in his address at the Oxford meeting, on the insufficiency of time
for the requirements of the Darwinian evolution. He then discusses
the estimates based by Lord Kelvin and Professor Tait on physical
considerations, and dismisses them as altogether inadequate, though
he admits that Professor George Darwin agrees with Lord Kelvin in
regarding 500 millions of years as the maximum duration of the life of
the sun.
He next takes up the estimates of geologists, and rather blames as too
modest those who ask for the longest time, say 400 millions of years,
for the duration of the habitable earth. He evidently scarcely deems
worthy of notice the more moderate demands of many eminent students of
the earth, who have based far lower estimates on more or less reliable
data of denudation and deposition, and on the thickness of deposits in
connection with their probable geographical extent.
He then proceeds to consider the biological evidence, and dwells on
the number of distinct types represented as far back as the Lower
Cambrian. Independently of the interpretations and explanations
of this great fact, the numerous types there represented, and the
persistence of some of them to the present day, give an almost
overwhelming impression of the vast duration of organisms in time. In
connection with the supposed slow and gradual process of evolution,
this naturally leads to the conclusion that "the whole period in which
the fossiliferous rocks were laid down must be multiplied several times
for this later history (that of the higher groups of animals alone).
The period thus obtained requires to be again increased, and perhaps
doubled for the earlier history." Ordinary geologists naturally stand
aghast at such demands, and inquire if they are seriously put forth,
and if it would not be wise to hesitate before accepting a theory on
behalf of which such drafts on time must be made. The late Edward
Forbes once humorously defined a geologist to be "an amiable enthusiast
who is happy and content if you will give him any quantity of that
which other men least value, namely, past time." But had this great
naturalist lived to "post-Darwinian" times, he might have defined a
Darwinian biologist to be an insatiable enthusiast, who feels himself
aggrieved if not supplied with infinity itself, wherein to carry on
the processes of his science. Seriously however, the necessity for
indefinitely protracted time does not arise from the facts, but from
the attempt to explain the facts without any adequate cause, and to
appeal to an infinite series of chance interactions apart from a
designed plan, and without regard to the consideration, that we know of
no way in which, with any conceivable amount of time, the first living
and organized beings could be spontaneously produced from dead matter.
It is this last difficulty which really blocks the way, and leads to
the wish to protract indefinitely an imaginary process, which must end
at last in an insuperable difficulty.
Were Evolutionists content to require a reasonable time for the
development of life, and to assign this to an adequate cause, they
might see in the reduction of living things in the pre-Cambrian ages to
few and generalized or synthetic types, evidence of an actual approach
to the beginnings of life, and beyond this to a condition of the earth
in which life would be impossible.
* * * * *
G. Controversies Respecting Eozoon.
In the text (Chapter IX.) I have referred in a cursory manner to these,
but have felt that it would be unprofitable to fight the old battles
over again, except in so far as the objections raised have suggested
new lines of study and investigation. The old objections of Messrs.
Rowney, King and Carter were conclusively replied to by the late Dr.
Carpenter. The later criticisms of Möbius in his elaborated memoir
in "Palæontographica" were in appearance more formidable; but he had
evidently entered on the question with imperfect material, and a very
defective conception of its extent and meaning. His treatment of it was
also marked by unfairness to those who had previously worked at the
subject, and by that narrow specialism and captious spirit for which
German naturalists are too deservedly celebrated. The difficulties he
raised were met at the time, more especially in articles by the present
writer in the American _Journal of Science_, and in the Canadian
Naturalist. Möbius, I have no doubt, did his best from his special
and limited point of view; but it was a crime which science should
not readily pardon or forget, on the part of editors of the German
periodical, to publish and illustrate as scientific material a paper
which was so very far from being either fair or adequate.
The later objections of Gregory and Lavis are open to similar criticism
as imperfect and partial, and as confounding Eozoon with mineral
structures which previous writers had carefully distinguished from it.
