Chapter XIX: Letter XIX: gives a definition of the ellipsis, which would be a (13)

“On sinking a well on a hill near Tobolsk, sixty-four _fathoms_ deep in the earth, an oaken beam was found; it was quite black, and not round but shaped[54].”

“At Watlington-park, Oxfordshire, at fifty or sixty feet depth, many whole oaks, hazel-nuts, a stag’s-head and antlers, were found, and on the same spot two Roman urns[55].”

“In Oxfordshire there is a tumulus which has become a perfect mount of stone.”

“Ralph, the brother of Earl Widdrington, showed me many _human_ bones taken from whole skeletons, with British beads, chains, iron rings, and brass bits of bridles, dug up in a _quarry_ at Blankney, Lincolnshire, which was probably plain mould when these old corpses of the Britons were interred: and I Saw many _human_ bones and armour, with Roman coins, fibluæ &c., found in a _stone_-pit in Hunstanton-park, Norfolk, belonging to Sir Nicholas L’Estrange[56].”

Very numerous instances could be added, in order to prove that the local circumstances, when skeletons of these quadrupeds are found, are not of a nature to disprove the _historical_ origin of fossil bones. From the highest authority we learn, that the “bones of species which are apparently the same with [p353] those that still exist alive, are never found except in the latest alluvial depositions, or in the fissures of caverns and rocks, in places where they may have been overwhelmed by debris, or even buried by man[57].”

Thus it appears that a comparative view of the exact _species_ now living, with that of the fossil remains, is what we must depend on to decide whether the fossil kinds may not be still in existence.

With respect to the very numerous theories of the earth, the last, by Werner, has been confidently quoted in opposition to the writer’s historical proofs[58]. But Werner himself, before his death (in 1817), tacitly acknowledged that it is not a tenable doctrine, and which is clearly indicated by the compilers of REES’s _Cyclopedia_[59], although it is generally allowed to be the best extant. This hypothesis was formed on a circumscribed view of the strata in Saxony, but it is found to be quite inapplicable, in America for instance[60]. To account for fossil bones of elephants, &c., being found high in the north, the American author who discovered this defect in the geological doctrine, conjectures that those large quadrupeds may have migrated, like the buffalos, during the change of seasons. This notion, however, would not apply to Asia, the native countries of those animals being well supplied with leaves or other food the year round.

With these prefatory remarks some historical proofs are offered, for the probability of the following animals found in a fossil state, not being of extinct species, beginning with the

ELEPHANT.

“On sinking the foundation for a mill, near the side of a small brook in the Bishop of Kilmore’s lands, at Maghery, [p354] eight miles from Belturbet, in the north of Ireland, A.D. 1715, four large teeth were found, with a piece of the under jawbone and part of the skull of a young elephant. The teeth were more solid and petrified than when in a natural state.”

Fig. A is one of the above grinders. B is a fossil grinder in the possession of the Royal Society. C is the grinder of an elephant between 10 and 11 feet high, the entire skull of which was then in Westminster[61].

It is thus apparent that two _fossil_ elephants are of the same species as those now in existence.

It is not improbable that the Maghery animal was conveyed to Ireland as a present, or for exhibition. “Fiacra, son of Eacha Moymedon, was mortally wounded at the battle of Caonry, which was fought A.D. 380, wherein he was victorious against the army of Momonia, (Munster). On his return to Hy-mac-uais, in _Meath_, he died of his wounds. His funeral [p355] leacht was erected, and on his tomb was inscribed his name in the Ogham character[62].”

We here find that the native sovereign of the northern part of Ireland resided in Meath, the borders of which county are not many miles from the place where the elephant was found. It was at about the year of the battle of Caonry that Maximus, the emperor in Britain, aspired to be master of the Roman empire. Finding the union of the Scots and Picts prevented his peaceable possession of Britain, which was a great obstacle to the execution of his project, he persuaded the Picts to join their forces to his, on the promise of giving them the lands of the Scots. The Scots were thus overpowered, and were forced to fly to Ireland and the adjacent isles. The Scots, being assisted by the Irish, invaded the north, and were driven back to Ireland by Maximus, at the head of his troops. The emperor threatened to invade Ireland, and punish the Irish; but the dread they had of the presence of a Roman army, induced them to grant Maximus his own terms, which, in order to conciliate all parties, were moderate[63]. Now it is by no means impossible that the British emperor, on this conciliating occasion, sent this very elephant to his Irish majesty. Tacitus observes, that Agricola (three centuries before Maximus) received an expelled petty king of Ireland into his protection; that in manners the natives vary little from the Britons; and that _the ports and landings of Ireland are better known, through the frequency of commerce and merchants, than those of Britain_[64].

THE MASTODON.

This quadruped is now known not to differ from the elephant, except in the form of the grinders, and has probably been called by the name of elephant by the Romans. Remains of the mastodon have been found mixed with those of the elephant, in Europe, Siberia, and America; and for the following [p356] reasons there is every probability of this animal being in existence.

Captain C. S. Cochrane, in his _Journal in Colombia_, vol. ii., p. 390, relates that numbers of the _carnivorous_ elephants have been seen feeding on the plains at the foot of a ridge of mountains, at Choco, in New Granada. “Part of the foot of a mastodon, with five nails attached, was found in a cave, with a tooth, by a savage west of the Missouri: it was very fresh, and perfectly resembling that of an elephant: it was obtained of a Mexican, who had purchased it of a native[65].”

“The native Americans describe the elephant as still existing in the northern parts of their country (the Missouri).”—Mr. Jefferson’s _Notes on Virginia_, p. 57.

