Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1874-10-10

HOW the Elephant has DegenerAted.
and spobbery into which the lover Glasses Of
this country seem to have descended, there was
something picturesque In certain sight wit
messed here lately. IL was that Of Old Professor
owen taking workipgmen through the British
animals. he began BY directing attention to
the tusks spd skull Of the "Elephas Primoge-
NUS" which has been elaborated In the British
museum nom sandstone blasted some forty
years ago. In the formation Of the Jums canal,
at o point one thousand feet above the Indian
ocean. Every bit of the original ivory and
bony substance had passed away, and had been
replaced by particles OF stone, but the texture
of the original ivory, which WAS pecufar, WAS
manifest with the aid Of the microscope. The
professor explained the existence OF the i'm
mepse tusks in this fossil by the supposition
thatwhen 10 roamed the forest NO human beings
existed on the earth, 20 that IL lived with
ease and without fear, and under these con-
ditions developed its tusks TO the fullest size.
But when these conditions were altered, and
the elfphsnt could not appear except under ter
Ter OF that vretched little biped, man, snd his
rlfe, the nervous system was not allowed the
quiet and repose it needed, and, therefore, there
vas not that development in existing animals
that was to be found in the fossil type. He sup
posed that this Indian elephant had died a
natural death, and there was no doubt that the
whole Himalaysn chain, the highest in the
world, had been raised since that old elephant
had lived, because In them, at greater nights
than the quarry in which it was found, were dis
covered not only fossil elephants, but hippopo-
tami, which required lakes and rivers TO live
IN, and also fossil sirafes. Similar evidence
was 10 be found in the Alps, the Pyrenees, and
the Andes. When they came TO apply their
own trumpery way Of reckoning time, they had
some evidence of nesrly 5000 years OF history;
but that was a mere hour, a minute. compared
with the lapse of time involved in the produc-
ton OF the phenomena to which he referred.
Therefore, the real value of these specimens
was not the mere interest and curiosity which
attached to them as such, but the light which
they threw on much larger questions, viz, the
immense Duration OF times past and the
VI "a 70 tav nj Sv,t f,a
OF the earth by the upheaval and subsistence of
the land. The learned professor, referring 10
another specimen which had been found at
Ilford, remarked that elephants were at one
time abundant in England, and that, when this
was so, England must have formed part OF a
continent in connection with Holland and the
north OF Europe. Having given other proof of
the subsistence, as the discovery of a submarine
forest at the mouth of the Tyne, with the
antlers Of deers and the horns of gigantic oxen,
and the sUbmeTsi0n of the estate of the old
Saxon earl of Selsea, as shown by the transfer
ence of the remains of the Saxon saints to Chi
chester cathedral, he briefly referred to the fOs-
sils of gigantic birds found in New Zealand and
Madagascar, whose eggs would require hat
for an egg cup, and then took leave of his aud
ience.-A. ID. Conlgdy in Cincinnati Commercial.
MYSTERY OF THE GREAT LAKRs.-Lake
Erie Is only sixty or seventy feet deep; but Lake
Ontario, which is 592 feet deep, is $50 feet below
the tide level of the ocean, or as low as most
parts of the Gulf of st. Lawrence and the bot
toms OF Lake Huron, Michigan and Superior,
aiuIousn inc surface Il so 1nucn higner are all
from their vast depth, on a level with the bot
tom of Ontario. Now, as the discharge through
the River Detroit, after allowing for The proba-
BILE portion carried off by evaporation, does not
appear by any means equal TO the quantity of
water which the upper three lakes receive, it
has been conjectured that a subterranean river
may run from Lake Superior, by the Huron, to
Lake Ontario. This conjecture Is not improba-
bic, and accounts for the singular fact that sal
mon and herring are caught in Gil the lakes
communicating with the st. Lawrence, but in
no others. AS the Falls of Niaghra must have
always existed, it would puzzle the naturalist to
say how these fish got into the upper lakes with
out some such subterranean river; moreover
any periodical obstruction OF the river would
furnish not improbable solution Of the mystic
IiOus tlux and retiux of the lakes