348 PETRIFACTIONS AND THEIR TEACHINGS. CHAP. III. 



The skeleton is attached to the slab of stone by its dorsal 

 aspect, consequently the under surface of the lower jaw, and 

 the series of cervical vertebrae, is exposed. The pectoral arch, 

 with its large coracoids and anchylosed scapulae and clavicles, 

 is well preserved ; the humerus, radius, and ulna, of each 

 side are in situ, and the right carpus, and some of the pha- 

 langes. The sterno-costal arcs of the abdominal region are 

 beautifully shown ; and the pubic and ischiac bones of the 

 pelvis are clearly developed there are no anchylosed sacral 

 vertebrae in the Plesiosaurus. The femora, tibiae, and fibulae, 

 and many of the tarsal and digital bones of the paddles, are 

 likewise well denned ; and the series of caudal vertebrae, 

 though dislocated from the sacrum, and thrown out of the 

 normal position, is very distinct. 



This specimen was figured and described by Dr. Buckland 

 and other authors as Plesiosaurus dolichodeirus ; but Professor 



" it happened that a person of Street, by name Creese, a quarrier, a 

 worthy man enow, came across the Triatarsostinus a few days before, 

 and as I had given him no inconsiderable monies for the bones that he 

 had met with in the course of his business, he was at the pains of taking 

 it home in hopes of getting more. The Philistines from Dan to Beer- 

 sheba know what a vile tendency to mischief every beautiful object that 

 he can set his paw upon disgraces John Bull.",' 



Mr. Hawkins found that in the attempt to clear the specimen, the 

 men had broken it into a hundred pieces, and lost many of the frag- 

 ments. The narrative thus proceeds : 



" May heaven forgive me magna componere parvis I have never 

 forgiven the Goths that sacked the Eternal City, the infamous Caliph 

 that destroyed the Alexandrian library nor these men ! When I came 

 to Street so opportunely, they had thrown away nearly the whole of the 

 two anterior paddles, and the whole of the posterior right one they had 

 reduced the flag-stone to nearly thirty pitiful pieces, and stabbed the 

 bone as a Spanish Matadore does a bull all over. But I should congratu- 

 late myself upon such fortune as fell to my lot, and thank the stars and 

 the cholera that it was no worse, as had I not arrived at that very four 

 of the clock in the afternoon, Bruin had resolved to chissel away the 

 surface of the stone, never dreaming that the process would have swept 

 away the bones too ! 



" Creese paid a severe penalty for his temerity : instead of giving him 

 as much as my conscience told me was the worth of it a rule that I 

 have never departed from but in this deserving instance I was content 

 to pay him liberally for the trouble he had been at in noticing it. The 

 rest of the chapter is short. Some parts of the three minor paddles 

 are recovered. 1 forgot the pestilence, sat up at work all day and all 

 night, and in about two months the Triatarsostinus, my hewn-god, was 

 finished." 



