Now, the Scripture flood (and we may be allowed to say, we are not trying to explain away the fact of the deluge,[100] nor to weaken the strength of the Mosaic narrative, but the very contrary) was a most extraordinary event. Not only were the “windows of heaven opened,” but the “fountains of the great deep” were broken up, and if it had left any traces of its action, they would have been of a heterogeneous and diluvial character; whereas in the Wealden, as elsewhere, the fossils occur in the most orderly and quiet manner, preserving in many cases those exquisite forms of beauty which distinguished them during life. Without entering more fully into details of the fossil remains of this period, we shall conclude this chapter by a reference to one of the vast saurians whose remains have been disinterred from the Wealden. Many years ago Dr. Mantell discovered, in a quarry at Cuckfield in Sussex, a tooth, which he took up to the Geological Society of London; it was altogether unlike any tooth he had hitherto found, but yet it was so common, that the quarrymen had broken many of them up to mend the roads. The most eminent geologists of the day were puzzled extremely with this tooth. One thought it belonged to a fish; another, that it belonged to an unknown herbivorous mammal; and a third, who was right, that it belonged to a herbivorous reptile. Sir Charles Lyell was at that time about to visit Paris, and the tooth, and that alone, was shown to Cuvier, who at once pronounced it to be the tooth of a rhinoceros. In the process of time other fossil remains were found, portions of jaws, cervical, dorsal, and caudal vertebræ; and on Cuvier seeing these, with the magnanimity of a truly great mind, he frankly avowed his error, and said, “I am entirely convinced of my error in pronouncing it to be the tooth of a rhinoceros.” Shortly after, Dr. Mantell was fortunate enough to procure the skeleton of an iguana,[101] and he found that the fossil teeth found in Tilgate forest bore a close resemblance to the teeth of the iguana. The teeth of the iguana were found to be small, closely set, and serrated like the edge of a saw, not so much for crushing victims, as for champing and grinding its vegetable food; this corresponded precisely with the fossil teeth found, and after long and careful deliberation, the name given to this crocodile lizard, and the name which it retains, was Iguanodon, or the reptile with teeth like the iguana.