192 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 



organic remains, had long since attracted the attention of naturalists, and rendered these quarries 

 celebrated throughout Europe. In 1770, M. Hoffman, the surgeon of the Fort, who had for some 

 years been assiduously collecting the fossils of this locality, had the good fortune to discover 

 a specimen which has conferred an enduring celebrity on his name. Some workmen, on blasting 

 the rock in one of the caverns of the interior of the mountain, perceived to their astonishment 

 the jaws of a large animal attached to the roof of the chasm. The discovery was immediately 

 made known to M. Hoffman, who repaired to the spot, and for weeks presided over the arduous 

 task of separating the mass of stone containing these remains from the surrounding rock. His 

 labours were rewarded by the successful extrication of the specimen, which he conveyed in 

 triumph to his house. This extraordinary discovery soon became the subject of general conver- 

 sation, and upon reaching the ears of the Canon of the cathedral which stands on the mountain, 

 excited in that functionary a determination to claim the fossil, in right of being lord of the 

 manor ; and he unfortunately succeeded, after a long and harassing lawsuit, in obtaining this 

 precious relic. It remained for years in his possession, and Hoffman died without regaining his 

 treasure, or receiving any compensation. At length the French revolution broke out, and the 

 armies of the republic advanced to the gates of Maestricht. The town was bombarded ; but at 

 the suggestion of the committee of savans who accompanied the French troops to select their 

 share of plunder, the artillery was not suffered to bombard that part of the city in which the 

 celebrated fossil was known to be preserved. In the mean time, the Canon of St. Peter's, 

 shrewdly suspecting the reason why such peculiar favour was shown to his residence, removed 

 the specimen, and concealed it in a vault ; but when the city was taken, the French authorities 

 compelled him to give up his ill-gotten prize, which was immediately transmitted to the Jardin 

 des Plantes, at Paris, where it still forms one of the most striking objects in that magnificent 

 collection.' 



The beautiful model of this most interesting fossil in the British Museum, was presented to 

 me by Baron Cuvier. It is four and a half feet long, and two and a half wide ; it consists of the 

 jaws, with teeth, palatal bones, and the tympanic bone, or os quadratum, a bone possessed by 

 reptiles, as well as birds, and in which the auditory cells are contained. There are likewise some 

 fine portions of jaws, with teeth, in the British Museum, presented by Camper. The original 

 animal was probably a terrestrial reptile, holding an intermediate place between the Monitors and 

 Iguanas. It was about twenty-five feet long. 



I discovered, many years since (1820), some vertebrfe in the chalk near Lewes, which closely 

 resemble the corresponding bones of the Mosasaurus, and in all probability belong to another 

 species. In the cretaceous strata of New Jersey, Dr. Harlan found and described, and my 

 friend. Dr. Morton, of Philadelphia, sent me, in 1834, teeth which cannot be distinguished from 

 those of Maestricht. Vertebrte, and other bones, have since been obtained from the same deposits 

 by Professor Rogers, and described by Professor Owen in the Geological Journal. 



XVI. Fossil Reptiles. Although when Mr. Parkinson's work was published many fossil bones 

 and teeth of reptiles had been discovered in various parts of England, yet the abundance and 

 variety, and the extraordinary modification of form and structure of this class of vertebrated animals, 

 which prevailed throughout the secondary geological formations, were not for a moment suspected. 

 The few examples of the remains of fossil reptiles described by Mr. Parkinson, serve to mark the 



' Faujus St. Fond, in whose beautiful work on the fossils of St. Peter's Mountain the above account is given, remarks 

 with much sang froid, " La justice, quoique tardive, arrive enfin avec le tems ! " The reader will probably think that although 

 the Canon was justly despoiled of his ill-gotten treasure, the French mvans were a very equivocal personification of Jiisiice ! 



