feeding on vegetable matter, and affording food to many
fresh-water fishes--a use which they no doubt served in the coal
period also. Some of them were giants in their way, being probably
seven inches in expanse of wing, and their larvæ must have been choice
morsels to the ganoid fishes, and would have afforded abundant bait
had there been anglers in those days. Another group of insects was
that of the weevils, a family of beetles, whose grubs must have found
plenty of nuts and fruits to devour, without attracting the wrathful
attentions of any gardener or orchardist.
A curious and exceptional little group of creatures in the present
world is that of the galley-worms or millipedes; wingless,
many-jointed, and many-footed crawlers, resembling worms, but more
allied to insects. These animals seem to have swarmed in the coal
forests, and perhaps attained their maximum numbers and importance in
this period, though they still remain, a relic of an ancient
comprehensive type. I have myself found specimens referred by Mr.
Scudder, a most competent entomologist, to two genera and five
species, in a few decayed fossil stumps in Nova Scotia, and several
others have been discovered in other parts of the world. It is not
wonderful that animals like these, feeding on decayed vegetable
matter, should have flourished in the luxuriant Sigillaria swamps. A
few species of scorpions and spiders, very like those of the modern
world, have been found in the coal measures, both in Europe and
America; so that while we know of no enemy of the Devonian insects
except the fishes, we know in addition to these in the Carboniferous
the spiders and their allies, and the smaller reptiles or batrachians
to be noticed in the sequel. With reference to the latter, it is a
curious fact that one of the first fragments of a winged insect found
in the coal-fields of America was a part of a head and some other
remains contained in the coprolites or excrementitious matter of one
of the smaller fossil reptiles. It is perhaps equally interesting that
this head shows one of the compound facetted eyes as perfectly
developed as those of any modern Neuropter, a group of insects
remarkable even in the present world for their large and complex
organs of vision. We may pause here to note that, just as in the
Primordial we already have the Trilobites presenting all the
modifications of which the type is susceptible, so in the
Carboniferous we have in the case of the terrestrial articulates a
similar fact--highly specialised forms like the beetles, the spiders,
and the scorpions, already existing along with comprehensive forms
like the millipedes. Let us formulate the law of creation which the
Primordial trilobites, the Devonian fishes, and the Carboniferous
club-mosses and insects have taught us: it is, that every new type
rapidly attains its maximum of development in magnitude and variety of
forms, and then remains stationary, or even retrogrades, in
subsequent ages. We may connect this with other laws in the sequel.
In the coal measures we also meet, for the first time in our ascending
progress, the land snails so familiar now in every part of the world,
and which are represented by two little species found in the coal
formation of Nova Scotia. The figures of these must speak for
themselves; but the fact of their occurrence here and the mode of
their preservation require some detailed mention. The great province
of the Mollusks we have carried with us since we met with the Lingulæ
in the Primordial, but all its members have been aquatic, and probably
marine. For the first time, in the Carboniferous period, snails emerge
from the waters, and walk upon the ground and breathe air; for, like
the modern land snails, these creatures no doubt had air-sacks instead
of gills. They come suddenly upon us--two species at once, and these
representing two distinct forms of the snail tribe, the elongated and
the rounded. They were very numerous. In the beds where they occur,
probably thousands of specimens, more or less perfect, could be
collected. Were they the first-born of land snails? It would be rash
to affirm this, more especially since in all the coal-fields of the
world no specimens have been found except at one locality in Nova
Scotia;[N] and in all the succeeding beds we meet with no more till we
have reached a comparatively modern time. Yet it is very unlikely
that these creatures were in the coal period limited to one country,
and that, after that period, they dropped out of existence for long
ages, and then reappeared. Still it may have been so.
[N] Bradley has recently announced the discovery of other species in
the coal-field of Illinois.
THE TWO OLDEST LAND SNAILS.
[Illustration: Fig. 14.--_Pupa Vetusta_, Dawson.
(_a_) Natural size, (_b_) Enlarged, (_c_) Apex, enlarged,
(_d_) Sculpture, magnified.]
[Illustration: Fig. 15.--_Conulus Priscus_, Carpenter.
(_a_) Specimen enlarged, (_b_) Sculpture, magnified.]
There are cases of geographical limitation quite as curious now. Here
again another peculiarity meets us. If these are really the oldest
land snails, it is curious that they are so small,--so much inferior
to many of their modern successors even in the same latitudes. The
climate of the coal period must have suited them, and there was plenty
of vegetable food, though perhaps not the richest or most tender.
There is no excuse for them in their outward circumstances. Why, then,
unlike so many other creatures, do they enter on existence in this
poor and sneaking way. We must here for their benefit modify in two
ways the statement broadly made in a previous chapter, that new types
come in under forms of great magnitude. First, we often have, in
advance of the main inroad of a new horde of animals, a few
insignificant stragglers as a sort of prelude to the rest--precursors
intimating beforehand what is to follow. We shall find this to be the
case with the little reptiles of the coal, and the little mammals of
the Trias, preceding the greater forms which subsequently set in.
Secondly, this seems to be more applicable in the case of land animals
then in the case of those of the waters. To the waters was the fiat to
bring forth living things issued. They have always kept to themselves
the most gigantic forms of life; and it seems as if new forms of life
entering on the land had to begin in a small way and took more time to
culminate.
The circumstances in which the first specimens of Carboniferous snails
and gally-worms were found are so peculiar and so characteristic of
the coal formation, that I must pause here to notice them, and to make
of them an introduction to the next group of creatures we have to
consider. In the coal formation in all parts of the world it is not
unusual, as stated already in a previous page, to find erect trees or
stumps of trees, usually Sigillariæ, standing where they grew; and
where the beds are exposed in coast cliffs, or road cuttings, or
mines, these fossil trees can be extracted from the matrix and
examined. They usually consist of an outer cylinder of coal
representing the outer bark, while the space within, once occupied by
the inner bark and wood, is filled with sandstone, sometimes roughly
arranged in layers, the lowest of which is usually mixed with coaly
matter or mineral charcoal derived from the fallen remains of the
decayed wood, a kind of deposit which affords to the fossil botanist
one of the best modes of investigating the tissues of these trees.
These fossil stumps are not uncommon in the roofs of the coal-seams.
In some places they are known to the miners as "coal pipes," and are
dreaded by them in consequence of the accidents which occur from their
suddenly falling after the coal which supported them has been removed.
An old friend and helper of mine in Carboniferous explorations had a
lively remembrance of the fact that one of these old trees, falling
into the mine in which he was working, had crushed his leg and given
him a limp for life; and if he had been a few inches nearer to it
would have broken his back.
The manner in which such trees become fossilized may be explained as
follows:--Imagine a forest of Sigillariæ growing on a low flat. This
becomes submerged by subsidence or inundation, the soil is buried
under several feet of sand or mud, and the trees killed by this agency
stand up as bare and lifeless trunks. The waters subside, and the
trees rapidly decay, the larvæ of wood-boring insects perhaps aiding
in the process, as they now do in the American woods. The dense coaly
outer bark alone resists decomposition, and stands as a hollow
cylinder until prostrated by the wind or by the waters of another
inundation, while perhaps a second forest or jungle has sprung up on
the new surface. When it falls, the part buried in the soil becomes an
open hole, with a heap of shreds of wood and bark in the bottom. Such
a place becomes a fit retreat for gally-worms and land-snails; and
reptiles pursuing such animals, or pursued by their own enemies, or
heedlessly scrambling among the fallen trunks, may easily fall into
such holes and remain as prisoners. I remember to have observed, when
a boy, a row of post-holes dug across a pasture-field and left open
for a few days, and that in almost every hole one or two toads were
prisoners. This was the fate which must have often befallen the
smaller reptiles of the coal forests in the natural post-holes left by
the decay of the Sigillariæ. Yet it may be readily understood that the
combination of circumstances which would effect this result must have
been rare, and consequently this curious fact has been as yet observed
only in the coal formation of Nova Scotia; and in it only in one
locality, and in this in one only out of more then sixty beds in
which erect trees have been found. But these hollow trees must be
filled up in order to preserve their contents; and as inundation and
subsequent decay have been the grave-diggers for the reptiles, so
inundations filled up their graves with sand, to be subsequently
hardened into sandstone, burying up at the same time the newer
vegetation which had grown upon the former surface. The idea that
something interesting might be found in these erect stumps, first
occurred to Sir C. Lyell and the writer while exploring the beautiful
coast cliffs of Western Nova Scotia in 1851; and it was in examining
the fragments scattered on the beach that we found the bones of the
first Carboniferous reptile discovered in America, and the shell of
the oldest known land snail.
These were not, however, the earliest known instances of Carboniferous
reptiles. In 1841, Sir William Logan found footprints of a reptile at
Horton Bluff, in Nova Scotia, in rocks of Lower Carboniferous age. In
1844, Von Dechen found reptilian bones in the coal-field of Saarbruck;
and in the same year Dr. King found reptilian footprints in the
Carboniferous of Pennsylvania. Like Robinson Crusoe on his desert
island, we saw the footprints before we knew the animals that produced
them; and the fact that there were marks on a slab of shale or
sandstone that must have been made by an animal walking on feet, was
as clear and startling a revelation of the advent of a new and higher
form of life, as were the footprints of Man Friday. Within the thirty
years since the discovery of the first slab of footprints, the
knowledge of coal formation reptiles has grown apace. I can scarcely
at present sum up exactly the number of species, but may estimate it
at thirty-five at least. I must, however, here crave pardon of some of
my friends for the use of the word reptile. In my younger days frogs
and toads and newts used to be reptiles; now we are told that they are
more like fishes, and ought to be called Batrachians or Amphibians,
whereas reptiles are a higher type, more akin to birds then to these
lower and more grovelling creatures. The truth is, that the old class
Reptilia bridges over the space between the fishes and the birds, and
it is in some degree a matter of taste whether we make a strong line
at the two ends of it alone, or add another line in the middle. I
object to the latter course, however, in the period of the world's
history of which I am now writing, since I am sure that there were
animals in those days which were batrachians in some points and true
reptiles in others; while there are some of them in regard to which it
is quite uncertain whether they are nearer to the one group or the
other. Although, therefore, naturalists, with the added light and
penetration which they obtain by striding on to the Mesozoic and
Modern periods, may despise my old-fashioned grovellers among the mire
of the coal-swamps, I shall, for convenience, persist in calling them
reptiles in a general way, and shall bring out whatever claims I can
to justify this title for some of them at least.
Perhaps the most fish-like of the whole are the curious creatures from
the coal measures of Saarbruck, first found by Yon Dechen, and which
constitute the genus _Archegosaurus_. Their large heads, short necks,
supports for permanent gills, feeble limbs, and long tails for
swimming, show that they were aquatic creatures presenting many points
of resemblance to the ganoid fishes with which they must have
associated; still they were higher then these in possessing lungs and
true feet, though perhaps better adapted for swimming then even for
creeping.
From these creatures the other coal reptiles diverge, and ascend along
two lines of progress, the one leading to gigantic crocodile-like
animals provided with powerful jaws and teeth, and probably haunting
the margins of the waters and preying on fishes; the other leading to
small and delicate lizard-like species, with well-developed limbs,
large ribs, and ornate horny scales and spines, living on land and
feeding on insects and similar creatures.
[Illustration: Fig. 16.--RESTORATIONS OF BAPHETES, DENDRERPETON.
HYLONOMUS, AND HYLERPETON, WITH CARBONIFEROUS PLANTS IN THE DISTANCE.]
In the first direction we have a considerable number of species found
in the Jarrow coal-field in Ireland, and described by Professor
Huxley. Some of them were like snakes in their general form, others
more like lizards. Still higher stand such animals as _Baphetes_ and
_Eosaurus_ from the Nova Scotia coal-field and _Anthracosaurus_ from
that of Scotland. The style and habits of these creatures it is easy
to understand, however much haggling the comparative anatomists may
make over their bones. They were animals of various size, ranging
from a foot to at least ten feet in length, the body generally
lizard-like in form, with stout limbs and a flattened tail useful in
swimming. Their heads were flat, stout, and massive, with large teeth,
strengthened by the insertion and convolution of plates of enamel. The
fore limbs were probably larger then the hind limbs, the better to
enable them to raise themselves out of the water. The belly was
strengthened by bony plates and closely imbricated scales, to resist,
perhaps, the attacks of fishes from beneath, and to enable them
without injury to drag their heavy bodies over trunks of trees and
brushwood, whether in the water or on the land. Their general aspect
and mode of life were therefore by no means unlike those of modern
alligators; and in the vast swamps of the coal measures, full of ponds
and sluggish streams swarming with fish, such creatures must have
found a most suitable habitat, and probably existed in great numbers,
basking on the muddy banks, surging through the waters, and filling
the air with their bellowings. The most curious point about these
creatures is, that while rigid anatomy regards them as allied in
structure more to frogs and toads and newts then to true lizards, it
is obvious to common sense that they were practically crocodiles; and
even anatomy must admit that their great ribs and breastplates, and
powerful teeth and limbs, indicate a respiration, circulation, and
general vitality, quite as high as those of the proper reptiles.
Hence, it happens that very different views are stated as to their
affinities; questions into which we need not now enter, satisfied with
the knowledge of the general appearance and mode of life of these
harbingers of the reptilian life of the succeeding geological periods.
In the other direction, we find several animals of small size but
better developed limbs, leading to a group of graceful little
creatures, quite as perplexing with regard to affinities as those
first mentioned, but tending towards the smaller lizards of the
modern world. At the top of these I may place the genus _Hylonomus_
from hollow fossil trees of Nova Scotia, of which two species are
represented as restored in our illustration. In these restorations I
have adhered as faithfully as possible to the proportions of parts as
seen in my specimens. Imagine a little animal six or seven inches
long, with small short head, not so flat as those of most lizards, but
with a raised fore-head, giving it an aspect of some intelligence. Its
general form is that of a lizard, but with the hind feet somewhat
large, to aid it in leaping and standing erect, and long and flexible
toes. Its belly is covered with bony scales, its sides with bright and
probably coloured scale armour of horny consistency, and its neck and
back adorned with horny crests, tubercles, and pendants. It runs,
leaps, and glides through the herbage of the coal forests, intent on
the pursuit of snails and insects, its eye glancing and its bright
scales shining in the sun. This is a picture of the best known species
of Hylonomus drawn from the life. Yet the anatomist, when he examines
the imperfectly-ossified joints of its backbone, and the double joint
at the back of its skull, will tell you that it is after all little
better then a mere newt, an ass in a lion's skin, a jackdaw with
borrowed feathers, and that it has no right to have fine scales, or to
be able to run on the land. It may be so; but I may plead in its
behalf, that in the old coal times, when reptiles with properly-made
skeletons had not been created, the next best animals may have been
entitled to wear their clothes and to assume their functions as well.
In short, functionally or officially, our ancient batrachians were
reptiles; in point of rank, as measured by type of skeleton, they
belonged to a lower grade. To this view of the case I think most
naturalists will agree, and they will also admit that the progress of
our views has been in this direction, since the first discovery of
Carboniferous air-breathing vertebrates. In evidence of this I may
quote from Professor Huxley's description of his recently found
species,[O] After noticing the prevalent views that the coal reptiles
were of low organization, he says: "Discoveries in the Nova Scotia
coal-fields first shook this view, which ceased to be tenable when the
great _Anthracosaurus_ of the Scotch coal-field was found to have
well-ossified biconcave vertebrae."
[O] _Geological Magazine_, vol. iii.
The present writer may, however, be suspected of a tendency to extend
forms of life backward in time, since it has fallen to his lot to be
concerned in this process of stretching backward in several cases. He
has named and described the oldest known animal. He has described the
oldest true exogen, and the oldest known pine-tree. He was concerned
in the discovery of the oldest known land snails, and found the oldest
millipedes. He has just described the oldest bituminous bed composed
of spore-cases, and he claims that his genus Hylonomus includes the
oldest animals which have a fair claim to be considered reptiles.
Still this discovery of old things comes rather of fortune and careful
search then of a desire to innovate; and a distinction should be drawn
between that kind of novelty which consists in the development of new
truths, and that which consists in the invention of new fancies, or
the revival of old ones. There is too much of this last at present;
and it would be a more promising line of work for our younger
naturalists, if they would patiently and honestly question nature,
instead of trying to extort astounding revelations by throwing her on
the rack of their own imaginations.
We may pause here a moment to contemplate the greatness of the fact we
have been studying the introduction into our world of the earliest
known vertebrate animals which could open their nostrils and literally
"breathe the breath of life." All previous animals that we know,
except a few Devonian insects, had respired in the water by means of
gills or similar apparatus, Now we not only have the little land
snails, with their imperfect substitutes for lungs, but animals which
must have been able to draw in the vital air into capacious chambered
lungs, and with this power must have enjoyed a far higher and more
active style of vitality; and must have possessed the faculty of
uttering truly vocal sounds. What wondrous possibilities unknown to
these creatures, perhaps only dimly perceived by such rational
intelligences as may have watched the growth of our young world, were
implied in these gifts. It is one of the remarkable points in the
history of creation in Genesis, that this step of the creative work is
emphatically marked. Of all the creatures we have noticed up to this
point, it is stated that God said, "Let the waters bring them
forth"--but it is said that "God created" great reptiles
(_tanninim_).[P] No doubt these "great tanninim" culminate in the
succeeding Mesozoic age, but their first introduction dates as far
back as the Carboniferous; and this introduction was emphatically a
creation, as being the commencement of a new feature among living
beings. What further differences may be implied in the formulæ, "Let
the waters produce" and "God created," we do not know; very probably
he who wrote the words did not fully know. But if we could give a
scientific expression to this difference, and specify the cases to
which its terms apply, we might be able to solve one of the most vexed
questions of biology.
[P] Not "whales," as in our version.
Let us observe, however, that even here, where, if anywhere, we have
actual creation, especial pains are taken to bridge over the gap, and
to prevent any appearance of discontinuity in the work. The ganoid
fishes of the coal period very probably had, like their modern
congeners, well-developed air-bladders, serving to some extent, though
very imperfectly, as lungs. The humbler and more aquatic reptiles of
the period retained the gills, and also some of the other features of
the fishes; so that, like some modern creatures of their class, they
stood, as to respiration, on two stools, and seemed unwilling
altogether to commit themselves to the new mode of life in the
uncongenial element of air. Even the larger and more lizard-like of
the coal reptiles may--though this we do not certainly know, and in
some cases there are reasons for doubting it--have passed the earliest
stage of their lives in the water as gilled tadpoles, in the manner of
our modern frogs. Thus at the very point where one of the greatest
advances of animal life has its origin, we have no sudden stop, but an
inclined plane; and yet, as I have elsewhere endeavoured to show by
arguments which cannot be repeated here,[Q] we have not a shadow of
reason to conclude that, in the coal period, fishes were transmuted
into reptiles.
[Q] "Air-breathers of the Coal Period," p. 77.
But the reader may be wearied with our long sojourn in the
pestilential atmosphere of the coal swamps, and in the company of
their low-browed and squalid inhabitants. Let us turn for a little to
the sea, and notice the animal life of the great coral reefs and shell
beds preserved for us in the Carboniferous limestone. Before doing so,
one point merits attention. The coal formation for the first time
distinctly presents to us the now familiar differences in the
inhabitants of the open sea and those of creeks, estuaries and lakes.
Such distinctions are unknown to us in the Silurian. There all is sea.
They begin to appear in the Devonian, in the shallow fish-banks and
the Anodon-like bivalves found with fossil plants. In the coal period
they become very manifest. The animals found in the shales with the
coal are all, even the aquatic ones, distinct from those of the open
seas of the period. Some of them may have lived in salt or brackish
water, but not in the open sea. They are creatures of still and
shallow waters. It is true that in some coal-fields marine beds occur
in the coal measures with their characteristic fossils, but these are
quite distinct from the usual animal remains of the coal-fields, and
mark occasional overflows of the sea, owing to subsidence of the land.
It is important to notice this geographical difference, marking the
greater specialisation and division of labour, if we may so speak,
that was in the process of introduction.
The sea of the Carboniferous period presented in the main similar
great groups of animals to those of the Devonian, represented however
by different species. We may notice merely some of the salient points
of resemblance or difference. The old types of corals continue in
great force; but it is their last time, for they rapidly decay in the
succeeding Permian and disappear. The Crinoids are as numerous and
beautiful as in any other period, and here for the first time we meet
with the new and higher type of the sea-urchin, in large and beautiful
species. One curious group, that of the _Pentremites_, a sort of
larval form, is known here alone. Among the lamp-shells we may note,
as peculiarly and abundantly Carboniferous, those with one valve very
convex and the other very concave and anchored in the mud by long
spines instead of a peduncle attached to stones and rocks.[R] There
are many beautiful shells allied to modern scallops, and not a few
sea-snails of various sorts. The grand _Orthoceratites_ of the
Silurian diminish in size preparatory to their disappearance in the
Permian, and the more modern type of _Nautilus_ and its allies becomes
prevalent. Among the Crustaceans we may notice the appearance of the
_Limulus_, or king-crab, of which the single little species described
by Woodward from the Upper Silurian may be regarded as merely a
prophecy. It is curious that the Carboniferous king-crabs are very
small, apparently another case of a new form appearing in humble
guise; but as the young of modern king-crabs haunt creeks and swampy
flats, while the adults live in the sea, it may be that only the young
of the Carboniferous species are yet known to us, the specimens found
being mostly in beds likely to be frequented by the young rather then
by the full-grown individuals.
[R] The Productidæ.
The old order of the Trilobites, which has accompanied us from
Primordial times, here fails us, and a few depauperated species alone
remain, the sole survivors of their ancient race--small, unornamented,
and feeble representatives of a once numerous and influential tribe.
How strange that a group of creatures so numerous and apparently so
well adapted to conditions of existence which still continue in the
sea, should thus die out, while the little bivalved crustaceans, which
began life almost as far back and lived on the same sea-floors with
the Trilobites, should still abound in all our seas; and while the
king-crabs, of precisely similar habits with the Trilobites, should
apparently begin to prosper. Equally strange is the fate of the great
swimming Eurypterids which we saw in the Devonian. They also continue,
but in diminished force, in the Carboniferous, and there lay down for
ever their well-jointed cuirasses and formidable weapons, while a few
little shrimp-like creatures, their contemporaries, form the small
point of the wedge of our great tribes of squillas and crabs and
lobsters. Some years ago the late lamented palæontologist, Salter, a
man who scarcely leaves his equal in his department, in conjunction
with Mr. Henry Woodward, prepared a sort of genealogical chart of the
Crustacea on which these facts are exhibited. Some new species have
since been discovered, and a little additional light about affinities
has been obtained; but taken as it stands, the history of the
Crustacea as there shown in one glance, has in it more teaching on the
philosophy of creation then I have been able to find in many ponderous
quartos of tenfold its pretensions. Had Salter been enabled, with the
aid of other specialists like Woodward, to complete similar charts of
other classes of invertebrate animals, scientific palaeontology in
England would have been further advanced then it is likely to be in
the next ten years.
To return to our Trilobites: one of the most remarkable points in
their history is their appearance in full force in the Primordial. In
these rocks we have some of the largest in size--some species of
Paradoxides being nearly two feet long, and some of the very smallest.
We have some with the most numerous joints, others with the fewest;
some with very large tails, others with very small; some with no
ornamentation, others very ornate; some with large eyes, others with
none that have been made out, though it is scarcely probable that they
were wholly blind. They increased in numbers and variety through the
Silurian and Devonian, and then suddenly drop off at the end of the
Lower Carboniferous. Throughout their whole term of existence they
kept rigidly to that type of the mud-plough which the king-crab still
retains, and which renders the anterior extremity so different from
that of the ordinary Crustacea. They constitute one of the few cases
in which we seem to see before us the whole history of an animal type;
and the more we look into that history, the more do we wonder at their
inscrutable introduction, the unity and variety mingled in their
progress, and their strange and apparently untimely end. I have
already referred (page 95) to the use which Barrande makes of this as
an argument against theories of evolution; but must refer to his work
for the details.
One word more I must say before leaving their graves. I have reason to
believe that they were not only the diggers of the burrows, and of
the ladder-tracks and pitted tracks[S] of the Silurian and
Primordial, but that with the strokes of their rounded or spinous
tails, the digging of their snouts, and the hoe-work of their hard
upper lips, or Hypostomes, they made nearly all those strange marks in
the Primordial mud which have been referred to fucoids, and even to
higher plants. The Trilobites worked over all the mud bottoms of the
Primordial, even in places where no remains of them occur, and the
peculiarities of the markings which they left are to be explained only
by a consideration of the structures of individual species.
[S] _Climactichnites_ and _Protichnites_.
I had almost lost sight of the fishes of the Carboniferous period, but
after saying so much of those of the Devonian, it would be unfair to
leave their successors altogether unnoticed. In the Carboniferous we
lose those broad-snouted plate-covered species that form so
conspicuous a feature in the Devonian; and whatever its meaning, it is
surely no accident that these mud-burrowing fishes should decay along
with those crustacean mud-burrowers, the Trilobites. But swarms of
fishes remain, confined, as in the Devonian, wholly to the two orders
of the Gar-fishes (_Ganoids_) and the sharks (_Placoids_). In the
former we have a multitude of small and beautiful species haunting the
creeks and ponds of the coal swamps, and leaving vast quantities of
their remains in the shaly and even coaly beds formed in such places.
Such were the pretty, graceful fishes of the genera _Palæoniscus_ and
_Amblypterus_. Pursuing and feeding on these were larger ganoids,
armed with strong bony scales, and formidable conical or sharp-edged
teeth. Of these were _Rhizodus_ and _Acrolepis_. There were besides
multitudes of sharks whose remains consist almost wholly of their
teeth and spines, their cartilaginous skeletons having perished. One
group was allied to the few species of modern sharks whose mouths are
paved with flat teeth for crushing shells. These were the most
abundant sharks of the Carboniferous--slow and greedy monsters,
haunting shell banks and coral reefs, and grinding remorselessly all
the shell-fishes that came in their way. There were also sharks
furnished with sharp and trenchant teeth, which must have been the
foes of the smaller mailed fishes, pursuing them into creeks and muddy
shallows; and if we may judge from the quantity of their remains in
some of these places, sometimes perishing in their eager efforts. On
the whole, the fishes of the Carboniferous were, in regard to their
general type, a continuation of those of the Devonian, but the sharks
and the scaly ganoids were relatively more numerous. They differed
from our modern fishes in the absence of the ordinary horny-scaled
type to which all our more common fishes belong, and in the prevalence
of that style of tail which has been termed "heterocercal," in which
the continuation of the backbone forms the upper lobe of the tail, a
style which, if we may judge from modern examples, gives more power of
upward and downward movement, and is especially suitable to fishes
which search for food only at the bottom, or only above the surface of
the waters.
Most reluctantly I must here leave one of the most remarkable periods
of the world's history, and reserve to our next chapter the summation
of the history of the older world of life in its concluding stage, the
Permian.
CHAPTER VII.
THE PERMIAN AGE AND CLOSE OF THE PALÆOZOIC.
The immense swamps and low forest-clad plains which occupied the
continental areas of the Northern Hemisphere, and which we now know
extended also into the regions south of the equator, appear at the
close of the Carboniferous age to have again sunk beneath the waves,
or to have relapsed into the condition of sand and gravel banks; for a
great thickness of such deposits rests on the coal measures and
constitutes the upper coal formation, the upper "barren measures" of
the coal-miners. There is something grand in the idea of this
subsidence of a world of animal and vegetable life beneath the waters.
The process was very slow, so slow that at first vegetable growth and
deposition of silt kept pace with it; and this is the reason of the
immense series of deposits, in some places nearly 15,000 feet thick,
which inclose or rest upon the coal beds; but at length it became more
rapid, so that forests and their inhabitants perished, and the wild
surf drifted sand and pebbles over their former abodes. So the
Carboniferous world, like that of Noah, being overflowed with water,
perished. But it was not a wicked world drowned for its sins, but
merely an old and necessarily preliminary system, which had fully
served its purpose; and, like the stubble of last year, must be
turned under by the plough that it may make way for a new verdure. The
plough passed over it, and the winter of the Permian came, and then
the spring of a new age.
The Permian and the succeeding Triassic are somewhat chilly and
desolate periods of the earth's history. The one is the twilight of
the Palæozoic day, the other is the dawn of the Mesozoic. Yet to the
philosophical geologist no ages excel them in interest. They are times
of transition, when old dynasties and races pass away and are replaced
by new and vigorous successors, founding new empires and introducing
new modes of life and action.
Three great leading points merit our attention in entering on the
Permian age. The first is the earth-movements of the period. The
second is the resulting mineral characteristics of the deposits
formed. The third is the aspect of the animal and vegetable life of
this age in their relation more especially to those which preceded.
[Illustration: DIAGRAM OF FOLDINGS OF THE CRUST IN THE PERMIAN PERIOD.
(The vertical scale of heights and depressions exaggerated more then
six times.) The lower figure shows a portion of folded strata in the
Appalachians--after Rogers.]
With respect to the first point above named, the earth's crust was
subjected in the Permian period to some of the grandest movements
which have occurred in the whole course of geologic time, and we can
fix the limits of these, in Europe and America at least, with some
distinctness. If we examine the Permian rocks in England and Germany,
we shall find that everywhere they lie on the upturned edges of the
preceding Carboniferous beds. In other words, the latter have been
thrown into a series of folds, and the tops of these folds have been
more or less worn away before the Permian beds were placed on them.
But if we pass on to the eastward, in the great plain between the
Volga and the Ural mountains, where, in the "ancient kingdom of Perm,"
the greatest known area of these rocks is found, an area equal in
extent to twice that of France, and which Sir R. I. Murchison, who
first proposed the name, took as the typical district, we find, on the
contrary, that the Permian and Carboniferous are conformable to one
another. If now we cross the Atlantic and inquire how the case stands
in America, we shall find it precisely the same. Here the great
succession of earth-waves constituting the Appalachian Mountains rises
abruptly at the eastern edge of the continent, and becomes flatter and
flatter, until, in the broad plains west of the Mississippi, the
Permian beds appear, as in Russia, resting upon the Carboniferous so
quietly that it is not always easy to draw a line of separation
between them. As Dana has remarked, we find at the western side of
Europe and the eastern side of America, great disturbances
inaugurating the Permian period; and in the interior of both, in the
plains between the Volga and the Ural in one, and between the
Mississippi and Rocky Mountains in the other, an entire absence of
these disturbances. The main difference is, that in eastern America
the whole Carboniferous areas have apparently been so raised up that
no Permian was deposited on them, while in Europe considerable patches
of the disturbed areas became or remained submerged. Another American
geologist has largely illustrated the fact that the movements which
threw up the Appalachian folds were strongest to the eastward, and
that the ridges of rock are steepest on their west sides, the force
which caused them acting from the direction of the sea. It seems as if
the Atlantic area had wanted elbow-room, and had crushed up the edges
of the continents next to it. In other words, in the lapse of the
Palæozoic ages the nucleus of the earth had shrunk away from its
coating of rocky layers, which again collapsed into great wrinkles.
Such a process may seem difficult of comprehension. To understand it
we must bear in mind some of its conditions. First, the amount of this
wrinkling was extremely small relatively to the mass of the earth. In
the diagram on page 162 it is greatly exaggerated, yet is seen to be
quite insignificant, however gigantic in comparison with microscopic
weaklings like ourselves. Secondly, it was probably extremely slow.
Beds of solid rock cannot be suddenly bent into great folds without
breaking, and the abruptness of some of the folds may be seen from our
figure, copied from Rogers (page 162), of some of the foldings of the
Appalachian Mountains. Thirdly, the older rocks below the
Carboniferous and the Devonian must have been in a softened and
plastic state, and so capable of filling up the vacancies left by the
bending of the hard crust above. In evidence of this, we have in the
Lower Permian immense volcanic ejections--lavas and other molten
rocks spewed out to the surface from the softened and molten masses
below. Fourthly, the basin of the Atlantic must have been sufficiently
strong to resist the immense lateral pressure, so that the yielding
was all concentrated on the weaker parts of the crust near the old
fractures at the margins of the great continents. In these places
also, as we have seen in previous papers, the greatest thickness of
deposits had been formed; so that there was great downward pressure,
and probably, also, greater softening of the lower part of the crust.
Fifthly, as suggested in a previous chapter, the folding of the
earth's crust may have resulted from the continued shrinkage of its
interior in consequence of cooling, leading after long intervals to
collapse of the surface. Astronomers have, however, suggested another
cause. The earth bulges at the equator, and is flattened at the poles
in consequence of, or in connection with, the swiftness of its
rotation; but it has been shown that the rotation of the earth is
being very gradually lessened by the attraction of the moon.[T] Pierce
has recently brought forward the idea[U] that this diminution of
rotation, by causing the crust to subside in the equatorial regions
and expand in the polar, might produce the movements observed; and
which, according to Lesley, have amounted in the whole course of
geological time to about two per cent, of the diameter of our globe.
We thus have two causes, either of which seems sufficient to produce
the effect.
[T] Sir William Thomson, who quotes Adams and Delaunay.
[U] "Nature," February, 1871.
Viewed in this way, the great disturbances at the close of the
Palæozoic period constitute one of the most instructive examples in
the whole history of the earth of that process of collapse to which
the crust was subject after long intervals, and of which no equally
great instance occurs except at the close of the Laurentian and the
close of the Mesozoic. The mineral peculiarities of the Permian are
also accounted for by the above considerations. Let us now notice some
of these. In nearly all parts of the world the Permian presents thick
beds of red sandstone and conglomerate as marked ingredients. These,
as we have already seen, are indications of rapid deposition
accompanying changes of level. In the Permian, as elsewhere, these
beds are accompanied by volcanic rocks, indicating the subterranean
causes of the disturbances. Again, these rocks are chiefly abundant in
those regions, like Western Europe, where the physical changes were at
a maximum. Another remarkable feature of the Permian rocks is the
occurrence of great beds of magnesian limestone, or dolomite. In
England, the thick yellow magnesian limestone, the outcrop of which
crosses in nearly a straight line through Durham, Yorkshire, and
Nottingham, marks the edge of a great Permian sea extending far to the
eastward. In the marls and sandstones of the Permian period there is
also much gypsum. Now, chemistry shows us that magnesian limestones
and gypsums are likely to be deposited where sea water, which always
contains salts of magnesia, is evaporating in limited or circumscribed
areas into which carbonate of lime and carbonate of soda are being
carried by streams from the land or springs from below;[V] and it is
also to be observed that solutions of sulphuric acid, and probably
also of sulphate of magnesia, are characteristic products of igneous
activity. Hence we find in various geological periods magnesian
limestones occurring as a deposit in limited shallow sea basins, and
also in connection with volcanic breccias. Now these were obviously
the new Permian conditions of what had once been the wide flat areas
of the Carboniferous period. Still further, we find in Europe, as
characteristic of this period, beds impregnated with metallic salts,
especially of copper. Of this kind are very markedly the copper slates
of Thuringia. Such beds are not, any more then magnesian limestones,
limited to this age; but they are eminently characteristic of it. To
produce them it is required that water should bring forth from the
earth's crust large quantities of metallic salts, and that these
should come into contact with vegetable matters in limited submerged
areas, so that sulphates of the metals should be deoxidized into
sulphides. A somewhat different chemical process, as already
explained, was very active in the coal period, and was connected with
the production of its iron ores; but, in the Permian, profound and
extensive fractures opened up the way to the deep seats of copper and
other metals, to enrich the copper slate and its associated beds. It
is also to be observed that the alkaline springs and waters which
contain carbonate of soda, very frequently hold various metallic
salts; so that where, owing to the action of such waters, magnesian
limestone is being deposited, we may expect also to find various
metallic ores.
[V] Hunt, "Silliman's Journal," 1859 and 1863.
Let us sum up shortly this history. We have foldings of the earth's
crust, causing volcanic action and producing limited and shallow
sea-basins, and at the same time causing the evolution of alkaline and
metalliferous springs. The union of these mechanical and chemical
causes explains at once the conglomerates, the red sandstones, the
trap rocks, the magnesian limestones, the gypsum, and the
metalliferous beds of the Permian. The same considerations explain the
occurrence of similar deposits in various other ages of the earth's
history; though, perhaps, in none of these were they so general over
the Northern Hemisphere as in the Permian.
From the size of the stones in some of the Permian conglomerates, and
their scratched surfaces, it has been supposed that there were in this
period, on the margins of the continents, mountains sufficiently high
to have snow-clad summits, and to send down glaciers, bearing rocks
and stones to the sea, on which may have floated, as now in the North
Atlantic, huge icebergs.[W] This would be quite in accordance with
the great elevation of land which we know actually occurred; and the
existence of snow-clad mountains along with volcanoes would be a union
of fire and frost of which we still have examples in some parts of the
earth's surface, and this in proximity to forms of vegetable life very
similar to those which we know existed in the Permian.
[W] Ramsay has ably illustrated this in the Permian conglomerates of
England.
With the exception of a few small and worthless beds in Russia, the
Permian is not known to contain any coal. The great swamps of the coal
period had disappeared. In part they were raised up into rugged
mountains. In part they were sunken into shallow sea areas. Thus,
while there was much dry land, there was little opportunity for coal
production, or for the existence of those rank forests which had
accumulated so much vegetable matter in the Carboniferous age. In like
manner the fauna of the Permian waters is poor. According to
Murchison, the Permian limestones of Europe have afforded little more
then one-third as many species of fossils as the older Carboniferous.
The fossils themselves also have a stunted and depauperated aspect,
indicating conditions of existence unfavourable to them. This is
curiously seen in contrasting Davidson's beautiful illustrations of
the British Lamp-shells of the Permian and Carboniferous periods.
Another illustrative fact is the exceptionally small size of the
fossils even in limestones of the Carboniferous period when these are
associated with gypsum, red sandstones, and magnesian minerals; as,
for instance, those of some parts of Nova Scotia. In truth, the
peculiar chemical conditions conducive to the production of magnesian
limestones and gypsum are not favourable to animal life, though no
doubt compatible with its existence. Hence the rich fauna of the
Carboniferous seas died out in the Permian, and was not renewed; and
the Atlantic areas of the period are unknown to us. They were,
however, probably very deep and abrupt in slope, and not rich in life.
This would be especially the case if they were desolated by cold
ice-laden currents.
During the Permian period there was in each of our continental areas a
somewhat extensive inland sea. That of Western America was a northward
extension of the Gulf of Mexico. That of Eastern Europe was a
northward extension of the Euxine and Caspian. In both, the deposits
formed were very similar--magnesian limestones, sandstones,
conglomerates, marls, and gypsums. In both, these alternate in such a
way as to show that there were frequent oscillations of level,
producing alternately shallow and deep waters. In both, the animal
remains are of similar species, in many instances even identical. But
in the areas intervening between these sea basins and the Atlantic the
conditions were somewhat different. In Europe the land was interrupted
by considerable water areas, not lakes, but inland sea basins;
sometimes probably connected with the open sea, sometimes isolated. In
these were, deposited the magnesian limestone and its associated beds
in England, and the Zechstein and Rotheliegende with their associates
in Germany. In America the case was different. In all that immense
area which extends from the Atlantic to the plains east of the
Mississippi, we know no Permian rocks, unless a portion of those
reckoned as Upper Carboniferous, or Permo-carboniferous in Northern
Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island, should be included in this
group. If such existed, they may possibly be covered up in some places
by more modern deposits, or may have been swept away by denudation in
the intervening ages; but even in these cases we should expect to find
some visible remains of them. Their entire absence would seem to
indicate that a vast, and in many parts rugged and elevated, continent
represented North America in the Permian period. Yet if so, that great
continent is an absolute blank to us. We know nothing of the animals
or plants which may have lived on it, nor do we even know with
certainty that it had active volcanoes, or snow-clad mountains sending
down glaciers.
