i895. HUXLEY. 127 



with Salter in 1859), on Glyptodon (Phil. Trans., 1865), on Belemnites 

 [Mem. Geol. Siivv., 1864), and on reptilian bones from the Triassic 

 Sandstones of Elgin [Mem. Geol. Snvv., iSyy). Most of Huxley's 

 researches in palaeontology, however, were desultory, with special 

 reference to the successive questions of broad philosophy which 

 presented themselves to his mind at different times. At one 

 period the Labyrinthodontia interested him much, as being on the 

 borderland between fishes, amphibians, and reptiles. He thus 

 described Anthvacosanrus from the Coal-Measures of Northum- 

 berland, Loxomma from the Lower Carboniferous of Scotland, 

 several small forms from the Coal-Measures of Kilkenny, Ireland, 

 besides skulls from South Africa and other interesting frag- 

 ments. At another time Huxley, simultaneously with Cope and 

 Phillips, was suddenly impressed with the remarkable resem- 

 blance between the hind-quarters of certain dinosaurian reptiles 

 and those of the ostrich-like (struthious) birds. This led to valuable 

 papers on the small Wealden dinosaur he named Hypsilophodon, on 

 Megalosaurus, on the supposed dinosaurian bones from the Trias of 

 Bristol, and on other more fragmentary remains from South Africa. 

 He concluded by separating Compsognathus from the dinosaurs proper, 

 then grouping these together in a major division, " Ornithoscelida." 

 In expanding the idea, he and his contemporaries expressed them- 

 selves a little too confidently as to the bridged gap between birds and 

 reptiles, which was then supposed to be filled ; and while gratefully 

 accepting the new facts, subsequent writers have refused to adopt, to 

 any noteworthy extent, Huxley's innovation in nomenclature. In 

 1875, there came the discovery that the gradual formation of the false- 

 palate, which throws back the internal nostrils to the top of the throat 

 in existing crocodiles, could be traced among the fossil crocodiles. 

 Hence, his paper read before the Geological Society of London on the 

 " Evolution of the Crocodilia." This, again, states many truths, and 

 is as important as his earlier discovery (made simultaneously with 

 Owen) of the reptihan nature of the supposed fish-scutes, Stagonolepis, 

 from Elgin. As in the case of dinosaurs and birds, however, the 

 conclusions concerning the evolution of the crocodiles are now proved 

 to have been pushed a little too far, the problem of their early 

 ancestry not being quite so simple as it appeared to be in 1875. The 

 papers on Telerpeton (1867) and Hyperodapedon (1859, 1869, 1887), 

 reptiles from the Triassic sandstones of Elgin, are also important as 

 emphasising the small differences to be observed between these old 

 types and the existing lizard, Sphenodon. Finally, his visit to 

 America enabled Huxley to co-operate with Professor Marsh in the 

 now famous paper of the American professor on the ancestry of the 

 horse, as revealed by the discoveries of early Tertiary hoofed animals 

 in the United States. 



More might be recorded, but this brief statement will give some 

 idea of the value and fundamental importance of Huxley's contri- 