I have stated these points in letters to _Nature_ and to the Council
of the Dublin Academy, and have also re-stated the evidence bearing on
the animal nature of Eozoon in a series of papers in the Geological
Magazine for 1895. I may add here, as apposite to the present condition
of the matter, a few remarks referring to the appearance of Eozoon
in Dr. Dallinger's new edition of Carpenter's great work on the
Microscope,[59] and more especially to his retaining unchanged the
description of _Eozoon Canadense_, as a monument of an important
research up to a certain date, while adding a note with reference to
the later criticisms of Mr. Gregory.
[Footnote 59: _Nature_, March 17, 1892.]
Dr. Carpenter devoted much time to the study of Eozoon, and brought
to bear on it his great experience of foraminiferal forms, and his
wonderful powers of manipulating and unravelling difficult structures.
After having spent years in studying microscopic slices of Eozoon and
the limestones in which it occurs, I have ever felt new astonishment
when I saw the manner in which, by various processes of slicing and
etching, and by dexterous management of light, he could bring out
the structure of specimens often very imperfect. Not long before Dr.
Carpenter's death, I had an opportunity to appreciate this in spending
a few days with him in studying his more recently acquired specimens,
some of them from my own collections, and discussing the new points
which they exhibited, and which unhappily he did not live to publish.
Some of these new facts, in so far as they related to specimens in our
cabinet here, have since that time been noticed in my _résumé_ of the
question in the "Memoirs of the Peter Redpath Museum," 1888.
Those who know Dr. Carpenter's powers of investigation will not be
astonished that later observers, without his previous preparation
and rare insight, and often with only few and imperfect specimens,
should have failed to appreciate his results. One is rather surprised
that some of them have ventured to state with so great confidence
their own negative conclusions in a matter of so much difficulty,
and requiring so much knowledge of organic structures in various
states of mineralization. For myself, after working fifty years at
the microscopic examination of fossils and organic rocks, I feel more
strongly than ever the uncertainties and liabilities to error which
beset such inquiries.
As an illustration in the case of Eozoon: since the publication of my
memoir of 1888, which I had intended to be final and exhaustive as
to the main points in so far as I am concerned, I have had occasion
to have prepared and to examine about 200 slices of Eozoon from new
material; and while most of these have either failed to show the minute
structures or have presented nothing new, a few have exhibited certain
parts in altogether unexpected perfection, and have shown a prevalence
of injection of the canal system by dolomite not previously suspected.
I have also observed that unsuitable modes of preparation, notably some
of those employed in the preparation of ordinary petrological slices,
may fail to disclose organic structures in crystalline limestones when
actually present. Since that publication also, the discoveries of Mr.
Matthew in the Laurentian of New Brunswick, and the further study of
the singular Cambrian forms of the type of Cryptozoon, have opened up
new fields of inquiry.
I think it proper to state, in reference to Dr. Dallinger's footnote
on the recent paper of Mr. Gregory, that it must not be inferred from
it that Mr. Gregory had access to my specimens from Madoc and Tudor,
though he no doubt had excellent material from the collections of
the Canadian Geological Survey. It might also be inferred from this
note that I have regarded the Madoc and Tudor specimens as "Lower
Laurentian." The fact is, that I was originally induced in 1865, by
the belief of Sir W. E. Logan at that time that these rocks were
representatives in a less altered state of the middle part of the
Laurentian, to spend some time at Madoc and its vicinity in searching
for fossils, but discovered only worm-burrows, spicules, and fragments
of Eozoon, which were noticed in the _Journal of the Geological
Society_ for 1866. (The more complete specimen from Tudor was found by
Vennor in 1866.) On that occasion I satisfied myself fully that the
beds are much older than the Cambro-Silurian strata resting on them,
unconformably; but I felt disposed to regard them as more probably
of the age of some parts of the Huronian of Georgian Bay, which I had
explored with a similar purpose under Logan's guidance in 1856.
[In my subsequent notice of the Tudor specimens in "The Dawn of Life,"
in 1875, I referred to their age as "Upper Laurentian or Huronian";
and I may add, that while it is certain that the beds containing them
are pre-Palæozoic, their place in the Eozoic period is still not
precisely determined. Work is, however, now in progress which it is
hoped may finally settle the age of the "Hastings group" and the old
rocks associated with it. I may add that the specimen of Cryptozoon
discovered by Mr. Chambers, and of which a portion is represented
in the Frontispiece, seems to me to throw a new light on the Tudor
specimen. It shows in any case the survival of Cryptozoa similar
in form and general appearance to that specimen, as late as the
Cambro-Silurian or Ordovician.]