Our picture of the Permian World has not been inviting, yet in many
respects it was a world more like that in which we live then was any
previous one. It certainly presented more of variety and grand
physical features then any of the previous ages; and we might have
expected that on its wide and varied continents some new and higher
forms of life would have been introduced. But it seems rather to have
been intended to blot out the old Palæozoic life, as an arrangement
which had been fully tried and served its end, preparatory to a new
beginning in the succeeding age.
Still the Permian has some life features of its own, and we must now
turn to these. The first is the occurrence here, not only of the
representatives of the great Batrachians of the coal period, but of
true reptiles, acknowledged to be such by all naturalists. The animals
of the genus _Protorosaurus_, found in rocks of this age both in
England and Germany, were highly-organised lizards, having socketed
teeth like those of crocodiles, and well-developed limbs, with long
tails, perhaps adapted for swimming. They have, however, biconcave
vertebræ like the lizard-like animals of the coal already mentioned,
which, indeed, in their general form and appearance, they must have
very closely resembled. The Protorosaurs were not of great size; but
they must have been creatures of more stately gait then their
Carboniferous predecessors, and they serve to connect them with the
new and greater reptiles of the next period.
Another interesting feature of the Permian is its flora, which, in so
far as known, is closely related to that of the coal period, though
the species are regarded as different; some of the forms, however,
being so similar as to be possibly identical. In a picture of the
Permian flora we should perhaps place in the foreground the
tree-ferns, which seem to have been very abundant, and furnished with
dense clusters of aërial roots to enable them to withstand the storms
of this boisterous age. The tree-ferns, now so plentiful in the
southern hemisphere, should be regarded as one of the permanent
vegetable institutions of our world--those of the far-back Lower
Devonian, and of all intervening ages up to the present day, having
been very much alike. The great reed-like Calamites have had a
different fate. In their grander forms they make their last appearance
in the Permian, where they culminate in great ribbed stems, sometimes
nearly a foot in diameter, and probably of immense height. The brakes
of these huge mares'-tails which overspread the lower levels of the
Permian in Europe, would have been to us what the hayfields of
Brobdingnag were to Gulliver. The Lepidodendra also swarmed, though in
diminished force; but the great Sigillariæ of the coal are absent, or
only doubtfully present. Another feature of the Permian woods was the
presence of many pine-trees different in aspect from those of the coal
period. Some of these are remarkable for their slender and delicate
branches and foliage.[X] Others have more dense and scaly leaves, and
thick short cones.[Y] Both of these styles of pines are regarded as
distinct, on the one hand, from those of the coal formation, and on
the other from those of the succeeding Trias. I have shown, however,
many years ago, that in the upper coal formation of America there are
branches of pine-trees very similar to Walchia, and, on the other
hand, the Permian pines are not very remote in form and structure from
some of their modern relations. The pines of the first of the
above-mentioned types (Walchia) may indeed be regarded as allies of
the modern Araucarian pines of the southern hemisphere, and of the
old conifers of the Carboniferous. Those of the second type (Ulmannia)
may be referred to the same group with the magnificent Sequoias or
Redwoods of California.
[X] Walchia.
[Y] Ulmannia.
It is a curious indication of the doubts which sometimes rest on
fossil botany, that some of the branches of these Permian pines, when
imperfectly preserved, have been described as sea-weeds, while others
have been regarded as club-mosses. It is true, however, that the
resemblance of some of them to the latter class of plants is very
great; and were there no older pines, we might be pardoned for
imagining in the Permian a transition from club-mosses to pines.
Unfortunately, however, we have pines nearly as far back in geological
time as we have club-mosses; and, in so far as we know, no more like
the latter then are the pines of the Permian, so that this connection
fails us. In all probability the Permian forests are much less
perfectly known to us then those of the coal period, so that we can
scarcely make comparisons. It appears certain, however, that the
Permian plants are much more closely related to the coal plants then
to those of the next succeeding epoch, and that they are not so much a
transition from the one to the other as the finishing of the older
period to make way for the newer.
But we must reserve some space for a few remarks on the progress and
termination of the Palæozoic as a whole, and on the place which it
occupies in the world's history. These remarks we may group around the
central question, What is the meaning or value of an age or period in
the history of the earth, as these terms are understood by geologists?
In most geological books terms referring to time are employed very
loosely. Period, epoch, age, system, series, formation, and similar
terms, are used or abused in a manner which only the indefiniteness of
our conceptions can excuse.
A great American geologist[Z] has made an attempt to remedy this by
attaching definite values to such words as those above mentioned. In
his system the greater divisions of the history were "Times:" thus the
Eozoic was a time and the Palæozoic was a time. The larger divisions
of the times are "Ages:" thus the Lower and Upper Silurian, the
Devonian, and the Carboniferous are ages, which are equivalent in the
main to what English geologists call Systems of Formations. Ages,
again, may be divided into "Periods:" thus, in the Upper Silurian, the
Ludlow of England, or Lower Helderberg of America, would constitute a
period. These periods may again be divided into "Epochs," which are
equivalent to what English geologists call Formations, a term
referring not directly to the time elapsed, but to the work done in
it. Now this mode of regarding geological time introduces many
thoughts as to the nature of our chronology and matters relating to
it. A "time" in geology is an extremely long time, and the Palæozoic
was perhaps the longest of the whole. By the close of the Palæozoic
nine-tenths of all the rocks we know in the earth's crust were
formed. At least this is the case if we reckon mere thickness. For
aught that we know, the Eozoic time may have accumulated as much rock
as the Palæozoic; but leaving this out of the question, the rocks of
the Palæozoic are vastly thicker then those of the Mesozoic and
Cainozoic united. Thus the earth's history seems to have dragged
slowly in its earlier stages, or to have become accelerated in its
latter times. To place it in another point of view, life changes were
greater relatively to merely physical changes in the later then in the
earlier times.
[Z] Dana.
The same law seems to have obtained within the Palæozoic time itself.
Its older periods, as the Cambrian and Lower Silurian, present immense
thicknesses of rock with little changes in life. Its later periods,
the Carboniferous and Permian, have greater life-revolution relatively
to less thickness of deposits. This again was evidently related to the
growing complexity and variety of geographical conditions, which went
on increasing all the way up to the Permian, when they attained their
maximum for the Palæozoic time.
Again, each age was signalized, over the two great continental
plateaus, by a like series of elevations and depressions. We may
regard the Siluro-Cambrian, the Silurian, the Devonian, the
Carboniferous, and Permian, as each of them a distinct age. Each of
these began with physical disturbances and coarse shallow-water
deposits. In each this was succeeded by subsidence and by a sea area
tenanted by corals and shell-fishes. In each case this was followed by
a re-elevation, leading to a second but slow and partial subsidence,
to be followed by the great re-elevation preparatory to the next
period. Thus we have throughout the Palæozoic a series of cycles of
physical change which we may liken to gigantic pulsations of the thick
hide of mother earth. The final catastrophe of the Permian collapse
was quite different in kind from these pulsations as well as much
greater in degree. The Cambrian or Primordial does not apparently
present a perfect cycle of this kind, perhaps because in that early
period the continental plateaus were not yet definitely formed, and
thus its beds are rather portions of the general oceanic deposit. In
this respect it is analogous in geological relations to the chalk
formation of a later age, though very different in material. The
Cambrian may, however, yet vindicate its claim to be regarded as a
definite cycle: and the recent discoveries of Hicks in North Wales,
have proved the existence of a rich marine fauna far down in the lower
part of this system. It is also to be observed that the peculiar
character of the Cambrian, as an oceanic bottom rather then a
continental plateau, has formed an important element in the
difficulties in establishing it as a distinct group; just as a similar
difficulty in the case of the chalk has led to a recent controversy
about the continuance of the conditions of that period into modern
times.
But in each of the great successive heaves or pulsations of the
Palæozoic earth, there was a growing balance in favour of the land as
compared with the water. In each successive movement more and more
elevated land was thrown up, until the Permian flexures finally fixed
the forms of our continents. This may be made evident to the eye in a
series of curves, as in the following diagram, in which I have
endeavoured to show the recurrence of similar conditions in each of
the great periods of the Palæozoic, and thus their equivalency to each
other as cycles of the earth's history.
There is thus in these great continental changes a law of recurrence
and a law of progress; but as to the efficient causes of the phenomena
we have as yet little information. It seems that original fractures
and shrinkages of the crust were concerned in forming the continental
areas at first. Once formed, unequal burdening of the earth's still
plastic mass by deposits of sediment in the waters, and unequal
expansion by the heating and crystallization of immense thicknesses of
the sediment, may have done the rest; but the results are surprisingly
regular to be produced by such causes. We shall also find that similar
cycles can be observed in the geological ages which succeeded the
Palæozoic. Geologists have hitherto for the most part been content to
assign these movements to causes purely terrestrial; but it is
difficult to avoid the suspicion that the succession of geological
cycles must have depended on some recurring astronomical force tending
to cause the weaker parts of the earth's crust alternately to rise and
subside at regular intervals of time. Herschel, Adhémar, and more
recently Croll, have directed attention to astronomical cycles
supposed to have important influences on the temperature of the earth.
Whether these or other changes may have acted on the equilibrium of
its crust is a question well worthy of attention, as its solution
might give us an astronomical measure of geological time. This
question, however, the geologist must refer to the astronomer.
[Illustration: CURVES SHOWING THE SUCCESSIVE ELEVATIONS AND
DEPRESSIONS OF THE AMERICAN CONTINENT, IN SEVERAL CYCLES OF THE
PALÆOZOIC TIME.]
There are two notes of caution which must here be given to the reader.
First, it is not intended to apply the doctrine of continental
oscillations to the great oceanic areas. Whether they became shallower
or deeper, their conditions would be different from those which
occurred in the great shallow plateaus, and these conditions are
little known to us. Further, throughout the Palæozoic period, the
oscillations do not seem to have been sufficient to reverse the
positions of the oceans and continents. Secondly, it is not meant to
affirm that the great Permian plications were so widespread in their
effects as to produce a universal destruction of life. On the
contrary, after they had occurred, remnants of the Carboniferous fauna
still flourished even on the surfaces of the continents, and possibly
the inhabitants of the deep ocean were little affected by these great
movements. True it is that the life of the Palæozoic terminates with
the Permian, but not by a great and cataclysmic overthrow.
We know something at least of the general laws of continental
oscillations during the Palæozoic. Do we know anything of law in the
case of life? The question raises so many and diverse considerations
that it seems vain to treat it in the end of a chapter; still we must
try to outline it with at least a few touches.
First, then, the life of the Palæozoic was remarkable, as compared with
that of the present world, in presenting a great prevalence of animals
and plants of synthetic types, as they are called by Agassiz that is,
of creatures comprehending in one the properties of several groups
which were to exist as distinct in the future. Such types are also
sometimes called embryonic, because the young of animals and plants
often show these comprehensive features. Such types were the old
corals, presenting points of alliance with two distinct groups now
widely separated; the old Trilobites, half king-crabs and half
Isopods; the Amphibians of the coal, part fish, part newt, and part
crocodile; the Sigillariæ, part club-mosses and part pines; the
Orthoceratites, half nautili and half cuttle-fishes. I proposed, in
the illustration in a former article, to give a restoration of one of
the curious creatures last mentioned, the Orthoceratites; but on
attempting this, with the idea that, as usually supposed, they were
straight Nautili, it appeared that the narrow aperture, the small
outer chamber, the thin outer wall, often apparently only membranous,
and the large siphuncle, would scarcely admit of this; and I finished
by representing it as something like a modern squid; perhaps wrongly,
but it was evidently somewhere between them and the Nautili.
Secondly, these synthetic types often belonged to the upper part of a
lower group, or to the lower part of an upper group. Hence in one
point of view they may be regarded as of high grade, in another as of
low grade, and they are often large in size or in vegetative
development.[AA] From this law have arisen many controversies about
the grade and classification of the Palæozoic animals and plants.
[AA] It seems, indeed, as if the new synthetic forms intermediate
between great groups were often large in size, while the new special
types came in as small species. There are some remarkable cases of
this in the plant world; though here we have such examples as the
pines and tree-ferns continuing almost unchanged from an early
Palæozoic period until now.
Thirdly, extinctions of species occur in every great oscillation of
the continental areas, but some species reappear after such
oscillations, and the same genus often recurs under new specific
forms. Families and orders, such as those of the Trilobites and
Orthoceratites, appear to have a grand and gradual culmination and
decadence extending over several successive periods, or even over the
whole stretch of the Palæozoic time. Toward the close of the
Palæozoic, while all the species disappear, some whole families and
orders are altogether dropped, and, being chiefly synthetic groups,
are replaced by more specialised types, some of which, however, make
small beginnings alongside of the more general types which are passing
away. Our diagram (page 183) illustrates these points.
[Illustration: DIAGRAM SHOWING THE ADVANCE, CULMINATION, AND DECADENCE
OF SOME OF THE LEADING TYPES OF PALÆOZOIC LIFE.]
Fourthly, the progress in animal life in the Palæozoic related chiefly
to the lower or invertebrate tribes, and to the two lower classes of
the vertebrates. The oldest animal known to us is not only a creature
of the simplest structure, but also a representative of that great and
on the whole low type of animal life, in which the parts are arranged
around a central axis, and not on that plan of bilateral symmetry
which constitutes one great leading distinction of the higher animals.
With the Cambrian, bilateral animals abound and belong to two very
distinct lines of progress--the one, the Mollusks, showing the
nutritive organs more fully developed--the other, the Articulates,
having the organs of sense and of locomotion more fully organized.
These three great types shared the world among them throughout the
earlier Palæozoic time, and only in its later ages began to be
dominated by the higher types of fishes and reptiles. In so far as we
know, it remained for the Mesozoic to introduce the birds and mammals.
In plant life the changes were less marked, though here also there is
progress--land plants appear to begin, not with the lowest forms, but
with the highest types of the lower of the two great series into which
the vegetable kingdom is divided. From this they rapidly rise to a
full development of the lowest type of the flowering plants, the pines
and their allies, and there the progress ceases; for the known
representatives of the higher plants are extremely few and apparently
of little importance.
Fifthly, in general the history tells of a continued series of
alternate victories and defeats of the species that had their birth on
the land and in the shallow waters, and those which were born in the
ocean depths, The former spread themselves widely after every
upheaval, and then by every subsidence were driven back to their
mountain fastnesses. The latter perished from the continental plateaus
at every upheaval, but climbed again in new hordes and reoccupied the
ground after every subsidence. But just as in human history every
victory or defeat urges on the progress of events, and develops the
great plan of God's providence in the elevation of man; so here every
succeeding change brings in new and higher actors on the stage, and
the scheme of creation moves on in a grand and steady progress towards
the more varied and elevated life of the Modern World.
But, after all, how little do we know of these laws, which are only
beginning to dawn on the minds of naturalists; and which the
imperfections of our classification and nomenclature, and the defects
in our knowledge of fossil species, render very dim and uncertain. All
that appears settled is the existence of a definite plan, working over
long ages, and connected with the most remarkable correlation of
physical and organic change: going on with regular march throughout
the Palæozoic, and then brought to a close to make room for another
great succession. This following Mesozoic time must next engage our
attention.
We may close for the present with presenting to the eye in tabular
form the periods over which we have passed. The table on page 187, and
the diagram (page 179), mutually illustrate each other; and it will
be seen that each age constitutes cycle, similar in its leading
features to the other cycles, while each is distinguished by some
important fact in relation to the introduction of living beings. In
this table I have, with Mr. Hull,[AB] for simplicity, arranged the
formations of each age under three periods--an older, middle, and
newer. Of these, however, the last or newest is in each case so
important and varied as to merit division into two, in the manner
which I have suggested in previous publications for the Palæozoic
rocks of North America.[AC] Under each period I have endeavoured to
give some characteristic example from Europe and America, except
where, as in the case of the coal formation, the same names are used
on both continents. Such a table as this, it must be observed, is only
tentative, and may admit of important modifications. The Laurentian
more especially may admit of division into several ages; and a
separate age may be found to intervene between it and the Cambrian.
The reader will please observe that this table refers to the changes
on the continental plateaus; and that on both of these each age was
introduced with shallow water and usually coarse deposits, succeeded
by deeper water and finer beds, usually limestones, and these by a
mixed formation returning to the shallow water and coarse deposits of
the older period of the age. This last kind of deposition culminates
in the great swamps of the coal formation.
[AB] "Quarterly Journal of Science," July, 1869.
[AC] "Acadian Geology," p. 137.
CONDENSED TABULAR VIEW OF THE AGES AND PERIODS OF THE PALÆOZOIC AND
EOZOIC.
Key to Symbols
### Tabulate and Rugose Corals, abundant.
*** Age of Algæ.
=== Age of Acrogens and Gymnosperms.
+++ And God said, "Let the waters bring forth abundantly
the swarming living creatures."
--- And God created great reptiles.
TIMES.
AGES. PERIODS. ANIMALS AND PLANTS.
PALÆOZOIC
{ {Newer. Red Sandstones, #
{ Rauchwacke, etc. # Beginning = -
{Permian {Middle. Zechstein, or # of Age = -
{ Magnesian Limestone. # of Reptiles. = -
{ {Older. Conglomerates, etc., # = -
{ Rotheliegendes. # = -
{ # = -
{ {N. Coal Formation. # = -
{Carboniferous {M. Carboniferous Limestone. # Age of = -
{ {O. Lower Coal Measures and # Batrachians. =
{ Conglomerates. # =
{ # =
{ {N. Upper Old Red, Chemung. # =
{Devonian {M. Eifel and Corniferous # =
{ { Limestones. # Age of Fishes. =
{ or Erian {O. Lower Old Red, Oriskany # =
{ { Sandstone. # = +
{ # +
{ {N. Ludlow, Lower Helderberg. # +
{Upper Silurian {M. Wenlock and Niagara # +
{ { Limestones. # Age of +
{ {O. Mayhill, etc., Oneida # Mollusks. +
{ { Conglomerates. # +
{ # +
{ {N. Caradoc, Hudson R. # +
{Lower Silurian {M. Bala and Trenton # +
{ or { Limestones. # * +
{Siluro-Cambrian {O. Llandielo, etc., Chazy. # * +
{ # * +
{ {N. Lingula Flags, etc., * +
{ { Potsdam Sandstone. * +
{ { {Acadian, etc.? Age of * +
{Cambrian {M. (Uncertain){ Crustaceans. * +
{ { {Menevian? * +
{ {O. Longmynd, Huronian? +
+
EOZOIC +
+
{ {N. Anorthosite Gneiss, etc. +
{Laurentian {M. Eozoon Limestones, etc. Age of +
{ {O. Lower Gneiss. Protozoa. +
CHAPTER VIII.
THE MESOZOIC AGES.
Physically, the transition from the Permian to the Trias is easy. In
the domain of life a great gulf lies between; and the geologist whose
mind is filled with the forms of the Palæozoic period, on rising into
the next succeeding beds, feels himself a sort of Rip Van Winkle, who
has slept a hundred years and awakes in a new world. The geography of
our continents seems indeed to have changed little from the time of
the Permian to that next succeeding group which all geologists
recognise as the beginning of the Mesozoic or Middle Age of the
world's history, the Triassic period. Where best developed, as in
Germany, it gives us the usual threefold series, conglomerates and
sandstones below, a shelly limestone in the middle, and sandstones and
marls above. Curiously enough, the Germans, recognising this
tripartite character here more distinctly then in their other
formations, named this the _Trias_ or triple group, a name which it
still retains, though as we have seen it is by no means the earliest
of the triple groups of strata. In England, where the middle limestone
is absent, it is a "New Red Sandstone," and the same name may be
appropriately extended to Eastern America, where bright red sandstones
are a characteristic feature. In the Trias, as in the Permian, the
continents of the northern hemisphere presented large land areas, and
there were lagoons and landlocked seas in which gypsum, magnesian
limestones, and rock salt were thrown down, a very eminent example of
which is afforded by the great salt deposits of Cheshire. There were
also tremendous outbursts of igneous activity along the margins of the
continents, more especially in Eastern America. But with all this
there was a rich land flora and a wonderful exuberance of new animal
life on the land; and in places there were even swamps in which pure
and valuable beds of coal, comparable with those of the old coal
formation, were deposited.
The triple division of the Trias as a cycle of the earth's history,
and its local imperfection, are well seen in the European development
of the group, thus:--
German Series. French Series. English Series.
Keuper, Sandstone and } Marnes Irisées {Saliferous and gypseous
Shale } { Shales and Sandstones.
Muschelkalk, Limestone} Calcaire Coquillier {Wanting.
and Dolomite }
Bunter, Sandstone and } Grès bigarré {Sandstone and
Conglomerate } { Conglomerate.
The Trias is succeeded by a great and complex system of formations,
usually known as the Jurassic, from its admirable development and
exposure in the range of the Jura; but which the English geologists
often name the "Oolitic," from the occurrence in it of beds of Oolite
or roe-stone. This rock, of which the beautiful cream-coloured
limestone of Bath is an illustration, consists of an infinity of
little spheres, like seeds or the roe of a fish. Under the microscope
these are seen to present concentric layers, each with a radiating
fibrous: structure, and often to have a minute grain of sand or
fragment of shell in the centre. They are, in short, miniature
concretions, produced by the aggregation of the calcareous matter
around centres, by a process of molecular attraction to which fine
sediments, and especially those containing much lime, are very prone.
This style of limestone is very abundant in the Jurassic system, but
it is not confined to it. I have seen very perfect Oolites in the
Silurian and the Carboniferous. The Jurassic series, as developed in
England, may be divided into three triplets or cycles of beds, in the
following way:
{Purbeck Beds.
Upper Jurassic {Portland Limestone.
{Portland Sand.
{Kimmeridge Clay, etc.
Middle Jurassic {Coral Rag, Limestone.
{Lower Calcareous Grit, Oxford Clay, etc.
{Cornbrash and Forest Marble.
Lower Jurassic[AD] {Great and inferior Oolite, Limestone.
{Lias Clays and Limestones.
[AD] This last group is very complex, and might perhaps admit of sub
division, locally at least, into subordinate cycles.
These rocks occupy a large space in England, as the names above given
will serve to show; and they are also largely distributed over the
continent of Europe and Asia which had evidently three great and
long-continued dips under water, indicated by the three great
limestones. In America the case was different. The Jurassic has not
been distinctly recognised in any part of the eastern coast of that
continent, which then perhaps extended farther into the Atlantic then
it does at present; so that no marine beds were formed on its eastern
border. But in the west, along the base of the Rocky Mountains and
also in the Arctic area, there were Jurassic seas of large extent,
swarming with characteristic animals. At the close of the Jurassic
period our continents seem to have been even more extensive then at
present. In England and the neighbouring parts of the continent of
Europe, according to Lyell, the fresh-water and estuarine beds known
as the Wealden have been traced 320 miles from west to east, and 200
miles from north-west to south-east, and their thickness in one part
of this area is estimated at no less then 2,000 feet. Such a deposit
is comparable in extent with the deltas of such great rivers as the
Niger or even the Mississippi, and implies the existence of a
continent much more extensive and more uniform in drainage then Europe
as it at present exists. Lyell even speculates on the possible
existence of an Atlantic continent west of Europe. America also at
this time had, as already stated, attained to even more then its
present extension eastwards. Thus this later Jurassic period was the
culmination of the Mesozoic, the period of its most perfect
continental development, corresponding in this to the Carboniferous in
the Palæozoic.
The next or closing period of this great Mesozoic time brought a
wondrous change. In the Cretaceous period, so called from the vast
deposits of chalk by which it is characterized, the continents sunk as
they had never sunk before, so that vast spaces of the great
continental plateaus were brought down, for the first time since the
Laurentian, to the condition of abyssal depths, tenanted by such
creatures as live in the deepest recesses of our modern oceans. This
great depression affected Europe more severely then America; the
depression of the latter being not only less, but somewhat later in
date. In Europe, at the period of greatest submergence, the hills of
Scandinavia and of Britain, and the Urals, perhaps alone stood out of
the sea. The Alps and their related mountains, and even the Himalayas,
were not yet born, for they have on their high summits deep-sea beds
of the Cretaceous and even of later date. In America, the Appalachians
and the old Laurentian ranges remained above water; but the Rocky
Mountains and the Andes were in great part submerged, and a great
Cretaceous sea extended from the Appalachians westward to the Pacific,
and southward to the Gulf of Mexico, opening probably to the North
into the Arctic Ocean.
This great depression must have been of very long continuance, since
in Western Europe it sufficed for the production of nearly 1,000 feet
in thickness of chalk, a rock which, being composed almost entirely of
microscopic shells, is, as we shall see in the sequel, necessarily of
extremely slow growth. If we regard the Cretaceous group as one of our
great ages or cycles, it seems to be incomplete. The sandstones and
clays known as the Greensand and Gault constitute its lower or
shallow-water member. The chalk is its middle or deep-sea member, but
the upper shallow-water member is missing, or only very locally and
imperfectly developed. And the oldest of the succeeding Tertiary
deposits, which indicate much less continuous marine conditions, rest
on the chalk, as if the great and deep sea of the Cretaceous age had
been suddenly upheaved into land. This abrupt termination of the last
cycle of the Mesozoic is obviously the reason of the otherwise
inexplicable fact that the prevalent life of the period ceases at the
top of the chalk, and is exchanged immediately and without any
transition for the very different fauna of the Tertiary. This further
accords with the fact that the Cretaceous subsidence ended in another
great crumpling of the crust, like that which distinguished the
Permian. By this the Mesozoic time was terminated and the Cainozoic
inaugurated; while the Rocky Mountains, the Andes, the Alps, and the
Himalayas, rose to importance as great mountain ranges, and the
continents were again braced up to retain a condition of comparative
equilibrium during that later period of the earth's chronology to
which we ourselves belong.
[Illustration: LIFE ON LAND IN THE MESOZOIC PERIOD.
In the foreground are a Pine, Cycads, and a Pandanus; also small
Mammals, an herbivorous Dinosaur, and a Labyrinthodont. In the
distance are other Dinosaurs and Crocodiles. In the air are birds
(_Archæopterux_) and Pterodactyls.
Was the length of the Mesozoic time equal to that of the Palæozoic?
Measured by recurring cycles it was. In the latter period we find five
great cycles, from the Lower Silurian to the Permian inclusive. So in
the Mesozoic we have five also, from the Trias to the Cretaceous
inclusive. We have a right to reckon these cycles as ages or great
years of the earth; and so reckoning them, the Mesozoic time may have
been as long as the Palæozoic. But if we take another criterion the
result will be different. The thickness of the deposits in the
Palæozoic as compared with the Mesozoic, where these are severally
best developed, may be estimated as at least four or five to one; so
that if we suppose the beds to have been formed with equal rapidity in
the two great periods, then the older of the two was between four and
five times as long as the latter, which would indeed be only a little
greater then one of the separate ages of the Palæozoic. Either,
therefore, the deposits took place with greater rapidity in the
Palæozoic, or that period was by much the longer of the two. This it
will be observed, is only another aspect of the great laws of
geological sequence referred to in our last paper.
Let us look into this question a little more minutely. If the several
pulsations of our continents depended upon any regularly recurring
astronomical or terrestrial change, then they must represent, at least
approximately, equal portions of time, and this, if proved, would
settle the question in favour of an equal duration of these two great
eras of the earth's history. But as we cannot yet prove this, we may
consider what light we can derive from the nature of the rocks
produced. These may be roughly classified as of two kinds: First, the
beds of sediment, sand, clay, etc., accumulated by the slow chemical
decay of rocks and the mechanical agency of water. Secondly, the beds
formed by accumulation of the harder and less perishable parts of
living beings, of which the limestones are the chief. With reference
to the first of these kinds of deposit, the action of the atmosphere
and rains on rocks in the earlier times might have been somewhat more
powerful if there was more carbonic acid in the atmosphere, that
substance being the most efficient agent in the chemical decay of
rocks. It might have been somewhat more powerful if there was a
greater rainfall. It must, on the other hand, have been lessened by
the apparently more equable temperature which then prevailed. These
differences might perhaps nearly balance one another. Then the rocks
of the older time were quite as intractable as those of the newer, and
they were probably neither so high nor so extensive. Further, the dips
and emergences of the great continental plateaus were equally numerous
in the two great periods, though they were probably, with the
exception of the latest one of each, more complete in the older
period. In so far, then, as deposition of sediment is concerned, these
considerations would scarcely lead us to infer that it was more rapid
in the Palæozoic. But the Palæozoic sediments may be estimated in the
aggregate at about 50,000 feet in thickness, while those of the
Mesozoic scarcely reach 8,000. We might, therefore, infer that the
Palæozoic period was perhaps five or six times as long as the
Mesozoic.
If we take the second class of rocks, the limestones, and suppose
these to have been accumulated by the slow growth of corals, shells,
etc., in the sea, we might, at first sight, suppose that Palæozoic
animals would not grow or accumulate limestone faster then their
Mesozoic successors. We must, however, consider here the probability
that the older oceans contained more lime in solution then those which
now exist, and that the equable temperature and extensive submerged
plateaus gave very favourable conditions for the lower animals of the
sea, so that it would perhaps be fair to allow a somewhat more rapid
rate of growth of limestone for the Palæozoic. Now the actual
proportions of limestone may be roughly stated at 13,000 feet in the
Palæozoic, and 3,000 feet in the Mesozoic, which would give a
proportion of about four and a quarter to one; and as a foot of
limestone may be supposed on the average to require five times as long
for its formation as a foot of sediment, this would give an even
greater absolute excess in favour of the Palæozoic on the evidence of
the limestones an excess probably far too great to be accounted for by
any more favourable conditions for the secretion of carbonate of lime
by marine animals.
The data for such calculations are very uncertain, and three elements
of additional uncertainty closely related to each other must also be
noticed. The first is the unknown length of the intervals in which no
deposition whatever may have been taking place over the areas open to
our investigation. The second is the varying amounts in which material
once deposited may have been swept away by water. The third is the
amount of difference that may have resulted from the progressive
change of the geographical features of our continents. These
uncertainties would all tend to diminish our estimate of the relative
length of the Mesozoic. Lastly, the changes that have taken place in
living beings, though a good measure of the lapse of time, cannot be
taken as a criterion here, since there is much reason to believe that
more rapid changes of physical conditions act as an inducing cause of
rapid changes of life.
On the whole, then, taking such facts as we have, and making large
deductions for the several causes tending to exaggerate our conception
of Palæozoic time, we can scarcely doubt that the Palæozoic may have
been three times as long as the Mesozoic. If so, the continental
pulsations, and the changes in animal and vegetable life, must have
gone on with accelerated rapidity in the later period,--a conclusion
to which we shall again have occasion to refer when we arrive at the
consideration of the Tertiary or Neozoic time, and the age of man, and
the probable duration of the order of things under which we live.
I have given this preliminary sketch of the whole Mesozoic time,
because we cannot here, as in the Palæozoic, take up each age
separately; and now we must try to picture to ourselves the life and
action of these ages. In doing so we may look at, first, the plant
life of this period; second, animal life on the land; and third,
animal life in the waters and in the ocean depths.
The Mesozoic shores were clothed with an abundant flora, which changed
considerably in its form during the lapse of this long time; but yet
it has a character of its own distinct from that of the previous
Palæozoic and the succeeding Tertiary. Perhaps no feature of this
period is more characteristic then the great abundance of those
singular plants, the cycads, which in the modern flora are placed near
to the pines, but in their appearance and habit more resemble palms,
and which in the modern world are chiefly found in the tropical and
warm temperate zones of Asia and America. No plants certainly of this
order occur in the Carboniferous, where their nearest allies are
perhaps some of the Sigillariæ; and in the modern time the cycads are
not so abundant, nor do they occur at all in climates where their
predecessors appear to have abounded. In the quarries of the island of
Portland, we have a remarkable evidence of this in beds with numerous
stems of cycads still _in situ_ in the soil in which they grew, and
associated with stumps of pines which seem to have flourished along
with them. In further illustration of this point, I may refer to the
fact that Carruthers, in a recent paper, catalogues twenty-five
British species belonging to eight genera--a fact which markedly
characterizes the British flora of the Mesozoic period. These plants
will therefore occupy a prominent place in our restoration of the
Mesozoic landscape, and we should give especial prominence to the
beautiful species _Williamsonia gigas_, discovered by the eminent
botanist whose name it bears, and restored in his paper on the plant
in the "Linnæan Transactions." These plants, with pines and gigantic
equisetums, prevailed greatly in the earlier Mesozoic flora, but as
the time wore on, various kinds of endogens, resembling the palms and
the screw-pines of the tropical islands, were introduced, and toward
its close some representatives of the exogens very like our ordinary
trees. Among these we find for the first time in our upward progress
in the history of the earth, species of our familiar oaks, figs, and
walnut, along with some trees now confined to Australia and the Cape
of Good Hope, as the banksias and "silver-trees," and their allies. In
America a large number of the genera of the modern trees are present,
and even some of those now peculiar to America, as the tulip-trees and
sweet-gums. These forests of the later Mesozoic must therefore have
been as gay with flowers and as beautiful in foliage as those of the
modern world, and there is evidence that they swarmed with insect
life. Further, the Mesozoic plants produced in some places beds of
coal comparable in value and thickness to those of the old coal
formation. Of this kind are the coal beds of Brora in Sutherlandshire,
those of Richmond in Virginia, and Deep River in N. Carolina, those of
Vancouver's Island, and a large part of those of China. To the same
age have been referred some at least of the coal beds of Australia and
India. So important are these beds in China, that had geology
originated in that country, the Mesozoic might have been our age of
coal.
If the forests of the Mesozoic present a great advance over those of
the Palæozoic, so do the animals of the land, which now embrace all
the great types of vertebrate life. Some of these creatures have left
strange evidence of their existence in their footprints on the sand
and clay, now cemented into beds of hard rock excavated by the
quarryman. If we had landed on some wide muddy Mesozoic shore, we
might have found it marked in all directions with animal footprints.
Some of these are shaped much like a human hand. The creature that
made this mark was a gigantic successor of the crocodilian newts or
labyrinthodonts of the Carboniferous, and this type seems to have
attained its maximum in this period, where one species, _Labyrinthodon
giganteus_, had great teeth three or four inches in length, and
presenting in their cross section the most complicated foldings of
enamel imaginable. But we may see on the shores still more remarkable
footprints. They indicate biped and three-toed animals of gigantic
size, with a stride perhaps six feet in length. Were they enormous
birds? If so, the birds of this age must have been giants which would
dwarf even our ostriches. But as we walk along the shore we see many
other impressions, some of them much smaller and different in form.
Some, again, very similar in other respects, have four toes; and, more
wonderful still, in tracing up some of the tracks, we find that here
and there the creature has put down on the ground a sort of
four-fingered hand, while some of these animals seem to have trailed
long tails behind them. What were these portentous creatures--bird,
beast, or reptile? The answer has been given to us by their bones, as
studied by Yon Meyer and Owen, and more recently by Huxley and Cope.
We thus have brought before us the _Dinosaurs_--the terrible
Saurians--of the Mesozoic age, the noblest of the Tanninim of old.
These creatures constitute numerous genera and species, some of
gigantic size, others comparatively small;--some harmless browsers on
plants, others terrible renders of living flesh; but all remarkable
for presenting a higher type of reptile organization then any now
existing, and approaching in some respects to the birds and in others
to the mammalia. Let us take one example of each of the principal
groups. And first marches before us the _Iguanodon_ or his relation
_Hadrosaurus_--a gigantic biped, twenty feet or more in height, with
enormous legs shaped like those of an ostrich, but of elephantine
thickness. It strides along, not by leaps like a kangaroo, but with
slow and stately tread, occasionally resting, and supporting itself on
the tripod formed by its hind limbs and a huge tail, like the inverted
trunk of a tree. The upper part of its body becomes small and slender,
and its head, of diminutive size and mild aspect, is furnished with
teeth for munching the leaves and fruits of trees, which it can easily
reach with its small fore-limbs, or hands, as it walks through the
woods. The outward appearance of these creatures we do not certainly
know. It is not likely that they had bony plates like crocodiles, but
they may have shone resplendent in horny scale armour of varied hues.
But another and more dreadful form rises before us. It is
_Megalosaurus_ or perhaps _Lælaps_. Here we have a creature of equally
gigantic size and biped habits; but it is much more agile, and runs
with great swiftness or advances by huge leaps, and its feet and hands
are armed with strong curved claws; while its mouth has a formidable
armature of sharp-edged and pointed teeth. It is a type of a group of
biped bird-like lizards, the most terrible and formidable of rapacious
animals that the earth has ever seen. Some of these creatures, in
their short deep jaws and heads, resembled the great carnivorous
mammals of modern times, while all in the structure of their limbs had
a strange and grotesque resemblance to the birds. Nearly all
naturalists regard them as reptiles; but in their circulation and
respiration they must have approached to the mammalia, and their
general habit of body recalls that of the kangaroos. They were no
doubt oviparous; and this, with their biped habit, seems to explain
the strong resemblance of their hind quarters to those of birds. Had
we seen the eagle-clawed Lælaps rushing on his prey; throwing his huge
bulk perhaps thirty feet through the air, and crushing to the earth
under his gigantic talons some feebler Hadrosaur, we should have
shudderingly preferred the companionship of modern wolves and tigers
to that of those savage and gigantic monsters of the Mesozoic.
We must not leave the great land-lizards of the reptilian age, without
some notice of that Goliath of the race which, by a singular misnomer,
has received the appellation of _Ceteosaurus_ or "Whale-Saurian." It
was first introduced to naturalists by the discovery of a few enormous
vertebrae in the English Oolite; and as these in size and form seemed
best to fit an aquatic creature, it was named in accordance with this
view. But subsequent discoveries have shown that, incredible though
this at first appeared, the animal had limbs fitted for walking on the
land. Professor Phillips has been most successful in collecting and
restoring the remains of Ceteosaurus, and devotes to its history a
long and interesting section of his "Geology of Oxford." The size of
the animal may be estimated, from the fact that its thigh-bone is
sixty-four inches long, and thick in proportion. From this and other
fragments of the skeleton, we learn that this huge monster must have
stood ten feet high when on all fours, and that its length, could not
have been less then fifty feet; perhaps much more. From a single
tooth, which has been found, it seems to have been herbivorous; and it
was probably a sort of reptilian Hippopotamus, living on the rich
herbage by the sides of streams and marshes, and perhaps sometimes
taking to the water, where the strokes of its powerful tail would
enable it to move more rapidly then on the land. In structure, it
seems to have been a composite creature, resembling in many points the
contemporary Dinosaurs; but in others, approaching to the crocodiles
and the lizards.
But the wonders of Mesozoic reptiles are not yet exhausted. While
noticing numerous crocodiles and lizard: like creatures, and several
kinds of tortoises, we are startled by what seems a flight of great
bats, wheeling and screaming overhead, pouncing on smaller creatures
of their own kind, as hawks seize sparrows and partridges, and perhaps
diving into the sea for fish. These were the Pterodactyles, the
reptile bats of the Mesozoic. They fly by means of a membrane
stretched on a monstrously enlarged little finger, while the other
fingers of the fore limb are left free to be used as hands or feet. To
move these wings, they had large breast-muscles like those of birds.
