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Additional comments:/ Commentaires suppldmentnires: L'Institut a microfilm^ le meilleur exemplaire qu'il lui a 6t6 possible de se procurer. Les ddtails de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-Atre uniques du point de vue bibliogr'^phique, qui peuvent modifier une image reproduite, ou qui peuvent exiger une modification dans la methods normale de filmage sont indiqu6s ci-dessous. D D ^ D n Coloured pages/ Pages de couleur Pages damaged/ Pages endommag^es Pages restored and/or laminated/ Pages restaurdes et/ou p9llicul6es Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ Pages d4culor are thus able to do some direct good to man would not in all probability have attained such knowledge had they attacked the unknown fields of science in any other spirit than that which recognizes that all newly discovered items of fact are infinitely valuable, whether we can at the moment put tlnem to any direct use vr not. No one is wise enough to recognize the full value of a newly-discovered fact. One new fact may seem to have nothing to recommend it, except its anomalous character. Another may seem of er.ornious importance. But some later dis- covery may change all this, disclosing the value of the apparently anomalous fact and diminishing the value of that which seemed the most important. Out duty is to treasure every new truth or fact discovered, no matter how unimportant it may appear. We can readily understand that what seems nov/ of trifling value may be intimately connected with the working out of some problem in which man is deeply interested. This may seem an unnecessarily elaborate manner in which to draw your attention to the claims of palaontology, the subject in which I hope to interest you to-night. In its earjy history it was peculiarly a study in which patience was necessary in recording facts which seemed to have little more than mere- stratigraphical value to the discoverers. And even now that it may claim to be a ;c.Jy of systematized knowledge, its value is certainly underestimated in this centre of colleges and universities. The simplest manner in which to judge of the value of any particular f)ranch of science, such as paheontology. is doubtless to consider its interdepeudenci' v/ith other branches of science. In the ultimate analysis, of course, all science is interdependent, but I refer to that interdependence which at once occurs to the student who desires to be a specialist. The entomologist soon finds that he must know something of botany, the botanist that he must know something of ento- mology. Both soon learn, also, that without some knowledge of geology, if only of soils and altitudes, they cannot proceed very far. Let us, then, first consider the value of paK-eontoloRy to the student who is trying to work out the physical history of the globe. In the record of foscils he finds almost his only sure guide. If he tries to work backward through the crust of the earth, beginning with the most receni conditions on the surface, he finds that there is but one satisfactory guide piaving the real;eonto.logy. If he concludes that the stratigraphical arrangement of the sedimentary rocks is for practical purposes the most satisfactory measure of time, he must also conclude that without the palieon- tological record there could be no system of stratigraphy, and that where the stratigraphic sequence is broken there is little beside the correlation of the fauna in the two unconformable strata from which to measure the time represented by the break in the sequence. It may be well to recount very briefly how our present knowledge of stratigraphy has been gained and the extent to which this knowledge is due to pala-ontology. The first attempt to systematize the rocks comprising the crust of the earth was made by the Freiburg professor of mineralogy, Werner.'W (i) Many of the references to individual geologists have been taken from Sir Archibald Geikie's " Founders of Geology." 7<^<^ 5 3 PROCEEDINGS OJf THE CANADIAN INSTITUTB. 3 He advanced the theory that the globe was once completely enveloped in water- that is, that the water was high enough to covct the highest mountain. From and in this water the rocks forming the basis of everything were chemically pre- cipitated. These, according to Werner, included granite, gneiss, mica-slate, clay- slate, serpentine, basalt, porphyry and syenite. He even asserted at first that the chemical deposition was made in the order in which the rocks are here arranged. These were his Primitive rocks, iind they were followed by what he termed Transi- tion rocks, some of which were of chemical deposition and some sedimentary. Then came the so-called Floetz rocks, partly chemical, but in the main sedimen- tary. It became necessary, however, to recognize the existence