VISIT THE SECOND.

On entering the British Museum for the second time, the visitor should ascend the great staircase, pass through the south, central, and mammalia saloons; traverse the eastern zoological gallery, and continue north, direct into the first room of the most northern gallery of the northern wing ;-where the studies of his second visit should begin. His first visit was occupied in the examination of the varieties of animal life distributed throughout the surface of the globe. The greater part of his time on this occasion will be devoted to the study of the wonders that lie under the surface of the earth; of the revelations of extinct animal life made by impressible rocks; and of the metallic wealth which human ingenuity has adapted to the wants and luxuries of mankind. In the fossil remains he will be able to recognise traces of an animal life, of which we have no living specimens; of trees, the like of which never rise from the bosom of the soil at the present time. The lessons that lie in these indistinct, disjointed revelations of the remote past, are pregnant with matter for earnest thought to all men. They are part of our history—links that hold us to the sources of things, and recal us again and again to the condition of our universe, as it trembled into space, and as now we inhabit it—a great and marvellous globe, every

grain of which has an unfathomable story in it. Philosophers have laboured long at the story of the earth; and their revelations have tended to settle it, in a form not unlike the following:

Originally, within the space bounded by the orbit of Uranus, a gaseous matter was diffused at a high temperature. By laws, the origin of which we have not yet traced, the condition of the diffused heat was changed, and the particles of the gaseous matter, condensed and agglomerated by attraction, into a series of planets, of which our earth is the third in point of size. That the earth has undergone vast changes, is evident to the most superficial geological student. We are only able to investigate the crust of the earth, with all our ingenious boring instruments: but even in this crust we may trace a gradual change, and recognise the silent operations of nature in ages never counted by man. According to the popular theory, the earth must have been sixty times as large as its present size, and have cooled to its present dimensions, retaining still, in its unfathomable bowels, a burning heat. The conclusions of geologists, after long and patient examination, are, that certain rocks mark the age of the world —that, in fact, the crust of the globe consists of a certain number of strata, each belonging to a certain era, as the rings of a tree tell its years of growth. The more they test this theory, the more certain are they that the history of our globe may be accurately read in the strata which compose its crust. granitic crust, containing vast and profound oceans, as is proved by the extent and thickness of the earliest strata, was the infant condition of the earth. Points of unconformableness in the overlying aqueous rocks, connected with protrusions of granites, and other similar presentments of the internal igneous mass, such

"A

as trap and basalt, mark the conclusions 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." ."* 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

* Vestiges of Creation.

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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 according as they near the tropics. That the ferns and club mosses have diminished with the decrease of temperature of the earth, is proved by comparing the fossil club mosses, which have been found as large as beech trees, whereas at the present time the most gigantic club moss rarely exceeds three feet in height. In the lower sections of the third, fourth, and fifth cases, the visitor may notice some fine specimens of polished fossil woods; but the varieties of vegetable fossils can hardly engage his serious attention for any length of time, unless he have some real knowledge of botany and geology; yet he may gather the solemn teaching that lies in those dark masses of early coal formation and clay slate, even though he be unable to explain the first principles of botanical science. He may notice, however, in the fifth and sixth wall cases, fossil specimens of extinct plants, including the sigillaria, which, when living, is supposed to have attained often to the height of seventy feet. Having noticed these vegetable remains, the visitor should cross to the northern wall of the room, and examine the sandstones upon which the tracks of an extinct animal called the chirotherium-and footprints, supposed to be of birds, are distinguishable.

The central object in the room is a tortoise found in Hindostan, near Allahabad. It is carved out of nephrite or jade, and is deposited upon a curious table of inlaid ancient marbles. Against the eastern wall are deposited some beautiful varieties of branched native silver from Norway; Lady Chantrey's specimen of part of a coniferous tree, semi-opalised; and a mass of websterite from Newhaven, Sussex. The table cases

now remain for examination. These are devoted to varieties of

MINERALS.

and their combinations. The visitor should examine the cases in the order in which they are arranged, beginning with the cases marked 1 and 1 A. These two cases contain specimens of native Iron. Native iron has nearly always proved to be of meteoric origin; and the specimens are here arranged in the order in which they have been found. They have fallen from the heavens at different places, and at different periods. The largest known aerolite is that which fell in Brazil, and was no less than eight feet in length. These huge solid masses of iron, discharged from the clouds in a burning state, may well set the brains of philosophic men to work, to unravel the splendid mystery that contrives laboratories high up in the air, from which dense tons of pure iron are discharged upon our earth. Humboldt, discarding the Laplaceian theory that aerolites were detached masses of the moon, which ignited on reaching the oxygen that surrounds our globe, asserts that they are Lilliputian planets, having their system as we have ours; that they are identical with shooting stars, and that they occasionally fall to the earth by coming within the attraction of a body of overpowering magnitude. In the case with these meteoric specimens of native iron are specimens of native Copper-not often found in a pure state; native Lead, of meteoric origin; one specimen, exhibited in the form of a medal, having been cast out of the crater of Vesuvius about two hundred years ago; and native Bismuth, which expands as it cools.

In the second case the visitor will particularly notice the beautiful threads of native Silver from the Hartz