SELBORNE SOCIETY NOTICES 
39 
deep rejiret, and a refolution was |>assed, and forwarded to Mrs. Wills, expressing 
the great lo.ss the Society would sustain hy the death of Mr. Wills, and the 
desire to place on record the invaluable work he had done in connection with 
the Society, first in the formation of the Branch, and afterwards in fulfilling the 
duties of President, and later on, of Vice-President, for so many years, only 
relinquishing the latter post a few weeks before his death. 
Clapton (Lower Lea Valley). — At the meeting of this Branch on 
Decenilier 19, Mr. C. K. Allnutt read a paper entitled “Snap-shots in Belgium 
and Biiltany,” which was accom[>anied with lantern-slides illustrating places 
visited during summer holidays, attention being particularly drawn to the stone 
monuments of Carnac. 
The paper, on January 16, was read by Mr. J. K. II. Gilbard, F.I.C., F.C.S., 
the subject being “ The Cause and Prevention of Decomposition.” The ptaper 
was ol great interest and of practical value, demonstrating, amongst other (acts, 
the beneficial action of sunlight in destroying harmful bacteria. 
Fehtuaiy 20. A jiaper entitled “Stones of English History,” by Mr. R. 
Marshman Wattson, with lantern illustrations. Sigdon Road Board School 
(opposite Hackney Downs Station, S.K.R.), 7.30. 
Hampstead. — February 29, lecture by Mr. F. P. Smith, entitled “Spiders, 
their Structure and Habits,” with lantern illustrations, Subscription Library, 
Prince Arthur Road, Hampstead, 8.15. 
SELBORNE SATURDAY AFTERNOONS. 
Januaty 16, 1904. — Over thirty members had a thoroughly delightful and 
intellectual treat in the demonstration given at the Natural History Museum, by 
Dr. C. W. Andrews, in the unavoidable absence of Dr. Sniith Woodward, on 
“ Fossil Reptiles.” Dr Andrews first called attention to the specimens of 
Amphibia, which differ from true reptiles, in that they undergo metamorphoses 
after leaving the egg. The Amphibia, comparatively speaking, are all small 
creatures nowadays, but in past ages, many of them were not at all insignificant. 
Mastodonsauius gi^anUus, from the Lower Keuper of Wiirtemberg, one of the 
Labyrmthodouts, has a skull a yard in length and proportionately broad. But 
in those far off times, it was among the true reptiles that size asserted itself. The 
foSsil skeletons of the Plesiosaurs, Ichthyosaurs, Dinosaurs and Pterosaurs, in the 
Reptile Gallery of the Museum,.make the Sea-serpent almost a possibility. The 
Plesiosaurs were air-breathing, carnivorous, marine animals, with the head of a 
lizard, teeth of a crocodile, neck serpent-like, paddles like those of a turtle, the 
trunk and tail resembling those of a quadruped. A young Plesiosaur, measuring 
six feet in his immature growth, looks quite small beside some of his full-grown 
brethren ranged around him. The Ichthyosaurs (fish-lizards) were so-named from 
their fish-like shape. Lyme Regis, in Dorsetshire, has produced the largest entire 
fish-lizard known at present. It measures over seven yards long and nearly three 
yards across the expanded paddles. The typical Ichthyosaur had a large head 
with long tapering snout, short neck, and trunk ending in a long slender tail. 
Its vertebrae were much better adapted for swimming movements than those of its 
contemporary, the Plesiossaur. A dislocation near the end of the vertebrae suggests 
the presence of a tail fin : the upper and b'wer arm bones are very short and the 
finger bones numerous. These form paddles, resembling the front flippers of the 
whale. The Dinosaurs possessed limbs well adapted for walking on land, but it 
is believed that many of them were amphibious in their habits. Compsognathus 
longipes was a small dinosaur that walked erect, or semi-erect, like a bird. 
The Sauropodous Dinosaurs, from their huge size and weight, suggest extremely 
laboured movements on land. Remains of them have been discovered in marine 
deposits, which makes it probable that they lived like the recently extinct .Sea 
Cow, close to the shore, and browsed on the sea-weed just below low-water mark. 
A sketch of one of these huge reptiles, restored, explains how it might have been 
possible for the animal to live in deep water and yet reach the surface to breathe 
without swimming. A colossal Iguamdon shows in the hind feet a marked 
resemblance to the feet of an extinct bird — the moa. The fore limbs of the 
Iguanodon are very short, so short that it seems hardly possible that the reptile 
could have made use of them in walking, and the massive tail almost precludes 
