64 PAPERS, ETC. 



During one of my visits to Ilminster, happening to go 

 into a quarry which had not been worked for some years, I 

 found a small piece of stone having traces of the rib bones 

 of an Ichthyosaurus. As no more could then be found, I 

 was somewhat careless about its preservation. However, 

 it was preserved. Next year, in the same place, I found 

 anotber plece, which was also taken care of. Thia was the 

 moi'c fortunate, since two yeai's after, in visiting the same 

 locality, I perceived in the section of the quany indications 

 of more of the creature, and piece by piece I was enabled 

 to disentomb a Saurian, the first traces of which I had 

 four years before discovered. Owing to a considerable 

 amount of other geological labour, I have not finlshed 

 Clearing this specimen, and if I had, it would have been too 

 large to have brought with me. I have therefore been con- 

 tent to bring but a small part of it as its representative. 

 In the clay in which this specimen was found are some am- 

 monites, and I thought, when at work, I had dug up a 

 couple, and was about to throw them away; but seeing 

 a pecularity in them, I was led to look more narrowly, 

 and then I found it was part of the Ichthyosaui-us, — 

 actually its eyes lying loose in the clay. They display 

 very distinctly the character of the eye of the Ichthyosaurus, 

 which is made up of a number of horny plates — in fact, 

 they served the purpose of a telescope, and, by being 

 contracted or enlarged, enabled the creature to see to a 

 greater or lesser distance, a provision of Providence, which 

 the more readUy enabled it to supply its voracious 

 appetite. Nothing came amiss to it, even the young 

 and the weaker of its own kind, being occasionally made 

 to minister to its wants. Of these Saurians, including those 

 from the lower Lias, I have many fine specimens. In the 

 lower Lias the Plesiosaurus is associated with the Ichthyo- 