of volc^'noes, and he taught an eager, listening world that volcanoes were the result of the burning up of seams of coal and other inflammable sediments; and that volcanic action was one of the most recent of physical forces at work in the earth, if ever there was an instance of the value of collecting facts, no matter how apparently dis- sociated from each other, until a system could be built which would defy attack, we have it in the Neptunist geology of Werner. He could not wait for facts, hut theorized most brilliantly on the basis alone of what could be gathered in the mining district in which he lived. He contended that basalt was not volcanic, and satisfied most people, after a violent controversy, that it was not, and that obsidian and pumice were chiemically deposited in water, while at the same time in France the patient, tireless investigator, Deinarest, who refused to theorize, had laid before a world quite deaf to facts, the truth, as now recognized, regarding basalt and the real basis of what we know regarding volcanoes. It is true that the great founder of accurate geology, Hutton, did not upset the theories of Werner and others by the aid of fossils, but he established forever the value of ascertained facts, of real evidence as opposed to theory. He laid down the great principle in geology, that wc must judge of the action of the earth in the past by the action we see around us in the present. The doctrine of Uniformity in its extreme form is, of course, disputed by many.'D but the main principle as here stated is generally accepted. Hutton thus settled, in many cases for all time, the manner in which the .sedimentary rocks were created, setting aside the absurd notion of Werner's ocean depositing, chemically and by sediments, layers on the sloping sides of mountains covered to their tops by the sea. Hutton not only understood correctly the forces creating rocks but the destructive forces of erosion and the creation of watersheds and river systems. But although both Werner and Hutton knew that the various rocks were created in succession and that in this succession there was an order which it was desirable to understand, other men laid the real foundations of pala;ontology in its relation to stratigraphy. As early as 1779 the Abb6 Giraud-Soulavie, in France, set forth in a paper a stratigraphical description of a district in France in which the different strata were arranged by him in relation to their fossil contents, and in which he demonstrated that in the older rocks the fossils had no similar living species, while in some of the later rocks a percentage of the fossils were identical, or nearly related to living species. Little attention, however, was paid to these important truths, and his systematic arrangement of the rocks in question is not now recognized. The Abbe was followed by two great Frenchmen whom the world was obliged to regard. Cuvier and Brongniart were biologists who realized that they could not disregard the biological relations of fossils to living forms. Indeed, wc owe it to Cuvier that pal.xontology is accorded its place in the study of biology, while Brongniart, in his zoology of the Trilobites, thus early .demon- strated to what extent even an extinct tribe of crustaceans may be systematized and accorded their place in the order of natural history. But at the moment we (1) Lord Kelvin " Popular Lectures and Addresses," vol. it., page 6. Prestwich's Geology, 1886, vol. i., page 2. <«i»«i«iiHiipppiwiip«wian 4 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. are concerned only rcKanlin^ their conirilnitions to stratigraphy. WorkioK toKcther, these two ureal iiieii tliorouwhly siiuliid the neology and palaontoloKy of the Paris basin, and established the systematic arrangement of the Tertiary or Kain- ozoic formations so firt.dy that although many new minor divisions have been added, few alterations have been (jiade, and the main features of the present classi- fication are as tfiey arranged them. They distinctly state that they based their classification and division of the rocks upon the fact that at the .same horizon in a series of rocks, even when examined in widely separated places,, they found that the grt)ups of fossils were generally alike. Their conclusions, which in the com pitte form reached the public in 1808, were followed in 1813 by the results of the labours of another Frenchman, D'Omalius dHalloy, who worked out with true stratigrapliical principles the Secondary or Mesozoic rocks of France. Turning now to the development of stratigraphy in England, as early as 1760 the Rev. John Michell had stated most intelligently the principles of tlie stratifi- cation of rocks, but he contributed nothing towards the nomenclature of a system. English stratigraphy practically began with the well-known William