萬物簡史 第102期:勢不兩立的科學(10)

It would be hard to think of a more overlookedperson in the history of paleontology than MaryAnning, but in fact there was one who came painfullyclose. His name was Gideon Algernon Mantell and hewas a country doctor in Sussex.

在古生物學史上，很難想得出還有誰比瑪麗·安寧更不受人重視，但實際上還有一個人的情況跟她差不多。他叫吉迪恩·阿爾杰農·曼特爾，是蘇塞克斯的一名鄉村醫生。

Mantell was a lanky assemblage of shortcomings—he was vain, self-absorbed, priggish,neglectful of his family—but never was there a more devoted amateur paleontologist. Hewas also lucky to have a devoted and observant wife. In 1822, while he was making a housecall on a patient in rural Sussex, Mrs. Mantell went for a stroll down a nearby lane and in a pileof rubble that had been left to fill potholes she found a curious object—a curved brown stone,about the size of a small walnut.

曼特爾有一大堆不足之處——他虛榮心強，只顧自己，自命不凡，不關心家庭——但再也找不出一名像他這樣投入的業余古生物學工作者。他還很有運氣，有一位既忠心耿耿又留心觀察的太太。1822年，他去蘇塞克斯農村出診的時候，曼特爾太太正順著附近的一條小路散步，在一堆用來填平路面凹坑的碎石里發現了一樣古怪的東西——一塊弧形的棕色骨頭，大約有小胡桃那么大小。

Knowing her husband's interest in fossils, and thinking it might be one, she took it to him.Mantell could see at once it was a fossilized tooth, and after a little study became certain that itwas from an animal that was herbivorous, reptilian, extremely large—tens of feet long—andfrom the Cretaceous period. He was right on all counts, but these were bold conclusions sincenothing like it had been seen before or even imagined.

她認為那是一塊化石。她知道自己的丈夫對化石很感興趣，便拿給了他。曼特爾馬上看出，那是一顆牙齒的化石。稍加研究以后，他斷定，這是一顆動物牙齒，那種動物生活在白堊紀，食草，爬行，體形龐大——有幾十米長。他的估測完全正確;但他的膽量也真夠大的，因為在此之前，即使在想像中，誰也沒有見過這樣的東西。