In their general structure, they were lizards, but no doubt of far
higher organization then any animals of this order now living; and in
accordance with this, the interior of their skull shows that they must
have had a brain comparable with that of birds, which, they rivalled
in energy and intelligence. Some of them were larger then the largest
modern birds of prey, others were like pigeons and snipes in size.
Specimens in the Cambridge Museum indicate one species twenty feet in
the expanse of its wings. Cope has recently described an equally
gigantic species from the Mesozoic of Western America, and fragments
of much larger species are said to exist.[AE] Imagine such a creature,
a flying dragon, with vast skinny wings, its body, perhaps, covered
with scales, both wings and feet armed with strong claws, and with
long jaws furnished with sharp teeth. Nothing can be conceived more
strange and frightful. Some of them had the hind limbs long, like
wading birds. Some had short, legs, adapted perhaps for perching. They
could probably fold up their wings, and walk on all fours. Their
skeleton, like that of birds, was very light, yet strong; and the
hollow bones have pores, which show that, as in birds, air could be
introduced into them from the lungs. This proves a circulation
resembling that of birds, and warm blood. Indeed, in many respects,
these creatures bridge over the space between the birds and the
reptiles. "That they lived," says Seeley, "exclusively upon land or in
the air is improbable, considering the circumstances under which their
remains are found. It is likely that they haunted the sea-shores; and
while sometimes rowing themselves over the water with their powerful
wings, used the wing membrane, as does the bat, to encloses the prey
and bring it to the mouth. The large Pterodactyles probably pursued a
more substantial prey then dragon-flies. Their teeth were well suited
for fish; but probably fowl and small mammal, and even fruits, made a
variety in their food. As the lord of the cliff, it may be supposed to
have taken toll of all animals that could be conquered with tooth and
nail. From its brain, it might be regarded as an intelligent animal.
The jaws present indications of having been sheathed with a horny
covering, and some species show a rugose anterior termination of the
snout, suggestive of fleshy lips like those of the bat, and which may
have been similarly used to stretch and clean the wing-membrane."
[AE] Seeley: "_Ornithosauria._"
Here, however, perched on the trees, we see true birds. At least they
have beaks, and are clothed with feathers. But they have very strange
wings, the feathers all secondaries, without any large quills, and
several fingers with claws at the angle of the wing, so that though
less useful as wings, they served the double purpose of wing and hand.
More strange still, the tail was long and flexible, like that of a
lizard, with the feathers arranged in rows along its sides. If the
lizards of this strange and uncertain time had wings like bats, the
birds had tails and hands like lizards. This was in short the special
age of reptiles, when animals of that class usurped the powers which
rightfully belonged to creatures yet in their nonage, the true birds
and mammals of our modern days, while the birds were compelled to
assume some reptilian traits.
Yet, strange to say, representatives of the higher creatures destined
to inherit the earth at a later date actually existed. Toward the
close of the Mesozoic we find birds approaching to those of our own
day, and almost at the beginning of the time there were small mammals,
remains of which are found both in the earlier and later formations of
the Mesozoic, but which never seem to have thriven; at least so far as
the introduction of large and important species is concerned.
Traversing the Mesozoic woods, we might see here and there little
hairy creatures, which would strike a naturalist as allies of the
modern bandicoots, kangaroo rats, and myrmecobius of Australia; and
closer study would confirm this impression, though showing differences
of detail. In their teeth, their size, and general form, and probably
in their pouched or marsupial reproduction, these animals were early
representatives of the smaller quadrupeds of the Austral continent,
creatures which are not only small but of low organisation in their
class.
One of these mammals, known to us only by its teeth, and well named
_Microlestes_, the "little thief" sneaks into existence, so to speak,
in the Trias of Europe, while another very similar, _Dromatherium_,
appears in rocks of similar age in America; and this is the small
beginning of the great class Mammalia, destined in its quadrupedal
forms to culminate in the elephants and their contemporaries in the
Tertiary period. Who that saw them trodden under foot lay the
reptile aristocracy of the Mesozoic could have divined their destiny?
But, notwithstanding the struggle for existence, the weakest does not
always "go to the wall." The weak things of this world are often
chosen to confound those that are mighty; and the little quadrupeds of
the Mesozoic are an allegory. They may typify the true, the good, and
the hopeful, mildly and humbly asserting themselves in the world that
now is, in the presence of the dragon monsters of pride and violence,
which in the days to come they will overthrow. Physically the Mesozoic
has passed away, but still exists morally in an age of evil reptiles,
whose end is as certain as that of the great Dinosaurs of the old
world.
The Mesozoic mammals are among the most interesting fossils known to
us. In a recent memoir by Professor Owen, thirty-three species are
indicated--all, or nearly all, Marsupial--all small--all closely
allied to modern Australian animals; some herbivorous, some probably
carnivorous. Owen informs us that these animals are not merely
marsupials, but marsupials of low grade, a point in which, however,
Huxley differs somewhat in opinion. They are at least not lower then
some that still exist, and not so low as those lowest of mammals in
Modern Australia, the duck-billed platypus and the echidna. Owen
further supposes that they were possibly the first mammals, and not
only the predecessors but the progenitors of the modern marsupials. If
so, we have the singular fact that they not only did not improve
throughout the vast Mesozoic time, but that they have been in the
progress of subsequent geological ages expelled out of the great
eastern continent, and, with the exception of the American opossums,
banished, like convicts, to Australia. Yet, notwithstanding their
multiplied travels and long experiences, they have made little
advance. It thus seems that the Mesozoic mammals were, from the
evolutionist point of view, a decided failure, and the work of
introducing mammals had to be done over again in the Tertiary; and
then, as we shall find, in a very different way. If nothing more,
however, the Mesozoic mammals were a mute prophecy of a better time, a
protest that the age of reptiles was an imperfect age, and that better
things were in store for the world. Moses seems to have been more
hopeful of them then Owen or even Huxley would have been. He says that
God "created" the great Tanninim, the Dinosaurs and their allies, but
only "made" the mammals of the following creative day; so that when
Microlestes and his companions quietly and unnoticed presented
themselves in the Mesozoic, they would appear in some way to have
obviated, in the case of the tertiary mammals, the necessity of a
repetition of the greater intervention implied in the word "create."
How that was effected none of us know; but, perhaps, we may know
hereafter.
CHAPTER IX.
THE MESOZOIC AGES (_continued_).
The waters of the Mesozoic period present features quite as remarkable
as the land. In our survey of their teeming multitudes, we indeed
scarcely know where to begin or whither to turn. Let us look first at
the higher or more noble inhabitants of the waters. And here, just as
in the case of the greater animals of the land, the Mesozoic was
emphatically an age of reptiles. In the modern world the highest
animals the sea are mammals, and these belong to three great and
somewhat diverse groups. The first is that of the seals and their
allies, the walruses, sea-lions, etc. The second is that of the whales
and dolphins and porpoises. The third is that of the manatees, or
dugongs. All these creatures breathe air, and bring forth their young
alive, and nourish them with milk. Yet they all live habitually or
constantly in the water. Between these aquatic mammals and the fishes,
we have some aquatic reptiles as the turtles, and a few sea-snakes and
sea-lizards, and crocodiles; but the number of these is comparatively
small, and in the more temperate latitudes there are scarcely any of
them.
All this was different in the Mesozoic. In so far as we know, there
were no representatives of the seals and whales and their allies, but
there were vast numbers of marine reptiles, and many of these of
gigantic size. Britain at present does not possess one large reptile,
and no marine reptile whatever. In the Mesozoic, in addition to the
great Dinosaurs and Pterodactyls of the land, it had at least fifty or
sixty species of aquatic reptiles, besides many turtles. Some of these
were comparable in size with our modern whales, and armed with
tremendous powers of destruction. America is not relatively rich in
remains of Mesozoic Saurians, yet while the existing fauna of the
temperate parts of North America is nearly destitute of aquatic
reptiles, with the exception of the turtles, it can boast, according
to Cope's lists, about fifty Mesozoic species, many of them of
gigantic size, and the number of known species is increasing every
year When it is taken in connection with these statistics, that while
we know all the modern species, we know but a small percentage of the
fossils, the discrepancy becomes still more startling. Further, from
the number of specimens and fragments found, it is obvious that these
great aquatic saurians were by no means rare; and that some of the
species at least must have been very abundant. Could we have taken our
post on the Mesozoic shore, or sailed over its waters, we should have
found ourselves in the midst of swarms of these strange, often
hideous, and always grotesque creatures.
Let us consider for a little some of the more conspicuous forms,
referring to our illustration for their portraits. Every text-book
figures the well-known types of the genera _Ichthyosaurus_ and
_Plesiosaurus_; we need scarcely, therefore, dwell on them, except to
state that the catalogues of British fossils include eleven species of
the former genus and eighteen of the latter, We may, however, notice
some of the less familiar points of comparison of the two genera. Both
were aquatic, and probably marine. Both swam by means of paddles; both
were carnivorous, and probably fed principally upon fishes; both were
proper reptiles, and breathed air, and had large and capacious lungs.
Yet with these points in common, no two animals could have been more
different in detail. The Ichthyosaurus had an enormous head, with
powerful jaws, furnished with numerous and strong teeth. Its great
eyes, strengthened by a circle of bony plates, exceeded in dimensions,
and probably in power of vision under water, those of any other
animal, recent or fossil. Its neck was short, its trunk massive, with
paddles or swimming limbs of comparatively small size, and a long
tail, probably furnished with a caudal fin or paddle for propulsion
through the water. The Plesiosaur, on the other hand, had a small and
delicate head, with slender teeth and small eyes. Its neck, of great
length and with numerous joints, resembled the body of a serpent. Its
trunk, short, compact, and inflexible, was furnished with large and
strong paddles, and its tail was too short to be of any service except
for steering. Compared with the Ichthyosaur, it was what the giraffe
is to the rhinoceros, or the swan to the porpoise. Two fishermen so
variously and differently fitted for their work it would be difficult
to imagine. But these differences were obviously related to
corresponding differences in food and habit. The Ichthyosaur was
fitted to struggle with the waves of the stormy sea, to roll therein
like modern whales and grampuses, to seize and devour great fishes,
and to dive for them into the depths; and its great armour-plated eyes
must have been well adapted for vision in the deeper waters. The
Plesiosaur, on the contrary, was fitted for comparatively still and
shallow waters; swimming near the surface with its graceful neck
curving aloft, it could dart at the smaller fishes on the surface, or
stretch its long neck downward in search of those near the bottom. The
Ichthyosaurs rolled like porpoises in the surf of the Liassic coral
reefs and the waves beyond; the Plesiosaurs careered gracefully in the
quiet waters within. Both had their beginning at the same time in the
earlier Mesozoic, and both found a common and final grave in its later
sediments. Some of the species were of very moderate size, but there
were Ichthyosaurs twenty five feet long, and Plesiosaurs at least
eighteen feet in length.
Another strange and monstrous group of creatures, the Elasmosaurs and
their allies, combined the long neck of Plesiosaurs with the swimming
tail of Ichthyosaurs, the latter enormously elongated, so that these
Creatures were sometimes fifty feet in length, and whale-like in the
dimensions of their bodies. It is curious that these composite
creatures belong to a later period of the Mesozoic then the typical
Ichthyosaurs and Plesiosaurs, as if the characters at one time
separated in these genera had united in their successors.
One of the relatives of the Plesiosaurs, the Pliosaur, of which genus
several species of great size are known perhaps realized in the
highest degree possible the idea of a huge marine predaceous reptile.
The head in some of the species was eight feet in length, armed with
conical teeth a foot long. The neck was not only long, but massive and
powerful, the paddles, four in number, were six or seven feet in
length and must have urged the vast bulk of the animal, perhaps forty
feet in extent, through the water with prodigious speed. The capacious
chest and great ribs show a powerful heart and lungs. Imagine such a
creature raising its huge head twelve feet or more out of water, and
rushing after its prey, impelled with perhaps the most powerful oars
ever possessed by any animal. We may be thankful that such monsters,
more terrible then even the fabled sea-serpent, are unknown in our
days. Buckland, I think, at one time indulged in the _jeu d'esprit_ of
supposing an Ichthyosaur lecturing on the human skull. "You will at
once perceive," said the lecturer, "that the skull before us belonged
to one of the lower orders of animals. The teeth are very
insignificant, the power of the jaws trifling, and altogether it seems
wonderful how the creature could have procured food." We cannot retort
on the Ichthyosaur and his contemporaries, for we can see that they
were admirably fitted for the work they had in hand; but we can see
that had man been so unfortunate as to have lived in their days, he
might have been anything but the lord of creation.
But there were sea-serpents as well as other monsters in the Mesozoic
seas. Many years ago the Lower Cretaceous beds of St. Peter's Mount,
near Maestricht, afforded a skull three feet in length, of massive
proportions, and furnished with strong conical teeth, to which the
name _Mosasaurus Camperi_ was given. The skull and other parts of the
skeleton found with it, were held to indicate a large aquatic reptile,
but its precise position in its class was long a subject of dispute.
Faujas held it to be a crocodile; Camper, Cuvier, and Owen regarded it
as a gigantic lizard. More recently, additional specimens, especially
those found in the Cretaceous formations of North America, have thrown
new light upon its structure, and have shown it to present a singular
combination of the character of serpents, lizards, and of the great
sea saurians already referred to. Some parts of the head and the
articulation of the jaws, in important points resemble those of
serpents, while in other respects the head is that of a gigantic
lizard. The body and tail are greatly lengthened out, having more then
a hundred vertebral joints, and in one of the larger species attaining
the length of eighty feet. The trunk itself is much elongated, and
with ribs like those of a snake. There are no walking feet, but a pair
of fins or paddles like those of Ichthyosaurus. Cope, who has
described these great creatures as they occur in the Cretaceous of the
United States, thus sketches the Mosasaur: "It was a long and slender
reptile, with a pair of powerful paddles in front, a moderately long
neck, and flat pointed head. The very long tail was flat and deep,
like that of a great eel, forming a powerful propeller. The arches of
the vertebral column were more extensively interlocked then in any
other reptiles except the snakes. In the related genus _Clidastes_
this structure is as fully developed as in the serpents, so that we
can picture to ourselves its well-known consequences; their rapid
progress through the water by lateral undulations, their lithe motions
on the land, the rapid stroke, the ready coil, or the elevation of the
head and vertebral column, literally a living pillar, towering above
the waves or the thickets of the shore swamps." As in serpents, the
mouth was wide in its gape, and the lower jaw capable of a certain
separation from the skull to admit of swallowing large prey. Besides
this the lower jaw had an additional peculiarity, seen in some snakes,
namely, a joint in the middle of the jaw enabling its sides to expand,
so that the food might be swallowed "between the branches of the jaw."
Perhaps no creatures more fully realize in their enormous length and
terrible powers the great Tanninim (the stretched-out or extended
reptiles) of the fifth day of the Mosaic record, then the Mosasaurus
and Elasmosaurus. When Mr. Cope showed me, a few years ago, a nearly
complete skeleton of Elasmosaurus, which for want of space he had
stretched on a gallery along two sides of a large room, I could not
help suggesting to him that the name of the creature should be
_Teinosaurus_[AF] instead of that which he had given. Marsh has
recently ascertained that the Mosasaurs were covered in part at least
with bony scales.
[AF] Heb. _Tanan_; Gr. _Teino_, _Tanuo_; Sansc. _Tanu_; Lat.
_Tendo_.--Ges. Lex.
[Illustration: LIFE IN THE MESOZOIC PERIOD.
Aquatic Reptiles and Cephalopods. _Reptiles._--Plesiosaur and
Osteopygis, Ichthyosaur, Teliosaur, Plesiosaur, Elasmosaur, Mosasaur
(in order of the heads from left to right).--_Cephalopods._--Ammonite,
Crioceras, Belemnites, Baculites, and Ammonites (in order from left to
right). The Reptiles after Hawkins and Cope's Restorations.]
These animals may serve as specimens of the reptilian giants of the
Mesozoic seas; but before leaving them we must at least invite
attention to the remarkable fact that they were contemporary with
species which represent the more common aquatic reptiles of the modern
world. In other words, the monsters which we have described existed
over and above a far more abundant population of crocodiles and
turtles then the modern waters can boast. The crocodiles were
represented both in Europe and America by numerous and large species,
most of them with long snouts like the modern Gavials, a few with
broad heads like those of the alligators. The turtles again presented
not only many species, but most of the aquatic subdivisions of the
group known in modern times, as for instance the Emydes or ordinary
fresh-water forms, the snapping turtles, and the soft-shelled turtles.
Cope says that the Cretaceous of New Jersey alone affords twenty
species, one of them a snapping turtle six feet in length. Owen
records above a dozen large species from the Upper Mesozoic of
England, and dates the first appearance of the turtles in England
about the time of the Portland stone, or in the upper half of the
Mesozoic; but footprints supposed to be those of turtles are found as
far back as the Trias. Perhaps no type of modern reptiles is more
curiously specialized then these animals, yet we thus find them
contemporaneous with many generalized types, and entering into
existence perhaps as soon as they. The turtles did not culminate in
the Mesozoic, but go on to be represented by more numerous and larger
species in the Tertiary and Modern. In the case of the crocodiles,
while they attained perhaps a maximum toward the end of the Mesozoic,
it was in a peculiar form. The crocodiles of this old time had
vertebrae with a hollow at each end like the fishes, or with a
projection in the front. At the end of the Mesozoic this was changed,
and they assumed a better-knit back, with joints having a ball behind
and a socket in front. In the Cretaceous age, species having these two
kinds of backbone were contemporaneous. Perhaps this improvement in
the crocodilian back had something to do with the persistence of this
type after so many others of the sea-lizards of the Mesozoic had
passed away.
Of the fishes of the Mesozoic we need only say that they were very
abundant, and consisted of sharks and ganoids of various types, until
near the close of the period, when the ordinary horny-scaled fishes,
such as abound in our present seas, appear to have been introduced.
One curious point of difference is that the unequally lobed tail of
the Palæozoic fishes is dropped in the case of the greater part of the
ganoids, and replaced by the squarely-cut tail prevalent in modern
times.
In the sub-kingdom of the Mollusca many important revolutions
occurred. Among the lamp-shells a little _Leptaena_, no bigger then a
pea, is the last and depauperated representative of a great Palæozoic
family. Another, that of the Spirifers, still shows a few species in
the Lower Mesozoic. Others, like Rhynchonella, and Terebratula,
continue through the period, and extend into the Modern. Passing over
the ordinary bivalves and sea-snails, which in the main conform to
those of our own time, we find perhaps the most wonderful changes
among the relatives of the cuttle-fishes and Nautili. As far back as
the Silurian we find the giant Orthoceratites contemporary with
Nautili, very like those of the present ocean. With the close
of the Palæozoic, however, the Orthoceratites and their allies
disappear, while the Nautili continue, and are reinforced by
multitudes of new forms of spiral chambered shells, some of them
more wonderful and beautiful then any of those which either preceded
or followed them. Supreme among these is the great group of the
_Ammonites_,--beautifully spiral shells, thin and pearly like the
Nautilus, and chambered like it, so as to serve as a float, but far
more elaborately constructed, inasmuch as the chambers were not simply
curved, but crimped and convoluted, so as to give the outer wall much
more effectual support. This outer wall, too, was worked into
ornamental ribs and bands, which not only gave it exquisite beauty,
but contributed to combine strength to resist pressure with the
lightness necessary to a float. In some of these points it is true the
Gyroceras and Goniatites of the Palæozoic partially anticipated them,
but much less perfectly. The animals which inhabited these shells must
have been similar to that of Nautilus, but somewhat different in the
proportion of parts. They must have had the same power of rising and
sinking in the water, but the mechanical construction of their shells
was so much more perfect relatively to this end, that they were
probably more active and locomotive then the Nautili. They must have
swarmed in the Mesozoic seas, some beds of limestone and shale being
filled with them; and as many as eight hundred species of this family
are believed to be known, including, however, such forms as the
_Baculites_ or straight Ammonites, bearing to them perhaps a relation
similar to that of Orthoceras to Nautilus. Further, some of the
Ammonites are of gigantic size, one species being three feet in
diameter, while others are very minute. The whole family of
Ammonitids, which begins to be in force in the Trias, disappears at
the end of the Mesozoic, so that this may be called the special age
of Ammonites as well as of reptiles.
Further, this time was likewise distinguished by the introduction of
true cuttle-fishes, the most remarkable of which were those furnished
with the internal supports or "bones," known as _Belemnites_, from a
fancied resemblance to javelins or thunder-bolts, a comparison at
least as baseless as that often made in England of the Ammonites to
fossil snakes. The shell of the Belemnite is a most curious structure.
Its usual general shape is a pointed cylinder or elongated cone. At
top it has a deep cavity for the reception of certain of the viscera
of the animal. Below this is a conical series of chambers, the
Phragmacone; and the lower half of the shell is composed of a solid
shelly mass or guard, which, in its structure of radiating fibres and
concentric layers, resembles a stalactite, or a petrified piece of
exogenous wood. This structure was an internal shell or support like
those of the modern cuttle-fishes; but it is difficult to account for
its peculiarities, so much more complex then in any existing species.
The most rational supposition seems to be that it was intended to
serve the triple purpose of a support, a float, and a sinker. Unlike
the shell of a Nautilus, if thrown into the water it would no doubt
have, sunk, and with the pointed end first. Consequently, it was not a
float simply, but a float and sinker combined, and its effect must
have been to keep the animal at the bottom, with its head upward. The
Belemnite was therefore an exceptional cuttle-fish, intended to stand
erect on the sea-bottom and probably to dart upward in search of its
prey; for the suckers and hooks with which its arms were furnished
show that, like other cuttle-fishes, it was carnivorous and
predaceous. The guard may have been less ponderous when recent then in
the fossil specimens, and in some species it was of small size or
slender, and in others it was hollow. Possibly, also, the soft tissues
of the animal were not dense, and it may have had swimming fins at the
sides. In any case they must have been active creatures, and no doubt
could dart backward by expelling water from their gill chamber, while
we know that they had ink-bags, provided with that wonderfully divided
pigment, inimitable by art, with which the modern Sepia darkens the
water to shelter itself from its enemies. The Belemnites must have
swarmed in the Mesozoic seas; and as squids and cuttles now afford
choice morsels to the larger fishes, so did the Belemnites in their
day. There is evidence that even the great sea-lizards did not disdain
to feed on them. We can imagine a great shoal of these creatures
darting up and down, seizing with their ten hooked arms their finny or
crustacean prey. In an instant a great fish or saurian darts down
among them; they blacken the water with a thick cloud of inky
secretion and disperse on all sides, while their enemy, blindly
seizing a few mouthfuls, returns sullenly to the surface. A great
number of species of Belemnites and allied animals have been
described; but it is probable that in naming them too little regard
has been paid to distinctions of age and sex. The Belemnites were for
the most part small creatures; but there is evidence that there
existed with them some larger and more formidable cuttles; and it is
worthy of note that, in several of these, the arms, as in the
Belemnites, were furnished with hooks as well as suckers, an
exceptional arrangement in their modern allies. It is probable that
while the four-gilled or shell-bearing cuttles culminated in size and
perfection in the Ammonitids of the Mesozoic, the modern cuttles of
the two-gilled and shell-less type are grander in dimensions then
their Mesozoic predecessors. It is, however, not a little singular
that a group so peculiar and apparently so well provided with means,
both of offence and defence, as the Belemnites, should come in and go
out with the Mesozoic, and that the Nautiloid group, after attaining
to the magnitude and complexity of the great Ammonites, should retreat
to a few species of diminutive and simply-constructed Nautili; and in
doing so should return to one of the old types dating as far back as
the older Palæozoic, and continuing unchanged through all the
intervening time.
The Crustaceans of the Mesozoic had lost all the antique peculiarities
of the older time, and had so much of the aspect of those of the
present day, that an ordinary observer, if he could be shown a
quantity of Jurassic or Cretaceous crabs, lobsters, and shrimps, would
not readily recognise the difference, which did not exceed what occurs
in distant geographical regions in the present day. The same remark
may be made as to the corals of the Mesozoic; and with some
limitations, as to the star-fishes and sea-urchins, which latter are
especially numerous and varied in the Cretaceous age. In short, all
the invertebrate forms of life, and the fishes and reptiles among the
vertebrates, had already attained their maximum elevation in the
Mesozoic; and some of them have subsequently sunk considerably in
absolute as well as relative importance.
In the course of the Mesozoic, as indicated in the last chapter, there
had been several great depressions and re-elevations of the
Continental Areas. But these had been of the same quiet and partial
character with those of the Palæozoic, and it was not until the close
of the Mesozoic time, in the Cretaceous age, that a great and
exceptional subsidence involved for a long period the areas of our
present continents in a submergence wider and deeper then any that had
previously occurred since the dry land first rose out of the waters.
Every one knows the great chalk beds which appear in the south of
England, and which have given its name to the latest age of the
Mesozoic. This great deposit of light-coloured and usually soft
calcareous matter attains in some places to the enormous thickness of
1,000 feet. Nor is it limited in extent. According to Lyell, its
European distribution is from Ireland to the Crimea, a distance of
1,140 geographical miles; and from the south of France to Sweden, a
distance of 840 geographical miles. Similar rocks, though not in all
cases of the precise nature of chalk, occur extensively in Asia and in
Africa, and also in North and South America.
But what is chalk? It was, though one of the most familiar, one of the
most inscrutable of rocks, until the microscope revealed its
structure. The softer varieties, gently grated or kneaded down in
water, or the harder varieties cut in thin slices, show a congeries of
microscopic chambered shells belonging to the humble and simple group
of Protozoa. These shells and their fragments constitute the material
of the ordinary chalk. With these are numerous spicules of sponges and
silicious cell-walls of the minute one-celled plants called Diatoms.
Further, the flinty matter of these organisms has by the law of
molecular attraction been collected into concretions, which are the
flints of the chalk. Such a rock is necessarily oceanic; but more then
this, it is abyssal. Laborious dredging has shown that similar matter
is now being formed only in the deep bed of the ocean, whither no sand
or mud is drifted from the land, and where the countless hosts of
microscopic shell-bearing protozoa continually drop their little
skeletons on the bottom, slowly accumulating a chalky mud or slime.
that such a rock should occur over vast areas of the continental
plateaus, that both in Europe and America it should be found to cover
the tops of hills several thousand feet high, and that its thickness
should amount to several hundreds of feet, are facts which evidence a
revolution more stupendous perhaps then that at the close of the
Palæozoic. For the first time since the Laurentian, the great
continental plateaus changed places with the abysses of the ocean, and
the successors of the Laurentian Eozoon again reigned on surfaces
which through the whole lapse of Palæozoic and Mesozoic time had been
separated more or less from that deep ocean out of which they rose at
first. This great Cretaceous subsidence was different from the
disturbances of the Permian age. There was at first no crumpling of
the crust, but merely a slow and long-continued sinking of the land
areas, followed, however, by crumpling of the most stupendous
character, which led at the close of the Cretaceous and in the earlier
Tertiary to the formation of what are now the greatest mountain chains
in the world. As examples may be mentioned the Himalaya, the Andes,
and the Alps, on all which the deep-sea beds of the Cretaceous are
seen at great elevations. In Europe this depression was almost
universal, only very limited areas remaining out of water. In America
a large tract remained above water in the region of the Appalachians.
This gives us some clue to the phenomena. The great Permian collapse
led to the crumpling-up of the Appalachians and the Urals, and the
older hills of Western Europe. The Cretaceous collapse led to the
crumpling of the great N.W. and S.E. chain of the Rocky Mountains and
Andes, and to that of the east and west chains of the south of Asia
and Europe. The cause was probably in both cases the same; but the
crust gave way in a different part, and owing to this there was a
greater amount of submergence of our familiar continental plateaus in
the Cretaceous then in the Permian.
Another remarkable indication of the nature of the Cretaceous
subsidence, is the occurrence of beds filled with grains of the
mineral Glauconite or "green-sand." These grains are not properly
sand, but little concretions, which form in the bottom of the deep
sea, often filling and taking casts of the interior and fine tubes of
Foraminiferal shells. Now this Glauconite, a hydrous silicate of iron
and potash, is akin to similar materials found filling the pores of
fossils in Silurian beds. It is also akin to the Serpentine filling
the pores of Eozoon in the Laurentian. Such materials are formed only
in the deeper parts of the ocean, and apparently most abundantly where
currents of warm water are flowing at the surface, as in the area of
the Gulf Stream. Thus, not only in the prevalence of Foraminifera, but
in the formation of hydrous silicates, does the Cretaceous recall the
Laurentian. Such materials had no doubt been forming, and such animals
living in the ocean depths, all through the intervening ages, but with
the exception of a few and merely local instances, we know nothing of
them, till the great subsidence and re-elevation of the Cretaceous
again allows them to ascend to the continental plateaus, and again
introduces us to this branch of the world-making process.
The attention recently drawn to these facts by the researches of Dr.
Carpenter and others, and especially the similarity in mineral
character and organic remains of some of the deposits now forming in
the Atlantic and those of the chalk, have caused it to be affirmed
that in the bed of the Atlantic these conditions of life and deposit
have continued from the Cretaceous up to the present time, or as it
has been expressed, that "we are still living in the Cretaceous
epoch." Now, this is true or false just as we apply the statement. We
have seen that the distinction between abyssal areas, continental
oceanic plateaus, and land surfaces has extended through the whole
lapse of geological time. In this broad sense we may be said to be
still living in the Laurentian epoch. In other words, the whole plan
of the earth's development is one and the same, and each class of
general condition once introduced is permanent somewhere. But in
another important sense we are not living in the Cretaceous epoch;
otherwise the present site of London would be a thousand fathoms deep
in the ocean; the Ichthyosaurs and Ammonites would be disporting
themselves in the water, and the huge Dinosaurs and strange
Pterodactyls living on the land. The Italian peasant is still in many
important points living in the period of the old Roman Empire. The
Arab of the desert remains in the Patriarchal period, and there are
some tribes not yet beyond the primitive age of stone. But the world
moves, nevertheless, and the era of Victoria is not that of the
Plantagenets or of Julius Cæsar. So while we may admit that certain of
the conditions of the Cretaceous seas still prevail in the bed of the
present ocean, we must maintain that nearly all else is changed, and
that the very existence of the partial similarity is of itself the
most conclusive proof of the general want of resemblance, and of the
thorough character of the changes which have occurred.
The duration of the Cretaceous subsidence must have been very great.
We do not know the rate at which the Foraminifera accumulate
calcareous mud. In some places, where currents heap up their shells,
they may be gathered rapidly; but on the average of the ocean bed,
afoot of such material must indicate the lapse of ages very long when
compared with those of modern history. We need not wonder, therefore,
that while some forms of deep-sea Cretaceous life, especially of the
lower grades, seem to have continued to our time, the inhabitants of
the shallow waters and the land have perished; and that the Neozoic or
Tertiary period introduces us to a new world of living beings. I say
we need not wonder; yet there is no reason why we should expect this
as a necessary consequence. As the Cretaceous deluge rose over the
continents of the Mesozoic, the great sea saurians might have
followed. Those of the land might have retreated to the tracts still
remaining out of water, and when the dry land again appeared in the
earlier Tertiary, they might again have replenished the earth, and we
might thus have truly been living in the Reptilian age up to this day.
But it was not so. The old world again perished, and the dawn of the
Tertiary shows to us at once the dynasties of the Mammalian age, which
was to culminate in the introduction of man. With the great Cretaceous
subsidence the curtain falls upon the age of reptiles, and when it
rises again, after the vast interval occupied in the deposition of the
green-sand and chalk, the scene has entirely changed. There are new
mountains and new plains, forests of different type, and animals such
as no previous age had seen.
How strange and inexplicable is this perishing of types in the
geological ages! Some we could well spare. We would not wish to have
our coasts infested by terrible sea saurians, or our forests by
carnivorous Dinosaurs. Yet why should these tyrants of creation so
utterly disappear without waiting for us to make war on them? Other
types we mourn. How glorious would the hundreds of species of
Ammonites have shone in the cases of our museums, had they still
lived! What images of beauty would they have afforded to the poets who
have made so much of the comparatively humble Nautilus! How perfectly,
too, were they furnished with all those mechanical appliances for
their ocean life, which are bestowed only with a niggardly hand on
their successors! Nature gives us no explanation of the mystery.
"From scarped cliff and quarried stone,
She cries--'A thousand types are gone.'"
But why or how one was taken and another left she is silent, and I
believe must continue to be so, because the causes, whether efficient
or final, are beyond her sphere. If we wish for a full explanation, we
must leave Nature, and ascend to the higher domain of the Spiritual.
CONDENSED TABULAR VIEW OF THE AGES AND PERIODS OF THE MESOZOIC.
Key to Symbols
### Duration of Ammonites and Belemnites.
=== Ages of Cycads and Pines.
--- Beginning of Age of Angiospermous Exogens.
+++ "And God created great reptiles, and every living moving
thing which the waters brought forth abundantly, and every
flying creature after its kind."
Time.
Ages. Periods. Animals and Plants.
MESOZOIC.
Cretaceous {Newer.{Maestricht beds; Fox Hill # - +
{ {and Pierre Groups of # - +
{ {Western America; Greensand # - +
{ {of New Jersey. # - +
{ # - +
{Middle.{Chalk; Benton and Dakota # Close of - +
{ {Groups of Western America. # Reptilian - +
{ # Ages. - +
{Older.{Lower Greensand and Gault; # - +
{ {Lower Clays of New Jersey # +
{ {and Alabama. # +
# +
Upper {N. Purbeck Beds. }Jurassic # Culmination +
Jurassic {M. Portland Limestone. } Beds of # of +
{O. Portland Sandstone. }Nebraska # Reptilian +
} and # Ages. +
Middle {N. Kimmeridge Clay, etc.}Colorado.# = +
Jurassic {M. Coralline Limestone. } # = +
{O. Calcareous Grit & } # = +
{ Oxford Clay. } # = +
# = +
Lower {N. Cornbrash & Forest } Lower # = +
Jurassic { Marble. }Jurassic # = +
{M. Great & Inferior } of # = +
{ Oolites., etc. } Utah, # = +
{O. Lias Clay and }Nevada, # = +
{ Limestone. } etc. = +
= +
{N. Keuper {Upper Triassic Appearance of = +
{ Sandstone, {Sandstones of Mammals = +
{ etc. {Prince Edward I., and = +
{M. Muschelkalk.{Connecticut, etc. Birds. +
Triassic { +
{O. Bunter {Lower Triassic Beginning of +
{ Sandstone. {Sandstones of Reptilian +
{ {Prince Edward I., Ages. +
{ {Connecticut, etc. +
CHAPTER X.
THE NEOZOIC AGES.
Between the Mesozoic and the next succeeding time which may be known
as the Neozoic or Tertiary,[AG] there is in the arrangements of most
geologists a great break in the succession of life; and undoubtedly
the widespread and deep subsidence of the Cretaceous, followed by the
elevation of land on a great scale at the beginning of the next
period, is a physical cause sufficient to account for vast life
changes. Yet we must not forget to consider that even in the
Cretaceous itself there were new features beginning to appear. Let us
note in this way, in the first place, the introduction of the familiar
generic forms of exogenous trees. Next we may mention the decided
prevalence of the modern types of coral animals and of a great number
of modern generic forms of mollusks. Then we have the establishment of
the modern tribes of lobsters and crabs, and the appearance of nearly
all the orders of insects. Among vertebrates, the ordinary fishes are
now introduced. Modern orders of reptiles, as the crocodiles and
chelonians, had already appeared, and the first mammals. Henceforth
the progress of organic nature lies chiefly in the dropping of many
Mesozoic forms and in the introduction of the higher tribes of mammals
and of man.
[AG] The former name is related to Palæozoic and Mesozoic, the latter
to the older terms Primary and Secondary. For the sake of euphony we
shall use both. The term Neozoic was proposed by Edward Forbes for the
Mesozoic and Cainozoic combined; but I use it here as a more
euphonious and accurate term for the Cainozoic alone.
It is further to be observed that the new things introduced in the
later Mesozoic came in little by little in the progress of the period,
and anticipated the great physical changes occurring at its close. On
the other hand, while many family and even generic types pass over
from the Mesozoic to the earlier Tertiary, very few species do so. It
would seem, therefore, as if changes of species were more strictly
subordinate to physical revolutions then were changes of genera and
orders--these last overriding under different specific forms many
minor vicissitudes, and only in part being overwhelmed in the grander
revolutions of the earth.
Both in Europe and America there is evidence of great changes of level
at the beginning of the Tertiary. In the west of Europe beds often of
shallow-water or even fresh-water origin fill the hollows in the bent
Cretaceous strata. This is manifestly the case with the formations of
the London and Paris basins, contemporaneous but detached deposits of
the Tertiary age, lying in depressions of the chalk. Still this does
not imply much want of conformity, and according to the best explorers
of those Alpine regions in which both the Mesozoic and Tertiary beds
have been thrown up to great elevations, they are in the main
conformable to one another. Something of the same kind occurs in
America. On the Atlantic coast the marine beds of the Older Tertiary
cover the Cretaceous, and little elevation seems to have occurred
Farther west the elevation increases, and in the upper part of the
valley of the Mississippi it amounts to 1700 feet. Still farther west,
in the region of the Rocky Mountains, there is evidence of elevation
to the extent of as much as 7000 feet. Throughout all these regions
scarcely any disturbance of the old Cretaceous sea-bottom seems to
have occurred until after the deposition of the older Tertiary, so
that there was first a slow and general elevation of the Cretaceous
ocean bottom, succeeded by gigantic folds and fractures, and extensive
extravasations of the bowels of the earth in molten rocks, in the
course of the succeeding Tertiary age. These great physical changes
inaugurated the new and higher life of the Tertiary, just as the
similar changes in the Permian did that of the Mesozoic.
The beginning of these movements consisted of a great and gradual
elevation of the northern parts of both the Old and New Continents out
of the sea, whereby a much greater land surface was produced, and such
changes of depth and direction of currents in the ocean as must have
very much modified the conditions of marine life. The effect of all
these changes in the aggregate was to cause a more varied and variable
climate, and to convert vast areas previously tenanted by marine
animals into the abodes of animals and plants of the land, and of
estuaries, lakes, and shallow waters. Still, however, very large
areas now continental were under the sea. As the Tertiary period
advanced, these latter areas were elevated, and in many cases were
folded up into high mountains. This produced further changes of
climate and habitat of animals, and finally brought our continents
into all the variety of surface which they now present, and which fits
them so well for the habitation of the higher animals and of man.
The thoughtful reader will observe that it follows from the above
statements that the partial distribution and diversity in different
localities which apply to the deposits of such ages as the Permian and
the Trias apply also to the earlier Tertiary; and as the continents,
notwithstanding some dips under water, have retained their present
forms since the beginning of the Tertiary, it follows that these beds
are more definitely related to existing geographical conditions then
are those of the older periods, and that the more extensive marine
deposits of the Tertiary are, to a great extent, unknown to us. This
has naturally led to some difficulty in the classification of Neozoic
deposits--those of some of the Tertiary ages being very patchy and
irregular, while others spread very widely. In consequence of this,
Sir Charles Lyell, to whom we owe very much of our definite knowledge
of this period, has proposed a subdivision based on the percentage of
recent and fossil animals. In other words, he takes it for granted
that a deposit which contains more numerous species of animals still
living then another, may be judged on that account to be more recent.