* * * * *
H. Notes to Appendix, December, 1896.
While this work was going through the press, I have received the Report
of the U.S. Geological Survey for 1894-95, containing the elaborate
Memoir of C. R. Van Hise on the pre-Cambrian Geology of North America.
It is a very valuable contribution to the literature of this difficult
subject, and will constitute a standard book of reference: though I
think the use of the term "Algonkian" for groups of beds which are in
part basal Palæozoic and in part Eozoic or Archæan is to be deprecated,
and scarcely sufficient importance is attached to the labours of the
early Canadian explorers in this field.
In the past summer I was enabled to spend a few days, with the
assistance of my friend Mr. H. Tweeddale Atkin, of Egerton Park, Rock
Ferry, in examining the supposed pre-Cambrian rocks of Holyhead Island
and Anglesey. Fossils are very rare in these beds. As Sir A. Geikie
has shown, the quartzite of Holyhead is in some places perforated with
cylindrical worm-burrows, and in the micaceous shales there are long
cylindrical cords, which may be algæ of the genus _Palæochorda_, and
also bifurcating fronds resembling _Chondrites_; but I saw no animal
fossils. I have so far been unable to discover organic structure in
the layers of limestone associated with apparently bedded serpentine
in the southern part of Holyhead Island. In central Anglesey there
are lenticular beds of limestone and dolomite associated with
pre-Cambrian rocks, which Dr. Callaway regards as probably equivalent
to the Pebidian of Hicks. In these there are obscure traces of organic
fragments; and in one bed near Bodwrog Church I found a rounded
laminated body, which may be an imperfectly preserved specimen of
Cryptozoon, or some allied organism. The specimens collected have not,
however, been yet thoroughly examined. These and other pre-Cambrian
deposits in Great Britain correspond in their testimony, with the
Eozoic rocks of North America, as to the small number and rarity of
fossil remains in the formations below the base of the Palæozoic, and
the consequent probability that in these formations we are approaching
to the beginning of life on our planet; though there is still reason
to hope that additional oases of life may be found in these deserts
of the pre-Palæozoic. Such rare intervals of fertility should be the
more valued when the labours of so many skilled observers have proved
so meagre in their results in comparison with the great extent and
thickness of the beds which have been explored.
INDEX
PAGE
Adams on composition of Laurentian schists 108
---- his work on Laurentian stratigraphy 296
Animals, Cambrian, classes of 7, 11
---- pre-Cambrian 53
---- Huronian 67
---- Grenvillian 73, 303
Antiquity, relative 6
Aquatic animals, permanence of 13
Aragonite in fossils 117
Archæocyathus 35, 315
Archæozoon 214, 309
Barlow, his explorations 296
Bavaria, Eozoon of 71
Beecher on limbs of Trilobites 25
Bicknell on Eozoon 141
Billings on Eozoon 137
---- on Receptaculites 315
---- on Archæocyathus 316
---- on Signal Hill fossils 54
Bonney on Côte St. Pierre 142
Burbank on Chelmsford Eozoon 141
Calcarina 186
Calumet, Grand, Eozoon of 130
Canals of Eozoon 133
Cambrian, life of Early 17
---- geography of the 18
Carbon in Laurentian limestone 93
Carpenter, Dr., on Eozoon 137, 303, 324
Cayeux on Huronian fossils 68
Chambers, Mr. E. T. 313
Chrysotile, veins of 161, 239
Cœnostroma 174
Colorado cañon 56
Controversies respecting Eozoon 324
Corals, history of 32
Côte St. Pierre 88, 91
Cryptozoon 36, 56, 310