Many bones of the mastodon were found in the county of Wythe, Virginia, with a mass of half-ground branches, roots, and leaves, enclosed in a kind of sack, supposed to be the stomach, in the midst of them; so as to leave no doubt that they were substances which the animal had devoured, and among them were distinguishable the remains of some plants known in Virginia[66]. Teeth of the mastodon have been found in Little Tartary, (for five centuries possessed by the Moguls,) in Siberia, near the Oural mountains, and one at Harwich, in England[67].

There, have been brought from Ava, found on the left bank of the Irawaddy, in N. lat. 20° to 21°, near the wells of petroleum, in narrow ravines, sand-hills, beds of gravel, ironstone, and calcareous breccia, evidently a _diluvial_ formation,—fossil bones, shells, and wood. Bones of the mastodon, equal in size to those of the Ohio, a grinder 16-1/2 inches in circumference, a humerus, measuring 25 inches round the condyles, with several [p357] grinders and bones of younger individuals, and fragments of tusks: fossil molares of the rhinoceros, resembling two species of a genus named by Cuvier Anthracotherium: bones like an animal of the horse kind: remains of crocodiles, supposed to be the gavial, or long-nosed alligator of the Ganges, (not now known in the rivers of Ava.) The fossil bones were upon or near the surface, more or less exposed, not decomposed or rolled, and are of animals that died there. The bones are petrified, and deeply coloured with iron, the substance siliceous and very hard. The blocks of wood are larger than the trees growing there, but it is not known if they are of the same kind. “An idle notion is entertained by many, that these fossil remains have been generated by a petrifying quality in the water of the Irawaddy[68], but I think they are the result, as elsewhere, of one of the last catastrophes; in fact, the remains of a former world, before man was called into existence.”—_Morning Herald_, Sept. 14, 1827.

Bones of the mastodon have been found in Europe, mixed with menagerie collections, which cannot possibly be attributed to any other origin than that of sports of the amphitheatre. They are found in western Siberia, which was conquered by Sheibani, Genghis Khan’s grandson, A.D. 1242, and held 300 years, and whose first capital was at Tiumin[69], on the river Tura, near the Ural mountains, where the remains of the mastodon were found. Ava was conquered by the Grand Khan Kublai in 1272, in a battle with the king of eastern Bengal, in which there were a thousand elephants[70]. The places where they have been found in America correspond with history and tradition so faithfully, as to assist the other numerous proofs of Mexico and Peru having been conquered by the Moguls, in the year 1283, and the bones of the mastodon are there found, as well as remains of _elephants, precisely like those of Siberia_[71]. With regard to the tooth found at Harwich, the [p358] British kings Cuneboline[72] and Arviragus had representations of elephants on their coins. The bones of elephants, rhinoceroses, and crocodiles found in Ava are not, as those found in Europe and Siberia, what are termed _extraneous_ fossils; the same kinds of animals being natives of the spot in Ava. The one like the horse cannot be ascertained; but the kings of Pegu, in former times, had camelopards, and, therefore, probably, zebras in their _calichars_, or parks; they also had _unicorns_, ostriches, and rein-deer[73]. Timur Khan, grandson of Kublai, who invaded Siberia with such powerful armies, resided at Tali, in Yunan, N. lat. 25° east of the Irawaddy[74].

The writer is of opinion that all those fossil bones found in Ava are of species still in existence: they may have floated down from more northern parts, the river in question being as long as the Ganges, said to be navigable into China; and has its source in Thibet,—(see RENNELL’s _Memoir_, p. 217.) According to the hypothesis of the writer, Montezuma’s ancestor was a Mongul grandee from Assam; and mastodontes’ remains have been found in Mexico, and those beasts are, as above related, supposed to be found alive near the Missouri.

This is the first instance the writer has met with of similar bones not being _extraneous_; and is, therefore, a remarkable fact, which excites the strongest suspicion that their species are still living. Ava is a new world on a small scale, and this collection of bones will, very probably, at no distant date, lead to positive proof of the existence of other quadrupeds, now conjectured by naturalists to be extinct. With respect to the local position, it is in all probability the old bed of the river, as [p359] the beds of those in Asia change in a wonderful manner.—(See _Rennell_, p. 255.)

A skeleton of an elephant or mastodon, for it is not known which, was found in a tomb in Mexico, which had evidently been built on purpose.—(_Clavigero_, vol. i., p. 84.) No authority whatever dates the foundation of Mexico earlier than A.D. 1324. The Aztecs advanced from Culiacan, when they took possession of the marshes, and founded Mexico: other Aztecs had preceded them who had arrived by land; but the writer hazarded a theory[75] that _Montezuma’s_ ancestors had, like those of the Natchez and of the Incas, arrived in America by _sea_ with elephants, under Mango Capac; and he has had the satisfaction to find a confirmation of his conjectures in a _decade_ written by Peter Martyr, the Milanese, (employed by Ferdinand V., King of Castile and Arragon, and who died in the year 1526,) addressed to Adrian VI., who had been co-regent of Spain with Cardinal Ximenes. “Montezuma spoke thus to Cortez:—We have heard by our ancestors that we are strangers. A certain great prince, in _ships_, before the memory of all men living, brought our ancestors unto these coasts; whether voluntarily or driven by tempest it is not manifest; who, leaving his companions, departed into his country, and, at length returning, would have had them to have gone back again. But they had built houses, and joining themselves with the women of the country had begotten children, and had settled. Wherefore our ancestors, having chosen a senate and princes to govern the people, refused to go, and he departed with threatening speeches. Never any appeared unto this time who denied the right of that captain and commander. We think, therefore, that the king who sent you derived his descent from him, and all the kingdoms which we possess are yours[76].” It is impossible to know clearly what the allusions to the return of the great commander may mean, but whatever it be, it does not change the date. As the Mexicans considered Cortez to be a child of the sun, the _great prince_ must have been a descendant from Genghis Khan; and _thence_ the [p360] terrors and submission of Montezuma and the Mexicans, who had always dreaded such a visit.

