of subsequent sections in this grand tale. Dates, such as
chronologists never dreamed of--compared with which, those of Egypt's
dynasties are as the latter to a child's reckoning of its
birthdays--have thus been presented to the now living generation, in
connexion with the history of our planet."[5] These changing masses
have been discovered with remains of organic life wrapped in their
particles, each mass enclosing a petrified museum of the life that
flourished while it was in course of formation: thus not only have we
distinct proof of extinct forms of animal and vegetable life, but we
are also able to assign the dates of their existence.

The MOST EASTERLY ROOM of the NORTHERN MINERAL and FOSSIL GALLERY, is
that to which the visitor's attention will be first directed. In this
room, as in the next three, the table cases are devoted to the
minerals; and the wall cases, along the southern side of the gallery,
are filled with

FOSSIL VEGETABLES.

The wall cases of this room contain the various strata which have
traces of vegetable life. The earliest vegetable life of which the
geologist has found fossil remains is in the form of sea-weeds,
specimens of which the visitor will notice in case 1. The grand
harmony of the world's development is shown in this adaptation of the
earliest vegetable life to that of the earliest animal life--the
polypus drawing its sustenance from the sea-weed. In the next three
cases the visitor will notice various remains of fossil ferns (in clay
slate) and horse-tails, all indicating the former high temperature and
moisture of the localities in which they are found, since they are of
large proportions, and it is observable that these plants grow in bulk