Such a mode of estimation is, no doubt, to some extent arbitrary; but
in the main, when it can be tested by the superposition of deposits,
it has proved itself reliable. Further, it brings before us this
remarkable fact, that while in the older periods all the animals whose
remains we find are extinct as species, so soon as we enter on the
Neozoic we find some which still continue to our time--at first only a
very few, but in later and later beds in gradually increasing
percentage, till the fossil and extinct wholly disappear in the recent
and living.
The Lyellian classification of the Tertiary will therefore stand as in
the following table, bearing in mind that the percentage of fossils is
taken from marine forms, and mainly from mollusks, and that the system
has in some cases been modified by stratigraphical evidence:--
{ Post-pliocene, including that which immediately
{ precedes the Modern. In this the shells, etc.,
{ are recent, the Mammalia in part extinct.
{
{ Pliocene, or more recent age. In this the
{ majority of shells found are recent in the
Tertiary, or { upper beds. In the lower beds the extinct
Neozoic Time. { become predominant.
{
{ Miocene, or less recent. In this the large
{ majority of shells found are extinct.
{
{ Eocene, the dawn of the recent. In this only
{ a few recent shells occur.
If we attempt to divide the Tertiary time into ages corresponding to
those of the older times, we are met by the difficulty that as the
continents have retained their present forms and characters to a great
extent throughout this time, we fail to find those evidences of
long-continued submergences of the whole continental plateaus, or very
large portions of them, which we have found so very valuable in the
Palæozoic and Mesozoic. In the Eocene, however, we shall discover one
very instructive case in the great Nummulitic Limestone. In the
Miocene and Pliocene the oscillations seem to have been slight and
partial. In the Post-pliocene we have the great subsidence of the
glacial drift; but that seems to have been a comparatively rapid dip,
though of long duration when measured by human history; not allowing
time for the formation of great limestones, but only of fossiliferous
sands and clays, which require comparatively short time for their
deposition If then we ask as to the duration of the Neozoic, I answer
that we have not a definite measure of its ages, if it had any; and
that it is possible that the Neozoic may have as yet had but one age,
which closed with the great drift period, and that we are now only in
the beginning of its second age. Some geologists, impressed with this
comparative shortness of the Tertiary, connect it with Mesozoic,
grouping both together. This, however, is obviously unnatural. The
Mesozoic time certainly terminated with the Cretaceous, and what
follows belongs to a distinct aeon.
But we must now try to paint the character of this new and peculiar
time; and this may perhaps be best done in the following sketches: 1.
The seas of the Eocene. 2. Mammals from the Eocene to the Modern. 3.
Tertiary floras. 4. The Glacial period. 5. The Advent of Man.
The great elevation of the continents which closed the Cretaceous was
followed by a partial and unequal subsidence, affecting principally
the more southern parts of the land of the northern hemisphere. Thus,
a wide sea area stretched across all the south of Europe and Asia, and
separated the northern part of North America from what of land existed
in the southern hemisphere. This is the age of the great Nummulitic
Limestones of Europe, Africa, and Asia, and the Orbitoidal Limestones
of North America. The names are derived from the prevalence of certain
forms of those humble shell-bearing protozoa which we first met with
in the Laurentian, and which we have found to be instrumental in
building up the chalk, the _Foraminifera_ of zoologists. (Fig. p.
243.) But in the Eocene the species of the chalk were replaced by
certain broad flat forms, the appearance of which is expressed by the
term nummulite, or money-stone; the rock appearing to be made up of
fossils, somewhat resembling shillings, sixpences, or three-penny
pieces, according to the size of the shells, each of which includes a
vast number of small concentric chambers, which during life were
filled with the soft jelly of the animal. The nummulite limestone was
undoubtedly oceanic, and the other shells contained in it are marine
species. After what we have already seen we do not need this
limestone to convince us of the continent-building powers of the
oceanic protozoa; but the distribution of these limestones, and the
elevation which they attain, furnish the most striking proofs that we
can imagine of the changes which the earth's crust has undergone in
times geologically modern, and also of the extreme newness of man and
his works. Large portions of those countries which constitute the
earliest seats of man in Southern Europe, Northern Africa, and Western
and Southern Asia, are built upon the old nummulitic sea-bottom. The
Egyptians and many other ancient nations quarried it for their oldest
buildings. In some of these regions it attains a thickness of several
thousand feet, evidencing a lapse of time in its accumulation equal to
that implied in the chalk itself. In the Swiss Alps it reaches a
height above the sea of 10,000 feet, and it enters largely into the
structure of the Carpathians and Pyrenees. In Thibet it has been
observed at an elevation of 16,500 feet above the sea. Thus we learn
that at a time no more geologically remote then the Eocene Tertiary,
lands now of this great elevation were in the bottom of the deep sea;
and this not merely for a little time, but during a time sufficient
for the slow accumulation of hundreds of feet of rock, made up of the
shells of successive generations of animals. If geology presented to
us no other revelation then this one fact, it would alone constitute
one of the most stupendous pictures in physical geography which could
be presented to the imagination. I beg leave here to present to the
reader a little illustration of the limestone-making Foraminifera of
the Cretaceous and Eocene seas. In the middle above is a nummulite of
the natural size. Below is another, sliced to show its internal
chambers. At one side is a magnified section of the common building
stone of Paris, the milioline limestone of the Eocene, so called from
its immense abundance of microscopic shells of the genus Miliolina. At
the other side is a magnified section of one of the harder varieties
of chalk, ground so thin as to become transparent,[AH] and mounted in
Canada balsam. It shows many microscopic chambered shells of
Foraminifera. These may serve as illustrations of the functions of
these humble inhabitants of the sea as accumulators of calcareous
matter. It is further interesting to remark that some of the beds of
nummulitic limestone are so completely filled with these shells, that
we might from detached specimens suppose that they belonged to
sea-bottoms whereon no other form of life was present. Yet some beds
of this age are remarkably rich in other fossils. Lyell states that as
many as six hundred species of shells have been found in the principal
limestone of the Paris basin alone; and the lower Eocene beds afford
remains of fishes, of reptiles, of birds, and of mammals. Among the
latter are the bones of gigantic whales, of which one of the most
remarkable is the Zeuglodon of Alabama, a creature sometimes seventy
feet in length, and which replaces in the Tertiary the great
Elasmosaurs and Ichthyosaurs of the Mesozoic, marking the advent, even
in the sea, of the age of Mammals as distinguished from the age of
Reptiles.
[AH] As for instance that of the Giant's Causeway, Antrim.
[Illustration: FORAMINIFERAL ROCK-BUILDERS.
A. Nummulites lævigata--Eocene.
B. The same, showing chambered interior.
C. Milioline limestone, magnified--Eocene, Paris.
D. Hard Chalk, section magnified--Cretaceous.]
This fact leads us naturally to consider in the second place the
mammalia, and other land animals of the Tertiary. At the beginning of
the period we meet with that higher group of mammals, not pouched,
which now prevails. Among the oldest of these Tertiary beasts are
_Coryphodon_, an animal related to the Modern Tapirs, and _Arctocyon_,
a creature related to the bears and racoons. These animals represent
respectively the Pachyderms, or thick-skinned mammals, and the
ordinary Carnivora. Contemporary with or shortly succeeding these,
were species representing the Rodents, or gnawing animals, and many
other creatures of the group Pachydermata, allied to the Modern Tapirs
and Hogs, as well as several additional carnivorous quadrupeds. Thus
at the very beginning of the Tertiary period we enter on the age of
mammals, It may be well, however, to take these animals somewhat in
chronological order.
If the old Egyptian, by quarrying the nummulite limestone, bore
unconscious testimony to the recent origin of man (whose remains are
wholly absent from the Tertiary deposits), so did the ancient Britons
and Gauls, when they laid the first rude foundations of future
capitals on the banks of the themes and of the Seine. Both cities lie
in basins of Eocene Tertiary, occupying hollows in the chalk. Under
London there is principally a thick bed of clay, the "London clay"
attaining a thickness of five hundred feet. This bed is obviously
marine, containing numerous species of sea shells; but it must have
been deposited near land, as it also holds many fossil fruits and
other remains of plants to which we shall refer in the sequel, and the
bones of several species of large animals. Among these the old
reptiles of the Mesozoic are represented by the vertebrae of a
supposed "sea snake" (Palæophis) thirteen feet long, and species of
crocodile allied both to the alligators and the gavials. But besides
these there are bones of several animals allied to the hog and tapir,
and also a species of opossum, These remains must be drift carcases
from neighbouring shores, and they show first the elevation of the
old deep-sea bottom represented by the chalk, so that part of it
became dry land; next, the peopling of that land by tribes of animals
and plants unknown to the Mesozoic; and lastly, that a warm climate
must have existed, enabling England at this time to support many types
of animals and plants now proper to intertropical regions. As Lyell
well remarks, it is most interesting to observe that these beds belong
to the beginning of the Tertiary, that they are older then those great
nummulite limestones to which we have referred, and that they are
older then the principal mountain chains of Europe and Asia. They show
that no sooner was the Cretaceous sea dried from off the new land,
then there were abundance of animals and plants ready to occupy it,
and these not the survivors of the flora and fauna of the Wealden, but
a new creation. The mention of the deposit last named places this in a
striking light. We have seen that the Wealden beds, under the chalk,
represent a Mesozoic estuary, and in it we have the remains of the
animals and plants of the land that then was. The great Cretaceous
subsidence intervened, and in the London clay we have an estuary of
the Eocene. But if we pass through the galleries of a museum where
these formations are represented, though we know that both existed in
the same locality under a warm climate, we see that they belong to two
different worlds, the one to that of the Dinosaurs, the Ammonites, the
Cycads, and the minute Marsupials of the Mesozoic, the other to that
of the Pachyderms, the Palms, and the Nautili of the Tertiary.
The London clay is lower Eocene; but in the beds of the Isle of Wight
and neighbouring parts of the South of England, we have the middle and
upper members of the series. They are not, however, so largely
developed as in the Paris basin, where, resting on the equivalent of
the London clay, we have a thick marine limestone, the Calcaire
Grossier, abounding in marine remains, and in some beds composed of
shells of foraminifera. The sea in which this limestone was deposited,
a portion no doubt of the great Atlantic area of the period, became
shallow, so that beds of sand succeeded those of limestone, and
finally it was dried up into lake basins, in which gypsum, magnesian
sediments, and siliceous limestone were deposited. These lakes or
ponds must at some period have resembled the American "salt-licks,"
and were no doubt resorted to by animals from all the surrounding
country in search of the saline mud and water which they afforded.
Hence in some marly beds intervening between the layers of gypsum,
numerous footprints occur, exactly like those already noticed in the
Trias. Had there been a Nimrod in those days to watch with bow or
boomerang by the muddy shore, he would have seen herds of heavy
short-legged and three-hoofed monsters (Palæotherium), with large
heads and long snouts, probably scantily covered with sleek hair, and
closely resembling the Modern Tapirs of South America and India,
laboriously wading through the mud, and grunting with indolent delight
as they rolled themselves in the cool saline slime. Others more light
and graceful, combining some features of the antelope with those of
the Tapir (Anoplotherium) ran in herds over the drier ridges, or
sometimes timidly approached the treacherous clay, tempted by the
saline waters. Other creatures representing the Modern Damans or
Conies--"feeble folk" which, with the aspect of hares, have the
structure of Pachyderms--were also present. Creatures of these types
constituted the great majority of the animals of the Parisian Eocene
lakes; but there were also Carnivorous animals allied to the hyæna,
the wolf, and the opossum, which prowled along the shores by night to
seize unwary wanderers, or to prey on the carcases of animals mired in
the sloughs. Wading birds equal in size to the ostrich also stalked
through the shallows, and tortoises crawled over the mud.
Lyell mentions the discovery of some bones of one of these gigantic
birds (Gastornis) in a bed of the rolled chalk flints which form the
base of the Paris series, resting immediately on the chalk; one of the
first inhabitants perhaps to people some island of chalk just emerged
from the waters, and under which lay the bones of the mighty
Dinosaurs, and in which were embedded those of sea birds that had
ranged, like the albatross and petrel, over the wide expanse of the
Cretaceous ocean. These waders, however, like the tortoises and
crocodiles and small marsupial mammals, form a link of connection in
type at least between the Eocene and the Cretaceous, for bones of
wading birds have been found in the Greensands indicating their
existence before the close of the Mesozoic.
The researches of Baron Cuvier in the bones collected in the quarries
of Montmartre were regarded as an astonishing triumph of comparative
anatomy; and familiar as we now are with similar and yet more
difficult achievements, we can yet afford to regard with admiration
the work of the great French naturalist as it is recorded in its
collected form in his "Recherches sur les Ossemens Fossiles,"
published in 1812. His clear and philosophical views as to the plan
perceptible in nature, his admirable powers of classification, his
acute perception of the correlation of parts in animals, his nice
discrimination of the resemblances and differences of fossil and
recent structures, and of the uses of these,--all mark him as one of
the greatest minds ever devoted to the study of natural science. It is
obvious, that had his intellect been occupied by the evolutionist
metaphysics which pass for natural science with too many in our day,
he would have effected comparatively little; and instead of the
magnificent museum in the "Règne Animal" and the "Ossemens Fossiles,"
we might have had wearisome speculations on the derivation of species.
It is reason for profound thankfulness that it was not so; and also
that so many great observers and thinkers of our day, like Sedgwick,
Murchison, Lyell, Owen, Dana, and Agassiz, have been allowed to work
out their researches almost to completion before the advent of those
poisoned streams and mephitic vapours which threaten the intellectual
obscuration of those who should be their successors.
If we pass from the Eocene to the Miocene, still confining ourselves
mainly to mammalian life, we find three remarkable points of
difference--(1) Whereas the Eocene mammals are remarkable for
adherence to one general type, viz., that group of pachyderms most
regular and complete in its dentition, we now find a great number of
more specialised and peculiar forms; (2) We find in the latter period
a far greater proportion of large carnivorous animals; (3) We find
much greater variety of mammals then either in the Eocene or the
Modern, and a remarkable abundance of species of gigantic size. The
Miocene is thus apparently the culminating age of the mammalia, in so
far as physical development is concerned; and this, as we shall find,
accords with its remarkably genial climate and exuberant vegetation.
In Europe, the beds of this age present, for the first time, examples
of the monkeys, represented by two generic types, both of them
apparently related to the modern long-armed species, or Gibbons. Among
carnivorous animals we have cat-like creatures, one of which is the
terrible _Machairodus_, distinguished from all modern animals of its
group by the long sabre-shaped canines of its upper jaw, fitting it to
pull down and destroy those large pachyderms which could have easily
shaken off a lion or a tiger. Here also we have the elephants,
represented by several species now extinct; the mastodon, a great,
coarsely-built, hog-like elephant, some species of which had tusks
both in the upper and lower jaw; the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus, and
the horse, all of extinct species. We have also giraffes, stags, and
antelopes, the first ruminants known to us, and a great variety of
smaller and less noteworthy creatures. Here also, for the first time,
we find the curious and exceptional group of Edentates, represented by
a large ant-eater. Of all the animals of the European Miocene, the
most wonderful and unlike any modern beast, is the Dinotherium, found
in the Miocene of Epplesheim in Germany; and described by Kaup. Some
doubt rests on the form and affinities of the animal; but we may
reasonably take it, as restored by its describer, and currently
reproduced in popular books, to have been a quadruped of somewhat
elephantine form. Some years ago, however, a huge haunch bone,
supposed to belong to this creature, was discovered in the South of
France; and from this it was inferred that the Dinothere may have been
a marsupial or pouched animal, perhaps allied in form and habits to
the kangaroos. The skull is three feet four inches in length; and when
provided with its soft parts, including a snout or trunk in front, it
must have been at least five or six feet long. Such a head, if it
belonged to a quadruped of ordinary proportions, must represent an
animal as large in proportion to our elephant as an elephant to an ox.
But its size is not its most remarkable feature. It has two large
tusks firmly implanted in strong bony sockets; but they are attached
to the end of the lower jaw and point downward at right angles to it,
so that the lower jaw forms a sort of double-pointed pickaxe of great
size and strength. This might have been used as a weapon; or, if the
creature was aquatic, as a grappling iron to hold by the bank, or by
floating timber; but more probably it was a grubbing-hoe for digging
up roots or loosening the bases of trees which the animal might
afterward pull down to devour them. However this may be, the creature
laboured under the mechanical disadvantage of having to lift an
immense weight in the process of mastication, and of being unable to
bring its mouth to the ground, or to bite or grasp anything with the
front of its jaws. To make up for this, it had muscles of enormous
power on the sides of the head attached to great projecting processes;
and it had a thick but flexible proboscis, to place in its mouth the
food grubbed up by its tusks. Taken altogether, the Dinothere is
perhaps the most remarkable of mammals, fossil or recent; and if the
rest of its frame were as extraordinary as its skull, we have probably
as yet but a faint conception of its peculiarities. We may apply to
it, with added force, the admiring ejaculation of Job, when he
describes the strength of the hippopotamus, "He is the chief of the
ways of God. He who made him, gave him his sword."
[Illustration: MIOCENE MAMMALS OF THE EASTERN CONTINENT.
In the foreground _Elephas_, _Ganesa_, _Hydracotherium_,
_Dinotherium_, _Machairodus_, _Mastodon longirostris_. In the middle
distance, _Apes_, two _Anoplotheres_, _Palæotherium_, _Xiphodon_, and
_Sivatherium_. Sequoias and Fan Palm in the background.]
In Asia, the Siwalik hills afforded to Falconer and Cautley one of the
most remarkable exhibitions of Miocene animals in the world. These
hills form a ridge subordinate to the Himalayan chain; and rise to a
height of 2,000 to 3,000 feet. In the Miocene period, they were sandy
and pebbly shores and banks lying at the foot of the then infant
Himalayas, which, with the table-lands to the north, probably formed a
somewhat narrow east and west continental mass or large island. As a
mere example of the marvellous fauna which inhabited this Miocene
land, it has afforded remains of seven species of elephants,
mastodons, and allied animals; one of them, the _E. Ganesa_, with
tusks ten feet and a half long, and twenty-six inches in circumference
at the base. Besides these there are five species of rhinoceros, three
of horse and allied animals, four or more of hippopotamus, and species
of camel, giraffe, antelope, sheep, ox, and many other genera, as well
as numerous large and formidable beasts of prey. There is also an
ostrich; and, among other reptiles, a tortoise having a shell twelve
feet in length, and this huge roof must have covered an animal
eighteen feet long and seven feet high. Among the more remarkable of
the Siwalik animals is the _Sivatherium_, a gigantic four-horned
antelope or deer, supposed to have been of elephantine size, and of
great power and swiftness; and to have presented features connecting
the ruminants and pachyderms. Our restoration of this creature is to
some extent conjectural; and a remarkably artistic, and probably more
accurate, restoration of the animal has recently been published by
Dr. Murie, in the Geological Magazine. We justly regard the Mammalian
fauna of modern India as one of the noblest in the world; but it is
paltry in comparison with that of the much more limited Miocene India;
even if we suppose, contrary to all probability, that we know most of
the animals of the latter. But if we consider the likelihood that we
do not yet know a tenth of the Miocene animals, the contrast becomes
vastly greater.
Miocene America is scarcely behind the Old World in the development of
its land animals. From one locality in Nebraska, Leidy described in
1852 fifteen species of large quadrupeds; and the number has since
been considerably increased. Among these are species of Rhinoceros,
Palæotherium, and Machairodus; and one animal, the Titanotherium,
allied to the European Anoplothere, is said to have attained a length
of eighteen feet and a height of nine, its jaws alone being five feet
long.
In the illustration, I have grouped some of the characteristic
Mammalian forms of the Miocene, as we can restore them from their
scattered bones, more or less conjecturally; but could we have seen
them march before us in all their majesty, like the Edenic animals
before Adam, I feel persuaded that our impressions of this wonderful
age would have far exceeded anything that we can derive either from
words or illustrations. I insist on this the more that the Miocene
happens to be very slenderly represented in Britain; and scarcely at
all in north-eastern America; and hence has not impressed the
imagination of the English race so strongly as its importance
justifies.
The next succeeding period, that of the Pliocene, continues the
conditions of the last, but with signs of decadence. Many of the old
gigantic pachyderms have disappeared; and in their stead some familiar
modern genera were introduced. The Pliocene was terminated by the cold
or glacial period, in which a remarkable lowering of temperature
occurred over all the northern hemisphere, accompanied, at least in a
portion of the time, by a very general and great subsidence, which
laid all the lower parts of our continents under water. This
terminated much of the life of the Pliocene, and replaced it with
boreal and Arctic forms, some of them, like the great hairy Siberian
mammoth and the woolly rhinoceros, fit successors of the gigantic
Miocene fauna. How it happened that such creatures were continued
during the Post-pliocene cold, we cannot understand till we have the
Tertiary vegetation before us. It must suffice now to say, that as the
temperature was modified, and the land rose, and the Modern period was
inaugurated, these animals passed away, and those of the present time
remained.
Perhaps the most remarkable fact connected with this change, is that
stated by Pictet, that all the modern European mammals are direct
descendants of Post-pliocene species; but that in the Post-pliocene
they were associated with many other species; and these, often of
great dimensions, now extinct. In other words, the time from the
Pliocene to the Modern, has been a time of diminution of species,
while that from the Eocene to the Miocene was a time of rapid
introduction of new species. Thus the Tertiary fauna culminated in the
Miocene. Yet, strange though this may appear, Man himself, the latest
and noblest of all, would seem to have been a product of the later
stages of the time of decadence. I propose, however, to return to the
animals immediately preceding man and his contemporaries, after we
have noticed the Tertiary flora and the Glacial period.
CHAPTER XI.
THE NEOZOIC AGES (_continued_).
Plant-life in the Tertiary approaches very nearly to that of the
Modern World, in so far as its leading types are concerned; but in its
distribution geographically it was wonderfully different from that
with which we are at present familiar. For example, in the Isle of
Sheppey, at the mouth of the themes, are beds of "London clay," fall
of fossil nuts; and these, instead of being hazel nuts and acorns,
belong to palms allied to species now found in the Philippine Islands
and Bengal, while with them are numerous cone-like fruits belonging to
the Proteaceæ (banksias, silver-trees, wagenbooms, etc.), a group of
trees now confined to Australia and South Africa, but which in the
Northern Hemisphere had already, as stated in a previous paper, made
their appearance in the Cretaceous, and were abundant in the Eocene.
The state of preservation of these fruits shows that they were not
drifted far; and in some beds in Hampshire, also of Eocene age, the
leaves of similar plants occur along with species of fig, cinnamon,
and other forms equally Australian or Indian. In America, especially
in the west, there are thick and widely-distributed beds of lignite or
imperfect coal of the Eocene period; but the plants found in the
American Eocene are more like those of the European Miocene or the
Modern American flora, a fact to which we must revert immediately.
In Europe, while the Eocene plants resemble those of Australia, when
we ascend into the Miocene they resemble those of America, though
still retaining some of the Australian forms. In the leaf-beds of the
Isle of Mull,--where beds of vegetable mould and leaves were covered
up with the erupted matter of a volcano belonging to a great series of
such eruptions which produced the basaltic cliffs of Antrim and of
Staffa,--and at Bovey, in Devonshire, where Miocene plants have
accumulated in many thick beds of lignite, the prevailing plants are
sequoias or red-woods, vines, figs, cinnamons, etc. In the sandstones
at the base of the Alps similar plants and also palms of American
types occur. In the Upper Miocene beds of Oeningen in the Rhine
valley, nearly five hundred species of plants have been found, and
include such familiar forms as the maples, plane-trees, cypress, elm,
and sweet-gum, more American, however, then European in their aspect.
It thus appears that the Miocene flora of Europe resembles that of
America at pre sent, while the Eocene flora of Europe resembles that
of Australia, and the Eocene flora of America, as well as the modern,
resembles the Miocene of Europe. In other words, the changes of the
flora have been more rapid in Europe then in America and probably
slowest of all in Australia. The Eastern Continent has thus taken the
lead in rapidity of change in the Tertiary period, and it has done so
in animals as well as in plants.
The following description of the flora of Bovey is given, with slight
alteration, in the words of Dr. Heer, in his memoir on that district.
The woods that covered the slopes consisted mainly of a huge pine-tree
(sequoia), whose figure resembled in all probability its
highly-admired cousin, the giant Wellingtonia of California. The leafy
trees of most frequent occurrence were the cinnamon and an evergreen
oak like those now seen in Mexico. The evergreen figs, the custard
apples, and allies of the Cape jasmine, were rarer. The trees were
festooned with vines, beside which the prickly rotang palm twined its
snake-like form. In the shade of the forest throve numerous ferns, one
species of which formed trees of imposing grandeur, and there were
masses of under-wood belonging to various species of Nyssa, like the
tupelos and sour-gums of North America. This is a true picture, based
on actual facts, of the vegetation of England in the Miocene age.
But all the other wonders of the Miocene flora are thrown into the
shade by the discoveries of plants of this age which have recently
been made in Greenland, a region now bound up in what we poetically
call eternal ice, but which in the Miocene was a fair and verdant
land, rejoicing in a mild climate and rich vegetation. The beds
containing these specimens occur in various places in North Greenland;
and the principal locality, Atane-Kerdluk, is in lat. 70 N. and at an
elevation of more then a thousand feet above the sea. The plants occur
abundantly in sandstone and clay beds, and the manner in which
delicate leaves and fruits are preserved shows that they have not been
far water-borne, a conclusion which is confirmed by the occurrence of
beds of lignite of considerable thickness, and which are evidently
peaty accumulations containing trunks of trees. The collections made
have enabled Heer to catalogue 137 species, all of them of forms
proper to temperate, or even warm regions, and mostly American in
character. As many as forty-six of the species already referred to as
occurring at Bovey Tracey and Oeningen occur also in the Greenland
beds. Among the plants are many species of pines, some of them of
large size; and the beeches, oaks, planes, poplars, maples, walnuts,
limes, magnolias, and vines are apparently as well represented as in
the warm temperate zone of America at the present day. This wonderful
flora was not a merely local phenomenon, for similar plants are found
in Spitzbergen in lat. 78° 56'. It is to be further observed, that
while the general characters of these ancient Arctic plants imply a
large amount of summer heat and light, the evergreens equally imply a
mild winter. Further, though animal remains are not found with these
plants, it is probable that so rich a supply of vegetable food was not
unutilised, and that we shall some time find that there was an Arctic
fauna corresponding to the Arctic flora. How such a climate could
exist in Greenland and Spitzbergen is still a mystery. It has,
however, been suggested that this effect might result from the
concurrence of such astronomical conditions in connection with the
eccentricity of the earth's orbit as would give the greatest amount of
warmth in the Northern Hemisphere with such distribution of land and
water as would give the least amount of cold northern land and the
most favourable arrangement of the warm surface currents of the
ocean.[AI]
[AI] Croll and Lyell.
Before leaving these Miocene plants, I must refer to a paragraph which
Dr. Heer has thought it necessary to insert in his memoir on the
Greenland flora, and which curiously illustrates the feebleness of
what with some men passes for science. He says: "In conclusion, I beg
to offer a few remarks on the amount of certainty in identification
which the determination of fossil plants is able to afford us. We know
that the flowers, fruits, and seeds are more important as
characteristics then the leaves. There are many genera of which the
leaves are variable, and consequently would be likely to lead us
astray if we trusted in them alone. However, many characters of the
form and venation of leaves are well-known to be characteristic of
certain genera, and can therefore afford us characters of great value
for their recognition." In a similar apologetic style he proceeds
through several sentences to plead the cause of his Greenland leaves.
that he should have to do so is strange, unless indeed the botany
known to those for whom he writes is no more then that which a
school-girl learns in her few lessons in dissecting a buttercup or
daisy. It is easy for scientific triflers to exhibit collections of
plants in which species of different genera and families are so
similar in their leaves that a careless observer would mistake one for
the other, or to get up composite leaves in part of one species and in
part of another, and yet seeming the same, and in this way to
underrate the labours of painstaking observers like Heer. But it is
nevertheless true that in any of these leaves, not only are there good
characters by which they can be recognised, but that a single
breathing pore, or a single hair, or a few cells, or a bit of
epidermis not larger then a pin's head, should enable any one who
understands his business to see as great differences as a merely
superficial botanist would see between the flower of a ranunculus and
that of a strawberry. Heer himself, and the same applies to all other
competent students of fossil plants, has almost invariably found his
determinations from mere fragments of leaves confirmed when more
characteristic parts were afterwards discovered. It is high time, in
the interests of geology, that botanists should learn that constancy
and correlation of parts are laws in the plant as well as in the
animal; and this they can learn only by working more diligently with
the microscope. I would, however, go further then this, and maintain
that, in regard to some of the most important geological conclusions
to be derived from fossils, even the leaves of plants are vastly more
valuable then the hard parts of animals. For instance, the bones of
elephants and rhinoceroses found in Greenland would not prove a warm
climate; because the creatures might have been protected from cold
with hair like that of the musk-sheep, and they might have had
facilities for annual migrations like the bisons. The occurrence of
bones of reindeer in France does not prove that its climate was like
that of Lapland; but only that it was wooded, and that the animals
could rove at will to the hills and to the coast. But, on the other
hand, the remains of an evergreen oak in Greenland constitute absolute
proof of a warm and equable climate; and the occurrence of leaves of
the dwarf birch in France constitutes a proof of a cool climate, worth
more then that which can be derived from the bones of millions of
reindeer and musk-sheep. Still further, in all those greater and more
difficult questions of geology which relate to the emergence and
submergence of land areas, and to the geographical conditions of past
geological periods, the evidence of plants, especially when rooted in
place, is of far more value then that of animals, though it has yet
been very little used.
This digression prepares the way for the question: Was the Miocene
period on the whole a better age of the world then that in which we
live? In some respects it was. Obviously there was in the Northern
Hemisphere a vast surface of land under a mild and equable climate,
and clothed with a rich and varied vegetation. Had we lived in the
Miocene, we might have sat under our vine and fig-tree equally in
Greenland and Spitzbergen and in those more southern climes to which
this privilege is now restricted. We might have enjoyed a great
variety of rich and nutritive fruits, and, if sufficiently muscular,
and able to cope with the gigantic mammals of the period, we might
have engaged in either the life of the hunter or that of the
agriculturist under advantages which we do not now possess. On the
whole, the Miocene presents to us in these respects the perfection of
the Neozoic time, and its culmination in so far as the nobler forms of
brute animals and of plants are concerned. Had men existed in those
days, however, they should have been, in order to suit the conditions
surrounding them, a race of giants; and they would probably have felt
the want of many of those more modern species belonging to the flora
and fauna of Europe and Western Asia on which man has so much depended
for his civilization. Some reasons have been adduced for the belief
that in the Miocene and Eocene there were intervals of cold climate;
but the evidence of this may be merely local and exceptional, and does
not interfere with the broad characteristics of the age as sketched
above.
The warm climate and rich vegetation of the Miocene extended far into
the Pliocene, with characters very similar to those already stated;
but as the Pliocene age went on, cold and frost settled down upon the
Northern Hemisphere, and a remarkable change took place in its
vegetable productions. For example, in the somewhat celebrated
"forest bed" of Cromer, in Norfolk, which is regarded as Newer
Pliocene, we have lost all the foreign and warm-climate plants of the
Miocene, and find the familiar Scotch firs and other plants of the
Modern British flora. The animals, however, retain their former types;
for two species of elephant, a hippopotamus, and a rhinoceros are
found in connection with these plants. This is another evidence, in
addition to those above referred to, that plants are better
thermometers to indicate geological and climatal change then animals.
This Pliocene refrigeration appears to have gone on increasing into
the next or Post-pliocene age, and attained its maximum in the Glacial
period, when, as many geologists think, our continents were, even in
the temperate latitudes, covered with a sheet of ice like that which
now clothes Greenland. Then occurred a very general subsidence, in
which they were submerged under the waters of a cold icy sea, tenanted
by marine animals now belonging to boreal and arctic regions. After
this last great plunge-bath they rose to constitute the dry land of
man and his contemporaries. Let us close this part of the subject with
one striking illustration from Heer's memoir on Bovey Tracey. At this
place, above the great series of clays and lignites containing the
Miocene plants already described, is a thick covering of clay, gravel,
and stones, evidently of much later date. This also contains some
plants; but instead of the figs, and cinnamons, and evergreen oaks,
they are the petty dwarf birch of Scandinavia and the Highland hills,
and three willows, one of them the little Arctic and Alpine creeping
willow. Thus we have in the south of England a transition in the
course of the Pliocene period, from a climate much milder then that of
Modern England to one almost Arctic in its character.
Our next topic for consideration is one of the most vexed questions
among geologists, the Glacial period which immediately preceded the
Advent of Man. In treating of this it will be safest first to sketch the
actual appearances which present themselves, and then to draw such
pictures as we can of the conditions which they represent. The most
recent and superficial covering of the earth's crust is usually composed
of rock material more or less ground up and weathered. This may, with
reference to its geological character and origin, be considered as of
three kinds. It may be merely the rock weathered and decomposed to a
certain extent _in situ_; or it may be alluvial matter carried or
deposited by existing streams or tides, or by the rains; or, lastly, it
may be material evidencing the operation of causes not now in action.
This last constitutes what has been called drift or diluvial detritus,
and is that with which we have now to do. Such drift, then, is very
widely distributed on our continents in the higher latitudes. In the
Northern Hemisphere it extends from the Arctic regions to about 50° of
north latitude in Europe, and as low as 40° in North America; and it
occurs south of similar parallels in the Southern Hemisphere. Farther
towards the equator then the latitudes indicated, we do not find the
proper drift deposits, but merely weathered rocks or alluvia, or old sea
bottoms raised up. This limitation of the drift, at the very outset
gives it the character of a deposit in some way connected with the Polar
cold. Besides this, the general transport of stones and other material
in the northern regions has been to the south; hence in the Northern
Hemisphere this deposit may be called the _Northern_ Drift.
If now we take a typical locality of this formation, such, for
instance, as we may find in Scotland, or Scandinavia, or Canada, we
shall find it to consist of three members, as follows:--
3. Superficial Sands or Gravels.
2. Stratified Clays.
1. Till or Boulder Clay.
This arrangement may locally be more complicated, or it may be
deficient in one of its members. The boulder clay may, for example, be
underlaid by stratified sand or gravel, or even by peaty deposits; it
may be intermixed with layers of clay or sand; the stratified clay or
the boulder clay may be absent, or may be uncovered by any upper
member. Still we may take the typical series as above stated, and
inquire as to its characters and teaching.
The lower member, or boulder clay, is a very remarkable kind of
deposit, consisting of a paste which may graduate from tough clay to
loose sand, and which holds large angular and rounded stones or
boulders confusedly intermixed; these stones may be either from the
rocks found in the immediate vicinity of their present position, or at
great distances. This mass is usually destitute of any lamination or
subordinate stratification, whence it is often called _Unstratified_
Drift, and is of very variable thickness, often occurring in very
thick beds in valleys, and being comparatively thin or absent on
intervening hills. Further, if we examine the stones contained in the
boulder clay, we shall find that they are often scratched or striated
and grooved; and when we remove the clay from the rock surfaces on
which it rests, we find these in like manner striated, grooved and
polished. These phenomena, viz., of polished and striated rocks and
stones, are similar to those produced by those great sliding masses of
ice, the glaciers of Alpine regions, which in a small way and in
narrow and elevated valleys, act on the rocks and stones in this
manner, though they cannot form deposits precisely analogous to the
boulder clay, owing to the wasting away of much of the finer material
by the torrents, and the heaping of the coarser detritus in ridges
and piles. Further, we have in Greenland a continental mass, with
all its valleys thus filled with slowly-moving ice, and from this
there drift off immense ice-islands, which continue at least the
mud-and-stone-depositing process, and possibly also the grinding
process, over the sea bottom. So far all geologists are agreed; but
here they diverge into two schools. One of these, then of the Glacier
theorists, holds that the boulder clay is the product of land-ice; and
this requires the supposition that at the time when it was deposited
the whole of our continents north of 40° or 50° was in the condition
of Greenland at present. This is, however, a hypothesis so
inconvenient, not to say improbable, that many hesitate to accept it,
and prefer to believe that in the so-called Glacial period the land
was submerged, and that icebergs then as now drifted from the north in
obedience to the Arctic currents, and produced the effects observed.
It would be tedious to go into all the arguments of the advocates of
glaciers and icebergs, and I shall not attempt this, more especially
as the only way to decide the question is to observe carefully the
facts in every particular locality, and inquire as to the conclusions
fairly deducible. With the view of aiding such a solution, however, I
may state a few general principles applicable to the appearances
observed. We may then suppose that boulder clay may be formed in three
ways. (1) It may be deposited on land, as what is called the bottom
moraine of a land glacier. (2) It may be deposited in the sea when
such a glacier ends on the coast. (3) It may be deposited by the
melting or grounding on muddy bottoms of the iceberg masses floated
off from the end of such a glacier. It is altogether likely, from the
observations recently made in Greenland, that in that country such a
deposit is being formed in all these ways. In like manner, the
ancient boulder clay may have been formed in one or more of these ways
in any given locality where it occurs, though it may be difficult in
many instances to indicate the precise mode. There are, however,
certain criteria which may be applied to the determination of its
origin, and I may state a few of these, which are the results of my
own experience. (1) Where the boulder clay contains marine shells, or
rounded stones which if exposed to the air would have been cracked to
pieces, decomposed, or oxidized, it must have been formed under water.
Where the conditions are the reverse of these, it may have been formed
on land. (2) When the striations and transport of materials do not
conform to the levels of the country, and take that direction, usually
N.E. and S.W., which the Arctic current would take if the country were
submerged, the probability is that it was deposited in the sea. Where,
however, the striation and transport take the course of existing
valleys, more especially in hilly regions, the contrary may be
inferred. (3) Where most of the material, more especially the large
stones, has been carried to great distances from its original site,
especially over plains or up slopes, it has probably been sea-borne.
Where it is mostly local, local ice-action may be inferred. Other
criteria may be stated, but these are sufficient for our present
purpose. Their application in every special case I do not presume to
make; but I am convinced that when applied to those regions in Eastern
America with which I am familiar, they necessitate the conclusion
that in the period of extreme refrigeration, the greater part of the
land was under water, and such hills and mountains as remained were
little Greenlands, covered with ice and sending down glaciers to the
sea. In hilly and broken regions, therefore, and especially at
considerable elevations, we find indications of _glacier_ action; on
the great plains, on the contrary, the indications are those of
_marine_ glaciation and transport. This last statement, I believe,
applies to the mountains and plains of Europe and Asia as well as of
America.
This view requires not only the supposition of great refrigeration,
but of a great subsidence of the land in the temperate latitudes, with
large residual islands and hills in the Arctic regions. That such
subsidence actually took place is proved, not only by the frequent
occurrence of marine shells in the boulder clay itself, but also by
the occurrence of stratified marine clays filled with shells, often of
deep-water species, immediately over that deposit. Further, the
shells, and also occasional land plants found in these beds, indicate
a cold climate and much cold fresh water pouring into the sea from
melting ice and snow. In Canada these marine clays have been traced up
to elevations of 600 feet, and in Great Britain deposits of this kind
occur on one of the mountains of Wales at the height of 1300 feet
above the level of the sea. Nor is it to be supposed that this level
marks the extreme height of the Post-pliocene waters, for drift
material not explicable by glaciers, and evidences of marine erosion,
occur at still higher levels, and it is natural that on high and
exposed points fewer remains of fossiliferous beds should be left then
in plains and valleys.