The Aztecs had sojourned in Culiacan and other places, from the date of the arrival of the ships, till they proceeded to Anahuac. The foundation of Tenochtitlan (or Mexico) having been in 1324, and the first king, Montezuma’s ancestor, elected in 1377; therefore, the empire, when Montezuma died, had lasted only 144 years; and this calculation is from the most authentic documents known, that is, the pictures in Purchas’s collection. In Harris’s _Voyages_, vol. ii., p. 97, Montezuma is said to have told Cortez, that it was only a century since they had been settled where they were, meaning, probably, that it was not _two_ centuries.

Thus an elephant being found in a tomb in Mexico, and others in tombs in Siberia, is an additional argument to the strong ones already produced, for the Mexicans being the Moguls blown from the shores of Japan, A.D. 1283, which appears irresistible; and also that mammoths and mastodontes are not extinct, being found either living or fossil in all the places in America, which agree with the traditions on that subject, and with the histories of China and Japan[77].

THE TAPIR.

The Tapir was supposed to be peculiar to the New World: two fossil species, one of them gigantic, have been found in [p361] France, Germany; and Italy[78]. The remains of a tapir being found at Florence, with those of other quadrupeds usually exhibited by the Romans, was an unaccountable fact, till it was known, through Sir Stamford Raffles, that the tapir exists in Sumatra. We know that the Romans carried on a commerce with India, which employed _one hundred and twenty ships annually_, and that they had the power of being supplied with all the animals of those regions, by means of country ships, which traded to the ports of Musiris and Barace, those which the Romans frequented. Moreover, the author of the _Periplus_, p. 36, describes _Sumatra_. It appears, therefore, evident that the Romans procured tapirs from that island, if they be not inhabitants of Africa. The British king, father of Caractacus, had a tapir on one of his numerous coins[79]; which may be reckoned among many other proofs that the ancient Britons were not quite so ignorant and barbarous as is generally, but unjustly, imagined. The discovery of this tapir shows how little is yet known even of those countries in which Britain has, for a length of years, had establishments. The tapir is probably what the natives have reported as a _river-horse_, a much more appropriate name for it than for the African beast. “The descriptions of the hippopotamus,” says Baron Cuvier, “by Herodotus and Aristotle, are supposed to have been borrowed from Hecatæus of Miletus, and must have been taken from two very different animals, one of which is the true hippopotamus, and the other the _antelope gnu_ of Gmelin[80].” Now, as it appears that the Indians described by Herodotus by the name _Padæi_, is an exact account of the _Batta_ in Sumatra,—(Dr. Leyden thinks them the same word, as the Indo-Chinese pronounce B as P[81],)—it is rendered probable that that island was known to the Greeks, long before the Romans possessed Egypt. On these grounds, I venture a conjecture that Aristotle and Herodotus alluded to the tapir, which is _amphibious_, but the gnu is not. The tapir is probably the _küda-ayer_ of Sumatra, and the _conda-aijeer_, or _river paard_, of the [p362] Javans.—(See MARSDEN’s _Sumatra_, third edition.) With respect to the _gigantic_ tapir, it is as probable that those regions (apparently less known to moderns, as regards zoology, than to the Greeks and Romans) may contain gigantic tapirs as ouranoutangs, near eight feet high, so lately discovered.

UNICORN.

Many reasons have been given, in another place[82], to prove the probability of the existence of the unicorn, since which the following description of two has been met with.

“On the other part of the temple of Mecca are parks or places enclosed, where are seen two unicorns: they are shown to the people as a miracle; and not without good reason, for their rareness and strange nature. One of them, which is much higher than the other, is not much unlike a colt of thirty months of age: in the forehead groweth one horn, in manner right forth, of the length of three cubits. The other is only one year of age, and like a young colt: the horn of this is of the length of four handfuls. This beast is of that colour of a horse called weasel, and hath a head like a hart, but not a long neck, and a thin mane, hanging on one side. Their legs are thin and slender, like a fawn or hind: the hoofs of the fore feet are divided in two, much like the feet of a goat: the outer part of the hinder feet is very full of hair. This beast seemeth wild or fierce, yet tempereth that fierceness with a certain comeliness. These unicorns were given to the Sultan of Mecca as a most precious and rare gift. They were sent him out of Ethiopia by a king of that country, who was desirous by such a present to gratify the Sultan[83].”

So lately as the year 1799, a Mahomedan African prince is said to have sent two of them to Mecca.—(REES’s _Cyclopedia_, “Monoceros.”) Bell of Antermony describes one which was killed in Siberia, near the _Irtish_, in 1713. Tamerlane slew unicorns and rhinoceroses on the frontier of _Cashmere_, (_Sherefeddin_, b. 4., ch. xxx.) and there have recently been _reports_ of unicorns in _Nepaul_, which are rendered more probable to be [p363] the truth, by those references of Mr. Bell and Sherefeddin to countries not very distant.

The British king Cuneboline had also the unicorn on his coins, and the figure of the animal is very similar to the above description[84]. The writer is, therefore, of opinion that these now described are the real oryx mentioned by Aristotle, Pliny, and other ancient authors[85].

HIPPOPOTAMUS.

The remains of this beast have been found in England at the residences of the Romans, _viz._, near London, Colchester, and York; and not any in Ireland or Scotland. They have also been found in Italy mixed with great numbers of the bones of other beasts known to have been exhibited by the Romans. This animal is not known to inhabit any country but Africa. Two were caught near Damietta, A.D. 1600. They are known to inhabit Abyssinia, Bornou, the Cape of Good Hope, Senegal, and they were met with in great abundance by the two vessels, the Sion, of 200 tons, and St. John, of 50 tons, which sailed above nine hundred miles up the river Gambia, A.D. 1620, employed by Sir Wm. St. John[86]. The inference is, that they inhabit the whole of that vast continent, and that it is most probable the number of species is as great as that of elephants; and that the fossil kinds not having been brought from the same country as the living individuals with which they have been compared, has induced naturalists to suppose them extinct. An elaborately grand Roman [p364] pavement was dug up at Roxby, in Lincolnshire, upon which is represented Orpheus, surrounded by an elephant, lion, boar, dog, wolf, stag, and another, which appears to be the hippopotamus[87].

