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posterior paired bones represents the anchylosed prevomers. 

 Above, and completely concealed by this element, is a large, 

 well-developed, typically mammalian median vomer extending 

 from the basisphenoid behind to the premaxillse in front. 

 Along its upper side the vomer is grooved for the large 

 basal and ethmoidal cartilage ; while posteriorly it is closely 

 united to the basisphenoid. This confirms the view that the 

 mammalian vomer is the reptilian parasphenoid, and thus quite 

 different from the prevomers. 



Passing on to Chelonia, it may first be noticed that a 

 remarkable new generic type of the side-necked or pleurodiran 

 group from the Keuper, in the neighbourhood of Stuttgart, 

 has been described by Prof. O. Fraas in the Jahresheft Ver. 

 Naturkunde Wiirttemberg, 191 3, No. 80, under the name of 

 P rote roc hersis robusta. Its most striking peculiarity consists in 

 the presence of two complete pairs of mesoplastral bones in the 

 lower shell, which is believed to be a unique feature in the 

 order. As a mesoplastron seems to be a primitive feature, its 

 duplication may perhaps represent a still more archaic type. 



Two tortoises from the Oligocene of Wyoming form the 

 subject of an article by Mr. L. M. Lambe in the Ottazva Naturalist 

 (vol. xxvii. pp. 57-63). The first represents a new species of 

 land tortoise {Testudo prceexstans), characterised by the great 

 development of the horn-like epiplastra on the front edge of 

 the lower half of the shell — a feature displayed to a minor 

 degree in T. thomsoni of the Oligocene of South Dakota. The 

 second is referred to a well-known Tertiary species, Stylemys 

 nebrascensis. 



Reference may also be made to a paragraph in Nature based 

 on a cutting from the Daily Malta Chronicle of February 17, 

 1913, in which Mr. N. Tagliaferro records the discovery in 

 a rock-fissure at Corradino of a large series of remains of 

 giant land-tortoises. Many of these, it is stated, are referable 

 to Testudo robusta and the smaller T spratti of Leith Adams ; 

 but one specimen indicates a tortoise nearly half as large 

 again as the biggest described example of the former, and 

 may, it is suggested, represent a third species. These and 

 other deposits have been deposited in the museum at Valletta. 

 Leurospondylus ultimus is the name proposed by Mr. Barnum 

 Brown {Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist. vol. xxxii. pp. 605-15) for a 

 new generic type of plesiosaurian from the Edmonton Creta- 



