ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. XXIU 



fossils, and formed a private museum, such as has rarely if ever been 

 equalled. In the year 1835 he removed to Brighton, and four 

 years afterwards from thence to Clapham, near London, At the 

 time of his death he resided in Chester Square. When at Lewes, 

 he published his principal separate works, " The Illustrations of 

 the Geology of Sussex," and " The Fossils of the South Downs." 

 The latter work, which was first in point of date (1822), appeared 

 simultaneously with that of Cuvier and Brongniart upon the Geology 

 of the Environs of Paris, and many of the organic remains of the 

 Chalk were described in both works simultaneously and indepen- 

 dently. Whilst at Lewes he called attention to the interest and 

 beauty of the remains of fishes found in the Chalk, and it was there 

 that he commenced the series of observations which placed him in a 

 prominent position among British geologists. 



The attention of Dr. Mantell was early directed to the phsenomena 

 exhibited by the strata of the Wealden formation. His most im- 

 portant discoveries sprang out of the researches which he never 

 ceased to pursue amongst this his favourite group of rocks. At the 

 time of his death he was occupied with the preparation of a work 

 intended to embrace a general resume of all that had been done 

 about and among them at home and abroad. His location at an 

 early period of his professional career was exceedingly favourable 

 for these inquiries. He was assuredly the original demonstrator 

 of the fresh-water origin of the mass of Wealden beds, — a great step 

 in British geology. His observation of the conditions under which 

 existing fresh-water shells and other bodies of fluviatile origin were 

 imbedded in the alluvium of the valley of the Ouse, and even alter- 

 nated with marine exuviae, suggested the probability of the occurrence 

 of similar, but infinitely more ancient, phsenomena in the clays and 

 sands of the Weald, and careful research fully confirmed his 

 conjectures. With the Wealden, too, are connected his chief and 

 very memorable palseontological discoveries. Out of that formation 

 he procured the most interesting of the relics of prodigious extinct 

 reptiles, which owe to him their scientific appellations, and whose 

 remains will long constitute some of the chief attractions of the 

 great collection originally amassed by him, and now displayed 

 in the galleries of the British Museum. Whether we regard 

 his discovery and demonstration of the Iguanodon and its colossal 

 allies in a geological point of view, as characterizing distinctly 

 an epoch in time, or, with respect to their zoological value, as 

 filling up great gaps in the series of Vertebrata and elucidating 

 the organization of a lost order of reptiles, at once highest in its 

 class and most wonderful, we must, as geologists and naturalists, 

 feel that a large debt of gratitude is due to the indefatigable and 

 enthusiastic man, out of whose labours this knowledge arose. In the 

 group of Dinosaurian reptiles were some of the largest of terres- 

 trial animals. In their organization, whilst truly reptilian, they 

 approached the mammalian type. Their characters were so peculiar, 

 that of the value and distinctness of their order there can be no 

 question. Their osteology has been elaborated with skill and care, 