TURTLE. TORTOISE.

“A beautiful fossil sea-turtle has recently been discovered, and, by the perfect substitution of all the organic parts as well as its locality, may be considered an interesting remain of a former world. It is encrusted in a mass of ferruginous limestone, and weighs 180 lbs. The spot on which it was found is in four fathoms of water, and is formed of an extensive stratum of stones, called the Stone Ridge, about four miles off Harwich harbour; and is considered to be the line of conjunction between the opposite cliffs of Walton and Harwich. It is in the possession of Mr. Deck, of Cambridge[88].”

A fossil turtle was found near Harwich, embedded in a solid block of cement-stone; another large stone, when broken, was found to contain “nearly the whole of a _human_ skeleton[89].”

Fossil sea-tortoises have been found in the environs of Brussels, in the environs of Maestricht, at the village of Melsbroeck and in the mountain of St. Peter, in the state of Glaris and in the vicinity of Aix; they differ in species from any of those at present known[90].

There is not any of the extraneous fossil remains more probably of Roman origin than tortoises. “The beds, the doors, and pillars of the houses of the Greeks and Romans, were decorated with tortoise-shell. In the reign of Augustus, this species of luxury was at, its height in Rome[91]. Bruce says, the Egyptians dealt very largely with the Romans in this elegant article of commerce; Martial relates that beds were inlaid with it; Velleius Paterculus observes, that when Alexandria was taken by Julius Cæsar, the magazines were so full of this article, that he at first proposed to make it the principal ornament of his triumph; as he used ivory afterwards when triumphing for his African victories[92].” [p365]

Cuneboline and his son Arviragus having had the elephant, tapir, and unicorn on their coins; and as the first was brought up at the court of Augustus[93], there is every probability of their having possessed tortoises at Harwich, the port of the capital of the British king.

SPECIES.

With regard to elephants, the number of species appears to be very great, even with the extremely limited knowledge we possess. The writer saw three distinct kinds captured in one keddah at Tippera, when he was there during Mr. Corse’s residence at that place, and who has described them. Some African females have tusks as large as the males, but it is not known to be so in Asia. Le Vaillant mentions a race of elephants which never have tusks. Two Ceylon elephants were found to differ in the shape of the jaws, and another is mentioned by Baron Cuvier, which is dissimilar to any that had been seen[94].

The Camelopard now at Paris differs in many essential anatomical characters from the kind at the Cape of Good Hope[95].

The Romans and Moguls crossed the species and genera of different animals. The crocotta was between a dog and a wolf; the crocuta, between a hyæna and a lioness[96]. The Moguls cross the breed of dogs with leopards, the best of which are those of Hezereh and Tesheen in Cabulistan; and some are so brave that they will attack a lion[97]. Four towns near Babylon were exempted from any other tax than the maintaining of dogs which were supposed to be produced between the tiger and bitch[98]. We thus may perceive how impossible it is to be certain of a fossil species being extinct because we are not acquainted with it. [p366]

Ptolemy Philadelphus, in a procession at Alexandria, had twenty-four thousand Indian dogs, a camelopard, a white bear, and twenty-four chariots drawn by elephants, twelve by lions, seven by oryxes, eight by ostriches, four by wild asses, and five by buffaloes[99]. Bajazet, in the fourteenth century, had twelve thousand dog-keepers. The immensity of wild beasts slaughtered by the Persians, Moguls, and Romans, would be incredible, were it not attested by so many different authorities; and with regard to the Romans, no author mentions a less number than five thousand of every description slain at the opening of the Coliseum. These sports having been in vogue all over the Roman empire for so many centuries, the fossil bones which have been found are but few indeed. In Britain there were at least five amphitheatres; at Sandwich, Dorchester, Silchester, Caerleon, York[100]. In France, at Paris, Cahors[101], Vienne, Arles, Orange, Autun, Treves, Nismes, Poitou[102], and Bordeaux. In Spain, at Seville, Tarragona, Merida, and Saguntum. In Italy a great number. The popularity of monarchs and statesmen depended on their power to indulge the people with these cruel sports. Commodus is said to have been one of the most dexterous marksmen: he always had with him Parthians, to teach him archery, and Moors, to perfect him in throwing the dart. He ran with all horned animals, except bulls, and smote them unerringly as he pursued. Lions, panthers, and other fierce beasts, he ran after in the Peridrome, and darted at them from above with never-failing effect, whether he aimed at the forehead or the heart. With arrows, pointed like a half-moon, he would cut off the heads of the Mauritanian ostriches, while their wings were [p367] expanded to aid their speed, and they continued their course for a time without their heads. He would expose a prize-fighter to the attack of a panther, and strike the beast dead before it could fasten its teeth on the man. A hundred lions have been sent out of the dens, and all killed by him with such certainty, that they lay close together, not a dart failing[103].

Domitian had been equally notorious in these grand sports in the Amphitheatre.

“What scene sequestered, or what rude renown,
Sends no spectator to the imperial town?
The Rhodopean hind now tempts the plains,
And tunes from Hemus his Orphean strains.
The Sarmat, Cæsar, hies, thy works to see;
And gives the steed he swills[104] to share the glee.
They come, who first the rising Nile explore;
And they who hear remotest ocean roar.
The Arab hasted, the Sabean flew;
And the Cilician own’d his native dew.
With tortured tresses, here Sicambrians gay;
There Ethiops, bristling in their diverse way.
’Mid various speech, but one glad voice we find,
That hails thee father of converg’d mankind[105].”