Smith. He was born in the same year with Cuvier, and outlived him seven years, but, instead of the splendidly endowed biologist, we have only a land surveyor, imperfectly educated He drew up as early as 1799, although he did not publish it beyond distributing copies by hand among a few scientific friends, a card of the English strata, with a tabular list of formations from the Coal up to the Chalk, giving the thickness of the .several members, lists of the fossils peculiar to each, and the lithological changes. In 1815 he published a geological map covering all England, of which all sulisequent maps are practically but an elaboration, and he established the Jurassic system as permanently in England, besides much of our knowledge of the Secondary rocks, as Cuvier and Brongniart did the Tertiary in France. The geology of the Secondary or Mesozoic rocks in England as known to-day is filled with the names of formations given by Smith, and we owe to him the first sufticient arrangement of the Primary or Palicozoic and the Secondary or Meso- zoic rocks from the Old Red Sandstone to the Chalk. So that he and the French- men referred to cleared up on paheontological grounds the entire stratigraphy from the Old Red Sandstone to the present time. Practically nothing was known in 1831 of the stratigraphy of the rocks below the Old Red Sandstone, and I have only now to refer to the splendid work of Murchison and Sedgwick in establishing as the result of investigation in Eng- land, Wales, Scotland, the Alps and elsewhere, the Cambrian, Silurian and Devonian systems; and of the subsequent investigations, still being pursued, to work out the pre-Cambrian rocks, the foundation efforts in which are now by common con- sent accredited to our own great geologist, Sir William Logan, whose portrait hangs upon our walls as the first President of this Institute. Sir Archibald Geikie, on whom I have drawn most liberally for personal facts regarding the early geologists, says:— (1)" The determination of the value of fossils as chronological documents, has done more than any other discovery to change the character and accelerate the progress of geological inquiry." The geographical discoverer is unsatisfied as long as there is a shore line not marked upon the map of the world, and naturally the geologist is unsatisfied as long as there is a section in his geological column the nature of which he has not determined. We have shown how the geological column from the top or present time back to the base of the Cambrian has ibeen determined satisfactorily by the^aid of palxontology, and we have suggested the value of such a complete record to the student trying to work out the physical history of the globe. But the geological column extends below the Cambrian to the Arch.xan, representing a period of time regarding the measure of which the geologist, the biologist, and (I) Sir Archibald Geikie, " Ttie Founders of Geology," page 24a. .4. mm^tmrmmmmmm •tit- PROCIRDINGS O^ THE CANADIAN INSTrTUTB. 5 tlic physirist are in most thorough disagreement. Are thirc no more fossils below ihf base o( the Cambrian to illumine this dark period ? In the Lower Cambrian of North America, according lu Mr. VVolcott, one of tiie leading autlu.riiies on \\h- Cambrian time, there are as many as lOo specien, and these cover all clas.scH of marine invert-brates. Clearly, then, in the Lower Cambrian we are not n-ar the bcKlnning of life on this planet, and surely we are not near the earliest preserved ■ reninams < t life. The rocks in North America which arc older than the Cambrian are divided by Ur Dawson'" in descending order, as follows:— I. Kcwecrawan. a. Animikie. Heie throughout a Rreat part of North America, there (»ccur8 a profound unconformity. 3. Huronian. 4- Upper Laurentir.n or Grenville Series. 5. Lower Laurentian or Fundamental (inciss. It is evident that if fossiJs are found in any of these, groups the l'al;i(>/..ic division must ')e extended dowmward to nichic etjuivalen. to the Kev/ee- niawan.'-') They contain " but a meagre fauna, mostly animals a low type of structure, as Protozoans, Brachiopods, Ediinoderms, and Molluscs," with worm- burrows and trails. Mr. Walcott, in a memoir on the Lower Cambrian, <<> writes as follows: — " The section laid bare in the Grand Canon of the Coilorado. beneath the great unconformity at the base of the known Cambrian, shows 12,000 feet of unaltered sandstones, shales, and limestones, that, I think, were deposited in pre-Cambrian lime and should be referred to the Algonkian (Keweenawan). The entire section of pre-Cambrian strata is unbroken, and the sandstones, shales, and limestones are much like those of the Ordovician section of New York. In a bed of dark argillaceous shale, 3500 feet from the summit "of the section, I found a small Patelloid or Discinoid shell, a fragment of what appears to be the pleural lobe oi a segment of a trilobitc, and an obscure, small Ilyolithes, in a layer of bituminous limestone. In layers of limestone, still lower in the section, an obscure Stromato- poroid form occurs in abundance. These fossils indicate a fauna, but do not tell us what it is." In the same memoir, in a note at the foot of page 552. Mr. Walcott mentions the discovery of Salterella and fragments of a trilobite. 