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course, we shall be told of the possibility of denuded strata which may have contained many missing-links, but to establish a theory upon the unknown is not science.

There is another difficulty. So far as we know, no new species are being evolved now. The differentiation of form is quite. another thing. Hence there is no opportunity given us of watching this supposed evolutionary process. If evolution is possible, or ever has been possible, it must be due not only to outward conditions but to innate biological tendencies; and we have no proof that such tendencies exist. If in the growth of the same embryo different forms are assumed the form of a fish and then the form of a bird-there is not the least evidence that there is no vital difference between fish-bioplasm and bird-bioplasm, or that fish-bioplasm can produce a bird. But I think the advocates of the theory have failed to pay sufficient attention to the fact that there is reason to believe that in the earlier ages of the world's history a process was taking place which is not taking place now. If we believe in a Divine Creator with a Will as free as our own, we cannot deny to Him the power of acting paroxysmally as well as gradually, and it is not unscientific to believe that He has done so. Indeed, when we carry our thoughts up into the religious sphere, I suppose none of us will doubt that He has done so in our own experience. If we have become regenerated it was not by a process of evolution that, we passed out of death into life." Nor will any of us, I hope, be prepared to apply the theory to the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. As yet the theory is undemonstrated, and we ought not to have it forced upon us upon the authority of great names; and we are only exercising a true scientific caution in requiring that our difficulties should be removed before we receive it.

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The AUTHOR'S Reply. I wish to express my sense of the uniform courtesy and general agreement with which my paper has been received. A special interest attaches to Dr. G. Frederick Wright's remarks upon Vitalism. The inability of evolutionists to account for the fact of Life is of no little significance.

I ought, perhaps, to answer some friendly criticisms, which were not altogether unexpected. Mr. Woods Smyth has already had his contention corrected by Mr. Rouse. Mr. Woods Smyth appears to be misinformed in thinking that the Hebrew in the Creation narrative of Genesis lends support to evolutionism. Some time ago,

in this room, he enunciated the same opinion. Being diffident of my own Hebrew, I consulted a reliable Hebraist, who had no hesitation in declaring that Mr. Woods Smyth was mistaken. The criticisms of Dr. Irving embrace the great and the minute, Asa Gray and the atom. He wishes that my paper had quoted the former, and discussed the latter. Then it would have been still more up to date. I cannot agree with him. Had the subject before the Society been "Science and Evolution," a quotation from Asa Gray would have been appropriate enough, and have deservedly carried weight; but I am not aware that the eminent scientist has any claim to be regarded as an authority in philosophy. And where are quotations to end? Is there to be no limit? Most readers will be of opinion that the list given in the paper is sufficiently long, and that, when they are brought up to within a few months of this present day, the paper is well up to date. As to the constitution of the atom, there was not time to discuss it; nor would the discussion have been very relevant, if there had been time. Dr. Irving can hardly be ignorant that scientists are by no means unanimous on this matter. Personally, I hold with Clerk-Maxwell; but even if matter were electricity, this would not affect my argument. I am thoroughly in agreement with Dr. Irving that "the" accepted conclusions' of mere critics and scholars (based to a large extent on negative evidence) can have to the scientific mind nothing of the nature of finality, and that deductions drawn from them can have no surer value than the nebulous data upon which they too often rest.”*

To any one here who may with little consideration have adopted some theory of Evolution, may I commend Bacon's wise counsel— "The Lord St. Alban would say to some philosophers, 'Gentlemen, nature is a labyrinth, in which the very haste you move with, will make you lose your way.""

* Dr. Irving, Transactions of the Victoria Institute, vol. xxxix, p. 216.

ORDINARY GENERAL MEETING.*

COLONEL C. E. YATE, C.S.I., C.M.G., IN THE CHAIR.

The Minutes of the previous Meeting were read and confirmed.

The following election was announced :—

LIBRARY ASSOCIATE.-Newcastle-upon-Tyne Public Free Library.

The following paper was then read by the Author, with the assistance of the Chairman :

ON

THE

SPREAD

OF EXISTING ANIMALS THROUGH EUROPE AND TO THE ISLANDS OF THE ATLANTIC; BASED ON DR. SCHARFF'S RECENT WORK, " EUROPEAN ANIMALS"+ By Professor EDWARD HULL, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S., (Secretary).

THE

PART I.-INTRODUCTORY.