As for the Romans themselves, according to Juvenal, these amusements seem to have been preferred to all others.

“Could you the pleasures of the Cirque forego,
At Fabrateria or at Frusino,
Some villa might be bought, for what will here
Scarce hire a gloomy dungeon by the year[106].”

Had the fossil animals died, or been killed by natural accidents, the skeletons would generally have been found entire, but for the most part they are scattered and broken, and are often mixed with bones of animals resembling the species of the present time[107]. In the vicinity of Orleans in France, a _fossil_ roe, of a living species, was found in _limestone_, along with the bones of the _palæotherium_.

Instances have occurred of bones being found, in great numbers; and, many feet deeper, other heaps of bones of elephants and wild beasts; but as many amphitheatres were built [p368] with wood, and as the games were exhibited for about six centuries, those structures would require to be often renewed, and the old bones would thus be covered over with earth. Britain was invaded or visited by about twenty emperors, or those so high in importance as to become emperors of Rome; and York was the head-quarters of the Roman empire during the residence in Britain of Severus and his two sons and co-emperors, Geta and Caracalla[108]. All the _collections_ of fossil bones are found at the head-quarters of the Romans, or near the several amphitheatres in the island. Bones of elephants which have been found in France and Italy in fifteen places, are so faithfully accurate to the road over which Hannibal and Asdrubal with fifty-two elephants marched[109], and _Hannibal’s (thirty-seven) all perished before his arrival at Thrasymene_, that no theory whatever can stand in competition with such historical conviction[110]. If the bones found on Hannibal’s road be not those of his Getulian elephants, are we to conclude that the remains of the beasts lost two thousand years ago have totally perished; but that other bones of elephants, many thousands of years older, have been preserved upon the same spot, although some of them are found quite near the surface? At Plaine de Grenelle, a fossil elephant was dug up, and at that place there stood a Roman amphitheatre[111]. The great numbers of elephants then used in warfare may be judged of, by Metellus having captured upwards of a hundred in the battle of Palermo, where many besides had been killed[112]; and accordingly fossil bones have been found, there and also at Syracuse, where there was an amphitheatre. In Spain, thirty-nine elephants were slain at Munda, in the battle fought between the two Scipios and Asdrubal. At the bridge of Manzanares, and at Toledo, fossil remains of elephants have been [p369] dug up; and at these very places Hannibal and Asdrubal defeated one hundred thousand Carpetani, many of whom were trodden to death by their forty elephants[113].

If we glance at the sports of the Mongols, what a treasure for an osteologist might be found at Termed in Sogdiana, where the army commanded in person by Genghis Khan were four months occupied in enclosing an immense circle, till all the wild beasts were driven (without one escaping, under pain of death to the soldier who failed in his duty, but who was not allowed to kill the tigers, lions, &c.) into a spacious plain, where they were slaughtered by the Grand Khan and all the Imperial princes and military commanders, till they chose to permit the soldiers to end the destruction[114]. How many fossil _species_ might be discovered there, of which naturalists have no knowledge! The Persians are said to have slaughtered as many as fourteen thousand beasts on a like expedition[115]. So long have these amusements existed, that Hushing, king of Persia, B. C. 865, _bred dogs and leopards_ for hunting[116].

Besides the fossil remains which have been found of numerous quadrupeds, named by the Romans in their sports, they employed the following, bones of which have not been detected:—Indian dogs, white bears, camels (one found), dromedaries, camelopards, wild asses, zebras, quaggas, oryxes (unicorns), Ethiopian sheep, Arabian sheep, the crocotta (bred from a dog and wolf), crocuta (from a hyæna and lioness), little dragons, ostriches. The gnu was known to the Romans; and probably the nyl-ghau and the om-kergay (quite harmless, and the size of a rhinoceros). In this list several of the fossil kinds described as the ancient wild beast with a thick skin (palæotherium), and the beast without weapons, or unarmed (anoplotherium), may be found, and also those of the genus canis, and a carnivorous beast[117].

Such is a short notice of this most extensive subject, to which the writer’s attention has been attracted by the concurrence of [p370] historical relations with the locality of fossil remains. It is offered for the consideration of the reader, not in a spirit of controversy, but with a desire to ascertain an important truth in natural history, whether his speculations be confirmed or refuted. Whichever way a decision is awarded, it will add to the interest attached to zoological pursuits, and the reader will be, by these remarks, enabled to form a judgment whether the laborious and ingenious works which have been published, since the conviction that elephants are not human giants, (a notion seriously maintained so recently as in Clavegero’s _History of Mexico_, written since that of Robertson) are descriptions of the quadrupeds of a _former world_, or of the world which is now in _existence_. _It is necessary to remark that these particular researches relate only to animals connected with Roman and Mogul history_; and if it should be conceded that it may justly be inferred, that quadrupeds hitherto deemed extinct are still to be found in the undiscovered parts of Africa, Asia, and America, not half of either region being yet scientifically known, it will give an interest to zoology and osteology ten fold more attractive than a blank and unsatisfactory hypothesis of their having all perished _before the creation of man_, as is often alleged. It is perhaps the most remarkable circumstance in literature, that naturalists so rarely allude to the astonishing number of beasts slain in the Roman games, although the list of them is, generally speaking, so similar to that of the fossil remains. Erroneous notions concerning fossil bones, those of elephants, in particular, being the most plentiful, began in very early ages when they were considered to be human; and James the First (of Britain) sent Lord Herbert of Cherbury to Gloucester, to ascertain if a skeleton, dug up at that place, was really that of a giant. There were found mingled with it horns and bones of oxen and sheep, and the tusks of a boar. Lord Herbert, Dr. Clayton, and the celebrated Harvey, thought the bones were those of one of the Roman elephants; and Bishop Hakewill received a letter from my lord of Gloucester, mentioning that “he was _not confident_ that the grinder was the tooth of a man[118].” This discovery, perhaps, put an end in England to the notion of giants’ bones. [p371]

The next fanciful origin was, that these fossil remains were those of an extinct monster, called Mammoth by the native Siberians, their name for the walrus; but which was transferred and confounded with the bones of whales, elephants, and buffalos, found in that country, and such erroneous opinions will long be entertained in those quarters.

