[A] "_Flints cannot grow._"--Here I would digress for a moment to notice an opinion so generally prevalent, that perhaps some of my young readers will not be prepared at once to answer the question--_Do stones grow?_ The farmer who annually ploughs the same land, and observes a fresh crop of stones every season, will probably reply in the affirmative; and the general observer who has for successive years noticed his gardens and plantations strewn with stones, notwithstanding their frequent removal, may possibly entertain the same opinion; but a little reflection will show that stones cannot be said to grow or increase, in the proper acceptation of the term. Animals and plants grow, because they are provided with vessels and organs by winch they are capable of taking up particles of matter and converting them into their own substance; but an inorganic body can only increase in bulk by the addition of some extraneous material; hence stones may become incrusted, or they may be cemented together and form a solid conglomerate, but they possess no inherent power by which they can increase either in size or number--_they cannot grow_. [B] Plate I, _a_. [C] Plate I, _b_. [D] Plate I, _c_. [Sidenote: FOSSIL ECHINUS WITH SPINES.] [Illustration: Lign. 2:--Fossil Turban Echinus, with its spines; in limestone. (See '_Medals of Creation_', p. 340.)] [Sidenote: FOSSIL SHELLS IN CHALK.] [Illustration: Lign. 3:--Shell with spines, imbedded in Chalk; from Lewes. (See '_Medals of Creation_,' 1 p. 390.)] To avoid confusion, we will reverse the order of our inquiry, and first contemplate the formation of the flint in its native rock. The Chalk, that beautiful white stone, which (as an American friend, who saw it for the first time, observed), is so like an artificial production, abounds in marine shells and corals, and in the remains of fishes, crabs, lobsters, and reptiles, all of which differ essentially from living species; although a few of the corals and shells resemble, in some particulars, certain kinds that inhabit the seas of hot climates. These remains are found in so perfect a state--the shells with all their spines and delicate processes (_Lign. 3_), and the fishes with their teeth (_Lign, 4_), scales, and fins, entire--that no doubt can be entertained of the animals having been surrounded by the chalk while living in their native sea, and that many of them were entombed in their stony sepulchres suddenly, when the rock was in the state of mud, or like liquid plaster of Paris.[E] [E] See Note I. _Shells in the Chalk._ [Illustration: Lign. 4:--Fossil teeth of Fishes of the Shark family, in Chalk; from Lewes. (See '_Medals of Creation_.' p. 625.)] [Sidenote: SHELLS AND FISHES IN CHALK.]