be remembered that, as Mr. Gladstone incidentally remarks, he cannot now
be called a recent authority. In fact, he has been dead more than half
a century; and the palaeontology of our day is related to that of his,
very much as the geography of the sixteenth century is related to that
of the fourteenth. Since 1832, when Cuvier died, not only a new world,
but new worlds, of ancient life have been discovered; and those who
have most faithfully carried on the work of the chief founder of
palaeontology have done most to invalidate the essentially negative
grounds of his speculative adherence to tradition.

If Mr. Gladstone's latest information on these matters is derived
from the famous discourse prefixed to the "Ossemens Fossiles," I
can understand the position he has taken up; if he has ever opened a
respectable modern manual of palaeontology, or geology, I cannot.
For the facts which demolish his whole argument are of the commonest
notoriety. But before proceeding to consider the evidence for this
assertion we must be clear about the meaning of the phraseology
employed.

I apprehend that when Mr. Gladstone uses the term "water-population" he
means those animals which in Genesis i. 21 (Revised Version) are spoken
of as "the great sea monsters and every living creature that moveth,
which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind." And I
presume that it will be agreed that whales and porpoises, sea fishes,
and the innumerable hosts of marine invertebrated animals, are meant
thereby. So "air-population" must be the equivalent of "fowl" in verse
20, and "every winged fowl after its kind," verse 21. I suppose I may
take it for granted that by "fowl" we have here to understand birds--at
any rate primarily. Secondarily, it may be that the bats and the extinct
pterodactyles, which were flying reptiles, come under the same head.
But whether all insects are "creeping things" of the land-population,
or whether flying insects are to be included under the denomination of
"winged fowl," is a point for the decision of Hebrew exegetes. Lastly,
I suppose I may assume that "land-population" signifies "the cattle" and
"the beasts of the earth," and "every creeping thing that creepeth upon
the earth," in verses 25 and 26; presumably it comprehends all kinds of
terrestrial animals, vertebrate and invertebrate, except such as may be
comprised under the head of the "air-population."

Now what I want to make clear is this: that if