[1] We thank our correspondent for the above communication on
one of the most interesting phenomena of British geology; for,
as we hinted in our last, the pleasantest hours of our sojourn
at Margate, about three years since, were passed in the
watchmaker's museum, nearly opposite the Marine Library, which
collection contains many Sheppey fossils, especially a _prawn_,
said to be the only one in England. We remember the proprietor
to have been a self-educated man: he had been to the museum at
Paris twice or thrice, and spoke in high terms of the courteous
reception he met with from M Cuvier; and we are happy to
corroborate his representations. With respect to the _reptile_,
or, as we should say, _insect_, alluded to in the preceding
letter, we suppose it to have been a vermicular insect, similar
to those inhabiting the _cells_ of _corallines_, of whose tiny
labours, in the formation of coral islands, we quoted a spirited
poetical description in No. 279 of the MIRROR. Corallines much
resemble fossil or petrified wood; and we recollect to have
received from the landlady of an inn at Portsmouth a small
branch of _fossil wood_, which she asserted to be _coral_, and
_that_ upon the authority of scores of her visiters; but the
fibres, &c. of the wood were too evident to admit of a dispute.
* * * * *