5. The _Tantalus Ibis_ of Linnæus, in the present state of synonymy, comprehends four species of three different genera, namely, 1. A Tantalus, the ibis of Perrault and Buffon; 2. An Ardea, the ibis of Hasselquist; 3. and 4. Two Numenii, the ibis of Belonius, and the ox-bird of Shaw. From this example, and so many others, one may judge of the state in which the _Systema Naturæ_ still exists, which it would be of so much advantage to purge by degrees of the errors with which it abounds, and which would seem to be every day increasing, by the addition of species, characters, and synonyms, made without selection and without critical examination. The general conclusion of the whole investigation is, that the Ibis still exists in Egypt, as it did in the days of the Pharaohs, and, that it was owing to the inaccuracy of naturalists that the species was for some time thought to be extinct, or to have been altered in its forms. GEOLOGICAL ILLUSTRATIONS, BY PROFESSOR JAMESON. _In Civil History records are consulted, medals examined, and antique inscriptions deciphered, in order to determine the epochs of human revolutions, and verify moral events; so in Natural History we must search the archives of the world; draw from the bowels of the earth the monuments of former times; collect the fragments, and gather into one body of proofs all the indices of physical changes, which may enable us to retrace the different ages of nature. It is thus only that we can fix some points in the immensity of space, and mark the progressive stages in the eternal march of time._ ILLUSTRATIONS. NOTE A and B, p. 9. _On the Subsidence of Strata._ M. Cuvier adopts the opinion of De Luc, that all the older strata of which the crust of the earth is composed, were originally in an horizontal situation, and have been raised into their present highly-inclined position, by subsidences that have taken place over the whole surface of the earth. It cannot be doubted, that subsidences, to a considerable extent, have taken place; yet we are not of opinion that these have been so general as maintained by these geologists. We are rather inclined to believe, that the present inclined position of strata is in general their original one;--an opinion which is countenanced by the known mode of connection of strata, the phenomena of veins, particularly contemporaneous veins, the crystalline nature of every species of older rock, and the great regularity in the _direction_ of strata throughout the globe.