500 feet below a series of beds in Vermont which are 700 feet thick, of conformably bedded lime- (i) G. M. Diwson. Presidential Address, Geological Section, B.A.A.S., 1S97. {t) G. F. Matthew. The Protolenus Fauna, Trans. N.Y. Acad. Science, vol. xlv., page 105, 1895. ^^) sir W. Diwson. Note on Cryptozoon and other Ancient Fossils, Can. Record Science vol vll page 803, Oct. 1896. ' ■ (4) C. D. Walcott, The Fauna of the Lower Cambrian, etc , U.S. Gov't Surv. Annua; Report, page 550, 1888^. O PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN iNSFlTUTE. Stone, and lie beneath the OleneUns Zone (the so-called base of the Cambrian). In the pre-Cambrian rocks of Wales and elsewhere fossils have been found, but n t 1)1 a more satisfactory character than those already mentioned. 1 do not here discuss the so-called fossils of the Huronian and Laurentian, because until the vast beds of the Keweenavan and Animikie are cleared up it is hardly worth while to enter upon a mere controvercy as to whetht'r certain forms are fossils or not. The subject is complicated by the many breaks or unconformities in Cambrian and pre-Cambrian times. In the extended areas of ancient rocks in North America there are sections where the Lower or some younger portion of the Cani- bri.in rests directly upon Archiean or other pre-Cambrian rocks, and there are places where the section is conformable from the Cambrian series downward for many thousands of feet into the Keweenawan. Therefore, considering the many widely separated sections in North America, if at any point downward we were ible to say we had rea-^hed the . after dismisring the peculiarities of a well-known Cambrian trilobite. says: " If this be so, the entire outer covering df the trilobites, at a period not very remote from the end of pre-Cambrian times, may have been membranous, and the same thin^ may have occurred with the structures analogous to the hurd parts of organisms of other groups. Indeed, with our present views as to development, we can scarcely suppose that organisms acquired hard parts at a very ea.ly period of their existence, and fauna after fauna may have occupied the glebe, and disap- peared, louving no trace of its existence." I have thus far been considering the value of fossib iti demonstrating ihe position and relative age of the different strata 01 the earth's cra^t. It is not necessary for such purposes that the fauna of one stritum should bear any like- ness to that of an immediately older or younger stratum. Indeed, to seme extent. (1) J. E. Marr. Presidential Address, Geological Section, B.A.A.S., 1896. HROCEKDINGS OF THK CANADIAN INSTITUTE. J the lew sSike the bett;r fur mere purposes of distinguishing strata. Tt was there- fore, not unnatuial that the early geologists, believing, as they did thnt each particular animal or plant was a special effort of creation, should fail to recognize the value of biolog;' m connection with the study of fossil remains. Indeed when Cuvier and Brongniart, and, later, Dcshayes and Lyell, undertook to correlate the organi.Hms in the later rocks with living organisms— to point out where they were identical, where they were related but not identical, and w.iere there seemed little relation— there were not wanting those who doubted the value of biology in the study of geology, and who persisted in estimating the value of fossils merely as guides in the stratigrapliica! airangement of the rocks. Comparatively few fos- sils had be.n gathered, specific diflferences were often not recognized, the doc- trine of evolution had not been advanced, ana as I have already said, any par- ticular fossil might be regarded as an organism whose history had no relation to anytlnng but itself. The change which has come about in fifty or sixtv years would be incredible were the record not clearly before us. I am notable to state even approximately the number of species now known, but a few detached facts will sufficiently illustrate the scope of modern palxo.itology. Prestwich estimated the species found in Great Britain in the Pahvozoic .