They have their analogues in other continents, but nowhere beyond the limits of the American continent do we find any fishes identical with those of the district, the fauna of which we have been recently surveying. The lamprey eels of the lake district have very close representatives in Europe, but they cannot be identified. The sturgeons of this continent are neither identical with those of Europe nor with those of Asia. The cat-fishes are equally different. We find a similar analogy and similar differences between the perches, pickerels, eelpouts, salmons, and carps. In all the families which occur throughout the temperate zone, there are near relatives on the two continents, but they do not belong to the same stock. And in addition to these, there are also types which are either entirely peculiar to the American continent, such as Lepidosteus and Percopsis, or belong to genera which have not simultaneous representatives in the two worlds, and are therefore more or less remote from those which have such close analogues. The family of Percoids, for instance, has several genera in Europe, which have no representatives in America; and several genera in America which have no representatives in Europe, besides genera which are represented on both continents, though by representatives specifically distinct. Such facts have an important bearing upon the history of creation; and it would be very unphilosophical to adhere to any view respecting its plan, which would not embrace these facts, and grant them their full meaning. If we face the fundamental question which is at the bottom of this particular distribution of animals, and ask ourselves, where have all these fishes been created, there can be but one answer given which will not be in conflict and direct contradiction with the facts themselves, and the laws that regulate animal life. The fishes, and all other fresh-water animals of the region of the great lakes, must have been created where they live. They are circumscribed within boundaries over which they cannot pass, and to which there is no natural access from other quarters. There is no trace of their having extended further in their geographical distribution at any former period, nor of their having been limited within narrower boundaries. It cannot be rational to suppose that they were created in some other part of the world, and were transferred to this continent, to die away in the region where they are supposed to have originated, and to multiply in the region where they are found. There is no reason why we should not take the present evidence in their distribution as the natural fact respecting their origin, and that they are, and were from the beginning, best suited for the country where they are now found.