228 PETRIFACTIONS AND THEIR TEACHINGS. CHAP. III. 



DISCOVERY OF THE IGUANODON. Soon after my first dis- 

 covery of bones of colossal reptiles in the strata of Tilgate 

 Forest, some teeth of a very remarkable character particu- 

 larly excited my curiosity, for they were wholly unlike any 

 that had previously come under my observation ; even the 

 quarrymen accustomed to collect the remains of fishes, shells, 

 and other objects imbedded in the rocks, had not observed 

 fossils of this kind ; and until shown some specimens which 

 I had extracted from a block of stone, were not aware of the 

 presence of such teeth in the stone they were constantly 

 breaking up for the roads. 



The first specimen that arrested my attention was a large 

 tooth, which from the worn, smooth, and oblique surface, of the 



crown, had evidently belonged 

 to an herbivorous animal; 

 and so entirely resembled 

 in form the corresponding 

 part of an incisor of a large 

 pachyderm ground down by 

 use, that I was much embar- 

 rassed to account for its pre- 



The crown worn down below the lateral j n w hich, according to all g6O- 

 denticulations. i i & 



a. Posterior aspect. logical experience, no fossil 



b. Anterior aspect. remains of mammalia would 

 ever be discovered; and as no known existing reptiles are 

 capable of masticating their food, I could not venture to 

 assign the tooth in question to a saurian. 



As my friend Mr. (now Sir Charles) Lyell was about to 

 visit Paris, I availed myself of the opportunity of submitting 

 it to the examination of Baron Cuvier, with whom I had the 

 high privilege of corresponding : and, to my astonishment, 

 learned from my friend, that M. Cuvier, without hesitation, 

 pronounced it to be an upper incisor of a Rhinoceros. 1 



1 It is delightful to quote the following generous admission of this 

 mistake recorded by the illustrious Cuvier himself in his immortal work. 

 " Des fragmens d'os du metacarpe ou du m6tatarse sont si gros qu'un 

 premier coup-d'oeil jeles avoir pris pour ceux d'un grand hippopotame." 

 " Avec ces os M. Mantell en a trouve" de crocodile, de tortue, de plesiosau- 

 rus, de cetace's, et d'oiseaux, et il en a recueilli aussi dont il n'est pas 

 possible d'assigner le genre. On ne peut trop 1'encourager dans le pro- 