-ocks at 5.6g7, in the Mesozoic rocks at 7,546, and in the Kainozoic, including the Quaternary, at 4.013. That is, altogether, at 17,256 species, in the British Isles. This, as we know, is but a trifling part of the earth's area, although it is that which has bee;i most thoroughly examined Barrande estimated the Silurian species alone of Europe and America at 10,674, to which, of course, many have been added since the cal- culation was made. Every year great numbers of new forms are described and new territory is put under examination. No one would be so foolish as to attempt to guess tie number of species which will eventually be recorded in science. If one will tarn from the meagre text-books of the first half of this cen- tury to Zitte!'sly the hard parts of animals preserved. The soft parts are gone, and. worse stiil, the animals which had no hard parts have left almost no trace at all. This is quite trie, and at first sight it seems an ines- timable loss to the student of evolution. How will he ever fill the gaps in hi.? record if only the bones have been preserved for him ? In the case of fcssil animals having apparently no living analogues, had there been no theory of evolution there would doubtless have been no great desire to ascertain tlie nature of the soft parts, and thus to establish them in their proper places in the systems of natural history. And certainly in many cases, where the analogy is now clear, without this interest on the part of the biologist it wDuld not have been suspected. But if in some class of fossil animals there are sull c few living analogues, it is wonderful to what a degree tie generic relations can t- worked out and a system, satisfactory even to the biologist, be created, which shall include all the known extinct and living forms, even when the fosril species outnumber the living by a hundred to one. Allow me to illustrate this point by reference to the work done in connection with one of the most, if not the most, ancient order of shells, the brachiopoda. About 1884 Dr. Thomas Davidson, after thirty years of labour on the subject, finished the fir.st great work on brachiopods <2) Jt fills five quarto volumes and is illustrated by 250 plates. What is perhaps more strik- ing is the fact that the bibliography which co.-npletes the work, consists of 160 quarto pages, containing the titles of over 2.500 publications dealing with brachio- (i) Karl von ZIttel. Handbuch der Palaeontologie, 3 vols., 1876-1893. («) T. Davidson. Britisli Fossil Brachlopi. la, vol. l.-vl., Fublications of Palxontographical Society, 1850-1885, 8 PROCEEIJINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. pods. Tlie brachiopod is a bivalve, but with valves of unequal sire. In the over- whelming majority of cases in the fossil form the valves arc found united, and, as ihe valves are filled either with sediment or with crystallized matter, the interior is rarely visible. This involved a greater difliculty than Liat of merely ascertaining the marks of the attachments of the organs on the inner sides of the shells. The brachiopods have supports for the soft parts, the so-called arms, in the shape of loops cr spirals, or other processes, and while in modern brachiopods these are not calcareous, in fossil forms they were. These spiral and other processes were occasionally but rarely exposed and separated valves showing the muscular markings were also found, but naturally the first attempts at systematizing the brachiopods were largely based on mere external characters. During the progress of Dr. Davidson's labours, however, the Rev. Norman Glass, assisted him materially. By the exercise of great ingenuity and delicate workmanship he removed the shells and exposed the delicate brachial supports referred to, in the case of many species, so that a greptly improved system was the result. It is but right to say tha. others were working upon the brachiopods in the same direction, notably Mr. Whitfield, of the American Museum of Natural History, New York. The number of known fossil species has, however, kept on increasing at a surprising rate, and »ve have also added largely to the known living forms. Dr. Davidson's work was, therefore, soon followed by important contributions from D. P. Oehlert, in 1887,"' and by Professor Zittel in his Hand-book, already referred to. It was still main- tained that we possessed no treatise in which " facts in regard to structure, function, habits, and distribution of these animals, the distinguishing characters and sys- tematic relations cf their genera, " are included in one work. This Professor Hall and his co-workers have sought to do in the "Introduction to the Study of Ihe Brachiopoda " and in the eighth volume ol the Pala-ontology of New York. Here we can readily follow their history from the very minute and rudimentary brachio- pods in the Lower Cambrian throtigli their enormous development in tine Pal;eo- zoic both in numbers of individuals and in variety of form and size, continuing in less'Mietl though still great numbers through the Mesozoic, and gradually les- sening until the present age, of which Professor Hall records