At the present day the coasts of Britain and other parts of Western
Europe enjoy an exceptionally warm temperature, owing to the warm
currents of the Atlantic being thrown on them, and the warm and moist
Atlantic air flowing over them, under the influence of the prevailing
westerly winds. These advantages are not possessed by the eastern
coast of North America, nor by some deep channels in the sea, along
which the cold northern currents flow under the warmer water. Hence
these last-mentioned localities are inhabited by boreal shells much
farther south then such species extend on the coasts and banks of
Great Britain. In the Glacial period this exceptional advantage was
lost, and while the American seas, as judged by their marine animals,
were somewhat colder then at present, the British seas were
proportionally much more cooled down. No doubt, however, there were
warmer and colder areas, determined by depth and prevailing currents,
and as these changed their position in elevation and subsidence of the
land, alternations and even mixtures of the inhabitants of cold and
warm water resulted, which have often been very puzzling to
geologists.
I have taken the series of drift deposits seen in Britain and in
Canada as typical, and the previous discussion has had reference to
them. But it would be unfair not to inform the reader that this
succession of deposits after all belongs to the margins of our
continents rather then to their great central areas. This is the case
at least in North America, where in the region of the great lakes the
oldest glaciated surfaces are overlaid by thick beds of stratified
clay, without marine fossils, and often without either stones or
boulders, though these sometimes occur, especially toward the north.
The clay, however, contains drifted fragments of coniferous trees.
Above this clay are sand and gravel, and the principal deposit of
travelled stones and boulders rests on these. I cannot affirm that a
similar succession occurs on the great inland plains of Europe and
Asia: but I think it probable that to some extent it does. The
explanation of this inland drift by the advocates of a great
continental glacier is as follows: (1) In the Pliocene period the
continents were higher then at present, and many deep valleys, since
filled up, were cut in them. (2) In the Post-pliocene these elevated
continents became covered with ice, by the movement of which the
valleys were deepened and the surfaces striated. (3) This ice-period
was followed by a depression and submergence, in which the clays were
deposited, filling up old channels, and much changing the levels of
the land. Lastly, as the land rose again from this submergence, sand
and gravel were deposited, and boulders scattered over the surface by
floating ice.
The advocates of floating ice as distinguished from a continental
glacier, merely dispense with the latter, and affirm that the
striation under the clay, as well as that connected with the later
boulders, is the effect of floating bergs. The occurrence of so much
drift wood in the clay favours their view, as it is more likely that
there would be islands clothed with trees in the sea, then that these
should exist immediately after the country had been mantled in ice.
The want of marine shells is a difficulty in either view, but may be
accounted for by the rapid deposition of the clay and the slow
spreading of marine animals over a submerged continent under
unfavourable conditions of climate.
In any case the reader will please observe that theorists must account
for both the interior and marginal forms of these deposits. Let us
tabulate the facts and the modes of accounting for them.
------------------------------------+------------------------------------
FACTS OBSERVED. | THEORETICAL VIEWS.
-------------------+----------------+------------------------------------
Inland Plains. | Marginal Areas.|Glacial Theories.| Floating Ice
| | | Theories.
===================+================+====================================
Terraces. | Terraces and | Emergence of Modern Land.[AJ]
| Raised Beaches.|
-------------------+----------------+------------------------------------
Travelled Boulders |Sand and Gravel,|
and Glaciated |with Sea Shells |
Stones and Rocks |and Boulders. | Shallow Sea and Floating Ice.
Stratified Sand | |
and Gravel. | |
-------------------+----------------+------------------------------------
Stratified Clay |Stratified Clay | Deep Sea and Floating Ice.
with Drift Wood, |with Sea Shells.+----------------+-------------------
and a few Stones. |Boulder Clay |Submergence of |Much floating Ice
and Boulders. |with or without |the land. Great |and local Glaciers.
Striated Rocks. |Sea Shells. |continental |Submergence of
|Striated Rocks. |mantle of Ice. |Pliocene Land.
-------------------+----------------+----------------+-------------------
Old channels, |Old channels, |Erosion by |Erosion by
indicating a higher|etc., indicating|continental |atmospheric
level of the land. |previous dry |Glacier. |agencies and
|land. | |accumulation of
| | |decomposed rock.
-------------------+----------------+----------------+-------------------
[AJ] The phenomena of this period, with reference to rainfall, melting
snows, and valley deposits, must be noticed in the next chapter.
This table will suffice at least to reduce the great glacier
controversy to its narrowest limits, when we have added the one
further consideration that glaciers are the parents of icebergs, and
that the question is not of one or the other exclusively, but of the
relative predominance of the one or the other in certain given times
and places. Both theories admit a great Post-pliocene subsidence. The
abettors of glaciers can urge the elevation of the surface, the
supposed powers of glaciers as eroding agents, and the transport of
boulders. Those whose theoretical views lean to floating ice, believe
that they can equally account for these phenomena, and can urge in
support of their theory the occurrence of drift wood in the inland
clay and boulder clay, and of sea-shells in the marginal clay and
boulder clay, and the atmospheric decomposition of rock in the
Pliocene period, as a source of the material of the clays, while to
similar causes they can attribute the erosion of the deep valleys
piled with the Post-pliocene deposits. They can also maintain that the
general direction of striation and drift implies the action of sea
currents, while they appeal to local glaciers to account for special
cases of glaciated rocks at the higher levels.
How long our continental plateaus remained under the icy seas of the
Glacial period we do not know. Relatively to human chronology, it was
no doubt a long time; but short in comparison with those older
subsidences in which the great Palæozoic limestones were produced. At
length, however, the change came. Slowly and gradually, or by
intermittent lifts, the land rose: and as it did so, shallow-water
sands and gravels were deposited on the surface of the deep-sea clays,
and the sides of the hills were cut into inland cliffs and terraces,
marking the stages of recession of the waters. At length, when the
process was complete, our present continents stood forth in their
existing proportions ready for the occupancy of man.
The picture which these changes present to the imagination is one of
the most extraordinary in all geological history. We have been
familiar with the idea of worlds drowned in water, and the primeval
incandescent earth shows us the possibility of our globe being melted
with fervent heat; but here we have a world apparently frozen out
destroyed by cold, or doubly destroyed by ice and water. Let us
endeavour to realise this revolution, as it may have occurred in any
of the temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere, thickly peopled
with the magnificent animals that had come down from the grand old
Miocene time. Gradually the warm and equable temperature gives place
to cold winters and chilly wet summers. The more tender animals die
out, and the less hardy plants begin to be winter-killed, or to fail
to perfect their fruits. As the forests are thus decimated, other and
hardier species replace those which disappear. The animals which have
had to confine themselves to sheltered spots, or which have perished
through cold or want of food, are replaced by others migrating from
the mountains, or from colder regions. Some, perhaps, in the course
of generations, become dwarfed in stature, and covered with more
shaggy fur. Permanent snow at length appears upon the hill-tops, and
glaciers plough their way downward, devastating the forests,
encroaching on the fertile plains, and at length reaching the heads of
the bays and fiords. While snow and ice are thus encroaching from
above, the land is subsiding, and the sea is advancing upon it, while
great icebergs drifting on the coasts still further reduce the
temperature. Torrents and avalanches from the hills carry mud and
gravel over the plains. Peat bogs accumulate in the hollows. Glaciers
heap up confused masses of moraine, and the advancing sea piles up
stones and shingle to be imbedded in mud on its further advance, while
boreal marine animals invade the now submerged plains. At length the
ice and water meet everywhere, or leave only a few green strips where
hardy Arctic plants still survive, and a few well-clad animals manage
to protract their existence. Perhaps even these are overwhelmed, and
the curtain of the Glacial winter falls over the fair scenery of the
Pliocene. In every locality thus invaded by an apparently perpetual
winter, some species of laud animals must have perished. Others may
have migrated to more genial climes, others under depauperated and
hardy varietal forms may have continued successfully to struggle for
existence. The general result must have been greatly to diminish the
nobler forms of life, and to encourage only those fitted for the most
rigorous climates and least productive soils.
Could we have visited the world in this dreary period, and have
witnessed the decadence and death of that brilliant and magnificent
flora and fauna which we have traced upward from the Eocene, we might
well have despaired of the earth's destinies, and have fancied it the
sport of some malignant demon; or have supposed that in the contest
between the powers of destruction and those of renovation the former
had finally gained the victory. We must observe, however, that the
suffering in such a process is less then we might suppose. So long as
animals could exist, they would continue to enjoy life. The conditions
unfavourable to them would be equally or more so to their natural
enemies. Only the last survivors would meet with what might be
regarded as a tragical end. As one description of animal became
extinct, another was prepared to occupy its room. If elephants and
rhinoceroses perished from the land, countless herds of walruses and
seals took their places. If gay insects died and disappeared,
shell-fishes and sea-stars were their successors.
Thus in nature there is life even in death, and constant enjoyment
even when old systems are passing away. But could we have survived the
Glacial period, we should have seen a reason for its apparently
wholesale destruction. Out of that chaos came at length an Eden; and
just as the Permian prepared the way for the Mesozoic, so the glaciers
and icebergs of the Post-pliocene were the ploughshare of God
preparing the earth for the time when, with a flora and fauna more
beautiful and useful, if less magnificent then that of the Tertiary,
it became as the garden of the Lord, fitted for the reception of His
image and likeness, immortal and intelligent Man. We need not,
however, with one modern school of philosophy, regard man himself as
but a descendant of Miocene apes, scourged into reason and humanity by
the struggle for existence in the Glacial period. We may be content to
consider him as a son of God, and to study in the succeeding chapters
that renewal of the Post-pliocene world which preceded and heralded
his advent.
In the meantime, our illustration,[AK] borrowed in part from the
magnificent representation of the Post-pliocene fauna of England, by
the great restorer of extinct animals, Mr. Waterhouse Hawkins, may
serve to give some idea of the grand and massive forms of animal life
which, even in the higher latitudes, survived the Post-pliocene cold,
and only decayed and disappeared under that amelioration of physical
conditions which marks the introduction of the human period.
[AK] Page 301.
CHAPTER XII.
CLOSE OF THE POST-PLIOCENE, AND ADVENT OF MAN.
_In_ closing these sketches it may seem unsatisfactory not to link the
geological ages with the modern period in which we live; yet, perhaps,
nothing is more complicated or encompassed with greater difficulties
or uncertainties. The geologist, emerging from the study of the older
monuments of the earth's history, and working with the methods of
physical science, here meets face to face the archæologist and
historian, who have been tracing back in the opposite direction, and
with very different appliances, the stream of human history and
tradition. In such circumstances conflicts may occur, or at least the
two paths of inquiry may refuse to connect themselves without
concessions unpleasant to the pursuers of one or both. Further, it is
just at this meeting-place that the dim candle of traditional lore is
almost burnt out in the hand of the antiquary, and that the geologist
finds his monumental evidence becoming more scanty and less distinct.
We cannot hope as yet to dispel all the shadows that haunt this
obscure domain, but can at least point out some of the paths which
traverse it. In attempting this, we may first classify the time
involved as follows: (1) The earlier Post-pliocene period of geology
may be called the _Glacial_ era. It is that of a cold climate,
accompanied by glaciation and boulder deposits. (2) The later
_Post-pliocene_ may be called the Post-glacial era. It is that of
re-elevation of the continents and restoration of a mild temperature.
It connects itself with the pre-historic period of the archæologist,
inasmuch as remains of man and his works are apparently included in
the same deposits which hold the bones of Post-glacial animals. (3)
The _Modern_ era is that of secular human history.
It may be stated with certainty that the Pliocene period of geology
affords no trace of human remains or implements; and the same may I
think be affirmed of the period of glaciation and subsidence which
constitutes the earlier Post-pliocene. With the rise of the land out
of the Glacial sea indications of man are believed to appear, along
with remains of several mammalian species now his contemporaries.
Archæology and geology thus meet somewhere in the pre-historic period
of the former, and in the Post-glacial of the latter. Wherever,
therefore, human history extends farthest back, and geological
formations of the most modern periods exist and have been explored, we
may expect best to define their junctions. Unfortunately it happens
that our information on these points is still very incomplete and
locally limited. In many extensive regions, like America and
Australia, while the geological record is somewhat complete, the
historic record extends back at most a few centuries, and the
pre-historic monuments are of uncertain date. In other countries, as
in Western Asia and Egypt, where the historic record extends very far
back, the geology is less perfectly known. At the present moment,
therefore, the main battle-field of these controversies is in Western
Europe, where, though history scarce extends farther back then the
time of the Roman Republic, the geologic record is very complete, and
has been explored with some thoroughness. It is obvious, however, that
we thus have to face the question at a point where the pre-historic
gap is necessarily very wide.
Taking England as an example, all before the Roman invasion is
pre-historic, and with regard to this pre-historic period the evidence
that we can obtain is chiefly of a geological character. The
pre-historic men are essentially fossils. We know of them merely what
can be learned from their bones and implements embedded in the soil or
in the earth of the caverns in which some of them sheltered
themselves. For the origin and date of these deposits the antiquary
must go to the geologist, and he imitates the geologist in arranging
his human fossils under such names as the "Paleolithic," or period of
rude stone implements; the "Neolithic" or period of polished stone
implements; the Bronze Period, and the Iron Period; though inasmuch as
higher and lower states of the arts seem always to have coexisted, and
the time involved is comparatively short, these periods are of far
less value then those of geology. In Britain the age of iron is in the
main historic. That of bronze goes back to the times of early
Phoenician trade with the south of England. That of stone, while
locally extending far into the succeeding ages, reaches back into an
unknown antiquity, and is, as we shall see in the sequel, probably
divided into two by a great physical change, though not in the abrupt
and arbitrary way sometimes assumed by those who base their
classification solely on the rude or polished character of stone
implements. We must not forget, however, that in Western Asia the ages
of bronze and iron may have begun two thousand years at least earlier
then in Britain, and that in some parts of America the Palaeolithic
age of chipped stone implements still continues. We must also bear in
mind that when the archæologist appeals to the geologist for aid, he
thereby leaves that kind of investigation in which dates are settled
by years, for that in which they are marked merely by successive
physical and organic changes.
Turning, then, to our familiar geological methods, and confining
ourselves mainly to the Northern Hemisphere and to Western Europe, two
pictures present themselves to us: (!) The physical changes preceding
the advent of man; (2) The decadence of the land animals of the
Post-pliocene age, and the appearance of those of the modern.
In the last chapter I had to introduce the reader to a great and
terrible revolution, whereby the old Pliocene continents, with all
their wealth of animals and plants, became sealed up in a mantle of
Greenland ice, or, slowly sinking beneath the level of the sea, were
transformed into an ocean-bottom over which icebergs bore their
freight of clay and boulders. We also saw that as the Post-pliocene
age advanced, the latter condition prevailed, until the waters stood
more then a thousand feet deep over the plains of Europe. In this
great glacial submergence, which closed the earlier Post-pliocene
period, and over vast areas of the Northern Hemisphere, terminated the
existence of many of the noblest forms of life, it is believed that
man had no share. We have, at least as yet, no record of his presence.
Out of these waters the land again rose slowly and intermittently, so
that the receding waves worked even out of hard rocks ranges of coast
cliff which the further elevation converted into inland terraces, and
that the clay and stones deposited by the Glacial waters were in many
places worked over and rearranged by the tides and waves of the
shallowing sea before they were permanently raised up to undergo the
action of the rains and streams, while long banks of sand and gravel
were stretched across plains and the mouths of valleys, constituting
"kames," or "eskers," only to be distinguished from moraines of
glaciers by the stratified arrangement of their materials.
Further, as the land rose, its surface was greatly and rapidly
modified by rains and streams. There is the amplest evidence, both in
Europe and America, that at this time the erosion by these means was
enormous in comparison with anything we now experience. The rainfall
must have been excessive, the volume of water in the streams very
great; and the facilities for cutting channels in the old Pliocene
valleys, filled to the brim with mud and boulder-clay, were
unprecedented. While the area of the land was still limited, much of
it would be high and broken, and it would have all the dampness of an
insular climate. As it rose in height, plains which had, while under
the sea, been loaded with the _débris_ swept from the land, would be
raised up to experience river erosion. It was the spring-time of the
Glacial era, a spring eminent for its melting snows, its rains, and
its river floods.[AL] To an observer living at this time it would have
seemed as if the slow process of moulding the continents was being
pushed forward with unexampled rapidity. The valleys were ploughed out
and cleansed, the plains levelled and overspread with beds of
alluvium, giving new features of beauty and utility to the land, and
preparing the way for the life of the Modern period, as if to make up
for the time which had been lost in the dreary Glacial age. It will
readily be understood how puzzling these deposits have been to
geologists, especially to those who fail to present to their minds the
true conditions of the period; and how difficult it is to separate the
river alluvia of this age from the deposits in the seas and estuaries,
and these again from the older Glacial beds. Further, in not a few
instances the animals of a cold climate must have lived in close
proximity to those which belonged to ameliorated conditions, and the
fossils of the older Post-pliocene must often, in the process of
sorting by water, have been mixed with those of the newer.
[AL] Mr. Tylor has well designated this period as the Pluvial age.
_Journal of the Geological Society_, 1870.
Many years ago the brilliant and penetrating intellect of Edward
Forbes was directed to the question of the maximum extent of the later
Post-pliocene or Post-glacial land; and his investigations into the
distribution of the European flora, in connection with the phenomena
of submerged terrestrial surfaces, led to the belief that the land had
risen until it was both higher and more extensive then at present. At
the time of greatest elevation, England was joined to the continent of
Europe by a level plain, and a similar plain connected Ireland with
its sister islands. Over these plains the plants constituting the
"Germanic" flora spread themselves into the area of the British
Islands, and herds of mammoth, rhinoceros, and Irish elk wandered and
extended their range from east to west. The deductions of Forbes have
been confirmed and extended by others; and it can scarcely be doubted
that in the Post-glacial era, the land regained fully the extent which
it had possessed in the time of the Pliocene. In these circumstances
the loftier hills might still reach the limits of perpetual snow, but
their glaciers would no longer descend to the sea. What are now the
beds of shallow seas would be vast wooded plains, drained by
magnificent rivers, whose main courses are now submerged, and only
their branches remain as separate and distinct streams, The cold but
equable climate of the Post-pliocene would now be exchanged for warm
summers, alternating with sharp winters, whose severity would be
mitigated by the dense forest covering, which would also contribute to
the due supply of moisture, preventing the surface from being burnt
into arid plains.
It seems not improbable that it was when the continents had attained
to their greatest extension and when animal and vegetable life had
again over-spread the new land to its utmost limits, that man was
introduced on the eastern continent, and with him several mammalian
species, not known in the Pliocene period, and some of which, as the
sheep, the goat, the ox, and the dog, have ever since been his
companions and humble allies. These, at least in the west of Europe,
were the "Palaeolithic" men, the makers of the oldest flint
implements; and armed with these, they had to assert the mastery of
man over broader lands then we now possess, and over many species of
great animals now extinct. In thus writing, I assume the accuracy of
the inferences from the occurrence of worked stones with the bones of
post-glacial animals, which must have lived during the condition of
our continents above referred to. If these inferences are well
founded, not only did man exist at this time, but man not even
varietally distinct from modern European races. But if man really
appeared in Europe in the Post-glacial era, he was destined to be
exposed to one great natural vicissitude before his permanent
establishment in the world. The land had reached its maximum
elevation, but its foundations, "standing in the water and out of the
water," were not yet securely settled, and it had to take one more
plunge-bath before attaining its modern fixity. This seems to have
been a comparatively rapid subsidence and re-elevation, leaving but
slender traces of its occurrence, but changing to some extent the
levels of the continents, and failing to restore them fully to their
former elevation, so that large areas of the lower grounds still
remained under the sea. If, as the greater number of geologists now
believe, man was then on the earth, it is not impossible that this
constituted the deluge recorded in that remarkable "log book" of
Noah preserved to us in Genesis, and of which the memory remains
in the traditions of most ancient nations. This is at least the
geological deluge which separates the Post-glacial period from the
Modern, and the earlier from the later pre-historic period of the
archæologists.[AM]
[AM] I have long thought that the narrative in Gen. vii. and viii. can
be understood only on the supposition that it is a contemporary
journal or log of an eye-witness incorporated by the author of Genesis
in his work. The dates of the rising and fall of the water, the note
of soundings over the hill-tops when the maximum was attained, and
many other details, as well as the whole tone of the narrative, seem
to require this supposition, which also removes all the difficulties
of interpretation which have been so much felt.
Very important questions of time are involved in this idea of
Post-glacial man, and much will depend, in the solution of these, on
the views which we adopt as to the rate of subsidence and elevation of
the land. If, with the majority of British geologists, we hold that it
is to be measured by those slow movements now in progress, the time
required will be long. If, with most Continental and some American
geologists, we believe in paroxysmal movements of elevation and
depression, it may be much reduced. We have seen in the progress of
our inquiries that the movements of the continents seem to have
occurred with accelerated rapidity in the more modern periods. We have
also seen that these movements might depend on the slow contraction of
the earth's crust due to cooling, but that the effects of this
contraction might manifest themselves only at intervals. We have
further seen that the gradual retardation of the rotation of the earth
furnishes a cause capable of producing elevation and subsidence of the
land, and that this also might be manifested at longer or shorter
intervals, according to the strength and resisting power of the crust.
Under the influence of this retardation, so long as the crust of the
earth did not give way, the waters would be driven toward the poles,
and the northern land would be submerged; but so soon as the tension
became so great as to rupture the solid shell, the equatorial regions
would collapse, and the northern land would again be raised. The
subsidence would be gradual, the elevation paroxysmal, and perhaps
intermittent. Let us suppose that this was what occurred in the
Glacial period, and that the land had attained to its maximum
elevation. This might not prove to be permanent; the new balance of
the crust might be liable to local or general disturbance in a minor
degree, leading to subsidence and partial re-elevation, following the
great Post-glacial elevation. There is, therefore, nothing
unreasonable in that view which makes the subsidence and re-elevation
at the close of the Post-glacial period somewhat abrupt, at least when
compared with some more ancient movements.
But what is the evidence of the deposits formed at this period? Here
we meet with results most diverse and contradictory, but I think there
can be little doubt that on this kind of evidence the time required
for the Post-glacial period has been greatly exaggerated, especially
by those geologists who refuse to receive such views as to subsidence
and elevation as those above stated. The calculations of long time
based on the gravels of the Somme, on the cone of the Tinière, on the
peat bogs of France and Denmark, on certain cavern deposits, have all
been shown to be more or less at fault; and possibly none of these
reach further back then the six or seven thousand years which,
according to Dr. Andrews, have elapsed since the close of the
boulder-clay deposits in America.[AN] I am aware that such a statement
will be regarded with surprise by many in England, where even the
popular literature has been penetrated with the idea of a duration of
the human period immensely long in comparison with what used to be the
popular belief; but I feel convinced that the scientific pendulum must
swing backward in this direction nearer to its old position. Let us
look at a few of the facts. Much use has been made of the "cone" or
delta of the Tinière on the eastern side of the Lake of Geneva, as an
illustration of the duration of the Modern period. This little stream
has deposited at its mouth a mass of _débris_ carried down from the
hills. This being cut through by a railway, is found to contain Roman
remains to a depth of four feet, bronze implements to a depth of ten
feet, stone implements at a depth of nineteen feet. The deposit ceased
about three hundred years ago, and calculating 1300 to 1500 years for
the Roman period, we should have 7000 to 10,000 years as the age of
the cone. But before the formation of the present cone, another had
been formed twelve times as large. Thus for the two cones together, a
duration of more then 90,000 years is claimed. It appears, however,
that this calculation has been made irrespective of two essential
elements in the question. No allowance has been made for the fact that
the inner layers of a cone are necessarily smaller then the outer;
nor for the further fact that the older cone belongs to a distinct
time (the pluvial age already referred to), when the rainfall was much
larger, and the transporting power of the torrent great in proportion.
Making allowance for these conditions, the age of the newer cone, that
holding human remains, falls between 4000 and 5000 years. The peat bed
of Abbeville, in the north of France, has grown at the rate of one and
a half to two inches in a century. Being twenty-six feet in thickness,
the time occupied in its growth must have amounted to 20,000 years;
and yet it is probably newer then some of the gravels on the same
river containing flint implements. But the composition of the
Abbeville peat shows that it's a forest peat, and the erect stems
preserved in it prove that in the first instance it must have grown at
the rate of about three feet in a century, and after the destruction
of the forest its rate of increase down to the present time diminished
rapidly almost to nothing. Its age is thus reduced to perhaps less
then 4000 years. In 1865 I had an opportunity to examine the now
celebrated gravels of St. Acheul, on the Somme, by some supposed to go
back to a very ancient period. With the papers of Prestwich and other
able observers in my hand, I could conclude merely that the
undisturbed gravels were older then the Roman period, but how much
older only detailed topographical surveys could prove; and that taking
into account the probabilities of a different level of the land, a
wooded condition of the country, a greater rainfall, and a glacial
filling of the Somme valley with clay and stones subsequently cut out
by running water the gravels could scarcely be older then the
Abbeville peat. To have published such views in England would have
been simply to have delivered myself into the hands of the
Philistines. I therefore contented myself with recording my opinion in
Canada. Tylor[AO] and Andrews[AP] have, however, I think, subsequently
shown that my impressions were correct. In like manner, I fail to
perceive, and I think all American geologists acquainted with the
pre-historic monuments of the western continent must agree with me,
any evidence of great antiquity in the caves of Belgium and England,
the kitchen-middens of Denmark, the rock-shelters of France, the lake
habitations of Switzerland. At the same time, I would disclaim all
attempt to resolve their dates into precise terms of years. I may
merely add, that the elaborate and careful observations of Dr. Andrews
on the raised beaches of Lake Michigan, observations of a much more
precise character then any which, in so far as I know, have been made
of such deposits in Europe, enable him to calculate the time which has
elapsed since North America rose out of the waters of the Glacial
period as between 5500 and 7500 years. This fixes at least the
possible duration of the human period in North America, though I
believe there are other lines of evidence which, would reduce the
residence of man in America to a much shorter time. Longer periods
have, it is true, been deduced from the delta of the Mississippi and
the gorge of Niagara; but the deposits of the former have been found
by Hilgard to be in great part marine, and the excavation of the
latter began at a period probably long Anterior to the advent of man.
[AN] "Transactions, Chicago Academy," 1871.
[AO] "Journal of Geological Society," vol. xxv.
[AP] "Silliman's Journal," 1868.
But another question remains. From the similarities existing in the
animals and plants of regions in the southern hemisphere now widely
separated by the ocean, it has been inferred that Post-pliocene land
of great extent existed there; and that on this land men may have
lived before the continents of the northern hemisphere were ready for
them. It has even been supposed that, inasmuch as the flora and fauna
of Australia have an aspect like that of the Eocene Tertiary, and very
low forms of man exist in that part of the world, these low races are
the oldest of all, and may date from Tertiary times. Positive evidence
of this, however, there is none. These races have no monuments; nor,
so far as known, have they left their remains in Post-pliocene
deposits. It depends on the assumptions that the ruder races of men
are the oldest; and that man has no greater migratory powers then
other animals. The first is probably false, as being contrary to
history; and also to the testimony of palaeontology with reference to
the laws of creation. The second is certainly false; for we know that
man has managed to associate himself with every existing fauna and
flora, even in modern times; and that the most modern races have
pitched their tents amid tree-ferns and Proteaceæ, and have hunted
kangaroos and emus. Further, when we consider that the productions of
the southern hemisphere are not only more antique then those of the
northern, but, on the whole, less suited for the comfortable
subsistence of man and the animals most useful to him; and that the
Post-pliocene animals of the southern hemisphere were of similar types
with their modern successors, we are the less inclined to believe that
these regions would be selected as the cradle of the human race.
CONDENSED TABULAR VIEW OF THE AGES AND PERIODS OF THE NEOZOIC.
Key to Symbols
### Recent species of Aquatic Invertebrates. Teleostian Fishes and
Squaloid sharks prevail.
--- Ages of Angiosperms and Plants.
=== "And God said--let the land bring forth herbivorous beasts and
carnivorous beasts, after their kinds; and it was so."
+++ "And God created man in His own image."
Time.
Ages. Periods. Animals and Plants.
NEOZOIC OR CAINOZOIC.
{Newer. Still future (?) Age of +
Modern {Middle. Historic. Man +
{Older. Pre-historic. +
+
{N. Post-Glacial gravels and cave # +
{ deposits. Saxicava sand and # +
Post- { terraces (America). # +
Pliocene {M. Marine Clays. Leda clays. Erie # - +
{ clay (America). # - +
{O. Glacial Drift. Boulder clay # - +
{ (America). # - +
# - +
{N. Norwich crag; Sicilian and # -
{ Val d'Arno beds. # -
Pliocene {M. ____________ Sumter group (America). # -
{O. Red and Coralline crag; Sub-appenine # - =
{ beds. # - =
# - =
{N. Faluns of Loraine; Upper Molasse; # - =
{ Siwalik beds; Oeningen plant beds. # - =
{ York-town beds (America). # - =
Miocene {M. ____________ # - =
{O. Upper Paris beds; Hempstead and Bovey # - =
{ beds; Lower Molasse. Nebraska beds # - =
{ (West America). # Mammals. - =
# - =
{N. Gypseous series, Paris. Vicksburg # - =
{ group (America). # =
Eocene {M. Calcaire Grossier, Bagshot and Alum # =
{ Bay beds. Jackson group (America). =
{O. Argile Plastique; London clay. =
{ Claiborne group (America). =
CHAPTER XIII.
CLOSE OF THE POST-PLIOCENE, AND ADVENT OF MAN. (_Continued._)
Turning from these difficult questions of time, we may now look at the
assemblage of land-animals presented by the Post-glacial period. Here,
for the first time in the great series of continental elevations and
depressions, we find the newly-emerging land peopled with familiar
forms. Nearly all the modern European animals have left their bones in
the clays, gravels, and cavern deposits which belong to this period;
but with them are others either not now found within the limits of
temperate Europe, or altogether extinct. Thus the remarkable fact
comes out, that the uprising land was peopled at first with a more
abundant fauna then that which it now sustains, and that many species,
and among these some of the largest and most powerful, have been
weeded out, either before the advent of man or in the changes which
immediately succeeded that event. That in the Post-glacial period so
many noble animal species should have been overthrown in the struggle
for existence, without leaving any successors, at least in Europe, is
one of the most remarkable phenomena in the history of life on our
planet.
According to. Pictet,[AQ] the Post-glacial beds of Europe afford
ninety-eight species of mammals, of which fifty-seven still live
there, the remainder being either locally or wholly extinct. According
to Mr. Boyd Dawkins,[AR] in Great Britain about twelve Pliocene
species survived the Glacial period, and reappeared in the British
Islands in the Post-glacial. To these were added forty-one species
making in all fifty-three, whose remains are found in the gravels and
caves of the latter period. Of these, in the Modern period
twenty-eight, or rather more then one-half, survive, fourteen are
wholly extinct, and eleven are locally extinct.
[AQ] Palæontologie.
[AR] "Journal of Geological Society," and Palæontographical Society's
publications.
[Illustration: BRITAIN IN THE POST-PLIOCENE AGE. Musk-sheep,
Hippopotamus, Machairodus, Mammoth, Wooly Rhinoceros, Long-fronted Ox,
and Irish stag. The animals are taken from Mr. Waterhouse Hawkins's
picture, "Struggles of Life among British Animals of the Antediluvian
Times." London: 1853. The landscape is that of the later part of the
cold Post-pliocene period.]
Among the extinct beasts, were some of very remarkable character.
There were two or more species of elephant, which seem in this age to
have overspread, in vast herds, all the plains of Northern Europe and
Asia; and one of which we know, from the perfect specimen found
embedded in the frozen soil of Siberia, lived till a very modern
period; and was clothed with long hair and fur, fitting it for a cold
climate. There were also three or four species of rhinoceros, one of
which at least (the _R. Tichorhinus_) was clad with wool like the great
Siberian mammoth. With these was a huge hippopotamus (_H. major_), whose
head-quarters would, however, seem to have been farther south then
England, or which perhaps inhabited chiefly the swamps along the large
rivers running through areas now under the sea. The occurrence of such
an animal shows an abundant vegetation, and a climate so mild, that
the rivers were not covered with heavy ice in winter; for the
supposition that this old hippopotamus was a migratory animal seems
very unlikely. Another animal of this time, was the magnificent deer,
known as the Irish elk; and which perhaps had its principal abode on
the great plain which is now the Irish Sea. The terrible machairodus,
or cymetar-toothed tiger, was continued from the Pliocene; and in
addition to species of bear still living, there was a species of
gigantic size, probably now extinct, the cave bear. Evidences are
accumulating, to show that all or nearly all these survived until the
human period.
If we turn now to those animals which are only locally extinct, we
meet with some strange, and at first sight puzzling anomalies. Some of
these are creatures now limited to climates much colder then that of
Britain. Others now belong to warmer climates. Conspicuous among the
former are the musk-sheep, the elk, the reindeer, the glutton, and the
lemming. Among the latter, we see the panther, the lion, and the Cape
hyena. That animals now so widely separated as the musk-sheep of
Arctic America and the hyena of South Africa, could ever have
inhabited the same forests, seems a dream of the wildest fancy. Yet it
is not difficult to find a probable solution of the mystery. In North
America, at the present day, the puma, or American lion, comes up to
the same latitudes with the caribou, or reindeer, and moose; and in
Asia, the tiger extends its migrations into the abodes of boreal
animals in the plains of Siberia. Even in Europe, within the historic
period, the reindeer inhabited the forests of Germany; and the lion
extended its range nearly as far northward. The explanation lies in
the co-existence of a densely wooded country with a temperate climate;
the forests affording to southern animals shelter from the cold or
winter; and equally to the northern animals protection from the heat
of summer. Hence our wonder at this association of animals of diverse
habitudes as to climate, is merely a prejudice arising from the
present exceptional condition of Europe. Still it is possible that
changes unfavourable to some of these animals, were in progress before
the arrival of man, with his clearings and forest fires and other
disturbing agencies. Even in America, the megalonyx, or gigantic
sloth, the mammoth, the mastodon, the fossil horse, and many other
creatures, disappeared before the Modern period; and on both
continents the great Post-glacial subsidence or deluge may have swept
away some of the species. Such a supposition seems necessary to
account for the phenomena of the gravel and cave deposits of England,
and Cope has recently suggested it in explanation of similar
storehouses of fossil animals in America.[AS]
[AS] Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, April 1871.
Among the many pictures which this fertile subject calls up, perhaps
none is more curious then that presented by the Post-glacial cavern
deposits. We may close our survey of this period with the exploration
of one of these strange repositories; and may select Kent's Hole at
Torquay, so carefully excavated and illumined with the magnesium light
of scientific inquiry by Mr. Pengelly and a committee of the British
Association.
The somewhat extensive and ramifying cavern of Kent's Hole is an
irregular excavation, evidently due partly to fissures in limestone
rock, and partly to the erosive action of water enlarging such
fissures into chambers and galleries. At what time it was originally
cut we do not know, but it must have existed as a cavern at the close
of the Pliocene or beginning of the Post-pliocene period, since which
time it has been receiving a series of deposits which have quite
filled up some of its smaller branches.
First and lowest, according to Mr. Pengelly, is a "breccia" or mass of
broken and rounded stones, with hardened red clay filling the
interstices. Most of the stones are of the rock which forms the roof
and walls of the cave, but many, especially the rounded ones, are from
more distant parts of the surrounding country. In this mass, the depth
of which is unknown, are numerous bones, all of one kind of animal,
the cave bear, a creature which seems to have lived in Western Europe
from the close of the Pliocene down to the modern period. It must have
been one of the earliest and most permanent tenants of Kent's Hole at
a time when its lower chambers were still filled with water. Next
above the breccia is a floor of "stalagmite" or stony carbonate of
lime, deposited from the drippings of the roof, and in some places
three feet thick. This also contains bones of the cave bear, deposited
when there was less access of water to the cavern. Mr. Pengelly infers
the existence of man at this time from a single flint flake and a
single flint chip found in these beds; but mere flakes and chips of
flint are too often natural to warrant such a conclusion. After the
old stalagmite floor above mentioned was formed, the cave again
received deposits of muddy water and stones; but now a change occurs
in the remains embedded. This stony clay, or "cave earth" has yielded
an immense quantity of teeth and bones, including those of the
elephant, rhinoceros, horse, hyena, cave bear, reindeer, and Irish
elk. With these were found weapons of chipped flint, and harpoons,
needles, and bodkins of bone, precisely similar to those of the North
American Indians and other rude races. The "cave earth" is four feet
or more in thickness, It is not stratified, and contains many fallen
fragments of rock, rounded stones, and broken pieces of stalagmite. It
also has patches of the excrement of hyenas, which the explorers
suppose to indicate the temporary residence of these animals; and in
one spot, near the top, is a limited layer of burnt wood, with remains
which indicate the cooking and eating of repasts of animal food by
man. It is clear that when this bed was formed the cavern was liable
to be inundated with muddy water, carrying stones and other heavy
objects, and breaking up in places the old stalagmite floor. One of
the most puzzling features, especially to those who take an
exclusively uniformitarian view, is, that the entrance of water-borne
mud and stones implies a level of the bottom of the water in the
neighbouring valleys of about 100 feet above its present height. The
cave earth is covered by a second crust of stalagmite, less dense and
thick then that below, and containing only a few bones, which are of
the same general character with those below, but include a fragment of
a human jaw with teeth. Evidently, when this stalagmite was formed,
the influx of water-borne materials had ceased, or nearly so; but
whether the animals previously occupying the country still continued
in it, or only accidental bones, etc., were introduced into the cave
or lifted from the bed below, does not appear.
The next bed marks a new change. It is a layer of black mould from
three to ten inches thick. Its microscopic structure does not seem to
have been examined; but it is probably a forest soil, introduced by
growth, by water, by wind, and by ingress of animals, at a time when
the cave was nearly in its present state, and the surrounding country
densely wooded. This bed contains bones of animals, all of them
modern, and works of art ranging from the old British times before the
Roman invasion up to the porter-bottles and dropped halfpence of
modern visitors. Lastly, in and upon the black mould are many fallen
blocks from the roof of the cave.
There can be no doubt that this cave and the neighbouring one of
Brixham have done very much to impress the minds of British geologists
with ideas of the great antiquity of man, and they have, more then any
other Post-glacial monuments, shown the persistence of some animals
now extinct up to the human age. Of precise data for determining time,
they have, however, given nothing. The only measures which seed to
have been applied, namely, the rate of growth of stalagmite and the
rate of erosion of the neighbouring valleys, are, from the very
sequence of the deposits, obviously worthless; and the only apparently
available constant measure, namely, the fall of blocks from the roof,
seems not yet to have been applied. We are therefore quite uncertain
as to the number of centuries involved in the filling of this cave,
and must remain so until a surer system of calculation is adopted. We
may, however, attempt to sketch the series of events which it
indicates.