The diluvian origin was imagined by many to be the true one, but later careful examinations proving that the animals died on the spot where they are found broken, and the bones scattered about, that hypothesis could not in such instances be maintained, and recourse was had to the supposition, that Britain was in former ages a tropical country; but the mixed fossil remains, being those both of hot and cold climates, and of beasts peculiar only to Africa, or to Asia, this theory appears to be quite as objectionable as the others. The last, and the most specious, of all the hypothetical proofs of the origin is, that the teeth not often corresponding with those of the living specimens which have been seen, they must be the remains of extinct quadrupeds. There are, perhaps, fifty large regions where elephants abound, and the teeth of _very few indeed_ of the animals of those countries have yet been seen. This last appears to be, defective as it is, the strongest objection that can be urged against the historical origin; and the few remarks in this essay will contribute materially to weaken this remaining hypothesis. The reader who feels any interest in zoology will, by their means, be assisted in his endeavours to untie or cut this gordian knot. After he has decided either that these beasts are in existence, or all extinct.

“In his reflections, then, what scenes shall strike!
Adventures thicken! novelties surprise!
What webs of wonder shall unravel there[119]!”

FOOTNOTES:

[53] Count Bournon; Phil. Mag., vol. lvii., p. 458.

[54] Strahlenberg, p. 405.

[55] Dr. Plott’s History of Oxf., p. 161.

[56] Phil. Trans. Abridged, vol. iv., part ii., p. 273.

[57] Cuvier, Theory of the Earth.

[58] In the American Quarterly Review, published at Philadelphia, March, 1827. Art. “Fossil Remains.”

[59] Titles, “Werner,” “Fletz,” “Transition.”

[60] See two dissertations on the Geology of the U. S. of N. America, by W. M’Clure, Esq., in the Transactions of the Amer. Phil. Soc., new series, vol. i., Philadelphia, 1818. This gentleman had entertained a different view in the previous volume; but after eight years’ experience, in Europe and America, he had the philosophical justice, boldly to amend his former opinions.

[61] See Phil. Trans. Abridged, vol. iv., part ii., p. 236 to 245, and Camden’s Brit., Gough’s Ed., 1789, vol. iii., 604.

[62] Essay on the Antiquity of the Irish Language, by Lieut. Col. Vallancey, 8vo., London, 1818, p. 12.

[63] See Gibbon, ch. xxvii., Zosimus, b. iv., Rapin, b. i., Wars and Sports, ch. xiii.

[64] Life of Agricola.

[65] Parkinson, vol. iii., letter 26. Mr. P. relates that Baron Cuvier inclines to doubt the authenticity of this account; but Capt. Cochrane’s testimony _now_ renders it very probable to be correct. It is very worthy of remark, that the wild elephants in America are found, as reported, at Choco, and west of the Missouri; and that Mango Capac and Montezuma’s ancestor, by the traditions, landed at Cape St. Helen’s and Culiacan,—as if some elephants had been let loose, or had escaped and betaken themselves to perhaps the nearest thick forests, and have remained there undisturbed.

[66] Rees’s Cyclopedia, Addenda, “Mastodon.”

[67] See Parkinson, vol. iii., letter 26, p. 367.

[68] Duchat, an author of unquestioned credit, has seen recent wood petrified into flint by the water of a river in Ava. Rees’s Cyc., “Wood.”

[69] Levesque, Hist. de Russie, vol. vii. 244.

[70] Wars and Sports, p. 263.

[71] Conquest of Peru, ch. x. It is somewhat curious that, when Pyrrhus for the first time brought elephants into Italy, the Romans gave them the name of Lucanian bulls; and that the Americans call them big bulls in their traditions. It is probable that both people compared them with the largest beast known to them; as elephants, if indigenous in america before the arrival of Mango Capac and Montezuma’s ancestor, would have been extremely numerous, and have had a proper name.

[72] Shakspeare spells this name Cymbeline; Milton writes Kymbeline, which is probably the true pronunciation: see his History, 8vo. 1695, p. 62.

[73] Wars and Sports, p. 269.

[74] Id. p. 506. The Burmans eat elephants. The writer was at Dacca in 1794, when some Burmese troops invaded the Chittagong frontier. An expedition, under Colonel Erskine, was sent against them; and on the return to Dacca of Colonel Boujonnar’s battalion, the officers told the writer that they found in the stockade the skeleton of an elephant, which the Burmans had devoured.

[75] Conquest of Mexico and Peru, p. 288–301.

[76] Hakluyt, vol. iv., p. 558; and Conquest of Peru and Mexico, ch. vii.

[77] A Roman coin is said to have been discovered recently among the Indians in America, which has justly created surprise; but others have been found long ago. Bishop Hakewill’s book is dated A.D. 1635: he says, “Marianus Siculus, in his history of Spain, reports that certain coined pieces of gold, engraved with the image and inscription of Augustus Cæsar, were found in the American mines; thereby inferring that those countries were _then_ discovered.” p. 310. Batou, the cousin of Kublai, both grandsons of Genghis, had conquered Russia, ravaged Europe to the Adriatic, and died on his march to Constantinople, in 1256. His successor also ravaged as far as Constantinople, (P. de la Croix, p. 387.) Mango (so spelt by Du Halde, ii., 251, and Maundeville, p. 275; Manku by Tooke, Russ. Emp., ii., 13) was brother to Kublai, who is considered by the writer to be the father of the first Inca, and there is nothing more probable than that he and other Moguls on the Japanese expedition may have possessed Roman coins, the plunder of Hungary, Poland, Dalmatia, and the Greek empire, as far as the capital.

