. Elements of geology, or, The ancient changes of the earth and its inhabitants as illustrated by geological monuments. Geology. 300 MAMMALIA OF PAKIS GYPSUM. [Ch. XVL Cheiroptera, a bat; while the Marsupialia (an order now confined to America, Australia, and some contiguous islands) are represented by an opposum. Of birds, about ten species have been ascertained, the skeletons of some of which are entire. None of them are referable to existing species.* The same remark applies to the fish, according to MM. Cuvier and Agassiz, as also to the reptiles. Among the last are croc- odiles and tortoi
. Elements of geology, or, The ancient changes of the earth and its inhabitants as illustrated by geological monuments. Geology. 300 MAMMALIA OF PAKIS GYPSUM. [Ch. XVL Cheiroptera, a bat; while the Marsupialia (an order now confined to America, Australia, and some contiguous islands) are represented by an opposum. Of birds, about ten species have been ascertained, the skeletons of some of which are entire. None of them are referable to existing species.* The same remark applies to the fish, according to MM. Cuvier and Agassiz, as also to the reptiles. Among the last are croc- odiles and tortoises of the genera Emys and Trionyx. The tribe of land quadrupeds most abundant in this formation is such as now inhabits alluvial plains and marshes, and the banks of rivers and lakes, a class most exposed to suffer by ri^er inundations. Among these were several species of Paleotherium, a genus before alluded to (p. 283). These were associated with the Anoplotherium, a tribe intermediate between pachyderms and ruminants. One of the three divisions of this family was called by Cuvier Xiphodon. Their forms were slender and elegant, and one, named Xiphodon gracile (fig. 264), was about the size of the chamois; and Cuvier in- Fig. Xiphodon gracile, or Anoplotherium gracile, Cuvier. Eestored outline. ferred from the skeleton that it was as light, graceful, and agile as the gazelle. When the French osteologist declared, in the early part of the present century, that all the fossil quadrupeds of the gypsum of Paris were extinct, the announcement of so startling a fact, on such high authority, created a powerful sensation, and from that time a new im- pulse was given throughout Europe to the progress of geological in- vestigation. Eminent nuturalists, it is true, had long before main- tained that the shells and zoophytes met with in many ancient Euro- pean rocks had ceased to be inhabitants of the earth, but the majority even of the educated classes continued to believe that the
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1860, booksubjectgeology, bookyear1868
