3 
and for engraving most of my plates. I have also had the assistance 
of the British Tertiary Club in naming many of the new fossils. With 
my friends Mr. F. Edwards and Mr. G. A. Coombe, I have passed 
many pleasant days at Selsey in collecting specimens. To all these 
gentlemen I return my sincere thanks for their valuable assistance, 
since without their aid I should not have written the account of 
Bracklesham Bay: there are still many accuracies, nor do I publish 
it as anything more than an advanced catalogue of the Eocene fossils 
of this country. 
To some of my readers, a few observations may not be unacceptable 
in reference to the general utility and objects of geological research. 
Geology may be considered a new science. It is the investigation 
of the substances that constitute the earth’s surface, and the revolu- 
tions which that surface has undergone in former years and is still 
undergoing. The geologist may be considered as the historian of the 
changes of the world, who not only gives an account of its large divi- 
sions, minerals, and strata, but inquires into the various characters of 
the lost tribes of plants and animals which once inhabited the globe. 
The ancients knew nothing of this science, nor do we find it a sub- 
ject occupying much attention before the last century. It is true, at 
all periods fossil bones and petrifactions have occupied the attention 
of philosophers ; nor must the work of the elder Pliny be forgotten : 
but it is only within the last fifty years that any scientific arrangement 
of the earth’s surface has been formed, and divided into the Primary, 
Secondary, and Tertiary periods. The Germans have been most con- 
spicuous in the investigation of the Primary strata; the Secondary 
formations with their fossil contents have engaged the peculiar atten- 
tion of the English; and the French, guided by the illustrious Cuvier, 
Brongniart, Lamarck, and Deshayes, have minutely examined and 
clearly explained the Tertiary period. 
B2 
