Page:Early Man in Britain and His Place in the Tertiary Period.djvu/41

 

CHAPTER II.

BIOLOGICAL AND PHYSICAL CHANGES IN BRITAIN BEFORE THE ARRIVAL OF MAN.—THE EOCENE PERIOD.

The Eocene Classification.—South-Eastern Coast-Line of Britain.—Eocene Sea-Board of Britain.—The Eocene Sea.—Britain connected with America.—The Mountains.—The Rivers.—The Lower Eocene Plants and Animals.— The Lower Eocene Birds.—The Mid Eocene Flora.—The Mid Eocene Mammalia.—British Upper Eocene Mammals.—Upper Eocene Mammalia of the Continent.—The Order Primates represented.—Climate of Britain Tropical.—General Conclusions.—Man not here.

The close of the Secondary age, as we have observed in the preceding chapter, was marked by great changes in the physical geography of Europe. The cretaceous rocks, which had been formed at the bottom of a deep sea, were lifted up above the waves, and plants and animals hitherto unknown appeared on the new continent. The new invaders took possession of the land, the air, and the sea, and brought about as marked a change in the European fauna as that in geography which had preceded their arrival.

It is very probable that the elevation of the bottom of the sea, by which this immigration of new forms became possible, was accompanied by a corresponding depression of a neighbouring tract of land, like that