Nos. 4 & 5.—The Iguanodon.
(Iguanodon Mantelli, Conybeare.)
One afternoon, in the spring of 1822, an accomplished lady, the wife of a medical practitioner, at Lewes, in Sussex, walking along the picturesque paths of Tilgate Forest, discovered some objects in the coarse conglomerate rock of the quarries of that locality, which, from their peculiar form and substance, she thought would be interesting to her husband, whose attention had been directed, during his professional drives, to the geology and fossils of his neighbourhood.
The lady was Mrs. Mantell: her husband, the subsequently distinguished geologist, Dr. Mantell,[44] perceived that the fossils discovered by his wife were teeth, and teeth of a large and unknown animal.
[44] “The first specimens of the teeth were found by Mrs. Mantell in the coarse conglomerate of the Forest, in the spring of 1822.”—Mantell, “Geology of the South-East of England,” 8vo, 1833, p. 268.
“As these teeth,” writes the doctor, “were distinct from any that had previously come under my notice, I felt anxious to submit them to the examination of persons whose knowledge and means of observation were more extensive than my own. I therefore transmitted specimens to some of the most eminent naturalists in this country and on the continent. But although my communications were acknowledged with that candour and liberality which constantly characterise the intercourse of scientific men, yet no light was thrown upon the subject, except by the illustrious Baron Cuvier, whose opinions will best appear by the following extract from the correspondence with which he honoured me:—
“‘These teeth are certainly unknown to me; they are not from a carnivorous animal, and yet I believe that they belong, from their slight degree of complexity, the notching of their margins, and the thin coat of enamel that covers them, to the order of reptiles.
“‘May we not here have a new animal!—a herbivorous reptile? And, just as at the present time with regard to mammals (land-quadrupeds with warm blood), it is amongst the herbivorous that we find the largest species, so also with the reptiles at the remote period when they were the sole terrestrial animals, might not the largest amongst them have been nourished by vegetables?
“‘Some of the great bones which you possess may belong to this animal, which, up to the present time, is unique in its kind. Time will confirm or confute this idea, since it is impossible but that one day a part of the skeleton, united to portions of jaws with the teeth, will be discovered.’”
“These remarks,” Dr. Mantell proceeds to say, “induced me to pursue my investigations with increased assiduity, but hitherto they have not been attended with the desired success, no connected portion of the skeleton having been discovered. Among the specimens lately connected, some, however, were so perfect, that I resolved to avail myself of the obliging offer of Mr. Clift (to whose kindness and liberality I hold myself particularly indebted), to assist me in comparing the fossil teeth with those of the recent Lacertæ in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons. The result of this examination proved highly satisfactory, for in an Iguana which Mr. Stutchbury had prepared to present to the College, we discovered teeth possessing the form and structure of the fossil specimens.” (Phil. Trans., 1825, p. 180.) And he afterwards adds:—“The name Iguanodon, derived from the form of the teeth, (and which I have adopted at the suggestion of the Rev. W. Conybeare,) will not, it is presumed, be deemed objectionable.” (Ib. p. 184.)
The further discovery which Baron Cuvier’s prophetic glance saw buried in the womb of time, and the birth of which verified his conjecture that some of the great bones collected by Dr. Mantell belonged to the same animal as the teeth, was made by Mr. W. H. Bensted, of Maidstone, the proprietor of a stone-quarry of the Shanklin-sand formation, in the close vicinity of that town. This gentleman had his attention one day, in May, 1834, called by his workmen to what they supposed to be petrified wood in some pieces of stone which they had been blasting. He perceived that what they supposed to be wood was fossil bone, and with a zeal and care which have always characterised his endeavours to secure for science any evidence of fossil remains in his quarry, he immediately resorted to the spot. He found that the bore or blast by which these remains were brought to light, had been inserted into the centre of the specimen, so that the mass of stone containing it had been shattered into many pieces, some of which were blown into the adjoining fields. All these pieces he had carefully collected, and proceeding with equal ardour and success to the removal of the matrix from the fossils, he succeeded after a month’s labour in exposing them to view, and in fitting the fragments to their proper places.