ROOM III. PLESIOSAURUS HAWKIKSTI. 347 



" the water, by the suddenness and agility of the attack which 

 they enabled it to make on every animal fitted for its prey 

 that came within its extensive sweep." l 



PLESIOSAURUS HAWKINSII. Wall-case D. The splendid 

 specimen thus labelled (Lign. 73) in the upper compartment 

 of this Case, was one of the earliest examples placed before the 

 scientific world by Mr. Hawkins, as evidence of his consum- 

 mate skill, and untiring patience and perseverance, in develop- 

 ing the enaliosaurian skeletons from the liassic deposits of 

 England. This fossil, beautifully perfect as it now appears, 

 was reduced to fragments in removing it from the stratum 

 in which it was discovered, and as in the instance of the 

 Maidstone specimen, would have thrown no light on the 

 structure of the original animal, but for the successful result 

 of the labour bestowed on its reparation. 2 



1 " Geol. Trans." vol. i. new series, pp. 388, 389. 



2 The following account of the discovery of this specimen is too 

 graphic and characteristic to be omitted. Premising that the specimen 

 named as above by Professor Owen is described by Mr. Hawkins as 

 Plesiosaurus triatarsostinus, I give the following extract from the 

 " Memoirs of Ichthyosauri and Plesiosauri, extinct monsters of the 

 ancient earth," by Thomas Hawkins, Esq. F.G.S.* 



" I was spending the winter of 1831, as usual, in London the pesti- 

 lence came just in time to drive me thence to Somerset, for the salva- 

 tion of the Triatarsostinus. Listen, reader ! December gave up the 

 ghost amidst a thousand frightful rumours of the coming cholera : if 

 I remember right, the first of January, 1832, is mournfully distinguished 

 as the day on which one of the morning papers announced ' the scourge ' 

 present iu Southwark. Who will ever forget the panic that followed? 

 London was comparatively deserted within twenty-four hours. Tuesday 

 six cases were bulletined as having occurred since its breaking out a 

 distinguished physician assured me that 600 were nearer the truth; 

 along the Borough bank of the Thames, in those crowded houses, what 

 havoc and death ! 



" Wednesday fatal cases trebled about twenty were publicly acknow- 

 ledged at least a hundred and twenty known to the intelligent few. 

 Ah ! I was smoking cigars on the box of the Bath mail all the night, 

 and at ten o'clock, Thursday, galloping over the Mendips the British 

 Alps on " the Exeter." The first thing that 1 ever do when 1 come to 

 Glastonbury, is to call on my friend my Pythias there : the second, 

 to drink a cup of cofifee as sedative after my 140 miles journey ; the 

 third is to dash over to the lias quarries at a neck-hazard tangent. Now 



* In one vol. royal folio, with numerous beautiful plates, 1834. 

 Copies of this splendid and scarce work may be obtained of Professor 

 Tennant, 149, Strand. 



