APPENDIX. 19 



direct with my answer to Mr. Hawkins, to enable him to bring 

 an action upon the strength of its contents, and Mr. Hawkins 

 himself is the person to go about and make known to his 

 friends and neighbours, what had been said or written of him, 

 and what he had " declared " he should do in consequence. 



It will readily be supposed that this trial would have been 

 likely to excite some little interest in the Geological world; 

 and it was not long in getting wind, that an inquiry into the 

 circumstances attending the disposal to the British Museum, 

 of Mr. Hawkins's fossil saurians, was to be brought forward 

 in a legal shape. A gentleman, well known from his con- 

 tributions to both the first and present series of this journal, 

 passing through Oxford on his way to London, chanced to 

 call on Dr. Buckland, and in the course of his visit, was 

 somewhat startled at being informed by the Professor, that 

 the Editor of the Magazine of Natural History was on " the 

 brink of ruin." Dr. Buckland, after explaining to him the 

 state of the case, and learning that the party in question was 

 personally known to me, exhorted him to use his best efforts 

 to induce my falling in with Mr. Hawkins's proposal, it being 

 understood between them, that he was at liberty to commu- 

 nicate to me the Doctor's ideas upon the subject. Now it 

 was a most unwarrantable assumption on the part of Dr. 

 Buckland, to intimate to any third party, and especially to 

 a naturalist contributing to the Magazine, that the Editor 

 was on the brink of ruin, for no other reason than that an ac- 

 tion was commenced against him, and the damages laid at 

 a thousand pounds. He had no more foundation to justify 

 his drawing that inference, than I should have had, if it had 

 happened that Dr. Buckland had been the defendant in the 

 cause instead of myself. The gentleman above alluded to, on 

 his reaching London, saw me upon the subject, and I am sure 

 that he sincerely hoped to render me a service in so doing. — 

 Merely therefore, expressing my conviction of, and thanks for 

 his friendly intentions, I shall pass on to a note received 

 from Mr. Lyell. 



No. 10. 



Dear Sir, 



Happening to meet Dr. Buckland at dinner yesterday, I found 

 him most willing to be a mediator, and indeed he had already taken some 

 steps, though by no means aware the affair had proceeded so far. He will, 

 I believe, expect you to give a verbal apology of some sort before the par- 

 ties in whose company you used the expressions complained of, but as he 

 said this in conversation, I cannot of course know precisely what he will 



