Case of Distortion of the Spine, with Observations on Rotation of the Vertebræ as a Complication of Lateral Curvature

THE late Gideon Mantell was born at Lewes, in the county of Sussex.He applied himself at an early age to the exploration of the fossils of the upper chalk formation, and on coming to London to attend the medical school of Bartholomew's Hospital, he took with him a collection of considerable extent.On his return to Lewes to engage in practice, he still continued his investigations, and it will easily be believed that his labours were great, inasmuch as his most remarkable and successful researches were carried into the Galt and Wealden rag,-in the hard and untractile masses of the latter he discovered the remains of those lost gigantic reptiles, the Megalosaurus and Iguanodon.Impaired health and other causes induced him to transfer his practice from Lewes to Brighton, and some time after he again moved, and settled at Clapham, where his personal labours as to his favorite pursuits were restricted to the collection and examination of the few fossils to be met with in the gravelly alluvium.It appears that in 1842, being 52 years of age, he suffered from excessive pain in the back, inducing him to apply an opiate liniment and leeches.Then he was thrown from his