330 [December, 



Upon the right side the second and third superior molars, and the first and 

 second inferior are exposed to view, the others, excepting the first superior, 

 which has been shed, are enveloped in the matrix in which the fossil was im 

 bedded. Upon the left side the three inferior molars are preserved nearly entire. 



The alveoli for the superior incisors remain and are very large, and leave no 

 interval between them and the canine. 



The interval between the latter and the second molar is unusually large, being 

 7 lines. 



The chin is broken away but ten lines anterior to the first molar, the anterior 

 broken margin of the jaw at its upper part is only one line thick, and presents no 

 disposition to expand for the reception of the inferior canines. The coronoid 

 process is very short, being only nine lines. The face above the infra-orbitar 

 canals is very broad, and its anterior aspect with the forehead form a very abrupt 

 angle with the parietal crest, or the forehead is very high above the post orbitar 

 processes. 



measurements . 



Length from occipital condyles to incisive alveoli of upper jaw, 6J inches. 



Breadth of face above infra-orbiter foramina, . . 11 lines. 



Breadth of canine at base of crown. 7 " 



Thickness 4 



Dr. L. also made the cranium of a Musk-rat, obtained from a marl pit in New 

 Jersey, presented this evening by Dr. Burtt, the subject of the following remarks. 

 He observed, the specimen served as a hint to be cautious how we refer remains 

 of animals of a recent character to older formations. There are preserved in the 

 cabinet of the Academy fragments of a lower jaw, tibia, and antler of a deer, and 

 the cranium of a beaver, which were also found in digging marl in New Jersey. 

 All the specimens have the color of true marl fossils, but it is evident from the 

 character of the animals to which the remains belong, that they are only acci- 

 dental inhabitants of the Green Sand. They may have fallen into a narrow fissure 

 of a marl bed which was afterwards closed up, or they may have sunken in marl 

 mud on the banks of a stream, whose bed afterwards may have been filled up by 

 drift material, and thus the mode of access to the marl be obliterated. In the 

 cabinet is a specimen of the distal extremity of an os femoris of a Snipe, found in 

 the New Jersey marl, and described by Dr. Harlan* as a true fossil of the latter, 

 but this is also a fragment of a recent animal belonging to the same category as 

 the bones above mentioned. It is doubtful whether birds appeared very anterior 

 to the Eocene period ; the ornithicnites of the new Red Sandstone may yet prove 

 to be of reptilian origin. 



Dr. Fisher remarked, in relation to tbe fruit of the Palm, presented 

 this evening, that it was probably the fruit of the Corozo, mentioned by 

 Humboldt in his "Aspects of Nature," as being the smallest of the 

 Cocoa Palms. 



Med. and Phys. Researches, p. 280. 