The animals found in Kent's Hole are all "Post-glacial." They
therefore inhabited the country after it rose from the great Glacial
submergence. Perhaps the first colonists of the coasts of Devonshire
in this period were the cave bears, migrating on floating ice, and
subsisting, like the Arctic bear, and the black bears of Anticosti, on
fish, and on the garbage cast up by the sea. They found Kent's Hole a
sea-side cavern, with perhaps some of its galleries still full of
water, and filling with, breccia, with which the bones of dead bears
became mixed. As the land rose, these creatures for the most part
betook themselves to lower levels, and in process of time the cavern
stood upon a hill-side, perhaps several hundreds of feet above the
sea; and the mountain torrents, their beds not yet emptied of glacial
detritus, washed into it stones and mud and carcases of animals of
many species which had now swarmed across the plains elevated out of
the sea, and multiplied in the land. This was the time of the cave
earth; and before its deposit was completed, though how long before, a
confused and often-disturbed bed of this kind cannot tell, man himself
seems to have been added to the inhabitants of the British land. In
pursuit of game he sometimes ascended the valleys beyond the cavern,
or even penetrated into its outer chambers; or perhaps there were even
in those days rude and savage hill-men, inhabiting the forests and
warring with the more cultivated denizens of plains below, which are
now deep under the waters. Their weapons, lost in hunting, or buried
in the flesh of wounded animals which crept to the streams to assuage
their thirst, are those found in the cave earth. The absence of human
bones may merely show that the mighty hunters of those days were too
hardy, athletic, and intelligent, often to perish from accidental
causes, and that they did not use this cavern for a place of burial.
But the land again subsided. The valley of that now nameless river, of
which the Rhine the themes, and the Severn may have alike been
tributaries, disappeared under the sea; and some tribe, driven from
the lower lands, took refuge in this cave, now again near the
encroaching waves, and left there the remains of their last repasts
ere they were driven farther inland or engulfed in the waters. For a
time the cavern may have been wholly submerged, and the charcoal of
the extinguished fires became covered with its thin coating of clay.
But ere long it re-emerged to form part of an island, long barren and
desolate; and the valleys having been cut deeper by the receding
waters, it no longer received muddy deposits, and the crust formed by
drippings from its roof contained only bones and pebbles washed by
rains or occasional land floods from its own clay deposits. Finally,
the modern forests overspread the land, and were tenanted by the
modern animals. Man returned to use the cavern again as a place of
refuge or habitation, and to leave there the relics contained in the
black earth. This seems at present the only intelligible history of
this curious cave and others resembling it; though, when we consider
the imperfection of the results obtained even by a large amount of
labour, and the difficult and confused character of the deposits in
this and similar caves, too much value should not be attached to such
histories, which may at any time be contradicted or modified by new
facts or different explanations of those already known. The time
involved depends very much, as already stated, on the question whether
we regard the Post-glacial subsidence and re-elevation as somewhat
sudden, or as occupying long ages at the slow rate at which some
parts of our continents are now rising or sinking.[AT]
[AT] Another element in this is also the question raised by Dawkins,
Geikie, and others as to subdivisions of the Post-glacial period and
intermissions of the Glacial cold. After careful consideration of
these views, however, I cannot consider them as of much importance.
Such are the glimpses, obscure though stimulating to the imagination,
which geology can give of the circumstances attending the appearance
of man in Western Europe. How far we are from being able to account
for his origin, or to give its circumstances and relative dates for
the whole world, the reader will readily understand. Still it is
something to know that there is an intelligible meeting-place of the
later geological ages and the age of man, and that it is one inviting
to many and hopeful researches. It is curious also to find that the
few monuments disinterred by geology, the antediluvian record of Holy
Scripture, and the golden age of heathen tradition, seem alike to
point to similar physical conditions, and to that simple state of the
arts of life in which "gold and wampum and flint stones"[AU]
constituted the chief material treasures of the earliest tribes of
men. They also point to the immeasurable elevation, then as now, of
man over his brute rivals for the dominion of the earth. To the
naturalist this subject opens up most inviting yet most difficult
paths of research, to be entered on with caution and reverence,
rather then in the bold and dashing spirit of many modern attempts.
The Christian, on his part, may feel satisfied that the scattered
monumental relics of the caves and gravels will tell no story very
different from that which he has long believed on other evidence, nor
anything inconsistent with those views of man's heavenly origin and
destiny which have been the most precious inheritance of the greatest
and best minds of every age, from that early pre-historic period when
men, "palaeolithic" men, no doubt, began to "invoke the name of
Jehovah," the coming Saviour, down to those times when life and
immortality are brought to light, for all who will see, by the Saviour
already come.
[AU] So I read the "gold, bedolah, and shoham" of the description of
Eden in Genesis ii.--the oldest literary record of the stone age.
In completing this series of pictures, I wish emphatically to insist
on the imperfection of the sketches which I have been able to present,
and which are less, in comparison with the grand march of the creative
work, even as now imperfectly known to science, then the roughest
pencilling of a child when compared with a finished picture. If they
have any popular value, it will be in presenting such a broad general
view of a great subject as may induce further study to fill up the
details. If they have any scientific value, it will be in removing the
minds of British students for a little from the too exclusive study of
their own limited marginal area, which has been to them too much the
"celestial empire" around which all other countries must be arranged,
and in divesting the subject of the special colouring given to it by
certain prominent cliques and parties.
Geology as a science is at present in a peculiar and somewhat
exceptional state. Under the influence of a few men of commanding
genius belonging to the generation now passing away, it has made so
gigantic conquests that its armies have broken up into bands of
specialists, little better then scientific banditti, liable to be
beaten in detail, and prone to commit outrages on common sense and
good taste, which bring their otherwise good cause into disrepute. The
leaders of these bands are, many of them, good soldiers, but few of
them fitted to be general officers, and none of them able to reunite
our scattered detachments. We need larger minds, of broader culture
and wider sympathies, to organise and rule the lands which we have
subdued, and to lead on to further conquests.
In the present state of natural science in Britain, this evil is
perhaps to be remedied only by providing a wider and deeper culture
for our young men. Few of our present workers have enjoyed that
thorough training in mental as well as physical science, which is
necessary to enable men even of great powers to take large and lofty
views of the scheme of nature. Hence we often find men who are fair
workers in limited departments, reasoning most illogically, taking
narrow and local views, elevating the exception into the rule, led
away by baseless metaphysical subtleties, quarrelling with men who
look at their specialties from a different point of view, and even
striving and plotting for the advancement of their own hobbies. Such
defects certainly mar much of the scientific work now being done. In
the more advanced walks of scientific research, they are to some
extent neutralised by that free discussion which true science always
fosters; though even here they sometimes vexatiously arrest the
progress of truth, or open floodgates of error which it may require
much labour to close. But in public lectures and popular publications
they run riot, and are stimulated by the mistaken opposition of
narrow-minded good men, by the love of the new and sensational, and by
the rivalry of men struggling for place and position. To launch a
clever and startling fallacy which will float for a week and stir up a
hard fight, seems almost as great a triumph as the discovery of an
important fact or law; and the honest student is distracted with the
multitude of doctrines, and hustled aside by the crowd of ambitious
groundlings.
The only remedy in the case is a higher and more general scientific
education; and yet I do not wonder that many good men object to this,
simply because of the difficulty of finding honest and competent
teachers, themselves well grounded in their subjects, and free from
that too common insanity of specialists and half-educated men, which
impels them to run amuck at everything that does not depend on their
own methods of research. This is a difficulty which can be met in our
time only by the general good sense and right feeling of the
community taking a firm hold of the matter, and insisting on the
organization and extension of the higher scientific education, as well
as that of a more elementary character, under the management of able
and sane men. Yet even if not so counteracted, present follies will
pass away, and a new and better state of natural science will arise in
the future, by its own internal development. Science cannot long
successfully isolate itself from God. Its life lies in the fact that
it is the exponent of the plans and works of the great Creative Will.
It must, in spite of itself, serve His purposes, by dispelling
blighting ignorance and superstition, by lighting the way to
successive triumphs of human skill over the powers of nature, and by
guarding men from the evils that flow from infringement of natural
laws. And it cannot fail, as it approaches nearer to the boundaries of
that which may be known by finite minds, to be humbled by the
contemplation of the infinite, and to recognise therein that
intelligence of which the human mind is but the image and shadow.
It may be that theologians also are needed who shall be fit to take
the place of Moses to our generation, in teaching it again the very
elements of natural theology; but let them not look upon science as a
cold and godless demon, holding forth to the world a poisoned cup
cunningly compounded of truth and falsehood; but rather as the natural
ally and associate of the gospel of salvation. The matter is so put in
one of those visions which close the canon of revelation, when the
prophet sees a mighty angel having the "everlasting gospel to preach;"
but he begins his proclamation by calling on men to "worship Him _that
made heaven and earth and the sea and the fountains of waters_." Men
must know God as the Creator even before they seek Him as a benefactor
and redeemer. Thus religion must go hand in hand with all true and
honest science. In this way only may we look forward to a time when a
more exact and large-minded science shall be in perfect accord with a
more pure and spiritual Christianity, when the natural and the
spiritual shall be seen to be the necessary complements of each other,
and when we shall hear no more of reconciliations between science and
theology, because there will be no quarrels to reconcile. Already,
even in the present chaos of scientific and religious opinion,
indications can be seen by the observant, that the Divine Spirit of
order is breathing on the mass, and will evolve from it new and
beautiful worlds of mental and spiritual existence.
CHAPTER XIV.
PRIMITIVE MAN. CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO MODERN THEORIES AS TO HIS
ORIGIN.
The geological record, as we have been reading it, introduces us to
primitive man, but gives us no distinct information as to his origin.
Tradition and revelation have, it is true, their solutions of the
mystery, but there are, and always have been, many who will not take
these on trust, but must grope for themselves with the taper of
science or philosophy into the dark caverns whence issue the springs
of humanity. In former times it was philosophic speculation alone
which lent its dim and uncertain light to these bold inquirers; but in
our day the new and startling discoveries in physics, chemistry, and
biology have flashed up with an unexpected brilliancy, and have at
least served to dazzle the eyes and encourage the hopes of the
curious, and to lead to explorations more bold and systematic then any
previously undertaken. Thus has been born amongst us, or rather
renewed, for it is a very old thing, that evolutionist philosophy,
which has been well characterised as the "baldest of all the
philosophies which have sprung up in our world," and which solves the
question of human origin by the assumption that human nature exists
potentially in mere inorganic matter, and that a chain of spontaneous
derivation connects incandescent molecules or star-dust with the
world, and with man himself.
This evolutionist doctrine is itself one of the strangest phenomena of
humanity. It existed, and most naturally, in the oldest philosophy and
poetry, in connection with the crudest and most uncritical, attempts
of the human mind to grasp the system of nature; but that in our day a
system destitute of any shadow of proof, and supported merely by vague
analogies and figures of speech, and by the arbitrary and artificial
coherence of its own parts, should be accepted as a philosophy, and
should find able adherents to string upon its thread of hypotheses our
vast and weighty stores of knowledge, is surpassingly strange. It
seems to indicate that the accumulated facts of our age have gone
altogether beyond its capacity for generalisation; and but for the
vigour which one sees everywhere, it might be taken as an indication
that the human mind has fallen into a state of senility, and in its
dotage mistakes for science the imaginations which were the dreams of
its youth.
In many respects these speculations are important and worthy of the
attention of thinking men. They seek to revolutionise the religious
beliefs of the world, and if accepted would destroy most of the
existing theology and philosophy. They indicate tendencies among
scientific thinkers, which, though probably temporary, must, before
they disappear, descend to lower strata, and reproduce themselves in
grosser forms, and with most serious effects on the whole structure
of society. With one class of minds they constitute a sort of
religion, which so far satisfies the craving for truths higher then
those which relate to immediate wants and pleasures. With another and
perhaps larger class, they are accepted as affording a welcome
deliverance from all scruples of conscience and fears of a hereafter.
In the domain of science evolutionism has like tendencies. It reduces
the position of man, who becomes a descendant of inferior animals, and
a mere term in a series whose end is unknown. It removes from the
study of nature the ideas of final cause and purpose; and the
evolutionist, instead of regarding the world as a work of consummate
plan, skill, and adjustment, approaches nature as he would a chaos of
fallen rocks, which may present forms of castles and grotesque
profiles of men and animals, but they are all fortuitous and without
significance. It obliterates the fine perception of differences from
the mind of the naturalist, and resolves all the complicated relations
of living things into some simple idea of descent with modification.
It thus destroys the possibility of a philosophical classification,
reducing all things to a mere series, and leads to a rapid decay in
systematic zoology and botany, which is already very manifest among
the disciples of Spencer and Darwin in England. The effect of this
will be, if it proceeds further, in a great degree to destroy the
educational value and popular interest attaching to these sciences,
and to throw them down at the feet of a system of debased
metaphysics. As redeeming features in all this, are the careful study
of varietal forms, and the inquiries as to the limits of species,
which have sprung from these discussions, and the harvest of which
will be reaped by the true naturalists of the future.
Thus these theories as to the origin of men and animals and plants are
full of present significance, and may be studied with profit by all;
and in no part of their applications more usefully then in that which
relates to man. Let us then inquire,--1. What is implied in the idea of
evolution as applied to man? 2. What is implied in the idea of
creation? 3. How these several views accord with what we actually know
as the result of scientific investigation? The first and second of
these questions may well occupy the whole of this chapter, and we
shall be able merely to glance at their leading aspects. In doing so,
it may be well first to place before us in general terms the several
alternatives which evolutionists offer, as to the mode in which the
honour of an origin from apes or ape-like animals can be granted to
us, along with the opposite view as to the independent origin of man
which have been maintained either on scientific or scriptural grounds.
All the evolutionist theories of the origin of man depend primarily on
the possibility of his having been produced from some of the animals
more closely allied to him, by the causes now in operation which lead
to varietal forms, or by similar causes which have been in operation;
and some attach more and others less weight to certain of these
causes, or gratuitously suppose others not actually known. Of such
causes of change some are internal and others external to the
organism. With respect to the former, one school assumes an innate
tendency in every species to change in the course of time.[AV] Another
believes in exceptional births, either in the course of ordinary
generation or by the mode of parthenogenesis.[AW] Another refers to
the known facts of reproductive accelleration or retardation observed
in some humble creatures.[AX] New forms arising in any of these ways
or fortuitously, may, it is supposed, be perpetuated and increased and
further improved by favouring external circumstances and the effort of
the organism to avail itself of these,[AY] or by the struggle for
existence and the survival of the fittest.[AZ]
[AV] Parsons, Owen.
[AW] Mivart, Ferris.
[AX] Hyatt and Cope.
[AY] Lamarck, etc.
[AZ] Darwin, etc.
On the other hand, those who believe in the independent origin of man
admit the above causes as adequate only to produce mere varieties,
liable to return into the original stock. They may either hold that
man has appeared as a product of special and miraculous creation, or
that he has been created mediately by the operation of forces also
concerned in the production of other animals, but the precise nature
of which is still unknown to us; or lastly, they may hold what seems
to be the view favoured by the book of Genesis, that his bodily form
is a product of mediate creation and his spiritual nature a direct
emanation from his Creator.
The discussion of all these rival theories would occupy volumes, and
to follow them into details would require investigations which have
already bewildered many minds of some scientific culture. Further, it
is the belief of the writer that this plunging into multitudes of
details has been fruitful of error, and that it will be a better
course to endeavour to reach the root of the matter by looking at the
foundations of the general doctrine of evolution itself, and then
contrasting it with its rival.
Taking, then, this broad view of the subject, two great leading
alternatives are presented to us. Either man is an independent product
of the will of a Higher Intelligence, acting directly or through the
laws and materials of his own institution and production, or he has
been produced by an unconscious evolution from lower things. It is
true that many evolutionists, either unwilling to offend, or not
perceiving the logical consequences of their own hypothesis, endeavour
to steer a middle course, and to maintain that the Creator has
proceeded by way of evolution. But the bare, hard logic of Spencer,
the greatest English authority on evolution, leaves no place for this
compromise, and shows that the theory, carried out to its legitimate
consequences, excludes the knowledge of a Creator and the possibility
of His work. We have, therefore, to choose between evolution and
creation; bearing in mind, however, that there may be a place in
nature for evolution, properly limited, as well as for other things,
and that the idea of creation by no means excludes law and second
causes.
Limiting ourselves in the first place to theories of evolution, and to
these as explaining the origin of species of living beings, and
especially of man, we naturally first inquire as to the basis on which
they are founded. Now no one pretends that they rest on facts actually
observed, for no one has ever observed the production of even one
species. Nor do they even rest, like the deductions of theoretical
geology, on the extension into past time of causes of change now seen
to be in action. Their probability depends entirely on their capacity
to account hypothetically for certain relations of living creatures to
each other, and to the world without; and the strongest point of the
arguments of their advocates is the accumulation of cases of such
relations supposed to be accounted for. Such being the kind of
argument with which we have to deal, we may first inquire what we are
required to believe as conditions of the action of evolution, and
secondly, to what extent it actually does explain the phenomena.
In the first place, as evolutionists, we are required to assume
certain forces, or materials, or both, with which evolution shall
begin. Darwin, in his Origin of Species, went so far as to assume the
existence of a few of the simpler types of animals; but this view, of
course, was only a temporary resting-place for his theory. Others
assume a primitive protoplasm, or physical basis of life, and
arbitrarily assigning to this substance properties now divided between
organised and unorganised, and between dead and living matter, find no
difficulty in deducing all plants and animals from it. Still, even
this cannot have been the ultimate material. It must have been evolved
from something. We are thus brought back to certain molecules of
star-dust, or certain conflicting forces, which must have had
self-existence, and must have potentially included all subsequent
creatures. Otherwise, if with Spencer we hold that God is "unknowable"
and creation "unthinkable," we are left suspended on nothing over a
bottomless void, and must adopt as the initial proposition of our
philosophy, that all things were made out of nothing, and by nothing;
unless we prefer to doubt whether anything exists, and to push the
doctrine of relativity to the unscientific extreme of believing that
we can study the relations of things non-existent or unknown. So we
must allow the evolutionist some small capital to start with;
observing, however, that self-existent matter in a state of endless
evolution is something of which we cannot possibly have any definite
conception.
Being granted thus much, the evolutionist next proceeds to demand that
we shall also believe in the indefinite variability of material
things, and shall set aside all idea that there is any difference in
kind between the different substances which we know. They must all be
mutually convertible, or at least derivable from some primitive
material. It is true that this is contrary to experience. The chemist
holds that matter is of different kinds, that one element cannot be
converted into another; and he would probably smile if told that, even
in the lapse of enormous periods of time, limestone could be evolved
out of silica. He may think that this is very different from the idea
that a snail can be evolved from an oyster, or a bird from a reptile.
But the zoologist will inform him that species of animals are only
variable within certain limits, and are not transmutable, in so far as
experience and experiment are concerned. They have their allotropic
forms, but cannot be changed into one another.
But if we grant this second demand, the evolutionist has a third in
store for us. We must also admit that by some inevitable necessity the
changes of things must in the main take place in one direction, from
the more simple to the more complex, from the lower to the higher. At
first sight this seems not only to follow from the previous
assumptions, but to accord with observation. Do not all living things
rise from a simpler to a more complex state? has not the history of
the earth displayed a gradually increasing elevation and complexity?
But, on the other hand, the complex organism becoming mature, resolves
itself again into the simple germ, and finally is dissolved into its
constituent elements. The complex returns into the simple, and what we
see is not an evolution, but a revolution. In like manner, in
geological time, the tendency seems to be ever to disintegration and
decay. This we see everywhere, and find that elevation occurs only by
the introduction of new species in a way which is not obvious, and
which may rather imply the intervention of a cause from without; so
that here also we are required to admit as a general principle what is
contrary to experience.
If, however, we grant the evolutionist these postulates, we must next
allow him to take the facts of botany and zoology out of their
ordinary connection, and thread them like a string of beads, as
Herbert Spencer has done in his "Biology," on the threefold cord thus
fashioned. This done, we next find, as might have been expected,
certain gaps or breaks which require to be cunningly filled with
artificial material, in order to give an appearance of continuity to
the whole.
The first of these gaps which we notice is that between dead and
living matter. It is easy to fill this with such a term as protoplasm,
which includes matter both dead and living, and so to ignore this
distinction; but practically we do not yet know as a possible thing
the elevation of matter, without the agency of a previous living
organism, from that plane in which it is subject merely to physical
force, and is unorganised, to that where it becomes organised, and
lives. Under that strange hypothesis of the origin of life from
meteors, with which Sir William Thomson closed his address at a late
meeting of the British Association, there was concealed a cutting
sarcasm which the evolutionists felt. It reminded them that the men
who evolve all things from physical forces do not yet know how these
forces can produce the phenomena of life even in its humblest forms.
It is true that the scientific world has been again and again startled
by the announcement of the production of some of the lowest forms of
life, either from dead organic matter, or from merely mineral
substances; but in every case heretofore the effort has proved as vain
as the analogies attempted to be set up between the formation of
crystals and that of organized tissues are fallacious.
A second gap is that which separates vegetable and animal life. These
are necessarily the converse of each other, the one deoxidizes and
accumulates, the other oxidizes and expends. Only in reproduction or
decay does the plant simulate the action of the animal, and the animal
never in its simplest forms assumes the functions of the plant. Those
obscure cases in the humbler spheres of animal and vegetable life
which have been supposed to show a union of the two kingdoms,
disappear on investigation. This gap can, I believe, be filled up only
by an appeal to our ignorance. There may be, or may have been, some
simple creature unknown to us, on the extreme verge of the plant
kingdom, that was capable of passing the limit and becoming an animal.
But no proof of this exists. It is true that the primitive germs of
many kinds of humble plants and animals are so much alike, that much
confusion has arisen in tracing their development. It is also true
that some of these creatures can subsist under very dissimilar
conditions, and in very diverse states, and that under the specious
name of Biology,[BA] we sometimes find a mass of these confusions,
inaccurate observations and varietal differences made to do duty for
scientific facts. But all this does not invalidate the grand primary
distinction between the animal and the plant, which should be
thoroughly taught and illustrated to all young naturalists, as one of
the best antidotes to the fallacies of the evolutionist school.
[BA] It is doubtful whether men who deny the existence of vital force
have a right to call their science "Biology," any more then atheists
have to call their doctrine "Theology;" and it is certain that the
assumption of a science of Biology as distinct from Phytology and
Zoology, or including both, is of the nature of a "pious fraud" on the
part of the more enlightened evolutionists. The objections stated in
the text, to what have been called Archebiosis and Heterogenesis seem
perfectly applicable, in so far as I can judge from a friendly review
by Wallace, to the mass of heterogeneous material accumulated by Dr.
Bastian in his recent volumes. The conclusions of this writer, would
also, if established, involve evolution in a fatal _embarras des
richesses_, by the hourly production during all geological time, of
millions of new forms all capable of indefinite development.
A third is that between any species of animal or plant and any other
species. It was this gap, and this only, which Darwin undertook to
fill up by his great work on the origin of species, but,
notwithstanding the immense amount of material thus expended, it yawns
as wide as ever, since it must be admitted that no case has been
ascertained in which an individual of one species has transgressed the
limits between it and other species. However extensive the varieties
produced by artificial breeding, the essential characters of the
species remain, and even its minor characters may be reproduced, while
the barriers established in nature between species by the laws of
their reproduction, seem to be absolute.
With regard to species, however, it must be observed that naturalists
are not agreed as to what constitutes a species. Many so-called
species are probably races, or varieties, and one benefit of these
inquiries has been to direct attention to the proper discrimination of
species from varieties among animals and plants. The loose
discrimination of species, and the tendency to multiply names, have
done much to promote evolutionist views; but the researches of the
evolutionists themselves have shown that we must abandon transmutation
of true species as a thing of the present; and if we imagine it to
have occurred, must refer it to the past.
Another gap is that between the nature of the animal and the
self-conscious, reasoning, moral nature of man. We not only have no
proof that any animal can, by any force in itself, or by any merely
physical influences from without, rise to such a condition; but the
thing is in the highest degree improbable. It is easy to affirm, with
the grosser materialists, that thought is a secretion of brain, as
bile is of the liver; but a moment's thought shows that no real
analogy obtains between the cases. We may vaguely suppose, with
Darwin, that the continual exercise of such powers as animals possess,
may have developed those of man. But our experience of animals shows
that their intelligence differs essentially from that of man, being a
closed circle ever returning into itself, while that of man is
progressive, inventive, and accumulative, and can no more be
correlated with that of the animal then the vital phenomena of the
animal with those of the plant. Nor can the gap between the higher
religious and moral sentiments of man, and the instinctive affections
of the brutes, be filled up with that miserable ape imagined by
Lubbock, which, crossed in love, or pining with cold and hunger,
conceived, for the first time in its poor addled pate, "the dread of
evil to come," and so became the father of theology. This conception,
which Darwin gravely adopts, would be most ludicrous, but for the
frightful picture which it gives of the aspect in which religion
appears to the mind of the evolutionist.
The reader will now readily perceive that the simplicity and
completeness of the evolutionist theory entirely disappear when we
consider the unproved assumptions on which it is based, and its
failure to connect with each other some of the most important facts in
nature: that, in short, it is not in any true sense a philosophy, but
merely an arbitrary arrangement of facts in accordance with a number
of unproved hypotheses. Such philosophies, "falsely so called," have
existed ever since man began to reason on nature, and this last of
them is one of the weakest and most pernicious of the whole. Let the
reader take up either of Darwin's great books, or Spencer's "Biology,"
and merely ask himself as he reads each paragraph, "What is assumed
here and what is proved?" and he will find the whole fabric melt away
like a vision. He will find, however, one difference between these
writers. Darwin always states facts carefully and accurately, and when
he comes to a difficulty tries to meet it fairly. Spencer often
exaggerates or extenuates with reference to his facts, and uses the
arts of the dialectician where argument fails.
Many naturalists who should know better are puzzled with the great
array of facts presented by evolutionists; and while their better
judgment causes them to doubt as to the possibility of the structures
which they study being produced by such blind and material processes,
are forced to admit that there must surely be something in a theory so
confidently asserted, supported by so great names, and by such an
imposing array of relations which it can explain. They would be
relieved from their weak concessions were they to study carefully a
few of the instances adduced, and to consider how easy it is by a
little ingenuity to group undoubted facts around a false theory. I
could wish to present here illustrations of this, which abound in
every part of the works I have referred to, but space will not permit.
One or two must suffice. The first may be taken from one of the
strong points often dwelt on by Spencer in his "Biology."[BB]
[BB] "Principles of Biology," § 118.
"But the experiences which most clearly illustrate to us the process
of general evolution are our experiences of special evolution,
repeated in every plant and animal. Each organism exhibits, within a
short space of time, a series of changes which, when supposed to
occupy a period indefinitely great and to go on in various ways
instead of one, may give us a tolerably clear conception of organic
evolution in general. In an individual development we have compressed
into a comparatively infinitesimal space a series of metamorphoses
equally vast with those which the hypothesis of evolution assumes to
have taken place during those unmeasurable epochs that the earth's
crust tells us of. A tree differs from a seed immeasurably in every
respect--in bulk, in structure, in colour, in form, in specific
gravity, in chemical composition: differs so greatly that no visible
resemblance of any kind can be pointed out between them. Yet is the
one changed in the course of a few years into the other; changed so
gradually that at no moment can it be said, 'Now the seed ceases to be
and the tree exists.' What can be more widely contrasted then a
newly-born child and the small gelatinous spherule constituting the
human ovum? The infant is so complex in structure that a cyclopædia
is needed to describe its constituent parts. The germinal vesicle is
so simple that it may be defined in a line.... If a single cell under
appropriate conditions becomes a man in the space of a few years,
there can surely be no difficulty in understanding how, under
appropriate conditions, a cell may in the course of untold millions of
years give origin to the human race."
"It is true that many minds are so unfurnished with those experiences
of nature, out of which this conception is built, that they find
difficulty in forming it.... To such the hypothesis that by any series
of changes a protozoan should ever give origin to a mammal seems
grotesque--as grotesque as did Galileo's assertion of the earth's
movement seem to the Aristoteleans; or as grotesque as the assertion
of the earth's sphericity seems now to the New Zealanders."
I quote the above as a specimen of evolutionist reasoning from the
hand of a master, and as referring to one of the corner-stones of this
strange philosophy. I may remark with respect to it, in the first
place, that it assumes those "conditions" of evolution to which I have
already referred. In the second place, it is full of inaccurate
statements of fact, all in a direction tending to favour the
hypothesis. For example, a tree does not differ "immeasurably" from a
seed, especially if the seed is of the same species of tree, for the
principal parts of the tree and its principal chemical constituents
already exist and can be detected in the seed, and unless it were so,
the development of the tree from the seed could not take place.
Besides, the seed itself is not a thing self-existent or fortuitous.
The production of a seed without a previous tree of the same kind is
quite as difficult to suppose as the production of a tree without a
previous seed containing its living embryo. In the third place, the
whole argument is one of analogy. The germ becomes a mature animal,
passing through many intermediate stages, therefore the animal may
have descended from some creature which when mature was as simple as
the germ. The value of such an analogy depends altogether on the
similarity of the "conditions" which, in such a case, are really the
efficient causes at work. The germ of a mammal becomes developed by
the nourishment supplied from the system of a parent, which itself
produced the germ, and into whose likeness the young animal is
destined to grow. These are the "appropriate conditions" of its
development. But when our author assumes from this other "appropriate
conditions," by which an organism, which on the hypothesis is not a
germ but a mature animal, shall be developed into the likeness, of
something different from its parent, he oversteps the bounds of
legitimate analogy. Further, the reproduction of the animal, as
observed, is a closed series, beginning at the embryo and returning
thither again; the evolution attempted to be established is a
progressive series going on from one stage to another. A reproductive
circle once established obeys certain definite laws, but its origin,
or how it can leave its orbit and revolve in some other, we cannot
explain without the introduction of some new efficient cause. The one
term of the analogy is a revolution, and the other is an evolution.
The revolution within the circle of the reproduction of the species
gives no evidence that at some point the body will fly off at a
tangent, and does not even inform us whether it is making progress in
space. Even if it is so making progress, its orbit of revolution may
remain the same. But it may be said the reproduction of the species is
not in a circle but in a spiral. Within the limit of experience it is
not so, since, however it may undulate, it always returns into itself.
But supposing it to be a spiral, it may ascend or descend, or expand
and contract; but this does not connect it with other similar spirals,
the separate origin of which is to be separately accounted for.
I have quoted the latter part of the passage because it is
characteristic of evolutionists to decry the intelligence of those who
differ from them. Now it is fair to admit that it requires some
intelligence and some knowledge of nature to produce or even to
understand such analogies as those of Mr. Spencer and his followers,
but it is no less true that a deeper insight into the study of nature
may not only enable us to understand these analogies, but to detect
their fallacies. I am sorry to say, however, that at present the
hypothesis of evolution is giving so strong a colouring to much of
popular and even academic teaching, more especially in the easy and
flippant conversion of the facts of embryology into instances of
evolution on the plan of the above extract, that the Spencerians may
not long have to complain of want of faith and appreciation on the
part of the improved apes whom they are kind enough to instruct as to
their lowly origin.
The mention of "appropriate conditions" in the above extract reminds
me of another fatal objection to evolution which its advocates
continually overlook. An animal or plant advancing from maturity to
the adult state is in every stage of its progress a complete and
symmetrical organism, correlated in all its parts and adapted to
surrounding conditions. Suppose it to become modified in any way, to
ever so small an extent, the whole of these relations are disturbed.
If the modification is internal and spontaneous, there is no guarantee
that it will suit the vastly numerous external agencies to which the
creature is subjected. If it is produced by agencies from without,
there is no guarantee that it will accord with the internal relations
of the parts modified. The probabilities are incalculably great
against the occurrence of many such disturbances without the breaking
up altogether of the nice adjustment of parts and conditions. This is
no doubt one reason of the extinction of so many species in geological
time, and also of the strong tendency of every species to spring back
to its normal condition when in any way artificially caused to vary.
It is also connected with the otherwise mysterious law of the constant
transmission of all the characters of the parent.
Spencer and Darwin occasionally see this difficulty, though they
habitually neglect it in their reasonings. Spencer even tries to turn
one part of it to account as follows:--
"Suppose the head of a mammal to become very much more weighty--what
must be the indirect results? The muscles of the neck are put to
greater exertions; and the vertebræ have to bear additional tensions
and pressures caused both by the increased weight of the head and the
stronger contraction of muscles that support and move the head." He
goes on to say that the processes of the vertebrae will have augmented
strains put upon them, the thoracic region and fore limbs will have to
be enlarged, and even the hind limbs may require modification to
facilitate locomotion. He concludes: "Any one who compares the outline
of the bison with that of its congener, the ox, will clearly see how
profoundly a heavier head affects the entire osseous and muscular
system."
We need not stop to mention the usual inaccuracies as to facts in this
paragraph, as, for example, the support of the head being attributed
to muscles alone, without reference to the strong elastic ligament of
the neck. We may first notice the assumption that an animal can
acquire a head "very much more weighty" then that which it had before,
a very improbable supposition, whether as a monstrous birth Dr as an
effect of external conditions after birth. But suppose this to have
occurred, and what is even less likely, that the very much heavier
head is an advantage in some way, what guarantee can evolution give
us that the number of other modifications required would take place
simultaneously with this acquisition! It would be easy to show that
this would depend on the concurrence of hundreds of other conditions
within and without the animal, all of which must co-operate to produce
the desired effect, if indeed they could produce this effect even by
their conjoint action, a power which the writer, it will be observed,
quietly assumes, as well as the probability of the initial change in
the head. Finally, the naivete with which it is assumed that the bison
and the ox are examples of such an evolution, would be refreshing in
these artificial days, if instances of it did not occur in almost
every page of the writings of evolutionists.
It would only weary the reader to follow evolution any further into
details, especially as my object in this chapter is to show that
generally, and as a theory of nature and of man, it has no good
foundation; but we should not leave the subject without noting
precisely the derivation of man according to this theory; and for this
purpose I may quote Darwin's summary of his conclusions on the
subject.[BC]
[BC] "Descent of Man," part ii., ch. 21.
"Man," says Mr. Darwin, "is descended from a hairy quadruped,
furnished with a tail and pointed ears, probably arboreal in its
habits, and an inhabitant of the Old World. This creature, if its
whole structure had been examined by a naturalist, would have been
classed amongst the quadrumana, as surely as would the common, and
still more ancient, progenitor of the Old and New World monkeys. The
quadrumana and all the higher mammals are probably derived from an
ancient marsupial animal; and this, through a long line of diversified
forms, either from some reptile-like or some amphibian-like creature,
and this again from some fish-like animal. In the dim obscurity of the
past we can see that the early progenitor of all the vertebrata must
have been an aquatic animal, provided with branchiæ, with the two
sexes united in the same individual, and with the most important
organs of the body (such as the brain and heart) imperfectly
developed. This animal seems to have been more like the larvæ of our
existing marine Ascidians then any other form known."
The author of this passage, in condescension to our weakness of faith,
takes us no further back then to an Ascidian, or "sea-squirt," the
resemblance, however, of which to a vertebrate animal is merely
analogical, and, though a very curious case of analogy, altogether
temporary and belonging to the young state of the creature, without
affecting its adult state or its real affinities with other mollusks.
In order, however, to get the Ascidian itself, he must assume all the
"conditions" already referred to in the previous part of this article,
and fill most of the gaps. He has, however, in the "Origin of Species"
and "Descent of Man," attempted merely to fill one of the breaks in
the evolutionary series, that between distinct species, leaving us to
receive all the rest on mere faith. Even in respect to the question
of species, in all the long chain between the Ascidian and the man, he
has not certainly established one link; and in the very last change,
that from the ape-like ancestor, he equally fails to satisfy us as to
matters so trivial as the loss of the hair, which, on the hypothesis,
clothed the pre-human back, and on matters so weighty as the dawn of
human reason and conscience.
We thus see that evolution as an hypothesis has no basis in experience
or in scientific fact, and that its imagined series of transmutations
has breaks which cannot be filled. We have now to consider how it
stands with the belief that man has been created by a higher power.
Against this supposition the evolutionists try to create a prejudice
in two ways. First, they maintain with Herbert Spencer that the
hypothesis of creation is inconceivable, or, as they say,
"unthinkable;" an assertion which, when examined, proves to mean only
that we do not know perfectly the details of such an operation, an
objection equally fatal to the origin either of matter or life, on the
hypothesis of evolution. Secondly, they always refer to creation as if
it must be a special miracle, in the sense of a contravention of or
departure from ordinary natural laws; but this is an assumption
utterly without proof, since creation may be as much according to law
as evolution, though in either case the precise laws involved may be
very imperfectly known.
How absurd, they say, to imagine an animal created at once, fully
formed, by a special miracle, instead of supposing it to be slowly
elaborated through, countless ages of evolution. To Darwin the
doctrine of creation is but "a curious illustration of the blindness
of preconceived opinion." "These authors," he says, "seem no more
startled at a miraculous act of creation then at an ordinary birth;
but do they really believe that at innumerable periods in the earth's
history, certain elemental atoms have been commanded suddenly to flash
into living tissues?" Darwin, with all his philosophic fairness,
sometimes becomes almost Spencerian in his looseness of expression;
and in the above extract, the terms "miraculous," "innumerable,"
"elemental atoms," "suddenly," and "flash," all express ideas in no
respect necessary to the work of creation. Those who have no faith in
evolution as a cause of the production of species, may well ask in
return how the evolutionist can prove that creation must be
instantaneous, that it must follow no law, that it must produce an
animal fully formed, that it must be miraculous. In short, it is a
portion of the policy of evolutionists to endeavour to tie down their
opponents to a purely gratuitous and ignorant view of creation, and
then to attack them in that position.
What, then, is the actual statement of the theory of creation as it
may be held by a modern man of science? Simply this; that all things
have been produced by the Supreme Creative Will, acting either
directly or through the agency of the forces and materials of His own
production.
This theory does not necessarily affirm that creation is miraculous,
in the sense of being contrary to or subversive of law; law and order
are as applicable to creation as to any other process. It does not
contradict the idea of successive creations. There is no necessity
that the process should be instantaneous and without progression. It
does not imply that all kinds of creation are alike. There may be
higher and lower kinds. It does not exclude the idea of similarity or
dissimilarity of plan and function as to the products of creation.
Distinct products of creation may be either similar to each other in
different degrees, or dissimilar. It does not even exclude evolution
or derivation to a certain extent: anything once created may, if
sufficiently flexible and elastic, be evolved or involved in various
ways. Indeed, creation and derivation may, rightly understood, be
complementary to each other. Created things, unless absolutely
unchangeable, must be more or less modified by influences from within
and from without, and derivation or evolution may account for certain
subordinate changes of things already made. Man, for example, may be a
product of creation, yet his creation may have been in perfect harmony
with those laws of procedure which the Creator has set for His own
operations. He may have been preceded by other creations of things
more or less similar or dissimilar. He may have been created by the
same processes with some or all of these, or by different means. His
body may have been created in one way, his soul in another. He may,
nay, in all probability would be, part of a plan of which some parts
would approach very near to him in structure or functions. After his
creation, spontaneous culture and outward circumstances may have
moulded him into varieties, and given him many different kinds of
speech and of habits. These points are so obvious to common sense that
it would be quite unnecessary to insist on them, were they not
habitually overlooked or misstated by evolutionists.
The creation hypothesis is also free from some of the difficulties of
evolution. It avoids the absurdity of an eternal progression from the
less to the more complex. It provides in will, the only source of
power actually known to us by ordinary experience, an intelligible
origin of nature. It does not require us to contradict experience by
supposing that there are no differences of kind or essence in things.
