A Naturalist's Valentine. By a Palaeontologist

BORNE upon Pterodactyle’s wing,
This heart, which once you deemed of stone,
Model of maids, to thee I bring,
And offer it to thee alone!
Not Owen pondering o’er bone
Of great Dinorius, fonder grew
Of mighty wingless birds unknown,
Than I, sweet maid, of you.

The Glyptodon, which Darwin found
Beside the South Atlantic main,
Was in no harder armour bound
Than that my spirit did enchain;
Till, bade by thee, love rent in twain
The fetters which my fancy tied
To boulder, glacier, and moraine,
And bore me to thy side!

Like some fantastic trilobite,
That perished in the Silurian sea,
And long lay hid from mortal sight,
So was the heart I yield to thee.
Now from its stony matrix free,
The palaeontologic skill
Once more hath called it forth to be
The servant of thy will.

EDWARD FORBES
Geological Society, Feb. 14

From: Daubeny, (1869) Fugitive Poems Connected with Natural History and Physical Science, 175-176.