128 
LIFE OF DEAN BUCK LAND. 
[CH. V. 
underground must be abandoned. ‘ We may absolve him 
from the imputation of being a borough-monger; indeed, 
from what I before said, you will have concluded that he was 
rather a radical.’ He concluded with pointing out that 
as the structure of the sloth was beautifully fitted for the 
purpose for which he was intended, so was the megatherium 
for his habits. ‘ Buffon therefore, and Cuvier even, in de¬ 
scribing the sloth, and Cuvier the megatherium, as awkward, 
erred. They are as admirably formed as the gazelle,’ etc. 
It was the best thing I ever heard Buckland do.” 1 
In the possession of the writer is the original manuscript 
from which Buckland gave the lecture, written out for him 
in his wife’s clear handwriting. From this document a 
few extracts may be given which will show the careful 
manner in which he arrived at the habits, form, and 
character of this monstrosity, whose fossil remains arrived 
at such a very opportune time. 
“ It has occurred that within these few days there 
has arrived in London a large portion of an animal 
apparently the most monstrous of the monster kind, an 
animal of which one fragment only had, till within the last 
few days, ever reached this country. The fragment to 
which I allude has been for several years in the Ashmolean 
Museum, to which it was presented by his late Royal 
Highness the Duke of York—this a portion, and an 
unimportant portion, of the skeleton of the animal whose 
entire restoration you there see,' 2 a restoration not founded 
1 u Life of Sir Charles Lyell,” vol. i., p. 3S8. 
,J A very fine skeleton of the megatherium is to be seen in the Natural 
History Museum, Cromwell Road. It is a cast, while that at the College 
of Surgeons is partly Sir Woodbine Parish's original specimen placed 
there in 1832 and partly a restoration. Dr. Buckland took the greatest 
pains and interest in setting up the bones, and persuaded Sir Francis 
Chantrey, one of his oldest and most intimate friends, to allow casts 
of them to be taken in his foundry. From his friend Dr. Clift’s 
