REVIEW, 



119 



was a carnivorous animal or not is still, and will probably always remain, in 

 great doubt. The enormous claws are in favour of such a conclusion ; but 

 the evidence of the mouth is against it, which is merely furnished with common 

 grinders, without fangs, or any traces of them, though' that part of the skeleton 

 is entirely perfect. The neck is long enough to touch the ground. It is 

 evidently of the cat kind, and appears to have been a sort of gigantic tiger. 

 The breadth of the animal and the solidity of its bones are wonderfully striking." 



Can you inform your readers whether the remarkable fossil animal above 

 mentioned is still in the museum at Madrid ; and whether it has been seen and 

 described by anyone who (from the great advances made in geology of late 

 years), is better qualified to give a more particular and scientific account of it 

 than the writer of these travels ? — Qu.lry. 



Errata in Mr. Prestwich's Paper on Cliff Section at Mundesley, 

 Norfolk. — At page 70, 9th line, omit reference mark (g) ; 30th line, for 

 littoralis read littorea. 



REVIEW. 



The Cleveland Ironstone. By J. Bewick. London : John Weale. 1860. 



In a paper which appears in our pages this month upon the geology of 

 Cleveland, the writer has made a casual reference to the volume before us, by 

 Mr. Bewick, which has very lately appeared from the press ; but as it is in- 

 tended to be an exhaustive treatise on the subject, it demands a more particular 

 notice than we might otherwise have bestowed upon it. 



The volume shows a vast amount of observation amongst the strata of the 

 district, and gives a tediously-minute history of the development of the Lias 

 iron-seams in the Whitby district, where their commercial value appears first 

 to have been recognised. We may date the birth of their importance, indeed, 

 from the year 1838, when the Wylam Iron Company leased the ironstone on 

 the estate of the Marquis of Normanby. Mr. Bewick's observations, however, 

 are too much confined throughout to what is usually called the " Grosmont 

 district," which has now been outstripped in point of importance by the dis- 

 coveries in the neighbourhood of Guisborough. 



When the writer speaks of the fossils of the Lower Lias as "the remains of 

 antediluvian animals which enjoyed life, in all probability, at a date far beyond 

 our chronology," he will find few geologists to dispute the probability; but 

 wheu he longs for " some Newton to teach us more than we know of the birth 

 of matter" the probability of his hopes being realized is scarcely so well 

 founded. In most pages there is work for a judiciously handled pruning-knife ; 

 whilst there are within them the elements of a scientific treatise of the greatest 

 value. The inaccuracies which we notice in the present volume might easily 

 be rectified, and much interesting matter added, which is now wanting. We 

 do not certainly see any reason for "inferring" from any facts which the 

 volume contains, " that the rocks upon which the Lias rests are of a very un- 

 even character," although such may undoubtedly be the case. When, again, 

 the basaltic dyke, which intersects the district, is referred to as the " probable 

 disturbing element" by which the rocks in Commondale are said to be uplifted 

 on their edges, a glance at the phenomena there exhibited would at once nega- 

 tive such a supposition : on each side of the dyke, the strata retain their hori- 

 zontal position, or whatever inclination they may have had previously, without 



