CONSISTENCY OF GEOLOGY WITH SACRED HISTORY. 399 



Saurians or Lizards. 



Within a few years, the skeletons or disjointed bones of some very 

 large Oviparous animals of the Saurian family, namely, ancient croco- 

 diles, the ichthyosaurus or fish lizard, the megalosaurus or great liz- 

 ard, and the plesiosaurus, have been found in the recent secondary 

 rocks, especially of England and France, and some of them in the 

 tertiary. 



The Megalosaurus is found in limestones and sandstones lying 

 higher than the lias, and the ichthyosaurus and plesiosaurus are found 

 also in many of the strata above, and in some of those below that rock. 



The fossil crocodile appears to have been, anciently, an inhabitant 

 of fresh water, and of rivers, as at present. In the West Indies, ac- 

 cording to De La Beche, the crocodiles frequent muddy, and sometimes 

 brackish ponds ; and in shallows, they often remain for hours, with 

 the tips of their noses out of water. The organization and habits of 

 crocodiles, do not enable them to contend with the agitations of the 

 sea, which they shun. It would seem, however, that the organiza- 

 tion of the ichthyosaurus would enable him to swim in the waves. 



The crocodile has been continued, perhaps, from the new red sand- 

 stone — certainly from the lias, to the present time — and, as its remains 

 often occur in the interval, it appears to have been a tolerably constant 

 inhabitant of our globe. 



With one exception, that of the opossum, found in the Stonesfield 

 slate, near Oxford, (Eng.) no viviparous vertebrated animal has been 

 found below the chalk.* The Stonesfield slate belongs to the oolitic 

 series, and lies below the chalk. 



The remains of the Saurians, found, within a few years, in England 

 France, and other countries, indicate animals of twenty, forty, fifty, 

 and seventy feet or more in length. They were generally amphibi- 

 ous, and there is every reason to believe, that when only portions of 

 England stood out, as islands, above the water, these enormous ani- 

 mals swam and sported about, in the inter-insular waters of primitive 

 Britain, or basked upon the shores of its seas and estuaries. 



Mr. Mantell, of Lewes, in Sussex, England, has described another 

 enormous Saurian animal, the Iguanodon, (so called from his resem- 

 blance to the Iguana of the West Indies ;) it was an herbivorous rep- 

 tile, and appears to have attained the length of seventy fest or more 

 with a height of nine or ten feet. Still, his remains are interred in 



* Unless it be the East Windsor animal— Vide Am. Jour. Vol. IL 



