ii PREFACE. 



After referring to the localities in which the remains attributed to birds (as 

 those by Buckland from the Oolitic Slate of Oxford) had been found, Cuvier 

 proceeds : — " Les os de serpens sont encore plus rares, s'il est possible. Je n'en 

 ai vu que des vertebres des breches osseuses de Cette, et une seule des terrains d'eau 

 douce de I'lle de Sheppey " (ib., p. 476). 



My determination of the Fossil Remains collected by John Hunter and 

 described in the ' Catalogues of the Hunterian Collections ' then under my charge, 

 together with the knowledge of other fossil remains of Reptilia with which holiday 

 geological excursions and the transmissions by local collectors had made me 

 acquainted, begat a conviction that the contributions of Buckland, De la Beche, 

 Conybeare, and Mantell, were but the forerunners of other, probably much more 

 extensive, acquisitions of evidences of Reptilian modifications of vertebral struc- 

 tures from British strata. The application of a grant by the " British Association 

 for the Advancement of Science," in aid of such research, enabled me to visit and 

 personally explore the most promising localities of Reptilian Fossils, the results of 

 which were communicated in two " Reports," published in the ' Transactions of the 

 Association ' for the years 1841 and 1842. 



The foundation of the " Pal^ontographical Society," in which I co-operated 

 with BowERBANK, Thomas Bell, and Searles Wood, gave subsequent opportunities 

 of putting on record the characters of species of British Fossil Reptiles, at that time 

 new to science. 



The contribution of such descriptions to the annual volumes was attended 

 with the Society's permission to take, at my own cost, impressions of the plates, 

 after their use by the Society, for the pui'pose of the present work. 



Its issue in " Parts " exhausted the materials at my command in 1854, and I 

 thought that the new Fossil Reptiles, of which I received indications, would occupy 

 a concluding part of like size and number of plates with its forerunners. But the 

 acquisitions of fragmentary fossils, suggestive of new species or genera of Beptilia, 

 beguiled me into procrastinating hopes of reconstructions which, in some instances 

 have been fulfilled. In the excitement of such quests after draconic forms time 

 passes swiftly, and conviction becomes imperative that it must have a term. 

 Moreover, a Record of what may have been discovered of a given group or class of 

 Natural Objects, especially of Fossil Remains, with figures aiding recognition and 

 comparison, becomes a help and stimulus to rapid and extensive additions. The 

 attempt to grapple with these and make them usefully known has absorbed year 

 liy year such leisure as I could so devote after oflicial duties. The result is 

 summarised in the Indexes to Volumes I and III of the present work. 



