xl 
view the minute defects incidental to every numerous assemblage of 
men, to watch with critical fastidiousness the taste of every word 
which might be uttered by individuals amongst us, instead of casting a 
master’s eye over the work which has been done, and is doing, at our 
meetings, is no mark of superior discernment and comprehensive wis- 
dom, but is evidence rather of a confinement to narrow views, and an 
indulgence of vain and ignoble passions. 
But to proceed with our useful efforts,—one of the principal ob- 
jects of our Annual Volumes, is the publication in the most authentic 
form of the results of special researches, undertaken by the request, 
and prosecuted in many instances at the cost, of the Association. It 
is a trite remark, that if a man of talent has but fair play, he will soon 
secure to himself his due place in public estimation. We fully admit 
the truth of this in many instances, and above all where the points of 
research are connected with commerce and the useful arts ; but many 
also are the subtile threads of knowledge, which, destined at some 
future day to be woven into the great web in which all the sciences are 
knit together, are yet not appreciable to the vulgar eye, and if simply 
submitted to public judgment, would too often meet with silent neglect. 
Numberless, we say, are the subjects (and if your Association exceeds 
a centenary, still more numerous will they be) with which the retired 
and skilful man may wish to grapple, and still be deterred by his want 
of opportunity or of means. Thenis it that, adopting the well-balanced 
recommendations of the men in whose capacity and rectitude you con- 
fide, you step forward with your aids, and bring about these recondite 
researches, the result of which, in the volume under our notice, we now 
proceed to consider. 
The first of these inquiries to which we advert, you called for at the 
hands of Professor Owen, upon “British Fossil Reptiles,” one of the 
branches of Natural History, on a correct knowledge of which the 
development of geology is intimately dependent. 
The merits of the author selected for this inquiry are now widely 
recognized, and he has, with justice, been approved as the worthy suc- 
cessor of John Hunter, that illustrious Scotchman who laid the founda- 
tion of comparative anatomy in the British isles. That this science is 
now taking a fresh spring, would, we are persuaded, be the opinion of 
Cuvier himself, could that eminent man view the progress which our 
young countryman is making towards the completion of the temple of 
which the French naturalist was the great architect. It is therefore a 
pleasing reflection, that when we solicited Professor Owen to work 
out this subject, we did not follow in the wake of Europe’s praise, but 
