Being the Conclusion of the Fullerian Course of Lectures on Physiology, for 1859

In a Report to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, On the Extinct Mammals of Australia, published in the Volume of Reports for 1844, evidence is adduced in proof of the law, that with extinct as with existing mammalia particular forms were assigned to particular provinces, and that the same forms were restricted to the same provinces at a former geological period as they are at the present day. That period, however, was the more recent tertiary one.

In carrying back the retrospective comparison of existing and extinct mammals to those of the eocene and oolitic strata, in relation to their local distribution, we obtain indications of extensive changes in the relative position of sea and land during those epochs, through the degree of incongruity between the generic forms of the mammalia which then existed in Europe, and any that actually exist on the great natural continent of which Europe now forms part. It would seem, indeed, that the further we penetrate into time for the recovery of extinct mammalia, the further we must go into space to find their existing analogues. To match the eocene palseotheres and lophiodons we must bring tapirs from Sumatra or South America; and we must travel to the antipodes for myrmecobians, the nearest living analogue to the amphitheres and spalacotheres of our oolitic strata.

My first impulse in availing myself of the privilege of addressing you in this place, is, to give expression to the deep sense which I entertain of the honour conferred on me by my appointment to ‘Sir Robert Reade's Lectureship,’ especially as it is the first which has been made since the revival of that ancient foundation. Believe me, Sir, I truly appreciate the favour of your choice, and am fully impressed with the responsibilities which it involves. And if my acknowledgments should seem curt or inadequate, I would beseech you to believe that this results from the wish not to trespass too long on your most valuable time, but to devote to the subject selected as much as may be of the period commonly allotted to an oral discourse.

In reviewing, for the choice of this subject, the field of Natural Science in which I am a labourer, I desired to select one that might be treated of with a certain degree of completeness in a single Lecture, one that would enable me to submit to you some of the more recent generalisations in Natural History, and at the same time exemplify the applicability of that science, as a discipline, to the improvement of the intellect, and especially as a sharpener of the faculties of observation and of methodical arrangement.

I trust that in the attempt to briefly unfold the Classification and Geographical Distribution of the Mammalia I may attain the end I have in view.