[78] Cuvier, Theory of the Earth, p. 257.

[79] Conq. of Peru, &c. plate iv.

[80] Theory of the Earth, p. 67.

[81] Herodotus, Thalia xcix. Rees’s Cyc., “Sumatra.”

[82] Wars and Sports, p. 335.

[83] Travels of Lewis Vertomanus to Egypt, Arabia, &c., A.D. 1503, in Galvano’s collection. Hakluyt, vol, iv., p. 162.

[84] Wars and Sports, p. 354.

[85] See Cuvier’s Theory of the Earth, p. 80. Wars and Sports, p. 335. With regard to the unicorn, Camper has remarked, that “if this animal was ruminant and cloven-footed, it is certain that its frontal bone must have been divided longitudinally into two, and that it could not possibly have had a horn placed upon the suture.” This remark by Camper, when we consider how nature adapts every thing to its purposes, cannot stand as a real objection to the existence of the oryx. The most eminent naturalists have been wrong in some of their conjectures. John Hunter pronounced the mastodon to be a carnivorous beast. Buffon, after frequently considering the bones of the mammoth, conceived them to belong to a beast six times larger than the biggest elephant; and Muller was of opinion that it must have been 105 feet in height, and 133 in length! So little capable is any human being to judge what nature does, or can do!

[86] See Relation of Master Wm. Jobson in Purchas, vol. ii, p. 921.

[87] Conq. of Peru; p. 450.

[88] New London Literary Gazette, Oct. 13, 1827, p. 303.

[89] Common Sense Newspaper, No. 60.

[90] Cuvier’s Theory of the Earth, p. 291.

[91] Shaw’s Zool., III. pt. 1. Rees’s Cyc. “Tortoise.”

[92] _Ibid._

[93] Milton’s Hist. 8vo. p. 62.

[94] Cuvier, Ossemens Fossiles, p. 185.

[95] Ed. New Phil. Journal, Sept. 1827, p. 390. Here is a direct instance, that if a fossil _Egyptian_ camelopard had been found, it would, like elephants, &c., have been pronounced to be an _extinct_ species, the modern specimens being from South Africa.

[96] Pliny, b. viii.

[97] Ayeen Akbery, vol. i. p. 242.

[98] Herodotus, Clio, cxci. We may conjecture that _tiger_ has been written for _leopard_, a frequent error.

[99] Montfaucon, vol. iii. p. 179.

[100] Augustan History, “Severus,” p. 253. “Wherever Caracalla wintered, or but intended to winter, they were constrained to erect amphitheatres and cirques for public games, and those within a while were taken down again.”—Hakewill’s Apology, p. 443. Caracalla was three years at York; and Spartian, in his Life of Severus, relates, that among other omens just before that emperor died, (at York,) three figures of Victory, which stood upon the platform near the throne, were blown down while the _games of the circus were celebrating_. There was a Roman road from York to Whitby (Dunus Sinus), and Kirkdale is about half way between the port and the capital.

[101] Rees’s Cyc. “Cahors.”

[102] Marquis Maffei, p. 260.

[103] Herodian, “Commodus.”

[104] The Tartar opens a vein of his horse and drinks the blood.

[105] Martial (Elphinston’s, p. 19) on the Sports of Domitian.

[106] Satire iii.

[107] Cuvier. Theory of the Earth, pp. 89 and 263.

[108] The emperors had their families and the whole Roman court with them. The celebrated Julia Domna, and her sister Julia Mesa, were there during those three years. See De Serviez, Roman Empresses, vol. ii. p. 239.

[109] Passage des Alpes par Annibal, d’après la narration de Polybe. Comparée aux récherches faites sur les lieux, par J. A. De Luc. Géneve, 1818.

[110] Wars and Sports, p. 295.

[111] Gibbon, ch. xix. p. 177.

[112] Catrou, vol. ii. p. 591.

[113] Livy, b. xxi. ch. v.; b. xxiv. ch. xlii.

[114] De la Croix. Hist. of Genghis, b. iii. ch. vii.

[115] Sir John Chardin, vol. ii. 33.

[116] Sir William Jones, vol. v. 588. The above may possibly mean a cross breed of the two beasts, which we find is still practised in Cabulistan, as related in the Ayeen Akbery.

[117] See Rees’s Cyc. “Strata.”

[118] Hakewill’s Apology, p. 229.

[119] Young. Night VI.

_Description of a cheap and portable Instrument for enabling Young People to acquire a knowledge of the Stars, or determine their situation in the Heavens_. By S. Lee, Esq.

There is no science, the study of which tends so much to enlarge the mind as Astronomy. It opens to our view the grandest examples of Almighty power, wisdom, and beneficence—the [p372] contemplation of which fills the soul with reverence and affection for the great Author of nature, and banishes all narrow and superstitious notions respecting him.

The cultivation of this science, therefore, cannot be too strongly recommended to the attention of young people. The eager curiosity and avidity for discovery which so peculiarly distinguish that period of life, when the reasoning faculties begin to develope, is peculiarly fitted for its reception—and, accordingly, amongst the better-educated classes of society, the elements of this science are generally considered as a necessary branch of instruction—though commonly limited to a mere _dogmatic_ explanation of the Copernican system, and the use of the globes.

