264 



FOSSIL MONITOR. 



the gavial, and have a longer snout than that of the ani- 

 mal of Honfleur, and may therefore belong to the other 

 fossil species found in France. 3. That the remains of an 

 unknown species of fossil crocodile was found near New- 

 ark, in Nottinghamshire, by Dr. Stukely. 4. That the 

 supposed crocodiles found along with fish in the cop- 

 per slate, or bituminous marl slate, of Thuringia, are 

 reptiles of the genus monitor. 5. Lastly, that all these 

 fossil remains of oviparous quadrupeds belong to very 

 old flo3tz strata, far older than the floetz rocks that con- 

 tain unknown genera of quadrupeds, such as the palce- 

 otheriums and anoplotheriums ; which opinion, however, 

 does not oppose the finding of the remains of crocodiles 

 with those of these genera, as has been done in the gyp- 

 sum quarries.^ 



Monitor. 



In the well-known quarries of Macstricht there occur 

 remains of a large fossil monitor. This species, which 

 is one of the most celebrated of all the fossil species of 

 oviparous quadrupeds, occurs in a soft limestone which 

 contains flint, and the same kinds of petrifactions as are 

 observed in the chalk near Paris. Even so early as the 

 year 1T66 it had engaged the attention of inquirers, and 

 up to the present day has not ceased to be an object of 

 discussion and investigation among naturalists. Some 

 have described it as a crocodile, others as a whale; and it 

 has even been arranged along with fishes. Cuvier, after 



* Sir Everard Home has described, in the Transactions of the Royal 

 Society of London for the year 1814, the fossil remains of an animal 

 possessing characters partly of the crocodile, partly of the species of 

 the class of fishes. It was found in a blue-coloured clayey limestone, 

 named .Lias, on the estate of Henry Host Henley, Esq. between Lyine 

 and Charmoutji, in Dorsetshire, and is now in the museum of Mr 

 Bullock of London, 



