174 Miscellanies. 



and also various remains of marine plants in chalk. Among the 

 most interesting objects in this museum, are the fossils from the Sus- 

 sex beds beneath the chalk formation. Many of the vegetables ap- 

 pear allied to the ferns and palms, &;c. of tropical climates, and 

 prove the existence of dry land, at or before the period when the 

 strata that contain them were deposited. Of these vegetable remains 

 there are numerous fine specimens in this collection, comprising all 

 the fossil species discovered in Sussex. But it is the remains of 

 large animals evidently formed for walking on land, that renders the 

 museum of Mr. Mantell so unique. In the strata of Tilgate Forest, 

 Mr. M. has identified no less than four gigantic reptiles. The Igua- 

 nodon, so named from its resemblance in many respects to the living 

 Iguana, is justly regarded by Mr. M. as the most gratifying result of 

 his labors. To form some nodon of the immense magnitude of this 

 animal, it may be useful to mention, that I measured the circumfer- 

 ence of the condyle, or joint of a thigh-bone, in the museum, and 

 found it to be thirty-five inches ! and the thigh-bone of a larger ani- 

 mal at a distance from the condyle, measured twenty-five inches m 

 circumference ; were this thigh clothed with muscles and integu- 

 ments of suitable proportions, where is the living animal with a limb 

 that could rival this extremity of a lizard of the primiuve ages of the 

 world ? 



"Among the other bones in this museum, from Tilgate Forest, 

 there are some of one or more species of birds. It ought, however, 

 to be remarked, that as the supposed bird's bones found in the Lias, 

 have been discovered to belong to a flying lizard, it may be doubtful 

 whether these bones do not belong to a similar species of reptile ; 

 Mr. M., whose authority as a comparative anatomist ought to have 

 great weight, is, however, inclined to refer these bones to birds. — 

 There are also the remains of three species of Turtles from the Sus- 

 sex beds, two of which are supposed to be fresh-water ; the remains 

 of fishes are also numerous : they consist chiefly of detached bones, 

 teeth, and scales; no entire skeleton has been found. 



" A very satisfactory description of the Fossils and Strata of Til-- 

 gate Forest, is given in the second volume of Mr. Mantell's Illustra- 

 tions of the Geology of Sussex, a work which ought to be in every 

 library where natural history is cultivated : the forty-two plates of the 

 first volume, it has already been mendoned, were engraved by Mrs. 

 Mantell, without whose able co-operation it would have been impos- 

 sible for Mr. M., occupied as he is in the arduous labors of an exten- 