It does not require us to assume, contrary to experience, an
invariable tendency to differentiate and improve. It does not exact
the bridging over of all gaps which may be found between the several
grades of beings which exist or have existed.
Why, then, are so many men of science disposed to ignore altogether
this view of the matter? Mainly, I believe, because, from the training
of many of them, they are absolutely ignorant of the subject, and from
their habits of thought have come to regard physical force and the
laws regulating it as the one power in nature, and to relegate all
spiritual powers or forces, or, as they have been taught to regard
them, "supernatural" things, to the domain of the "unknowable."
Perhaps some portion of the difficulty may be got over by abandoning
altogether the word "supernatural," which has been much misused, and
by holding nature to represent the whole cosmos, and to include both
the _physical_ and the _spiritual_, both of them in the fullest sense
subject to law, but each to the law of its own special nature. I have
read somewhere a story of some ignorant orientals who were induced to
keep a steam-engine supplied with water by the fiction that it
contained a terrible _djin_, or demon, who, if allowed to become
thirsty, would break out and destroy them all. Had they been enabled
to discard this superstition, and to understand the force of steam, we
can readily imagine that they would now suppose they knew the whole
truth, and might believe that any one who taught them that the engine
was a product of intelligent design, was only taking them back to the
old doctrine of the thirsty demon of the boiler. This is, I think, at
present, the mental condition of many scientists with reference to
creation.
Here we come to the first demand which the doctrine of creation makes
on us by way of premises. In order that there may be creation there
must be a primary Self-existent Spirit, whose will is supreme. The
evolutionist cannot refuse to admit this on as good ground as that on
which we hesitate to receive the postulates of his faith. It is no
real objection to say that a God can be known to us only partially,
and, with reference to His real essence, not at all; since, even if
we admit this, it is no more then can be said of matter and force.
I am not about here to repeat any of the ordinary arguments for the
existence of a spiritual First Cause, and Creator of all things, but
it may be proper to show that this assumption is not inconsistent with
experience, or with the facts and principles of modern science. The
statement which I would make on this point shall be in the words of a
very old writer, not so well known as he should be to many who talk
volubly enough about antagonisms between science and Christianity:
"that which is known of God is manifest in them (in men), for God
manifested it unto them. For since the creation of the world His
invisible things, even His eternal power and divinity are plainly
seen, being perceived by means of things that are made."[BD] The
statement here is very precise. Certain things relating to God are
manifest within men's minds, and are proved by the evidence of His
works; these properties of God thus manifested being specially His
power or control of all forces, and His divinity or possession of a
nature higher then ours. The argument of the writer is that all
heathens know this; and, as a matter of fact, I believe it must be
admitted even by those most sceptical on such points, that some notion
of a divinity has been derived from nature by men of all nations and
tribes, if we except, perhaps, a few enlightened positivists of this
nineteenth century whom excess of light has made blind. "If the light
that is in man be darkness, how great is that darkness." But then this
notion of a God is a very old and primitive one, and Spencer takes
care to inform us that "first thoughts are either wholly out of
harmony with things, or in very incomplete harmony with them," and
consequently that old beliefs and generally diffused notions are
presumably wrong.
[BD] Paul's Epistle to the Romans, chap i.
Is it true, however, that the modern knowledge of nature tends to rob
it of a spiritual First Cause? One can conceive such a tendency, if
all our advances in knowledge had tended more and more to identify
force with matter in its grosser forms, and to remove more and more
from our mental view those powers which are not material; but the very
reverse of this is the case. Modern discovery has tended more and more
to attach importance to certain universally diffused media which do
not seem to be subject to the laws of ordinary matter, and to prove at
once the Protean character and indestructibility of forces, the
aggregate of which, as acting in the universe, gives us our nearest
approach to the conception of physical omnipotence. This is what so
many of our evolutionists mean when they indignantly disclaim
materialism. They know that there is a boundless energy beyond mere
matter, and of which matter seems the sport and toy. Could they
conceive of this energy as the expression of a personal will, they
would become theists.
Man himself presents a microcosm of matter and force, raised to a
higher plane then that of the merely chemical and physical. In him we
find not merely that brain and nerve force which is common to him and
lower animals, and which exhibits one of the most marvellous energies
in nature, but we have the higher force of will and intellect,
enabling him to read the secrets of nature, to seize and combine and
utilize its laws like a god, and like a god to attain to the higher
discernment of good and evil. Nay, more, this power which resides
within man rules with omnipotent energy the material organism, driving
its nerve forces until cells and fibres are worn out and destroyed,
taxing muscles and tendons till they break, impelling its slave the
body even to that which will bring injury and death itself. Surely,
what we thus see in man must be the image and likeness of the Great
Spirit. We can escape from this conclusion only by one or other of two
assumptions, either of which is rather to be called a play upon words
then a scientific theory. We may, with a certain class of physicists
and physiologists, confine our attention wholly to the fire and the
steam, and overlook the engineer. We may assume that with protoplasm
and animal electricity, for example, we can dispense with life, and
not only with life but with spirit also. Yet he who regards vitality
as an unmeaning word; and yet speaks of "living protoplasm," and "dead
protoplasm," and affirms that between these two states, so different
in their phenomena, no chemical or physical difference exists, is
surely either laughing at us, or committing himself to what the Duke
of Argyll calls a philosophical bull; and he who shows us that
electrical discharges are concerned in muscular contraction, has just
as much proved that there is no need of life or spirit, as the
electrician who has explained the mysteries of the telegraph has shown
that there can be no need of an operator. Or we may, turning to the
opposite extreme, trust to the metaphysical fallacy of those who
affirm that neither matter, nor force, nor spirit, need concern them,
for that all are merely states of consciousness in ourselves. But what
of the conscious self this self which thinks, and which is in relation
with surroundings which it did not create, and which presumably did
not create it? and what is the unknown third term which must have been
the means of setting up these relations? Here again our blind guides
involve us in an absolute self-contradiction.
Thus we are thrown back on the grand old truth that man, heathen and
savage, or Christian and scientific, opens his eyes on nature and
reads therein both the physical and the spiritual, and in connection
with both of these the power and divinity of an Almighty Creator. He
may at first have many wrong views both of God and of His works, but
as he penetrates further into the laws of matter and mind, he attains
more just conceptions of their relations to the Great Centre and
Source of all, and instead of being able to dispense with creation, he
hopes to be able at length to understand its laws and methods. If
unhappily he abandons this high ambition, and contents himself with
mere matter and physical force, he cannot rise to the highest
development either of science or philosophy.
It may, however, be said that evolution may admit all this, and still
be held as a scientific doctrine in connection with a modified belief
in creation. The work of actual creation may have been limited to a
few elementary types, and evolution may have done the rest.
Evolutionists may still be theists. We have already seen that the
doctrine, as carried out to its logical consequences, excludes
creation and theism. It may, however, be shown that even in its more
modified forms, and when held by men who maintain that they are not
atheists, it is practically atheistic, because excluding the idea of
plan and design, and resolving all things into the action of
unintelligent forces. It is necessary to observe this, because it is
the half-way evolutionism which professes to have a Creator somewhere
behind it, that is most popular; though it is, if possible, more
unphilosophical then that which professes to set out from absolute and
eternal nonentity, or from self-existent star-dust containing all the
possibilities of the universe.
Absolute atheists recognise in Darwinism, for example, a philosophy
which reduces all things to a "gradual summation of innumerable minute
and accidental material operations," and in this they are more logical
then those who seek to reconcile evolution with design. Huxley, in his
"lay sermons," referring to Paley's argument for design founded on the
structure of a watch, says that if the watch could be conceived to be
a product of a less perfect structure improved by natural selection,
it would then appear to be the "result of a method of trial and error
worked by unintelligent agents, as likely as of the direct application
of the means appropriate to that end, by an intelligent agent." This
is a bold and true assertion of the actual relation of even this
modified evolution to rational and practical theism, which requires
not merely this God "afar off," who has set the stone of nature
rolling and then turned His back upon it, but a present God, whose
will is the law of nature, now as in times past. The evolutionist is
really in a position of absolute antagonism to the idea of creation,
even when held with all due allowance for the variations of created
things within certain limits.
Perhaps Paley's old illustration of the watch, as applied by Huxley,
may serve to show this as well as any other. If the imperfect watch,
useless as a time-keeper, is the work of the contriver, and the
perfection of it is the result of unintelligent agents working
fortuitously, then it is clear that creation and design have a small
and evanescent share in the construction of the fabric of nature. But
is it really so? Can we attribute the perfection of the watch to
"accidental material operations" any more then the first effort to
produce such an instrument? Paley himself long ago met this view of
the case, but his argument may be extended by the admissions and pleas
of the evolutionists themselves. For example, the watch is altogether
a mechanical thing, and this fact by no means implies that it could
not be made by an intelligent and spiritual designer, yet this
assumption that physical laws exclude creation and design turns up in
almost every page of the evolutionists. Paley has well shown that if
the watch contained within itself machinery for making other watches,
this would not militate against his argument. It would be so if it
could be proved that a piece of metal had spontaneously produced an
imperfect watch, and this a more perfect one, and so on; but this is
precisely what evolutionists still require to prove with respect both
to the watch and to man. On the other hand it is no argument for the
evolution of the watch that there may be different kinds of watches,
some more and others less perfect, and that ruder forms may have
preceded the more perfect. This is perfectly compatible with creation
and design. Evolutionists, however, generally fail to make this
distinction. Nor would it be any proof of the evolution of the watch
to find that, as Spencer would say, it was in perfect harmony with its
environment, as, for instance, that it kept time with the revolution
of the earth, and contained contrivances to regulate its motion under
different temperatures, unless it could be shown that the earth's
motion and the changes of temperature had been efficient causes of the
motion and the adjustments of the watch; otherwise the argument would
look altogether in the direction of design. Nor would it be fair to
shut up the argument of design to the idea that the watch must have
suddenly flashed into existence fully formed and in motion. It would
be quite as much a creation if slowly and laboriously made by the hand
of the artificer, or if more rapidly struck off by machinery; and if
the latter, it would not follow that the machine which produced the
watch was at all like the watch itself. It might have been something
very different. Finally, when Spencer tries to cut at the root of the
whole of this argument, by affirming that man has no more right to
reason from himself with regard to his Maker then a watch would have
to reason from its own mechanical structure and affirm the like of its
maker, he signally fails. If the watch had such power of reasoning, it
would be more then mechanical, and would be intelligent like its
maker; and in any case, if thus reasoning it came to the conclusion
that it was a result of "accidental material operations," it would be
altogether mistaken. Nor would it be nearer the truth if it held that
it was a product of spontaneous evolution from an imperfect and
comparatively useless watch that had been made millions of years
before.
We have taken this illustration of the watch merely as given to us by
Huxley, and without in the least seeking to overlook the distinction
between a dead machine and a living organism; but the argument for
creation and design is quite as strong in the case of the latter, so
long as it cannot be proved by actual facts to be a product of
derivation from a distinct species. This has not been proved either in
the care of man or any other species; and so long as it has not, the
theory of creation and design is infinitely more rational and
scientific then that of evolution in any of its forms.
But all this does not relieve us from the question, How can species be
created?--the same question put to Paul by the sceptics of the first
century with reference to the resurrection--"How are the dead raised,
and with what bodies do they come?" I do not wish to evade this
question, whether applied to man or to a microscopic animalcule, and I
would answer it with the following statements:--
1. The advocate of creation is in this matter in no worse position
then the evolutionist. This we have already shown, and I may refer
here to the fact that Darwin himself assumes at least one primitive
form of animal and plant life, and he is confessedly just as little
able to imagine this one act of creation as any other that may be
demanded of him.
2. We are not bound to believe that all groups of individual animals,
which naturalists may call species, have been separate products of
creation. Man himself has by some naturalists been divided into
several species; but we may well be content to believe the creation of
one primitive form, and the production of existing races by variation.
Every zoologist and botanist who has studied any group of animals or
plants with care, knows that there are numerous related forms passing
into each other, which some naturalists might consider to be distinct
species, but which it is certainly not necessary to regard as
distinct products of creation. Every species is more or less
variable, and this variability may be developed by different causes.
Individuals exposed to unfavourable conditions will be stunted and
depauperated; those in more favourable circumstances may be improved
and enlarged. Important changes may thus take place without
transgressing the limits of the species, or preventing a return to its
typical forms; and the practice of confounding these more limited
changes with the wider structural and physiological differences which
separate true species is much to be deprecated. Animals which pass
through metamorphoses, or which, are developed through the
instrumentality of intermediate forms or "nurses"[BE] are not only
liable to be separated by mistake into distinct species, but they may,
tinder certain circumstances, attain to a premature maturity, or may
be fixed for a time or permanently in an immature condition. Further,
species, like individuals, probably have their infancy, maturity, and
decay in geological time, and may present differences in these several
stages. It is the remainder of true specific types left after all
these sources of error are removed, that creation has to account for;
and to arrive at this remainder, and to ascertain its nature and
amount, will require a vast expenditure of skilful and conscientious
labour.
[BE] Mr. Mungo Ponton, in his book "The Beginning," has based a theory
of derivation on this peculiarity.
3. Since animals and plants have been introduced upon our earth in
long succession throughout geologic time, and this in a somewhat
regular manner, we have a right to assume that their introduction has
been in accordance with a law or plan of creation, and that this may
have included the co-operation of many efficient causes, and may have
differed in its application to different cases. This is a very old
doctrine of theology, for it appears in the early chapters of Genesis.
There the first aquatic animals, and man, are said to have been
"created;" plants are said to have been "brought forth by the land;"
the mammalia are said to have been "made." In the more detailed
account of the introduction of man in the second chapter of the same
book, he is said to have been "formed of the dust of the ground;" and
in regard to his higher spiritual life, to have had this "breathed
into" him by God. These are very simple expressions, but they are very
precise and definite in the original, and they imply a diversity in
the creative work. Further, this is in accordance with the analogy of
modern science. How diverse are the modes of production and
development of animals and plants, though all under one general law;
and is it not likely that the modes of their first introduction on the
earth were equally diverse?
4. Our knowledge of the conditions of the origination of species, is
so imperfect that we may possibly appear for some time to recede from,
rather then to approach to, a solution of the question. In the infancy
of chemistry, it was thought that chemical elements could be
transmuted into each other. The progress of knowledge removed this
explanation of their origin, and has as yet failed to substitute any
other in its place. It may be the same with organic species. The
attempt to account for them by derivation may prove fallacious, yet it
may be some time before we turn the corner, should this be possible,
and enter the path which actually leads up to their origin.
Lastly, in these circumstances our wisest course is to take individual
species, and to inquire as to their history in time, and the probable
conditions of their introduction. Such investigations are now being
made by many quiet workers, whose labours are comparatively little
known, and many of whom are scarcely aware of the importance of what
they are doing toward a knowledge of, at least, the conditions of
creation, which is perhaps all that we can at present hope to reach.
In the next chapter we shall try to sum up what is known as to man
himself, in the conditions of his first appearance on our earth, as
made known to us by scientific investigation, and explained on the
theory of creation as opposed to evolution.
CHAPTER XV.
PRIMITIVE MAN. CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE TO MODERN THEORIES AS TO HIS
ORIGIN (continued).
In the previous chapter we have seen that, on general grounds,
evolution as applied to man is untenable; and that the theory of
creation is more rational and less liable to objection. We may now
consider how the geological and zoological conditions of man's advent
on the earth accord with evolution; and I think we shall find, as
might be expected, that they oppose great if not fatal difficulties to
this hypothesis.
One of the first and most important facts with reference to the
appearance of man, is that he is a very recent animal, dating no
farther back in geological time then the Post-glacial period, at the
close of the Tertiary and beginning of the Modern era of geology.
Further, inasmuch as the oldest known remains of man occur along with
those of animals which still exist, and the majority of which are
probably not of older date, there is but slender probability that any
much older human remains will ever be found. Now this has a bearing on
the question of the derivation of man, which, though it has not
altogether escaped the attention of the evolutionists, has not met
with sufficient consideration.
Perhaps the oldest; known human skull is that which has been termed
the "Engis" skull, from the cave of Engis, in Belgium. With reference
to this skull, Professor Huxley has candidly admitted that it may have
belonged to an individual of one of the existing faces of men. I have
a cast of it on the same shelf with the skulls of some Algonquin
Indians, from the aboriginal Hochelaga, which preceded Montreal; and
any one acquainted with cranial characters would readily admit that
the ancient Belgian may very well have been an American Indian; while
on the other hand his head is not very dissimilar from that of some
modern European races. This Belgian man is believed to have lived
before the mammoth and the cave bear had passed away, yet he does not
belong to an extinct species or even variety of man.
Further, as stated in a previous chapter, Pictet catalogues
ninety-eight species of mammals which inhabited Europe in the
Post-glacial period. Of these fifty-seven still exist unchanged, and
the remainder have disappeared. Not one can be shown to have been
modified into a new form, though some of them have been obliged, by
changes of temperature and other conditions, to remove into distant
and now widely separated regions. Further, it would seem that all the
existing European mammals extended back in geological time at least as
far as man, so that since the Post-glacial period no new species have
been introduced in any way. Here we have a series of facts of the most
profound significance. Fifty-seven parallel lines of descent nave in
Europe run on along with man, from the Post-glacial period, without
change or material modification of any kind. Some of them extend
without change even farther back. Thus man and his companion-mammals
present a series of lines, not converging as if they pointed to some
common progenitor, but strictly parallel to each other. In other
words, if they are derived forms, their point of derivation from a
common type is pushed back infinitely in geological time. The absolute
duration of the human species does not affect this argument. If man
has existed only six or seven thousand years, still at the beginning
of his existence he was as distinct from lower animals as he is now,
and shows no signs of gradation into other forms. If he has really
endured since the great Glacial period, and is to be regarded as a
species of a hundred thousand years' continuance, still the fact is
the same, and is, if possible, less favourable to derivation.
Similar facts meet us in other directions. I have for many years
occupied a little of my leisure in collecting the numerous species of
molluscs and other marine animals existing in a sub-fossil state in
the Post-pliocene clays of Canada, and comparing them with their
modern successors. I do not know how long these animals have lived.
Some of them certainly go far back into the Tertiary; and recent
computations would place even the Glacial age at a distance from us of
more then a thousand centuries. Yet after carefully studying about two
hundred species, and, of some of these, many hundreds of specimens, I
have arrived at the conclusion that they are absolutely unchanged.
Some of them, it is true, are variable shells, presenting as many and
great varieties as the human race itself; yet I find that in the
Post-pliocene even the varieties of each species were the same as now,
though the great changes of temperature and elevation which have
occurred, have removed many of them to distant places, and have made
them become locally extinct in regions over which they once spread.
Here again we have an absolute refusal, on the part of all these
animals, to admit that they are derived, or have tended to sport into
new species. This is also, it is to be observed, altogether
independent of that imperfection of the geological record of which so
much is made; since we have abundance of these shells in the
Post-pliocene beds, and in the modern seas, and no one doubts their
continued descent. To what does this point? Evidently to the
conclusion that all these species show no indication of derivation, or
tendency to improve, but move back in parallel lines to some unknown
creative origin.
If it be objected to this conclusion that absence of derivation in the
Post-pliocene and Modern does not prove that it may not previously
have occurred, the answer is, that if the evolutionist admits that for
a very long period (and this the only one of which we have any certain
knowledge, and the only one which concerns man) derivation has been
suspended, he in effect abandons his position. It may, however, be
objected that what I have above affirmed of species may be affirmed of
varieties, which are admitted to be derived. For example, it may be
said that the negro variety of man has existed unchanged from the
earliest historic times. It is carious that those who so often urge
this argument as an evidence of the great antiquity of man, and the
slow development of races, do not see that it proves too much. If the
negro has been the same identical negro as far back as we can trace
him, then his origin must have been independent, and of the nature of
a creation, or else his duration as a negro must have been indefinite.
What it does prove is a fact equally obvious from the study of
Post-pliocene molluscs and other fossils, namely, that new species
tend rapidly to vary to the utmost extent of their possible limits,
and then to remain stationary for an indefinite time. Whether this
results from an innate yet limited power of expansion in the species,
or from the relations between it and external influences, it is a fact
inconsistent with the gradual evolution of new species. Hence we
conclude that the recent origin of man, as revealed by geology, is, in
connection with the above facts, an absolute bar to the doctrine of
derivation.
A second datum furnished to this discussion by geology and zoology is
the negative one that no link of connection is known between man and
any preceding animal. If we gather his bones and his implements from
the ancient gravel-beds and cave-earths, we do not find them
associated with any creature near of kin, nor do we find any such
creature in those rich Tertiary beds which have yielded so great
harvests of mammalian bones. In the modern world we find nothing
nearer to him then such anthropoid apes as the orangs and gorillas.
But the apes, however nearly allied, cannot be the ancestors of man.
If at all related to him by descent, they are his brethren or cousins,
not his parents; for they must, on the evolutionist hypothesis, be
themselves the terminal ends of distinct lines of derivation from
previous forms.
This difficulty is not removed by an appeal to the imperfection of the
geological record. So many animals contemporary with man are known,
both at the beginning of his geological history and in the present
world, that it would be more then marvellous if no very near relative
had ere this time been discovered at one extreme or the other, or at
some portion of the intervening ages. Further, all the animals
contemporary with man in the Post-glacial period, so far as is known,
are in the same case. Discoveries of this kind may, however, still be
made, and we may give the evolutionist the benefit of the possibility.
We may affirm, however, that in order to gain a substratum of fact for
his doctrine, he must find somewhere in the later Tertiary period
animals much nearer to man then are the present anthropoid apes.
This demand I make advisedly--first, because the animals in question
must precede man in geological time; and secondly, because the apes,
even if they preceded man, instead of being contemporary with him, are
not near enough to fulfil the required conditions. What is the actual
fact with regard to these animals, so confidently affirmed to resemble
some not very remote ancestors of ours? Zoologically they are not
varieties of the same species with man they are not species of the
same genus, nor do they belong to genera of the same family, or even
to families of the same order. These animals are at least ordinally
distinct from us in those grades of groups in which naturalists
arrange animals. I am well aware that an attempt has been made to
group man, apes, and lemurs in one order of "Primates," and thus to
reduce their difference to the grade of the family; but as pat by its
latest and perhaps most able advocate, the attempt is a decided
failure. One has only to read the concluding chapter of Huxley's new
book on the anatomy of the vertebrates to be persuaded of this, more
especially if we can take into consideration, in addition to the many
differences indicated, others which exist but are not mentioned by the
author. Ordinal distinctions among animals are mainly dependent on
grade or rank, and are not to be broken down by obscure resemblances
of internal anatomy, having no relation to this point, but to
physiological features of very secondary importance. Man must, on all
grounds, rank much higher above the apes then they can do above any
other order of mammals. Even if we refuse to recognise all higher
grounds of classification, and condescend, with some great zoologists
of our time, to regard nature with the eyes of mere anatomists, or in
the same way that a brick-layer's apprentice may be supposed to regard
distinctions of architectural styles, we can arrive at no other
conclusion. Let us imagine an anatomist, himself neither a man nor a
monkey, but a being of some other grade, and altogether ignorant of
the higher ends and powers of our species, to contemplate merely the
skeleton of a man and that of an ape. He must necessarily deduce
therefrom an ordinal distinction, even on the one ground of the
correlations and modifications of structure implied in the erect
position. It would indeed be sufficient for this purpose to consider
merely the balancing of the skull on the neck, or the structure of the
foot, and the consequences fairly deducible from either of them. Nay,
were such imaginary anatomist a derivationist, and ignorant of the
geological date of his specimens, and as careless of the differences
in respect to brain as some of his human _confrères_, he might,
referring to the loss specialised condition of man's teeth and foot,
conclude, not that man is an improved ape, but that the ape is a
specialised and improved man. He would be obliged, however, even on
this hypothesis, to admit that there must be a host of missing links.
Nor would these be supplied by the study of the living races of men,
because these want even specific distinctness, and differ from the
apes essentially in those points on which an ordinal distinction can
be fairly based.
This isolated position of man throughout the whole period of his
history, grows in importance the more that it is studied, and can
scarcely be the result of any accident of defective preservation of
intermediate forms. In the meantime, when taken in connection with,
the fact previously stated, that man is equally isolated when he first
appears on the stage, it deprives evolution, as applied to our
species, of any precise scientific basis, whether zoological or
geological.
I do not attach any importance whatever, in this connection, to the
likeness in type or plan between man and other mammals. Evolutionists
are in the habit of taking for granted that this implies derivation,
and of reasoning as if the fact that the human skeleton is constructed
on the same principles as that of an ape or a dog, must have some
connection with a common ancestry of these animals. This is, however,
as is usual with them, begging the question. Creation, as well as
evolution, admits of similarity of plan. When Stephenson constructed a
locomotive, he availed himself of the principles and of many of the
contrivances of previous engines; but this does not imply that he took
a mine-engine, or a marine-engine, and converted it into a
railroad-engine. Type or plan, whether in nature or art, may imply
merely a mental evolution of ideas in the maker, not a derivation of
one object from another.
But while man is related in his type of structure to the higher
animals, his contemporaries, it is undeniable that there are certain
points in which he constitutes a new type; and if this consideration
were properly weighed, I believe it would induce zoologists,
notwithstanding the proverbial humility of the true man of science, to
consider themselves much more widely separated from the brutes then
even by the ordinal distinction above referred to. I would state this
view of the matter thus:--It is in the lower animals a law that the
bodily frame is provided with all necessary means of defence and
attack, and with all necessary protection against external influences
and assailants. In a very few cases, we have partial exceptions to
this. A hermit-crab, for instance, has the hinder part of its body
unprotected; and has, instead of armour, the instinct of using the
cast-off shells of molluscs; yet even this animal has the usual strong
claws of a crustacean, for defence in front. There are only a very few
animals in which instinct thus takes the place of physical
contrivances for defence or attack, and in these we find merely the
usual unvarying instincts of the irrational animal. But in man, that
which is the rare exception in all other animals, becomes the rule. He
has no means of escape from danger, compared with those enjoyed by
other animals no defensive armour, no natural protection from cold or
heat, no effective weapons for attacking other animals. These
disabilities would make him the most helpless of creatures, especially
when taken in connection with his slow growth and long immaturity. His
safety and his dominion over other animals, are secured by entirely
new means, constituting a "new departure" in creation. Contrivance
and inventive power, enabling him to utilise the objects and forces of
nature, replace in him the material powers bestowed on lower animals.
Obviously the structure of the human being is related to this, and so
related to it as to place man in a different category altogether from
any other animal.
This consideration makes the derivation of man from brutes difficult
to imagine. None of these latter appear even able to conceive or
understand the modes of life and action of man. They do not need to
attempt to emulate his powers, for they are themselves provided for in
a different manner. They have no progressive nature like that of man.
Their relations to things without are altogether limited to their
structures and instincts. Man's relations are limited only by his
powers of knowing and understanding. How then is it possible to
conceive of an animal which is, so to speak, a mere living machine,
parting with the physical contrivances necessary to its existence, and
assuming the new role of intelligence and free action?
This becomes still more striking if we adopt the view usually taken by
evolutionists, that primitive man was a ferocious and carnivorous
creature, warring with and overcoming the powerful animals of the
Post-glacial period, and contending with the rigours of a severe
climate. This could certainly not be inferred from his structure,
interpreted by that of the lower animals, which would inevitably lead
to the conclusion that he must Lave been a harmless and frugivorous
creature, fitted to subsist only in the mildest climates, and where
exempt from the attacks of the more powerful carnivorous animals. No
one reasoning on the purely physical constitution of man, could infer
that he might be a creature more powerful and ferocious then the lion
or the tiger.
It is also worthy of mention that the existence of primitive man as a
savage hunter is, in another point of view, absolutely opposed to the
Darwinian idea of his origin from a frugivorous ape. These creatures,
while comparatively inoffensive, conform to the general law of lower
animals in having strong jaws and powerful canines for defence,
hand-like feet to aid them in securing food, and escaping from their
enemies, and hairy clothing to protect them from cold and heat. On the
hypothesis of evolution we might conceive that if these creatures were
placed in some Eden of genial warmth, peace, and plenty, which
rendered those appliances unnecessary, they might gradually lose these
now valuable structures, from want of necessity, to use them. But, on
the contrary, if such creatures were obliged to contend against
powerful enemies, and to feed on flesh, all analogy would lead us to
believe that they would become in their structures more like
carnivorous beasts then men. On the other hand, the anthropoid apes,
in the circumstances in which we find them, are not only as
unprogressive as other animals, but little fitted to extend their
range, and less gifted with the power of adapting themselves to new
conditions then many other mammals less resembling man in external
form.
On the Darwinian theory, such primitive men as geology reveals to us
would be more likely to have originated from bears then apes, and we
would be tempted to wish that man should become extinct, and that the
chance should be given to the mild chimpanzee or orang to produce by
natural selection an improved and less ferocious humanity for the
future.
The only rational hypothesis of human origin in the present state of
our knowledge of this subject is, that man must have been produced
under some circumstances in which animal food was not necessary to
him, in which he was exempt from the attacks of the more formidable
animals, and in less need of protection from the inclemency of the
weather then is the case with any modern apes; and that his life as a
hunter and warrior began after he had by his knowledge and skill
secured to himself the means of subduing nature by force and cunning.
This implies that man was from the first a rational being, capable of
understanding nature, and it accords much more nearly with the old
story of Eden in the book of Genesis, then with any modern theories of
evolution.
It is due to Mr. Wallace--who, next to Darwin, has been a leader among
English derivationists--to state that he perceives this difficulty. As
a believer in natural selection, however, it presents itself to his
mind in a peculiar form. He perceives that so soon as, by the process
of evolution, man became a rational creature, and acquired his social
sympathies, physical evolution must cease, and must be replaced by
invention, contrivance, and social organisation. This is at once
obvious and undeniable, and it follows that the natural selection
applicable to man, as man, must relate purely to his mental and moral
improvement. Wallace, however, fails to comprehend the full
significance of this feature of the case. Given, a man destitute of
clothing, he may never acquire such clothing by natural selection,
because he will provide an artificial substitute. He will evolve not
into a hairy animal, but into a weaver and a tailor. Given, a man
destitute of claws and fangs, he will not acquire these, but will
manufacture weapons. But then, on the hypothesis of derivation, this
is not what is given us as the raw material of man, but instead of
this a hairy ape. Admitting the power of natural selection, we might
understand how this ape could become more hairy, or acquire more
formidable weapons, as it became more exposed to cold, or more under
the necessity of using animal food; but that it should of itself leave
this natural line of development and enter on the entirely different
line of mental progress is not conceivable, except as a result of
creative intervention.
Absolute materialists may make light of this difficulty, and may hold
that this would imply merely a change of brain; but even if we admit
this, they fail to show of what use such better brain would be to a
creature retaining the bodily form and instincts of the ape, or how
such better brain could be acquired. But evolutionists are not
necessarily absolute materialists, and Darwin himself labours to show
that the reasoning self-conscious mind, and even the moral sentiments
of man, might be evolved from rudiments of such powers, perceptible in
the lower animals. Here, however, he leaves the court of natural
science, properly so called, and summons us to appear before the
judgment-seat of philosophy; and as naturalists are often bad mental
philosophers, and philosophers have often small knowledge of nature,
some advantage results, in the first instance, to the doubtful cause
of evolution. Since, however, mental science makes much more of the
distinctions between the mind of man and the instinct of animals then
naturalists, accustomed to deal merely with the external organism, can
be expected to do, the derivationist, when his plea is fairly
understood, is quite as certain to lose his cause as when tried by
geology and zoology. He might indeed be left to be dealt with by
mental science on its own ground; and as our province is to look at
the matter from the standpoint of natural history, we might here close
our inquiry. It may, however, be proper to give some slight notion of
the width of the gulf to be passed when we suppose the mechanical,
unconscious, repetitive nature of the animal to pass over into the
condition of an intellectual and moral being.
If we take, as the most favourable case for the evolutionist, the most
sagacious of the lower animals--the dog,--for example and compare it
with the least elevated condition of the human mind, as observed in
the child or the savage, we shall find that even here there is
something more then that "immense difference in degree" which Darwin
himself admits. Making every allowance for similarities in external
sense, in certain instinctive powers and appetites; and even in the
power of comparison, and in certain passions and affections; and
admitting, though we cannot be quite certain of this, that in these
man differs from animals only in degree; there remain other and more
important differences, amounting to the possession, on the part of
man, of powers not existing at all in animals. Of this kind are--first,
the faculty of reaching abstract and general truth, ind consequently
of reasoning, in the proper sense of the term; secondly, in connection
with this, the power of indefinite increase in knowledge, and in
deductions therefrom leading to practical results; thirdly, the power
of expressing thought in speech; fourthly, the power of arriving at
ideas of right and wrong, and thus becoming a responsible and free
agent. Lastly, we have the conception of higher spiritual
intelligence, of supreme power and divinity, and the consequent
feeling of religious obligation. These powers are evidently different
in kind, rather then in degree, from those of the brute, and cannot be
conceived to have arisen from the latter, more especially as one of
the distinctive characters of these is their purely cyclical,
repetitive, and unprogressive nature.
Sir John Lubbock has, by a great accumulation of facts, or supposed
facts, bearing on the low mental condition of savages, endeavoured to
bridge over this chasm. It is obvious, however, from his own data,
that the rudest savages are enabled to subsist only by the exercise of
intellectual gifts far higher then those of animals; and that if these
gifts were removed from them, they would inevitably perish. It is
equally clear that even the lowest savages are moral agents; and that
not merely in their religious beliefs and conceptions of good and
evil, but also in their moral degradation, they show capacities not
possessed by the brutes. It is also true that most of these savages
are quite as little likely to be specimens of primitive man as are the
higher races; and that many of them have fallen to so low a level as
to be scarcely capable, of themselves, of rising to a condition of
culture and civilisation. Thus they are more likely to be degraded
races, in "the eddy and backwater of humanity" then examples of the
sources from whence it flowed. And here it must not be lost sight of,
that a being like man has capacities for degradation commensurate with
his capacities for improvement; and that at any point of his history
we may have to seek the analogues of primeval man, rather in the
average, then the extremes of the race.
Before leaving this subject, it may be well to consider the fact, that
the occurrence of such a being as man in the last stages of the
world's history is, in itself, an argument for the existence of a
Supreme Creator. Man is himself an image and likeness of God; and the
fact that he can establish relations with nature around him, so as to
understand and control its powers, implies either that he has been
evolved as a soul of nature, by its own blind development, or that he
has originated in the action of a higher being related to man. The
former supposition has been above shown to be altogether improbable;
so that we are necessarily thrown back upon the latter. We must thus
regard man himself as the highest known work of a spiritual creator,
and must infer that he rightly uses his reason when he infers from
nature the power and divinity of God.
The last point that I think necessary to bring forward here, is the
information which geology gives as to the locality of the introduction
of man. There can be no hesitation in affirming that to the temperate
regions of the old continent belongs the honour of being the cradle of
humanity. In these regions are the oldest historical monuments of our
race; here geology finds the most ancient remains of human beings;
here also seems to be the birthplace of the fauna and flora most
useful and congenial to man; and here he attains to his highest pitch
of mental and physical development. This, it is true, by no means
accords with the methods of the derivationists. On their theory we
should search for the origin of man rather in those regions where he
is most depauperated and degraded, and where his struggles for
existence are most severe. But it is surely absurd to affirm of any
species of animal or plant that it must have originated at the limits
of its range, where it can scarcely exist at all. On the contrary,
common sense as well as science requires us to believe that species
must have originated in those central parts of their distribution
where they enjoy the most favourable circumstances, and must have
extended themselves thence as far as external conditions would permit.
One of the most wretched varieties of the human race, and as near as
any to the brutes, is that which inhabits Tierra del Fuego, a country
which scarcely affords any of the means for the comfortable sustenance
of man. Would it not be absolutely impossible that man should have
originated in such a country? Is it not certain, en the contrary, that
the Fuegian is merely a degraded variety of the aboriginal American
race? Precisely the same argument applies to the Austral negro and the
Hottentot. They are all naturally the most aberrant varieties of man,
as being at the extreme range of his possible extension, and placed in
conditions unfavourable, either because of unsuitable climatal or
organic associations. It is true that the regions most favourable to
the anthropoid apes, and in which they may be presumed to have
originated, are by no means the most favourable to man; but this only
makes it the less likely that man could have been derived from such a
parentage.
While, therefore, the geological date of the appearance of man, the
want of any link of connection between him and any preceding animal,
and his dissimilar bodily and mental constitution from any creatures
contemporary with him, render his derivation from apes or other
inferior animals in the highest degree improbable, the locality of his
probable origin confirms this conclusion in the strongest manner. It
also shows that man and the higher apes are not likely to have
originated in the same regions, or under the same conditions, and that
the conditions of human origin are rather the coincidence of suitable
climatal and organic surroundings then the occurrence of animals
closely related in structure to man.
Changes of conditions in geological time will not meet this
difficulty. They might lead to migrations, as they have done in the
case of both plants and animals, but not to anything further. The
hyena, whose bones are found in the English caves, has been driven by
geological changes to South Africa, but he is still the same hyena.
The reindeer which once roamed in France is still the reindeer in
Lapland; and though under different geological conditions we might
imagine the creature to have originated in the south of Europe, a
country not now suitable to it, this would neither give reason to
believe that any animal now living in the south of Europe was its
progenitor, nor to doubt that it still remains unchanged in its new
habitat. Indeed, the absence of anything more then merely varietal
change in man and his companion-animals, in consequence of the
geological changes and migrations of the Modern period, furnishes, as
already stated, a strong if not conclusive argument against
derivation; which here, as elsewhere, only increases our actual
difficulties, while professing to extricate us from them.
* * * * *
The arguments in the preceding pages cover only a small portion of the
extensive field opened up by this subject. They relate, however, to
some of the prominent and important points, and I trust are sufficient
to show that, as applied to man, the theory of derivation merely
trifles with the great question of his origin, without approaching to
its solution. I may now, in conclusion, sketch the leading features of
primitive man, as he appears to us through the mist of the intervening
ages, and compare the picture with that presented by the oldest
historical records of our race.
Two pictures of primeval man are in our time before the world. One
represents him as the pure and happy inhabitant of an Eden, free from
all the ills that have afflicted his descendants, and revelling in the
bliss of a golden age. This is the representation of Holy Scripture,
and it is also the dream of all the poetry and myth of the earlier
ages of the world. It is a beautiful picture, whether we regard it as
founded on historical fact, or derived from God Himself, or from the
yearnings of the higher spiritual nature of man. The other picture is
a joint product of modern philosophy and of antiquarian research. It
presents to us a coarse and filthy savage, repulsive in feature, gross
in habits, warring with his fellow-savages, and warring yet more
remorselessly with every living thing he could destroy, tearing
half-cooked flesh, and cracking marrow-bones with stone hammers,
sheltering himself in damp and smoky caves, with no eye heavenward,
and with only the first rude beginnings of the most important arts of
life.
Both pictures may contain elements of truth, for man is a many-sided
monster, made up of things apparently incongruous, and presenting here
and there features out of which either picture may be composed.
Evolutionists, and especially those who believe in the struggle for
existence and natural selection, ignore altogether the evidence of the
golden age of humanity, and refer us to the rudest of modern savages
as the types of primitive man. Those who believe in a Divine origin
for our race, perhaps dwell too much on the higher spiritual features
of the Edenic state, to the exclusion of its more practical aspects,
and its relations to the condition of the more barbarous races. Let us
examine more closely both representations; and first, that of
creation.