only 147 species, many of which are mere varietal forms. Whether we consider the shapes of the valves as they have been influenced by the soft parts which are now gone, the microscopic structure of the shells, the systems of defence by spines, imitative surface markings or otherwise, the infinitely varied and very beautiful processes for svpporting the arms, the muscular scars, the complicated nature of the hinge, the foramen, the evidence as to fixity of habit or the reverse, or any other feature which may leave its morphological evidence on the fossil; or the softer parts which may be seen in living forms and by the aid of which both the structure and habits of the fossil organisms may at least to some extent be understood, we must admit that thv: history of the Brachiopoda, as gathered from the study of both fossil and living forms has produced a result infinitely more satisfactory to the bio' I id the geologist than could have been possible by the study of the fossil forms alone by the old-fashioned geologist and of the living forms alone by the old-fashioned biologist. And he would be a foolish man who undertook to say whether the fossil or the living forms had most aided in the final result. Both are absolutely necessary. In almost any other branch of fossil remains quite as valuab'e evidence ol the growth ol palaeontology on its biological side might be adduced. In the Pro- tozoans, George Jennings Hinde by his microscopic work is carrying the evidence of the existence of Radiolarian ren\ains farther and farther back in the Paleozoic rocks, and Messrs. W. D. and G. F. Matthew have found Globigerinidae in pho.^ (i) Paul Fischer. Manuel de Conchyllologle, Paris, 1887, with an appendix on the Brachipuds by D. P. Oehlert. ''i^f-'tf^rftf^riirj, J-tit^tiq^ while Dr. Hermann Rauff has been some yeiirs labouring upon a sy.stematic arrangement of all th« known fossil fornis.'»> Professor H. A. Nicholson has made the first attempt at systematizing our knowledge of those diflrtcult Hydrozoans, tlie Stroiuatoporoids.'" and Professor Lapworth and several other investigators are doin^ similar work upon the almost equally dilTi- cult llydrozoans known as Graptolites. In the Actinozoans a vast quantity of work has been done on fossil corals since the epoch-making volumes of Milne- Edwards and Jules Hainie. hut the great work of revision has not been under- taken as yet. In the Echinoderms, the camerate crinoids have been revised in a most elaborate manner l,ontographical Society, i886-if93. (3) H. Raulf. Palaiosponglologie, Memoir in PaliPontoRraphica, editerf by Prof. K. A. von Zittel, Stuggart, 1853. (4) H.A.Nicholson. British Stromatoporotds. Publications cfPala^ontographlcal Society, 1883-1892. (5) Wa(chsmuth and Springer. North American Criniodea Camerata, Memoir, Mug. Comp. Zool., Har- vard, 1897. (6) F. A. Bather. As an example of Mr. Bather's Palinontological work, see Petalocrinus, (J.J.G.S., vol. Iv., pages 401-441. (7) H. A. Nicholson, The Genus Mcnticulipora, Blackwood, Edinhurg, i8i-i. (8', E. O. Ulrlch. Geological Sufv. Illinois, vol. 8, iSyo. Geological Surv. Minnesota, vol. 3, 1895. (q) G B. Simpson. Different Genera of Fenestellida', 13th Annual Report N.V. State Geologists, 1894. Hand-book, N. A. Palaeozoic Bryoioa, 48th Annual Report, N.V.S. Mus. and 14th Annual Report N.Y.S. Geolo- gist, 1893. (to) On the grouping of some divisions of so-called " Jurossic " Time, S. S. Buckman, Q.J.G.S., "ol, liv., pages ',42-462, August 1898. lo PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITU IK. Iised upon a species of ammonite; and by the use of these zones in determining the precise age of one species relatively to another, he has been able to produce the genealogical tree of the Jurassic ammonites in a manner which should be satisfactory to the evolutionist. Doubtless this attempt to divide up the geoioRical formations into zones named fiom apparently dominant species and to work out with this aid the phylogeny of families or oiders may be carried too far. Clearly, however, by being able to divide the formations on biological grounds, so as to establish with reasonable precision the relative moment when a particular species arrived and flourished, and by being able to study young and mature individuals of the species so as to work out its embryology, great progress is being made in the history of the development of species through tho medium of fossils. I feel that I owe the members of the Institute an apology for the cliaracter of my address. My business duties preclude the possibility of engaging in original investigation even if I possessed ability of that kind. I have, therefore, merely sought by an address of a popular character to engage your attention regarding a branch of study which has been a source of deep interest to myself for many years.