Dallinger, note on Eozoon 325
Dawson, Dr. G. M. 66, 295
Ells, Dr. 217, 296
Eozoon, its discovery 73, 125
---- its general form 149
---- its mode of occurrence 90
---- its state of preservation 111
---- its laminæ and chambers 152, 157
---- its canals and tubuli 133, 138, 158, 160
---- its funnels 152
---- its minute granular structure 133
---- its characters and affinities 307
---- objections to its animal nature 221
---- acervuline specimens 203
---- in various places 141, 233
---- Bavarian species 71, 213
---- Tudor specimens 68
---- fragments of, in limestones 183
Eozoon, restoration of 327
Eozoic time as a geological age 76
Etcheminian system 48
---- fossils of 54
Evolution, pre-geological 320
Foraminifera, notice of modern 175
---- Etcheminian 59
---- Huronian 71
---- Laurentian, etc. 303
Fossils, how mineralized 111
Glauconite, mineralizing fossils 217, 298
Granular structure in Eozoon 165
Graphite of the Laurentian 93
Gregory on Eozoon 235, 325
Grenvillian series 39
Gresley on Huronian worms 68
Gümbel on European Eozoon 71, 213
Hall, Dr. James, on Cryptozoon 36, 310
Hanford Brook, section at 51
Hastings series (Huronian ?) 67
Hinde on Archæocyathus 34, 317
Hunt, Dr. Sterry, on indications of life 97
---- on silicates in fossils 298
Huronian system 65
Hymenocaris 27
Jones, T. Rupert, on Eozoon 75, 137
Jullien on Eozoon 235
Kewenian or Kewenawan series 48
King, Prof, on Eozoon 221
Laurentian system 71
---- its limestones 92
Lavis, Dr. Johnson, on Eozoon 235, 325
Life in Early Cambrian 17
---- in pre-Cambrian 50
---- in Huronian 65
---- in Laurentian 71
Limestones of Laurentian 92
Logan, Sir W., on Eozoon 129
Loganite in Eozoon 128
Long Lake, Specimens from 190, 208
Lowe as explorer 131, 141
Map of Laurentian America 85
---- Grenville limestone 88
Matthew, Dr., on Archæozoon 214, 309
---- on Etcheminian 48, 51, 54
McMullen as explorer 128
Möbius on Eozoon 161, 162
Murray on Signal Hill beds 53
Nummulite 163, 186
Objections 221
Ocean of Cambrian 18, 21
---- of Laurentian 85
Olenellus zone 20
Petite Nation 141
Pole Hill, specimen from 118
Pre-Cambrian life 47
Pre-Cambrian rocks in Canada 76
Pre-geological evolution 320
Pre-Palæozoic life 216
Pyroxene in Eozoon 167, 169
Receptaculites 315
Robb, Pole Hill specimens 301
Serpentine, mineralizing fossils 147
---- different origins of 167, 171
Signal Hill series 53
Silicates, mineralizing fossils 217, 298
Spines, use of 30
Stromatoporæ 173
St. Pierre, Côte 88, 91
Table of the history of life 2
---- of pre-Cambrian formations 76
Triarthrus 25
Tubuli of Eozoon 60, 61, 159
Van Hise on pre-Cambrian 66, 329
Varieties of Eozoon 107, 202
Vennor referred to 69
Walcott on Lower Cambrian 40, 62
---- on fossils, Colorado Cañon 57
Weston, Mr., referred to 131
White, Prof. C. A., on chronology of life 7
Wilson, Dr., referred to 127
Worm-burrows in Huronian 67
Worm-trails in Lower Cambrian, etc. 40, 43
* * * * *
Transcriber Note
In order to accommodate placement of illustrations and footnotes, many
paragraphs were split where it seemed reasonable. Minor typos were
corrected. A web search shows that the anchorless Footnote on page
139 appears to reference the quoted text on page 140. Therefore, the
Footnote was placed after the quoted text.
On page 174, Footnote 36 referred twice to Figure 8 and to a
"Microscopic slice" as Figure 61 (which does not exist). It is assumed
the intent was to refer to Figures 7, 7a, 8 and 59 and has been altered
to point to those figures. The caption for Fig. 7 also refers to "Fig.
61, p. 310" and has been updated to "Fig. 59, p. 237".