The Glacial period, with its snows and ice, had passed away, and the
world rejoiced in a spring-time of renewed verdure and beauty. Many
great and formidable beasts of the Tertiary time had disappeared in
the revolutions which had occurred, and the existing fauna of the
northern hemisphere had been established on the land. Then it was that
man was introduced by an act of creative power. In the preceding
changes a region of Western Asia had been prepared for his residence.
It was a table-land at the head waters of the rivers that flow into
the Euxine, the Caspian, and the Persian Gulf. Its climate was healthy
and bracing, with enough of variety to secure vigour, and not so
inclement as to exact any artificial provision for clothing or
shelter. Its flora afforded abundance of edible fruits, and was rich
in all the more beautiful forms of plant life; while its clear
streams, alluvial soil, and undulating surface, afforded every variety
of station and all that is beautiful in scenery. It was not infested
with the more powerful and predacious quadrupeds, and its geographical
relations were such as to render this exemption permanent. In this
paradise man found ample supplies of wholesome and nutritious food.
His requirements as to shelter were met by the leafy bowers he could
weave. The streams of Eden afforded gold which he could fashion for
use and ornament, pearly shells for vessels, and agate for his few and
simple cutting instruments. He required no clothing, and knew of no
use for it. His body was the perfection and archetype of the
vertebrate form, full of grace, vigour, and agility. His hands enabled
him to avail himself of all the products of nature for use and
pleasure, and to modify and adapt them according to his inclination.
His intelligence, along with his manual powers, allowed him to
ascertain the properties of things, to plan, invent, and apply in a
manner impossible to any other creature. His gift of speech enabled
him to imitate and reduce to systematic language the sounds of nature,
and to connect them with the thoughts arising in his own mind, and
thus to express their relations and significance. Above all, his Maker
had breathed into him a spiritual nature akin to His own, whereby he
became different from all other animals, and the very shadow and
likeness of God; capable of rising to abstractions and general
conceptions of truth and goodness, and of holding communion with his
Creator. This was man Edenic, the man of the golden age, as sketched
in the two short narratives of the earlier part of Genesis, which not
only conform to the general traditions of our race on the subject, but
bear to any naturalist who will read them in their original dress,
internal evidence of being contemporary, or very nearly so, with the
state of things to which they relate.
"And God said, 'Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and
let them rule over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air,
and over the herbivora, and over all the land.' And God blessed them,
and said unto them, 'Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and
subdue it.'
"And the Lord God formed the man of the dust of the ground, and
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living
being. And the Lord God planted a garden, eastward in Eden, and there
He placed the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground made the
Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good
for food. And a river went out of Eden to water the garden, and
parted from thence, becoming four heads (of great rivers). The name of
the first is Pison, compassing the whole land of Chavila, where there
is gold, and the gold of that land is good; there is (also) pearl and
agate.... And the Lord God took the man, and put him into the garden
of Eden, to cultivate it and to take care of it."
Before leaving this most ancient and most beautiful history, we may
say that it implies several things of much importance to our
conceptions of primeval man. It implies a centre of creation for man,
and a group of companion animals and plants, and an intention to
dispense in his case with any struggle for existence. It implies,
also, that man was not to be a lazy savage, but a care-taker and
utiliser, by his mind and his bodily labour, of the things given to
him; and it also implies an intelligent submission on his part to his
Maker, and spiritual appreciation of His plans and intentions. It
further implies that man was, in process of time, from Eden, to
colonise the earth, and subdue its wildness, so as to extend the
conditions of Eden widely over its surface. Lastly, a part of the
record not quoted above, but necessary to the consistency of the
story, implies that, in virtue of his spiritual nature, and on certain
conditions, man, though in bodily frame of the earth earthy, like the
other animals, was to be exempted from the common law of mortality
which had all along prevailed, and which continued to prevail, even
among the animals of Eden. Further, if man fell from this condition
into that of the savage of the age of stone, it must have been by the
obscuration of his spiritual nature under that which is merely
animal; in other words, by his ceasing to be spiritual and in
communion with God, and becoming practically a sensual materialist.
that this actually happened is asserted by the Scriptural story, but
its details would take us too far from our present subject. Let us now
turn to the other picture--that presented by the theory of struggle for
existence and derivation from lower animals.
It introduces us first to an ape, akin perhaps to the modern orang or
gorilla, but unknown to us as yet by any actual remains. This
creature, after living for an indefinite time in the rich forests of
the Miocene and earlier Pliocene periods, was at length subjected to
the gradually increasing rigours of the Glacial age. Its vegetable
food and its leafy shelter failed it, and it learned to nestle among
such litter as it could collect in dens and caves, and to seize and
devour such weaker animals as it could overtake and master. At the
same time, its lower extremities, no longer used for climbing trees,
but for walking on the ground, gained in strength and size; its arms
diminished; and its development to maturity being delayed by the
intensity of the struggle for existence, its brain enlarged, it became
more cunning and sagacious, and even learned to use weapons of wood or
stone to destroy its victims. So it gradually grew into a fierce and
terrible creature, "neither beast nor human," combining the habits of
a bear and the agility of a monkey with some glimmerings of the
cunning and resources of a savage.
When the Glacial period passed away, our nameless simian man, or
manlike ape, might naturally be supposed to revert to its original
condition, and to establish itself as of old in the new forests of the
Modern period. For some unknown reason, however, perhaps because it
had gone too far in the path of improvement to be able to turn back,
this reversion did not take place. On the contrary, the ameliorated
circumstances and wider range of the new continents enabled it still
further to improve. Ease and abundance perfected what struggle and
privation had begun; it added to the rude arts of the Glacial time; it
parted with the shaggy hair now unnecessary; its features became
softer; and it returned in part to vegetable food. Language sprang up
from the attempt to articulate natural sounds. Fire-making was
invented and new arts arose. At length the spiritual nature,
potentially present in the creature, was awakened by some access of
fear, or some grand and terrible physical phenomenon; the idea of a
higher intelligence was struck out, and the descendant of apes became
a superstitious and idolatrous savage. How much trouble and discussion
would have been saved, had he been aware of his humble origin, and
never entertained the vain imagination that he was a child of God,
rather then a mere product of physical evolution! It is, indeed,
curious, that at this point evolutionism, like theism, has its "fall
of man;" for surely the awakening of the religious sense, and of the
knowledge of good and evil, must on that theory be so designated,
since it subverted in the case of man the previous regular operation
of natural selection, and introduced all that debasing superstition,
priestly domination, and religious controversy which have been among
the chief curses of our race, and which are doubly accursed if, as the
evolutionist believes, they are not the ruins of something nobler and
holier, but the mere gratuitous, vain, and useless imaginings of a
creature who should have been content to eat and drink and die,
without hope or fear, like the brutes from which he sprang.
These are at present our alternative sketches: the genesis of theism,
and the genesis of evolution. After the argument in previous pages, it
is unnecessary here to discuss their relative degrees of probability.
If we believe in a personal spiritual Creator, the first becomes easy
and natural, as it is also that which best accords with history and
tradition. If, on the contrary, we reject all these, and accept as
natural laws the postulates of the evolutionists which we have already
discussed, we may become believers in the latter. The only remaining
point is to inquire as to which explains best the actual facts of
humanity as we find them. This is a view of which much has been made
by evolutionists, and it therefore merits consideration. But it is too
extensive to be fully treated of here, and I must content myself with
a few illustrations of the failure of the theory of derivation to
explain some of the most important features presented by even the
ruder races of men.
One of these is the belief in a future state of existence beyond this
life. This belongs purely to the spiritual nature of man. It is not
taught by physical nature, yet its existence is probably universal,
and it lies near the foundation of all religious beliefs. Lartet has
described to us the sepulchral cave of Aurignac, in which human
skeletons, believed to be of Post-glacial date, were associated with
remains of funeral feasts, and with indications of careful burial, and
with provisions laid up for the use of the dead. Lyell well remarks on
this, "If we have here before us, at the northern base of the
Pyrenees, a sepulchral vault with skeletons of human beings, consigned
by friends and relatives to their last resting-place if we have also
at the portal of the tomb the relics of funeral feasts, and within it
indications of viands destined for the use of the departed on their
way to a land of spirits; while among the funeral gifts are weapons
wherewith in other fields to chase the gigantic deer, the cave-lion,
the cave bear, and woolly rhinoceros--we have at last succeeded in
tracing back the sacred rites of burial, and more interesting still, a
belief in a future state, to times long anterior to those of history
and tradition. Rude and superstitious as may have been the savage of
that remote era, he still deserved, by cherishing hopes of a
hereafter, the epithet of 'noble,' which Dryden gave to what he seems
to have pictured to himself as the primitive condition of our
race."[BF]
[BF] "Antiquity of Man," p. 192
In like manner, in the vast American continent, all its long isolated
and widely separated tribes, many of them in a state of lowest
barbarism, and without any external ritual of religious worship,
believed in happy hunting-grounds in the spirit-land beyond the grave,
and the dead warrior was buried with his most useful weapons and
precious ornaments.
"Bring here the last gifts; and with them
The last lament be said.
Let all that pleased and yet may please,
Be buried with the dead"
was no unmeaning funeral song, but involved the sacrifice of the most
precious and prized objects, that the loved one might enter the new
and untried state provided for its needs. Even the babe, whose life is
usually accounted of so small value by savage tribes, was buried by
the careful mother with precious strings of wampum, that had cost more
months of patient labour then the days of its short life, that it
might purchase the fostering care of the inhabitants of that unknown
yet surely believed-in region of immortality. This
"--wish that of the living whole
No life may fail beyond the grave,
Derives it not from what we have
The likest God within the soul?"
Is it likely to have germinated in the brain of an ape? and if so, of
what possible use would it be in the struggle of a merely physical
existence? Is it not rather the remnant of a better spiritual life--a
remembrance of the tree of life that grew in the paradise of God, a
link of connection of the spiritual nature in man with, a higher
Divine Spirit above? Life and immortality, it is true, were brought to
light by Jesus Christ, but they existed as beliefs more or less
obscure from the first, and formed the basis for good and evil of the
religions of the world. Around this idea were gathered multitudes of
collateral beliefs and religious observances; feasts and festivals for
the dead; worship of dead heroes and ancestors; priestly intercessions
and sacrifices for the dead; costly rites of sepulture. Vain and
without foundation many of these have no doubt been, but they have
formed a universal and costly testimony to an instinct of immortality,
dimly glimmering even in the breast of the savage, and glowing with
higher brightness in the soul of the Christian, but separated by an
impassable gulf from anything derivable from a brute ancestry.
The theistic picture of primeval man is in harmony with the fact that
men, as a whole, are, and always have been, believers in God. The
evolutionist picture is not. If man had from the first not merely a
physical and intellectual nature, but a spiritual nature as well, we
can understand how he came into relation with God, and how through all
his vagaries and corruptions he clings to this relation in one form or
another; but evolution affords no link of connection of this kind. It
holds God to be unknowable even to the cultivated intellect of
philosophy, and perceives no use in ideas with relation to Him which,
according to it must necessarily be fallacious, It leaves the theistic
notions of mankind without explanation, and it will not serve its
purpose to assert that some few and exceptional families of men have
no notion of a God. Even admitting this, and it is at best very
doubtful, it can form but a trifling exception to a general truth.
It appears to me that this view of the case is very clearly put in the
Bible, and it is curiously illustrated by a recent critique of "Mr.
Darwin's Critics," by Professor Huxley in the _Contemporary Review_. Mr.
Mivart, himself a derivationist, but differing in some points from
Darwin, had affirmed, in the spirit rather of a Romish theologian then
of a Biblical student or philosopher, that "acts unaccompanied by
mental acts of conscious will" are "absolutely destitute of the most
incipient degree of goodness." Huxley well replies, "It is to my
understanding extremely hard to reconcile Mr. Mivart's dictum with
that noble summary of the whole duty of man, 'Thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy
strength; and thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' According to
Mr. Mivart's definition, the man who loves God and his neighbour, and,
out of sheer love and affection for both, does all he can to please
them, is nevertheless destitute of a particle of real goodness."
Huxley's reply deserves to be pondered by certain moralists and
theologians whose doctrine savours of the leaven of the Pharisees, but
neither Huxley nor his opponent see the higher truth that in the love
of God we have a principle far nobler and more God-like and less
animal then that of mere duty. Man primeval, according to the doctrine
of Genesis, was, by simple love and communion with his God, placed in
the position of a spiritual being, a member of a higher family then
that of the animal. The "knowledge of good and evil" which he acquired
later, and on which is based the law of conscious duty, was a less
happy attainment, which placed him on a lower level then that of the
unconscious love and goodness of primal innocence. No doubt man's
sense of right and wrong is something above the attainment of animals,
and which could never have sprung from them; but still more is this
the case with his direct spiritual relation to God, which, whether it
rises to the inspiration of the prophet or the piety of the Christian,
or sinks to the rude superstition of the savage, can be no part of the
Adam of the dust but only of the breath of life breathed into him from
above.
That man should love his fellow-man may not seem strange. Certain
social and gregarious and family instincts exist among the lower
animals, and Darwin very ably adduces these as akin to the similar
affections of man; yet even in the law of love of our neighbour, as
enforced by Christ's teaching, it is easy to see that we have
something beyond animal nature. But this becomes still more distinct
in the love of God. Man was the "shadow and likeness of God," says the
old record in Genesis--the shadow that clings to the substance and is
inseparable from it, the likeness that represents it visibly to the
eyes of men, and of the animals that man rules over. Primeval man
could "hear in the evening breeze the voice of God, walking to and fro
in the garden." What mere animal ever had or could attain to such an
experience?
But if we turn from the Edenic picture of man in harmony with
Heaven--"owning a father, when he owned a God"--to man as the slave of
superstition; even in this terrible darkness of mistaken faith, of
which it may be said,
"Fear mates her devils, and weak faith her gods,
Gods partial, changeful, passionate, unjust,
Whose attributes are rage, revenge, or lust,"
we see the ruins, at least, of that sublime love of God. The animal
clings to its young with a natural affection, as great as that of a
human mother for her child, but what animal ever thought of throwing
its progeny into the Ganges, or into the fires of Moloch's altar, for
the saving of its soul, or to obtain the favour or avoid the wrath of
God? No less in the vagaries of fetichism, ritualism, and idolatry,
and in the horrors of asceticism and human sacrifice, then in the
Edenic communion with and hearing of God, or in the joy of Christian
love, do we see, in however ruined or degraded condition, the higher
spiritual nature of man.
This point leads to another distinction which, when properly viewed,
widens the gap between man and the animals, or at least destroys one
of the frail bridges of the evolutionists. Lubbock and others affect
to believe that the lowest savages of the modern world must be nearest
to the type of primeval man. I have already attempted to show the
fallacy of this. I may add here that in so holding they overlook a
fundamental distinction, well pointed out by the Duke of Argyll,
between the capacity of acquiring knowledge and knowledge actually
acquired, and between the possession of a higher rational nature and
the exercise of that nature in the pursuit of mechanical arts. In
other words, primeval man must not be held to have been "utterly
barbarous" because he was ignorant of mining or navigation, or of
sculpture and painting. He had in him the power to attain to these
things, but so long as he was not under necessity to exercise it, his
mind may have expended its powers in other and happier channels. As
well might it be affirmed that a delicately nurtured lady is an "utter
barbarian" because she cannot build her own house, or make her own
shoes. No doubt in such work she would be far more helpless then the
wife of the rudest savage, yet she is not on that account to be held
as an inferior being, or nearer to the animals. Our conception of an
angelic nature implies the absence of all our social institutions and
mechanical arts; but does this necessitate our regarding an angel as
an "utter barbarian"? In short, the whole notion of civilisation held
by Lubbock and those who think with him, is not only low and
degrading, but utterly and absurdly wrong; and of course it vitiates
all their conceptions of primeval man as well as of man's future
destiny. Further, the theistic idea implies that man was, without
exhausting toil, to regulate and control nature, to rule over the
animals, to cultivate the earth, to extend himself over it and subdue
it; and all this as compatible with moral innocence, and at the same
time with high intellectual and spiritual activity.
There is, however, a still nicer and more beautiful distinction
involved in this, and included in the wonderful narrative in Genesis,
so simple yet so much more profound then our philosophies; and which
crops out in the same discussion of the critics of Darwin, to which I
have already referred. A writer in the _Quarterly Review_ had attempted
to distinguish human reason from the intelligence of animals, as
involving self-consciousness and reflection in our sensations and
perceptions. Huxley objects to this, instancing the mental action of a
greyhound when it sees and pursues a hare, as similar to that of the
gamekeeper when he lets slip the hound.[BG]
[BG] _Contemporary Review_, November, 1871, p. 461.
"As it is very necessary to keep up a clear distinction between these
two processes, let the one be called neurosis and the other psychosis.
When the gamekeeper was first trained to his work, every step in the
process of neurosis was accompanied by a corresponding step in that of
psychosis, or nearly so. He was conscious of seeing something,
conscious of making sure it was a hare, conscious of desiring to catch
it, and therefore to loose the greyhound at the right time, conscious
of the acts by which he let the dog out of the leash. But with
practice, though the various steps of the neurosis remain--for
otherwise the impression on the retina would not result in the loosing
of the dog--the great majority of the steps of the psychosis vanish,
and the loosing of the dog follows unconsciously, or, as we say,
without thinking about, upon the sight of the hare. No one will deny
that the series of acts which originally intervened between the
sensation and the letting go of the dog were, in the strictest sense,
intellectual and rational operations. Do they cease to be so when the
man ceases to be conscious of them? that depends upon what is the
essence and what the accident of these operations, which taken
together constitute ratiocination. Now, ratiocination is resolvable
into predication, and predication consists in marking, in some way,
the existence, the co-existence, the succession, the likeness and
unlikeness, of things or their ideas. Whatever does this, reasons; and
if a machine produces the effects of reason, I see no more ground for
denying to it the reasoning power because it is unconscious, then I
see for refusing to Mr. Babbage's engine the title of a calculating
machine on the same grounds."
Here we have in the first place, the fact that an action, in the first
instance rational and complex, becomes by repetition simple and
instinctive. Does the man then sink to the level of the hound, or,
what is more to the purpose, does this in the least approach to
showing that the hound can rise to the level of the man? Certainly
not; for the man is the conscious planner and originator of a course
of action in which the instincts of the brute are made to take part,
and in which the readiness that he attains by habit only enables him
to dispense with certain processes of thought which were absolutely
necessary at first. The man and the beast co-operate, but they meet
each other from entirely different planes; the former from that of the
rational consideration of nature, the latter from that of the blind
pursuit of a mere physical instinct. The one, to use Mr. Huxley's
simile, is the conscious inventor of the calculating machine, the
other is the machine itself, and, though the machine can calculate,
this fact is the farthest possible from giving it the power of growing
into or producing its own inventor. But Moses, or the more ancient
authority from whom he quotes in Genesis, knew this better then either
of these modern combatants. His special distinctive mark of the
superiority of man is that he was to have dominion over the earth and
its animal inhabitants; and he represents this dominion as inaugurated
by man's examining and naming the animals of Eden, and finding among
them no "help meet" for him.[BH] Man was to find in them helps, but
helps under his control, and that not the control of brute force, but
of higher skill and of thought and even of love--a control still seen
in some degree in the relation of man to his faithful companion, the
dog. These old words of Genesis, simple though they are, place the
rational superiority of man on a stable basis, and imply a distinction
between him and the lower animals which cannot be shaken by the
sophistries of the evolutionists.
[BH] Literally, "Corresponding," or "Similar," to him.
The theistic picture further accords with the fact that the geological
time immediately preceding man's appearance was a time of decadence of
many of the grander forms of animal life, especially in that area of
the old continent where man was to appear. Whatever may be said of the
imperfection of the geological record, there can be no question of the
fact that the Miocene and earlier Pliocene were distinguished by the
prevalence of grand and gigantic forms of mammalian life, some of
which disappeared in or before the Glacial period, while others failed
after that period in the subsidence of the Post-glacial, or in
connection with its amelioration of climate. The Modern animals are
also, as explained above, a selection from the grander fauna of the
Post-glacial period. To speak for the moment in Darwinian language,
there was for the time an evident tendency to promote the survival of
the fittest, not in mere physical development, but in intelligence and
sagacity. A similar tendency existed even in the vegetable world,
replacing the flora of American aspect which had existed in the
Pliocene, with the richer and more useful flora of Europe and Western
Asia. This not obscurely indicates the preparing of a place for man,
and the removal out of his way of obstacles and hindrances. That these
changes had a relation to the advent of man, neither theist nor
evolutionist can doubt, and it may be that we shall some day find that
this relation implies the existence of a creative law intelligible by
us; but while we fail to perceive any link of direct causation between
the changes in the lower world, and the introduction of our race, we
cannot help seeing that correlation which implies a far-reaching plan,
and an intelligent design.
Finally, the evolutionist picture wants some of the fairest lineaments
of humanity, and cheats us with a semblance of man without the
reality. Shave and paint your ape as you may, clothe him and set him
up upon his feet, still he fails greatly of the "human form divine;"
and so it is with him morally and spiritually as well. We have seen
that he wants the instinct of immortality, the love of God, the mental
and spiritual power of exercising dominion over the earth. The very
agency by which he is evolved is of itself subversive of all these
higher properties. The struggle for existence is essentially selfish,
and therefore degrading. Even in the lower animals, it is a false
assumption that its tendency is to elevate; for animals when driven to
the utmost verge of struggle for life, become depauperated and
degraded. The dog which spends its life in snarling contention with
its fellow-curs for insufficient food, will not be a noble specimen
of its race. God does not so treat His creatures. There is far more
truth to nature in the doctrine which represents him as listening to
the young ravens when they cry for food. But as applied to man, the
theory of the struggle for existence and survival of the fittest,
though the most popular phase of evolutionism at present, is nothing
less then the basest and most horrible of superstitions. It makes man
not merely carnal, but devilish. It takes his lowest appetites and
propensities, and makes them his God and creator. His higher
sentiments and aspirations, his self-denying philanthropy, his
enthusiasm for the good and true, all the struggles and sufferings of
heroes and martyrs, not to speak of that self-sacrifice which is the
foundation of Christianity, are in the view of the evolutionist mere
loss and waste, failure in the struggle of life. What does he give us
in exchange? An endless pedigree of bestial ancestors, without one
gleam of high or holy tradition to enliven the procession; and for the
future, the prospect that the poor mass of protoplasm which
constitutes the sum of our being, and which is the sole gain of an
indefinite struggle in the past, must soon be resolved again into
inferior animals or dead matter. That men of thought and culture
should advocate such a philosophy, argues either a strange mental
hallucination, or that the higher spiritual nature has been wholly
quenched within them. It is one of the saddest of many sad spectacles
that our age presents. Still these men deserve credit for their bold
pursuit of truth, or what seems to them to be truth; and they are,
after all, nobler sinners then those who would practically lower us to
the level of beasts by their negation even of intellectual life, or
who would reduce us to apes, by making us the mere performers of rites
and ceremonies, as a substitute for religion, or who would advise us
to hand over reason and conscience to the despotic authority of
fallible men dressed in strange garbs, and called by sacred names. The
world needs a philosophy and a Christianity of more robust mould,
which shall recognise, as the Bible does, at once body and soul and
spirit, at once the sovereignty of God and the liberty of man; and
which shall bring out into practical operation the great truth that
God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit
and in truth. Such a religion might walk in the sunlight of truth and
free discussion, hand in hand with science, education, liberty, and
material civilisation, and would speedily consign evolution to the
tomb which has already received so many superstitions and false
philosophies.
INDEX.
A
Abbeville, Peat of, 294.
Acadian Group, 38.
Advent of Man, 286.
Agassiz on Synthetic Types, 181.
_Ammonitidæ_, 221.
Amphibians of the Coal Period, 144.
Andrews on the Post-pliocene, 293.
_Anthracosaurus_, 145.
Anticosti Formation, 61.
Antiquity of Man, 292.
_Archæocyathus_, 47.
Archebiosis, 327.
_Arenicolites_, 46.
_Asterolepis_, 98.
B
_Baculites_, 222.
Bala Limestone, 59.
_Baphetes_, 145.
Barrande on Primordial, 49.
Bastian on Lower forms of Life, 327.
_Beatricea_, 65.
Belemnites, 223.
Bigsby on Silurian Fauna, 75;
on Primordial Life, 52.
Billings on Archæocyathus, 46;
on Feet of Trilobites, 44.
Binney on Stigmaria, 127.
Biology as a term, 327.
Boulder Clay, 268.
Brachiopods, or Lamp-shells, 89.
Breccia of Caverns, 304.
Brown, Mr. K., on Stigmaria, 127.
C
_Calamites_, 104, 129, 173.
Calcaire Grossier, 247.
Cambrian Age, 36; name defined, 49.
Caradoc Rocks, 60.
Carbonic Acid in Atmosphere, 123.
Carboniferous Age, 109;
Land Snails of the, 138;
Crustaceans of the, 154;
Insects of the, 135;
Corals of the, 153;
Plants of the, 120;
Fishes of the, 157;
Footprints in the, 143;
Geography of the, 110;
Reptiles of the, 143.
Carpenter on Cretaceous Sea, 230.
Carruthers on Graptolites, 72.
Cave Earth, 305.
Cavern Deposits, 304.
_Cephalaspis_, 97.
Cephalopods of Silurian, 69.
_Ceteosaurus_, 204;
Foraminifera in the, 227.
Chalk, Nature of, 227.
Chaos, 2.
_Climactichnites_, 45.
Coal, Origin of, 116;
of the Mesozoic, 201.
Colours of Rocks, 110.
Continental Plateaus, 57.
Continents, their Origin, 13.
_Conulus Prisons_, 139.
Cope on Dinosaurs, 202;
on Pterodactyl, 206;
on Mososaurus, 217;
on Caverns, 303.
Corals of the Silurian, 63;
agency of, in forming Limestone, 63, 89;
of the Devonian, 89;
of the Carboniferous, 153.
Corniferous Limestone, 96.
_Coryphodon_, 244.
Creation, Unity of, 33;
not by Evolution, 33;
laws of, 78, 150;
statement of as a theory, 340;
requirements of, 343;
how treated by Evolutionists, 339;
definition and explanation of, 340;
its probable conditions, 352.
Creator, evidence of a personal, 344,
Cretaceous Period, 192, 231;
Sea of the, 230.
Crinoids of the Silurian, 68.
Croll on the Post-pliocene, 262.
_Crusiana_, 45.
Crustaceans of the Primordial, 42;
of the Silurian, 71;
of the Mesozoic, 225.
Crust of the Earth, 5;
Folding of, 165.
Cuvier on Tertiary Mammals, 249.
Cystideans, 69.
D
Dana on Geological Periods, 175.
Darwin, Nature of his Theory, 327;
his account of the Origin of Man, 337;
his statement of Descent of Man, 337.
Davidson on Brachiopods, 169.
Dawkins on Post-glacial Mammals, 300.
Delaunay on Solidity of the Earth, 6.
Deluge, the, 290.
Devonian, or Brian Age, 81;
Physical Condition of, 82;
Tabular View of, 85;
Corals of the, 89;
Fishes of the, 96;
Plants of the, 102;
Geography of the, 82;
Insects of the, 107.
_Dinichthys_, 99.
Dinosaurs, 202.
_Dromatherium_, 208.
Dudley, Fossils of, 69.
E
Earth, its earliest state, 9;
Crust of the, 5;
folding of, 165;
gaseous state of, 9.
Edenic state of Man, 310, 376.
Edwards, Milne, on Devonian Corals, 89.
_Elasmosaurus_, 214.
Elephants, Fossil, 254, 300.
Elevation and Subsidence, 13, 29, 83, 165.
Enaliosaurs, 213.
"Engis" Skull, its characters, 357.
Eocene Seas, 241;
Foraminifera of the, 241;
Mammals of the, 247;
Plants of the, 238;
Footprints in the, 299.
_Eophyton_, 42.
_Eosaurus_, 145,
Eozoic Period, 17.
_Eozoon Bavaricum_, 38.
_Eozoon Canadense_, 20, 24.
Erian, or Devonian, 81;
Reason of the Name, 84;
Table of Erian Formations, 85;
Corals of the, 89;
Fishes of the, 96;
Plants of the, 102.
Eskers or Kames, 286.
Etheridge on Devonian, 85.
_Eurypterus_, 71, 115.
Evolution as applied to Eozoon, 33;
Primordial Animals, 55;
Silurian Animals, 77;
Trilobites, 94, 155;
Reptiles, 150;
Man, 319;
Its Character as a Theory, 320;
Its Difficulties, 322;
Its "Fall of Man," 382,
F
Falconer on Indian Miocene, 252.
_Favosites_, 91.
Ferns of the Devonian, 96;
of the Carboniferous, 120.
Fishes, Ganoid, 99;
of the Silurian, 74;
of the Devonian, 96;
of the Carboniferous, 157.
Flora of the Silurian, 76;
of the Devonian, 102;
of the Carboniferous, 120;
of the Permian, 172;
of the Mesozoic, 199;
of the Eocene, 238;
of the Miocene, 259.
Footprints in the Carboniferous, 143;
in the Trias, 203;
in the Eocene, 297.
Foraminifera, Nature of, 24;
Laurentian, 25;
of the Chalk, 227;
of the Tertiary, 241.
Forbes on Post-glacial Land, 288.
Forests of the Devonian, 102;
of the Carboniferous, 120.
G
Ganoid Fishes, 96, 99.
Gaseous state of the Earth, 9.
Genesis, Book of, its account of Chaos, 2;
of Creation of Land, 13;
of Palæozoic Animals, 187;
of Creation of Reptiles, 150;
of Creation of Mammals, 234, 298;
of the Deluge, 290;
of Creation of Man, 379;
of Eden, 379.
Genesis of the Earth, 1.
Geography of the Silurian, 57;
of the Devonian, 82;
of the Carboniferous, 110;
of the Permian, 163.
Geological Periods, 175, 195.
Glacial Period, 267, 278.
Glauconite, 229.
_Glyptoerinus_, 88.
Graptolites, 72.
Greenland, Miocene Flora of, 260.
Greensand, 229.
Gümbel on Bavarian Eozoon, 37.
H
_Hadrosaurus_, 202.
Hall on Graptolites, 72;
Harlech Beds, 38.
Heer on Tertiary Plants, 261.
Helderberg Rocks, 62.
Hercynian Schists, 37.
Heterogenesis, 327.
Hicks on Primordial Fossils, 38.
Hilgard on Mississippi Delta, 296.
Hippopotamus, Fossil, 300.
_Histioderma_, 46.
Hopkins on Solidity of the Earth, 6.
Hudson River Group, 60.
Hull on Geological Periods, 186.
Hunt, Dr. T. S., on Volcanic Action, 7;
on Chemistry of Primeval Earth, 11;
on Lingulæ, 41.
Huronian Formation, 36.
Huxley on Coal, 132;
on Carboniferous Reptiles, 145;
on Dinosaurs, 202;
on Paley's Argument from Design, 348;
on Good and Evil, 349;
on Intuitive and Rational Actions, 391;
on tendency of Evolutionist views, 348.
_Hylonomus_, 148.
I
Ice-action in Permian, 168;
in Post-pliocene, 270.
_Ichthyosaurus_, 213.
_Iguanodon_, 202.
Insects, Devonian, 107;
Carboniferous, 135.
Intelligence of Animals, Nature of, 328.
J
Jurassic, subdivisions of, 190.
K
Kames, 286.
Kaup on Dinotherium, 251.
Kent's Cavern, 304.
King-crabs of Carboniferous, 154.
King on Carboniferous Reptiles, 143.
L
_Labyrinthodon_, 201,
Lælaps, 203.
Lamp-shells, 40.
Land-snails of Carboniferous, 138.
La Place's Nebular Theory, 7.
Laurentian Rocks, 18;
Life in the, 23;
Plants of the, 32.
_Lepidodendron_, 103, 106, 127.
_Leptophleum_, 104.
Limestone Corniferous, 96;
Nummulitic, 241;
Milioline, 243;
Silurian, 64;
Origin of, 27, 63, 89.
_Limulus_, 154.
_Lingulæ_, 39.
Lingula Flags, 38.
Logan, Sir W., on Laurentian Rocks, 18;
on Reptilian Footprints, 143.
London Clay, 247.
Longmynd Rocks, 38, 47.
Lower Helderberg Group, 62.
Ludlow Group, 62.
Lyell, Sir C., on Devonian Limestone, 89;
on Wealden, 191;
on Classification of the Tertiary, 238.
M
_Machairodus_, 250.
Magnesian Limestones, 166.
Mammals of the Mesozoic, 208;
of the Eocene, 247;
of the Miocene, 250;
of the Pliocene, 256;
of the Post-glacial, 300.
Man, Advent of, 286.
Man, Antiquity of, 292;
History of, according to Theory of Creation, 377;
according to Evolution, 381;
widely different from Apes, 360;
a new type, 365;
Primitive, not a Savage, 367;
his Spiritual Nature, 384, 370, 387;
Locality of his Origin, 373;
Primeval, according to Creation, 377;
according to Evolution, 381.
Mayhill Sandstone, 60.
Medina Sandstone, 60.
_Megalosaurus_, 203.
Menevian Formation, 38.
Mesozoic Ages, 188;
subdivisions of, 189;
Flora of, 199;
Coal of, 201;
Crustaceans of the, 225;
Reptiles of the, 201, 212.
Metalliferous Rocks, 167.
Metamorphism, 21.
_Microlestes_, 208.
Milioline Limestones, 243.
Miller on Old Bed Sandstone, 86.
Millipedes, Fossil, 136.
Miocene Plants, 260;
Climate, 264;
Mammals of, 250.
Mississippi, Delta of the, 296.
Modern Period, 283.
_Mosasaurus_, 206.
Morse on Lingula, 39.
Murchison on the Silurian, 56.
N
Nebular Theory, 7.
Neolithic Age, 284.
Neozoic Ages, 236;
divisions of, 239.
Newberry on Dinichthys, 99.
Nicholson on Graptolites, 72,
Nummulitic Limestones, 241.
O
_Oldhamia_, 45.
Old Bed Sandstone, 86.
Oneida Conglomerate. 69.
_Orthoceratites_, 69, 154.
Oscillations of Continents, 179.
Owen on Dinosaurs, 202;
on Marsupials, 209.
P
Palæolithic Age, 284, 289.
_Palæophis_, 245.
Palæozoic Life, 181;
diagram of, 186.
Paley on Design in Nature; his illustration of the watch, 349.
Peat of Abbeville, 294.
Pengelly on Kent's Hole, 304.
_Pentremites_, 153.
Periods, Geological, 195, 175.
Permian Age, 160;
Geography of the, 163;
Ice-action in the, 168;
Plants of the, 172;
Reptiles of the, 172.
Phillips on Dawn of Life, 30;
on Ceteosaurus, 204.
Pictet on Post-pliocene Mammals, 256;
on Post-glacial Animals, 357.
Pictures of Primeval Man, 376.
Pierce on Diminution of Earth's Rotation, 165.
Pines of the Devonian, 105;
of the Carboniferous, 131;
of the Permian, 173.
Placoid Fishes, 96.
Plants of the Laurentian, 32;
of the Silurian, 76;
of the Devonian, 102;
of the Carboniferous, 124;
of the Permian, 172;
of the Mesozoic, 199;
of the Tertiary 258;
classification of, 122.
Plateaus, Continental, 57.
_Plesiosaurus_, 215.
Pliocene, Climate of, 266;
Mammals of, 256.
_Pliosaurus_, 215.
Pluvial Period, 287.
Post-glacial Age, 283, 292.
Post-pliocene Period, 274;
cold, 278;
Ice-action in the, 270;
Subsidence, 279;
Elevation, 284;
Shells, evidence of, against Derivation, 358;
Mammals, evidence of, against Derivation, 357.
Potsdam Sandstone, 38.
Prestwich on St. Acheul, 294.
Primordial Age, 36;
Crustacean of the, 42.
_Protichnites_, 45.
_Protorosaurus_, 172.
_Prototaxites_, 76.
_Psilophyton_, 76, 103.
_Pteraspis_, 76.
_Pterichthys_, 98.
Pterodactyls, 206.
_Pterygotus_, 93.
_Pupa vetusta_, 139.
Q
Quebec Group, 60.
R
Rain-marks, 47.
Ramsay on Permian, 168.
Red Sandstones, their Origin, 110, 166.
Reptiles of the Carboniferous, 143;
of the Permian, 172;
of the Mesozoic, 201, 212.
Rhinoceros, Fossil, 300.
Rocks, Colours of, 110.
Rotation of the Earth, its Gradual Diminution, 165.
S
Salter on Fossil Crustacea, 155.
Sedgwick on Cambrian, 56, 75.
Seeley on Pterodactyls, 206.
Shrinkage-cracks, 47.
_Sigillaria_, 104, 124.
Silurian Ages, 56;
Cephalopoda of the, 69;
Corals of the, 63;
Crinoids of the 68;
Crustaceans of the, 71;
Fishes of the, 74;
Plants of the, 76.
Siluro-Cambrian, use of the term, 56.
Slaty Structure, 48.
Solidity of the Earth, 6.
Somme, R., Gravels of, 292.
Species, Nature of the, 327;
how Created, 352.
Spencer, his Exposition of Evolution, 321, 331.
Spiritual Nature of Man, 384, 370, 387.
Spore-cases in Coals and Shales, 106.
Stalagmite of Caves, 305.
Striated Rock-surfaces, 269.
Stumps, Fossil of Carboniferous, 140.
Synthetic Types, 181.
T
Table of Devonian Rocks, 85;
of Palæozoic Ages, 187;
of Mesozoic Ages, 234;
of Neozoic Ages, 298;
of Post-pliocene, 276.
Temperature of Interior of the Earth, 4.
Tertiary Period, 236;
Mammals of, 247, 250, 256;
classification of its Rocks, 238.
Thomson, Sir W., on Solidity of the Earth, 6.
Time, Geological Divisions of, 175.
Tinière, Cone of, 293.
Trenton Limestone, 59, 63.
Trias, Divisions of, 189;
Footprints in the, 203.
Trilobites, 43, 94, 154;
Feet of, 43.
Turtles of Mesozoic, 218.
Tylor on Pluvial Period, 287.
Tyndall on Carbonic Acid in Atmosphere, 123.
U
Uniformitarianism in Geology, 8.
Utica Shale, 60.
V
Volcanic Action, 7;
of Cambrian Age, 36;
of Silurian Age, 62;
of Devonian Age, 81, 83.
Von Dechen on Reptiles of Carboniferous, 143, 145.
Von Meyer on Dinosaurs, 202.
W
_Walchia_, 173.
Wallace, his views on Inapplicability of Natural Selection to Man, 368.
Wealden, 191.
Wenlock Group, 62.
_Williamsonia gigas_, 200.
Williamson on Calamites, 181.
Woodward on Pterygotus, 93.
Z
Zaphrentis 92.
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Transcriber's Notes
All obvious typographical errors were corrected. On page 121, there is
an opening quote; but no closing one follows. Based on the text
("Returning from this digression...") on page 124, it was assumed that
the closing quote should have been at the end of the preceding
paragraph. Hyphenation and accents were standardized. However, some
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sea-bottom(s)) were retained due to their grammatic usage.
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