HE origin of the fauna and flora of islands at a great distance from continental coasts is one of the most interesting problems connected with natural history which can engage our attention. Such islands, it has been observed, are peopled by forms of life which are either identical with, or similar to, those inhabiting the adjoining main lands either at the present day, or at recent geological periods not more ancient than early Tertiary; and if we confine our attention for the moment to those forms common to the islands of the North Atlantic, distant from continental shores and separated by deep ocean waters, the question arises by what means, and under what conditions can the occupation of the islands by the animal inhabitants have taken place.

* Monday, 2nd March, 1908.

+ European Animals, their Geological

History and Geographical Distribution, by R. F. Scharff, Ph.D., B.Sc. Constable and Co., Ltd. 1907.

Now there are several conceivable means by which this distribution may have been effected; and they may be arranged under the following heads :

1. By human agency; such as accidental transportation by ships, or direct importation.

2. By the natural agency of winds and currents of the sea. 3. By flotation and swimming; and

4. By land connection at a former period owing to the rise of the sea-bed, by which a land passage was afforded

for immigration.

1. On the first of these means there is no necessity to dwell. We all know that animals and plants have from time to time been imported into distant lands by man; as for example the rabbit into Australia, and the sparrow into the United States of America; both turning out to be pests in the countries which have become their homes.

2. On the subject of the natural agency of winds and currents which we may term "meteorological agency," the treatise of Dr. Wallace, one of the founders of zoogeography, takes the first place amongst recent writers,* followed by the work of Dr. Scharff, which has given rise to the present essay, in which I shall have occasion to draw attention to the divergence of views of these writers.

3. The third means of distribution need not detain us, as it is of rare occurrence for distant islands; but the fourth is that which will require our attention as one of great importance.

4. Range of the Subject.-The able paper read before the Institute last session by Prof. Logan Lobleyt may be considered as introductory to the present subject, in that it dealt with the origin of the European fauna. On this occasion we have to consider the problem, how to account for the existence of some of these forms in the far distant islands of the Atlantic; and to investigate the very divergent views of Wallace and Scharff on this problem. And we shall also endeavour to ascertain how the fact of the great uprise of the lands and bed of the adjoining ocean which has been demonstrated by the formation of the submerged continental platform and the drowned river-valleys, throws light on the presence of these island forms of life.

*Island Life, by Dr. A. R. Wallace, 2nd Edit., 1892.

+ Trans. Vict. Inst., vol. xxxix, p. 102.

"On the subject of the plant distribution amongst the islands of the Dr. Guppy's able paper has already been laid before the Institute. See Trans., vol. xxxix, p. 167.

ocean.

PART II.

Community of forms between the West of Ireland and Portugal. -Before entering directly upon the subject of the fauna of the Atlantic islands, I may here be allowed to interpose a matter indirectly bearing upon it which has impressed itself upon my mind during these investigations. It is a good many years since the late Professor Edward Forbes pointed out the remarkable fact that the fauna and flora of the south-west of Ireland were to some extent identical with those of Spain and Portugal; in other words, that some plants and animals of Kerry and Connemara are peculiar to those parts of Ireland, and do not naturally occur in other parts of the British Islands, but are to be found in the Lusitanian Peninsula. Forbes maintained that it was only by a former land connection that this community of species could be accounted for, and consequently that there must have been, at a very recent period, such a rise in the level of the ocean bed as to form a causeway between the two countries, along which these plants and animals migrated. Amongst the latter are to be found the rare little toad (Bufo calamita) known as the "Natterjack," indigenous amongst the mountains of Kerry, and the spotted slug (Geomalacus maculosus) which lies concealed under the stones in the same district. But the more characteristic forms are those of the plants such as the Arbutus, several species of heath, together with, probably, the Osmunda regalis, which grows so luxuriantly by the Lakes of Killarney and western Donegal, also the "filmy fern" (Trichomanes radicans), and the "London Pride" (Saxafraga umbrosa).

The former land migration of plants and animals appears to have its counterpart in that of the very ancient races of man who settled in Ireland, especially the Milesians, who became settlers in early pagan times. According to Miss Lawless (quoting from authorities, especially The Annals of the Four Masters*), there were four successive invasions:-1, the

*Ireland, by the Hon. Emily Lawless, in The Story of the Nations Series. According to Miss Eleanor Hull (Pagan Ireland, D. Nutt, 1904) there were five pre-Christian invasions, of which the third was that of the Firblogs, the fourth that of the Tuatha-da-Danaan, the fifth that of the Milesians, the ancestors of the present Irish people, supposed to have come from Scythia, by way of Egypt and Spain, and to have landed on the shore of Ireland at Inisfail, or "The Island of Destiny." Miss Hull regards the Formorians not as settlers, but as sea rovers and pirates, like

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