VERTEBRATE PALEONTOLOGY IN 1908 467 



and sauropterygians are furnished with terminal epiphyses ; 

 but, according to the author, such structures are present in 

 neither of the two groups. The long cone-like structures in 

 the humerus and femur of the Sauropterygia, which have 

 been described as epiphyses, are regarded by Mr. Moodie as 

 really parts of the diaphyses of the bone, corresponding with 

 homologous elements found in all other Sauropsida. 



Dr. Hay {Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., vol. xxxv., p. 161) has 

 supplemented his big memoir by a paper on five species of 

 North American fossil tortoises, of which four are new. 



Turning to the more generalised orders, a remarkable skull 

 from the Permian of Texas has been referred by Dr. W. D. 

 Matthew (Bull. Anier. Mus. Nat. Hist., vol. xxiv. p. 183) to 

 the Pelycosauria, with the designation Tetraceratops insignis. Its 

 most conspicuous feature is the presence of two pieces of 

 prominent bones, or " horns," rising respectively from the pre- 

 maxillae and the prefrontals. The skull apparently indicates 

 a reptile allied to Clepsy drops and Dimetrodon, and therefore 

 probably provided with a tall dorsal fin, supported by the 

 elongation of the spines of the vertebrae of the trunk. In 

 habits the creature, judging from its dentition, was certainly 

 predaceous. 



The eighth part of vol. iv. of the Annals of the South African 

 Museum contains no less than five papers by Dr. R. Broom 

 on the Permo-Triassic tetrapodous vertebrates of Cape Colony 

 and the adjacent districts. In the first the genus Propappus, 

 originally named from a single limb-bone, is considered by 

 the author to be distinct from Pariasaurus, having, among 

 other peculiarities, a dermal armour on the spinal region. 

 New generic types of the carnivorous groups of anomodont,. 

 or mammal-like, reptiles are also described ; and it is pointed 

 out that the difference in the structure of the palate between 

 the Permian and the Triassic representatives of these reptiles 

 amply justifies their separation into distinct groups. While the 

 latter, as represented by Galesaurus, have a typically mammalian 

 secondary palate, that region in the former is a modification 

 of the type obtaining in the rhynchocephalian reptiles. For 

 these two groups Dr. Broom employs the names Cynodontia 

 ( = Theriodontia) and Therocephalia. In the last paper of the 

 series the author assigns certain Cape labyrinthodonts (one 

 of which had been previously referred to the American Eryops), 