But this superficial mode of instruction, though sufficient to enable any one to understand the real motions of our planetary system, and explain the apparent motions which must result from them, is hardly sufficient to satisfy inquisitive reasoning minds, since it leaves them ignorant of the means by which the distances, magnitudes, and orbits of the planets and comets were first discovered; and how, if lost, a knowledge of them might be recovered from observations alone.

The most pleasing methods of instruction will generally be found the most efficient. It is impossible for any one who has had the least experience in teaching not to have perceived, that one practical application of science makes a deeper and more lasting impression on the mind of a learner than a thousand theoretic propositions.

An accurate knowledge of the fixed stars is the first step to practical astronomy; it is, in fact, the alphabet of the science. By the rising, southing, and setting of these bodies, astronomers are enabled correctly to measure time; and from their apparent altitudes, to determine the latitude of places on the surface of the globe, whilst the permanent situations which they maintain with respect to one another, furnish them with so many marks by which to trace the course of the sun, moon, and planets through the heavens. Such were the data which enabled Copernicus and Newton to unravel the seeming irregularity of their apparent paths, and explain the beautiful simplicity of their real motions.

The instruments usually had recourse to for this purpose [p373] are, celestial globes, planispheres, and atlases, but none of these afford such ready and certain means of finding or identifying particular fixed stars, as at first might be expected from them.

The Globe possesses the great advantage of being easily rectified to the place of observation and adjusted to the exact hour of the night. It likewise exhibits all the stars in their proper situations of altitude and azimuth;—but the constellations being delineated on a convex surface, and viewed from without, whilst the heavens appear to us a concave viewed from within, the groups of stars are seen reversed, a circumstance which, occasions no small degree of perplexity to a learner.

Planispheres and atlases exhibit the constellations as they appear to the eye when on the meridian, but in a position very different from that which they assume when removed far from it. In short, except the pleiades and a few remarkable groups, it is difficult to recognise a constellation in every position, without great practice and continued observation.

The Equatorial furnishes the best and readiest means of discovering or identifying any particular star, but the great price of this instrument, and the complicated nature of its adjustments, render it unfit for learners.

The instrument which we are about to describe, is in its principle the same as the Equatorial, though not pretending to any thing like the same degree of accuracy; but it has this advantage over it,—its adjustments are more simple and obvious, consequently, better adapted to the capacity of learners; and it can be afforded at a very moderate expense, the price not exceeding that of a common globe.

A, B, C, D, is the stand of the instrument, composed of three triangular pieces of wood glewed together, so that the plane of the upper piece, D B C, makes with that of the lower piece, A B C, an angle equal to the co-latitude of the place it is intended for.

On the upper piece, D B C, is described a circle, E F G, the circumference of which is divided into twenty-four hours, and every hour into twelve parts, equal to five minutes each.

From the centre of this circle, and perpendicular to the [p374] plane on which it is described, rises a pillar, the top of which appears at H above the cone I, which can be made to revolve upon it as an axis.—On the surface of the cone is delineated the principal stars visible in England, and the lower edge is divided into 365 parts, representing the days of the year.

On the top of the pillar is fitted a segment of a circle, K, of [p375] about 140°: viz. 90° of north, and 40° of south declination, which may be made to revolve upon the pillar as an axis independently of the cone. To this part is attached the scale, L, divided into degrees of north and south declination, corresponding to those on the semicircle,—and so contrived as in every situation to touch lightly the surface of the cone.

To the declination circle K is attached the alidade M, which may be set to any degree required, and serves as an index to direct the eye of the observer to any object, which may be viewed along the edge of it, or through the small holes in the sights O P.

Having described the several parts of the instrument, it only remains to shew the use of it; which will be best explained by means of a few problems.

PROBLEM 1. To adjust the instrument.

The instrument being made for the place of observation, need only to be placed on a perfectly horizontal stand, and with the line joining the hours XII and XII on the circle, in the direction of the meridian: the former of these adjustments may be verified by means of a small level applied to the stand at N, in the directions B C and A N successively. If found incorrect in either position, let a piece of card be put under that foot (A, B, or C) from which the bubble is found to recede, and let this operation be repeated until the bubble rests in the middle, in both positions.

The instrument may be brought into the meridian by the assistance of a magnetic needle fixed to the frame at N, or on the opposite side, or more correctly by means of the sun, provided the time be exactly known, thus:—

Set the index M to the sun’s declination, turn the circle K round its axis, till the scale L points to the hour and minute on the circle E F G. Then if the instrument be correctly placed, the sun will be seen through the sights O, P, or what is the same thing, the light admitted at the hole O will fall on the hole P. If not, the instrument must be turned about till this effect is produced.

The instrument being once carefully adjusted to the meridian on any immoveable stand, such as the sill of a window, [p376] the top of a post, &c., lines may be drawn on the stand in the direction of the sides A B, A C, or B C, by means of which it may at any time be replaced with little trouble.

PROBLEM 2. The instrument being correctly placed and levelled, the next operation will be to adjust the conical projection to the day and hour of observation.

Turn the cone round till the day of the month on the circle, at the bottom of it, coincides with the hour and minute on the circle E F G.

Example.—To adjust the cone for the 15th January, at twenty minutes past nine at night. Turn the cone till the 15th January on the circle attached to it coincides with IX h. 20 m. P. M. on the circle E F G.

PROBLEM 3. The cone being adjusted, and any star proposed, to find its place in the heavens.

The cone remaining at rest, turn the declination segment K till the scale L cuts the proposed star on the projection; note its declination on the scale and set the index M to the same degree on the segment K, when the index will point to the star, which, if the adjustments have all been correctly made, will be seen through the sights P, O.

Example.—To find the star Aldebaran; look for Aldebaran on the projection, bring the scale L to cut it, and you will find it against 16° north declination. Set index M to 16° N. P., and look along the edge of it, or through the holes P, O, and you will see the star.

PROBLEM 4. Having observed a star in the heavens, to find it on the projection.